Welcome to The Faster Times update. In today's edition, we bring you Egyptian diplomacy, health care repeal, Punxsutawney Phil, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and a gay celebrities. Enjoy!

Against the backdrop of the continuing crisis in Egypt, Max Boot takes note of the apparent divide between the Israeli right and American neoconservatives over how to respond to the situation. Much of Boot’s post is devoted to offering a familiar set of caricatures of those who have criticized the neocons and the Israel lobby; there is little in here that is interesting enough to be worthy of a response. But I think Boot does have the kernel of a worthwhile point in his portrayal of the split between Israel’s Likud and its usual allies on the neoconservative right. While the Netanyahu government has been quietly attempting to bolster Mubarak, prominent neoconservatives such as Boot and Elliott Abrams have called for the Egyptian strongman’s ouster and chided the Israelis for short-sightedness.

The constitutionality of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 has been called into question repeatedly this week. The most notable case occurred on Monday, when Federal Judge Roger Vinson of Florida ruled that the entire health care reform law was unconstitutional. And on Wednesday, the Senate gets a spin at the law, with both a Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on the law’s constitutionality and a vote on the Act’s repeal likely to occur sometime during tomorrow’s session on the floor. But in reality, do any of these actions really matter? Or is the fate of the law rather just in the hands of one black robed, 74-year-old man?

Punxsutawney Phil, aka The Most Interesting Groundhog in the World, saw his own shadow today — Groundhog Day – and predicted an early spring. So we’ve got that going for us, which is nice. But seriously, this is phenomenal news for everyone who lives in New York/New Jersey area. I can only speak for myself, but I was getting kind of tired of having to shovel my way to work every other week.

During the early stages of production on Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, there seemed little doubt that Joseph Gordon-Levitt was joining the cast. He was rumored for everything from The Riddler (rumors that will almost certainly come back over the next few weeks ), to actually replacing Heath Ledger as The Joker for the final entry in Nolan’s Batman Trilogy.

Four score and seven years ago, or something in that vicinity, I interviewed k.d. lang, and among the interesting tidbits she shared with me (she thought Björk was adorable!), she said that the reason it took her so long to come out of the closet and tell the world that she was gay was because she always assumed that everyone already knew.