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.
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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 …
David Espo / Associated Press:
Kerry bows out of '08 presidential race
Kerry bows out of '08 presidential race
Discussion:
Blue Crab Boulevard
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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Kevin Drum / Political Animal:
IT'S THE POLICY, STUPID....Ruth Marcus on the Bush health plan: … Now, Marcus concedes that Bush has no one but himself to blame for this state of affairs. But at the same time, she also seems flatly unwilling to believe that opposition to Bush's plan might actually be based …
The Smoking Gun:
New Ethics Charges For Nifong — Bar: Former Duke D.A. withheld DNA evidence, then lied about actions — Mike Nifong, the embattled North Carolina district attorney who recently stepped down from the Duke rape case, was hit today with new ethics charges related to his botched handling of the prosecution of three lacrosse players.
RELATED:
Lara Setrakian / ABCNEWS:
Former Duke Prosecutor Faces New Ethics Charges
Former Duke Prosecutor Faces New Ethics Charges
Discussion:
Captain's Quarters
Aaron Beard / Associated Press:
New ethics charges for Duke prosecutor
New ethics charges for Duke prosecutor
Discussion:
Blue Crab Boulevard
Glenn Kessler / Washington Post:
President's Portrayal of 'The Enemy' Often Flawed — In his State of the Union address last night, President Bush presented an arguably misleading and often flawed description of "the enemy" that the United States faces overseas, lumping together disparate groups with opposing ideologies …
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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.
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Jonathan Alter / Newsweek:
A Powerful Response — Jim Webb tore up his party's playbook …
A Powerful Response — Jim Webb tore up his party's playbook …
Discussion:
The Mahablog, NewsBusters.org, Balloon Juice, MyDD, The Heretik, The Carpetbagger Report, Andrew Sullivan, The Democratic Daily, Crooks and Liars, The Anonymous Liberal, Dick Polman's American Debate, INSTAPUTZ, Washington Post, Gun Toting Liberal ™, Tennessee Guerilla Women and The Moderate Voice
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.
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 …
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.
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
Anne Flaherty / Associated Press:
Senators eye rejection of Bush war plan — WASHINGTON - Democrats took the first step toward a wartime repudiation of President Bush on Wednesday, convening a Senate committee to endorse legislation declaring that the deployment of additional troops to Iraq is "not in the national interest."
Doug Gross / Associated Press:
White Atlanta suburbs push for secession — ATLANTA - A potentially explosive dispute in the City Too Busy to Hate is taking shape over a proposal to break Fulton County in two and split off Atlanta's predominantly white, affluent suburbs to the north from some of the metropolitan area's poorest, black neighborhoods.
Hardball / Hardblogger:
SOTU: MCCAIN — LACK OF SELF-CONTROL? AN EXPRESSION OF CONTEMPT? EMBARRASSING IN ANY CASE. — By Tucker Carlson — "We advance our own interests by helping reformers and advocates for democracy"? That was Bush's position on the Middle East immediately after 9-11 and, remarkably, it remains his position.
Bill Carter / New York Times:
Rivals CNN and Fox News Spar Over Obama Report — A disputed report on the Web site of a conservative magazine about Senator Barack Obama's childhood schooling kicked off a pointed exchange this week between the rival cable news networks CNN and Fox News, when CNN seemed to make an overt effort …