Sorry for the hiatus, but I’m decidedly under the weather today, and also had an unexpectedly long work call.

Here are some midday doses of sunshine and rain:

* Turkish plane hijacker apparently headed for Sochi.

* Larry Sabato puts Scott Walker at the top of his 2016 list of GOP likelies for the moment.

* Per Gallup, continued Republican domination of Texas depends both on relatively high standing among Hispanics and extraordinary strength among white voters.

* Carle Hulse tries to explain why Republicans keep drawing attention to an immigration issue they can’t resolve in their own ranks.

* Montana Lt. Gov. John Walsh appointed to Max Baucus’ Senate seat.

* James Carville signs on with Fox News.

And in non-political news:

* Grantland‘s recommendations for Winter Olympics must-sees.

As we break for a very late lunch, here’s the Beatles with another of the tunes they sang on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, “Til There Was You.”

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Ed Kilgore is a political columnist for New York and managing editor at the Democratic Strategist website. He was a contributing writer at the Washington Monthly from January 2012 until November 2015, and was the principal contributor to the Political Animal blog.