Given that New York City is a coastal metropolis only a few dozen miles downriver from a nuclear power plant, the recent disaster in Japan raises some questions about what impact seismic activity would have on our neck of the woods.

More: A Look at the Tri-State's Active Fault Line

»» WNYC's Arun Venugopal is live-blogging the hearings from Washington DC Thursday morning

Rep. Peter King (R-NY) is set to hold a long-awaited (and for some, long-lamented) hearing on Muslim extremism in the United States Thursday. Specifically, the hearing will focus on what relationship, if any, exists between radical Islamists, American mosques and other domestic Muslim organizations.

Leading up to this week's hearings, a pro-Muslim demonstration was held in New York City on Sunday, where King was vilified for his insistence on such a hearing. However, another demonstration in favor of King's hearing was held at the same time, during which protesters said it was time for an inquiry into the activities of Muslim Americans.

The list of attendees for the Thursday hearing was released to the public on Monday. Here's a look at who is slated to speak.

One understands why lawmakers aren't chomping at the bit to rein in entitlement spending: it's clear that broad reform is necessary, that systemic change is needed, and that attempts to fix these problems will amount to political suicide more often than not.

That's why, relative to the challenge of redesigning the United States' largest and most sacred social programs, Republicans have picked an incredibly easy fight. In 2012, they will be able to say that they campaigned on spending reduction during the midterms, and they followed through on their promise.

This week in politics, the biggest news is barely news.

In the last days of February, reports surfaced that former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich was expected to announce the formation of a presidential exploratory committee "in 10 days," without Gingrich's official spokesman—or the man himself—saying a word.

Our government does a lot of things, which is why the prospect of a shutdown to begin later this week can be so daunting and confusing. Basically, during a shutdown, federal agencies must freeze all non-essential services. How does each organization decide what's essential? And what does that word even mean to a government that rarely agrees on what's important?

A shutdown would be bad; hopefully, the budget battle doesn't come to that. Best to be prepared, so here's a rundown of how our government makes these difficult choices.

Popular wisdom, at least since February, tells us that Jon Huntsman, Jr., is now a threat to President Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign.

On January 31, Huntsman tendered his resignation as U.S.  Ambassador to China, a position for which he was tapped by the current president. In 2009, Huntsman resigned as the Republican Governor of Utah in order to join the Obama administration in this capacity. During his tenure as Ambassador, reports indicated that Huntsman and the president got along well, enjoying a solid working relationship despite coming from opposite parties. His term as Ambassador does not officially end until April, but Huntsman got into hot water in February by attending an anti-government protest in Beijing and getting caught on video.

Now that the band is breaking up, Obama’s camp is worrying—quite publicly—that Huntsman may go solo.

That's right. Founder, patriarch, and perma-candidate of the Rent is Too Damn High party, has found a new home: the GOP.

This past weekend, the GOP-controlled House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution to cut $61 billion from President Obama's budget for 2011. Needless to say, Democrats hate it, and the legislation faces much higher hurdles on its way to becoming a law. But should the Senate reject or Obama veto, Republicans have promised not to reauthorize spending once the government runs out of money—in two weeks. If that happens, the federal government will essentially stop working.