Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee (I) told WPRI-TV that when he was a Republican U.S. Senator he ate lunch each week with four other GOP moderates: Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, Jim Jeffords of Vermont and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. They referred to themselves as “the Mod Squad.”

“In 2001, Jeffords left the party to caucus with the Democrats. In 2006, Chafee lost his seat to Sheldon Whitehouse after a primary challenge from the right. In 2009, Specter switched parties and went on to lose his first Democratic primary. And on Tuesday, Snowe shocked Washington by announcing her retirement… The last remaining member is Collins, who was re-elected in 2008.”

In the mail: The Last Great Senate by Ira Shapiro.

The author spent 12 years working for Senators Gaylord Nelson, Abraham Ribicoff, Thomas Eagleton, Robert Byrd, and Jay Rockefeller and paints a “vivid portrait of the statesmen who helped steer America during the crisis years of the late 1970s, transcending partisanship and overcoming procedural roadblocks that have all but strangled the Senate since their departure.”

A security video of Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) at a Nashville International Airport security checkpoint doesn’t show him being “irate,” as officials asserted in an incident reports when he refused a pat down.

Tennessean: “An incident report describes the police response as encountering ‘a passenger being irate.’ But videos released by the Metro Airport Authority late Wednesday show Paul entering the security line at 7:57 a.m. and then alternately sitting and standing in a glass cubicle while being watched by authorities. Paul appears to make a few phone calls as well. Paul is shown being escorted by an airport official at 9:04 a.m. Paul rebooked his flight and later went through security without incident.”

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Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) was hospitalized with a stroke over the weekend and underwent surgery today in Illinois, the Chicago Tribune reports.

National Journal reports Kirk “likely faces permanent physical damage and a long-term cognitive recovery after successful surgery.”

Just two months ago, Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) and Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) “wrote to the White House and nominated Joe Paterno for the Presidential Medal of Freedom — the nation’s highest civilian honor,” Politico reports.

Today, “less than 24 hours after the legendary football coach was fired following allegations that an assistant coach sexually abused multiple boys — that they were rescinding their support for Paterno’s nomination.”