Top Items:
Rick Klein / Boston Globe:
Kerry won't run for president in '08 — WASHINGTON —Senator John F. Kerry plans to announce today that he will not run in the 2008 presidential race, and will instead remain in Congress and seek reelection to his Senate seat next year, according to senior Democratic officials.
Discussion:
Jules Crittenden, The Political Pit Bull, Hot Air, Scared Monkeys, Matthew Yglesias, The American Mind, Washington Wire, MyDD, Andrew Olmsted dot com, The Democratic Daily, The Sundries Shack, OxBlog, John Edwards '08 Blog, Gateway Pundit, Wizbang, On Deadline, The American Princess, AMERICAblog, Centerfield and Riehl World View
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CNN:
Source: Kerry decides against 2008 presidential run … WASHINGTON (CNN) — Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004, won't make a second bid for the White House, sources familiar with Kerry's thinking said Wednesday. — A source close to Kerry …
Discussion:
Pollster, MyDD, Sirotablog, Liberal Values, The Carpetbagger Report, Political Animal, TalkLeft and A Blog For All
Adam Nagourney / New York Times:
Kerry Bows Out of 2008 Race — Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who narrowly lost the presidency to George Bush in 2004, stepped away today from what he had described as an almost all-but-certain second bid for the White House, bowing to a Democratic Party that was clearly unreceptive …
David Espo / Associated Press:
Kerry bows out of '08 presidential race — WASHINGTON - Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the Democrats' losing presidential candidate in 2004, said Wednesday that he won't run for the White House again in 2008. — "I've concluded this isn't the time for me to mount a presidential campaign," Kerry said.
Paul Kiel / TPMmuckraker:
Hagel: "There Is No Plan" — Here's Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) barnburner of a speech this morning during the Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting on the resolution against the president's troop increase in Iraq. — An excerpt: … Update: We've added a complete transcript of this portion of his remarks below.
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Paul Kiel / TPMmuckraker:
Transcript: CNN Interview with Cheney — We've just received the transcript for Vice President Cheney's interview with Wolf Blitzer this morning. It's posted in full below the fold. — Q And joining us now, the Vice President of the United States, Dick Cheney. Mr. Vice President, thanks very much for doing this.
Discussion:
AMERICAblog, CANNONFIRE, Happy Furry Puppy Story …, The Carpetbagger Report, Suburban Guerrilla and Horses Mouth
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Drudge Report:
CHENEY CALLS BLITZER QUESTION ON DAUGHTER'S PREGNANCY 'OUT OF LINE' — In an interview taped to air for today's 'Situation Room' on CNN, Vice President Cheney responded sharply to anchor Woilf Blitzer's line of questioning regarding the pregancy of Cheney's lesbian daughter:
Raleigh News & Observer:
Nifong faces additional ethics charges — Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong withheld DNA evidence in the Duke lacrosse case and then lied about it to judges and the North Carolina State Bar, according to a complaint filed today by the bar, which licenses and regulates lawyers.
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Ruth Marcus / Washington Post:
The Knee-Jerk Opposition — If George W. Bush proposes something, it must be bad. Such is the knee-jerk state of partisan suspiciousness that when the president actually endorses a tax increase — a tax increase that would primarily hit the well-off, no less — Democrats still howl.
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Bob Geiger:
Senate Republicans Block Minimum Wage Increase — Despite a united front from Senate Democrats for passing the same stand-alone minimum wage increase approved by the House of Representatives two weeks ago, the Republican minority voted against cloture on the bill today …
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Greg Sargent / Horses Mouth:
OBAMA TAKES ON FOX NEWS. If this is a sign of how Barack Obama intends to deal with the right-wing media during his Presidential campaign, then I'm all for it. — Obama is aggressively going after Fox News today for pushing that smear-job report claiming that he went to an Islamic "madrassa" school as a child.
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Hugh Hewitt / Hugh Hewitt's TownHall Blog:
Take The Pledge — Take the pledge. This is the temporary site. The full-service site will be up soon. — If you are a blogger who has taken the pledge and linked to the site, please send me a note so I can add your support here. — I interviewed Tony Snow at the top of the program today …
Discussion:
Democracy Project, Riehl World View, Instapundit.com, Bill Hobbs, INSTAPUTZ, Drumwaster's Rants, Wizbang and Oliver Willis
KSTP-TV:
MN congresswoman can't keep her hand off President — Newly-elected Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann got quite a bit of face time with President Bush after his State of the Union Speech Tuesday night. — While the President was signing autographs for members of Congress after the speech …
Discussion:
Crooks and Liars, newsweek, The Huffington Post, Wonkette, Norwegianity, The Caucus, Pam's House Blend and SCSUScholars
Jonathan Chait / The New Republic:
SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS ARE NEW YORK MONEY PEOPLE: — I've admired Wes Clark for a long time. But his comments to Ariana Huffington about wealthy Jews pushing the country toward war with Iran strike me as nutty and disturbing. Either I seriously misjudged the man, or his comments were misquoted or taken wildly out of context.
Steven Mufson / Washington Post:
Critics See Too Little Significant Change — The energy proposals President Bush outlined last night break new ground for his administration. — He combined a call to lower gasoline consumption with new mandates for oil companies and new standards for automakers.
Damien Cave / New York Times:
Iraq Parliament Finds a Quorum Hard to Come By — Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, the speaker of Parliament, read a roll call of the 275 elected members with a goal of shaming the no-shows. — Ayad Allawi, the former prime minister? Absent, living in Amman and London. Adnan Pachachi, the octogenarian statesman?
Chris Bowers / MyDD:
Dodd Bill Fails To Get Out of Commitee — Democrats have a host of bills to try and stop the escalation. One of those bills was from Chris Dodd, and had the following purpose: … Good idea—this bill has actual teeth. Unfortunately, today it failed to get out of committee, largely due to five Democratic defections.
Michael J. Gerson / Newsweek:
Exceeding Expectations — Bush's former speechwriter on what the president did right—and on Jim Webb's wobbly wordcraft. — All the commentary leading up to the State of the Union noted the president's historically low poll ratings and unpopular Iraq strategy.
Rick Perlstein / Salon:
Why Democrats can stop the war — Pundits say if the party gets too tough with Bush, it will be blamed for "losing" Iraq. But the real political risk is going too easy on Bush, and losing the trust of war-weary voters. — Clockwise from top left: Lyndon Johnson, George W. Bush, a Vietnam War protest and Richard Nixon
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