Top Items:
Allahpundit / Hot Air:
Video: Rudy blasts Ron Paul's apology for 9/11 — Ahem. — The smartass reply would have been to ask Paul whether, if in fact conditions in Iraq precipitated 9/11, it wasn't perfectly appropriate then to take extreme measures to try to remedy those conditions afterwards.
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Michelle Malkin:
Liveblogging: The South Carolina debate is on - Video links adds, post-mortem reax — The stage will still be crowded. Elephants soon to be in the room. — Hot buttons: Iraq, Iraq, Iraq. Immigration, immigration, immigration. — What do you want to see asked tonight?
Discussion:
CBN.com, Fox News, Townhall.com, Power Line, Sister Toldjah, Don Surber, Washington Post, Hot Air and Iowa Voice
Andrew Sullivan / The Atlantic Online:
Palmetto Punditry — The debate took a while to gain any traction, but there were some clarifying moments for me. The questions were often excellent - especially the tough ones at the beginning about the war. The Republicans, we learned, have absolutely no idea what to do about Iraq.
Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:
Giuliani Wins, But Paul Threw The Game — Team Rudy should send a hundred roses to Ron Paul — yellow roses, of course — after the Congressman essentially tossed the debate to Giuliani. Rudy had a pretty good night going anyway, but when Paul as much as said that the terrorists had a point …
Hotline On Call:
Pre-Spin Room Thoughts: McCain, Rudy, Romney — Invoking the Roger Simon rule: in my judgment, John McCain convincingly and incontrovertibly won tonight's debate. He was strong, confident, answered tough questions with ease and dispatch, and seemed the most presidential.
TigerHawk:
The GOP debate live-blog post — I'll be live-blogging the Republican presidential debate at this post, with numbered paragraphs reflecting each new post. Note that I missed the first debate — catastrophic TiVo failure that may or may not have been related to human error — so I'm coming to these guys fresh!
Stephen Green / VodkaPundit:
Debate Drunkblogging - LIVE! — 7:03 (All times Mountain) I hope they do the candidate introductions twice this time around. I promised myself, tonight I'd remember everybody's names. — 7:05 Already I don't miss Chris Matthews. I bet I'm not the only person to say that - tonight or any night.
Roger Simon / The Politico:
Gloves come off at second GOP debate — Tuesday night's Republican debate in South Carolina turned out to be the Zinger Debate, featuring the sharp exchanges and one-liners that TV producers dream about and crowds applaud. — Debates are about theater, and the Fox News debate in Columbia …
Discussion:
The Caucus
ABCNEWS:
Bush Taps New 'War Czar' — ABC News Learns Pentagon Official Selected to Oversee Iraq, Afghanistan Wars — After a frustrating search for a new "war czar" to oversee the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, ABC News has learned that President Bush has chosen the Pentagon's director of operations, Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, for the role.
Discussion:
The Left Coaster, The Reaction, TPMmuckraker, Comments From Left Field, Captain's Quarters, MSNBC, The Huffington Post, The Gun Toting Liberal™, World-O-Crap, MotherJones.com, The Next Hurrah, The Carpetbagger Report, The Impolitic, The Talent Show, Blah3, Middle Earth Journal, The Democratic Daily, Daily Kos and rubber hose
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Sheryl Gay Stolberg / New York Times:
Bush Picks Army General to Coordinate War Policy
Bush Picks Army General to Coordinate War Policy
Discussion:
INTEL DUMP
Nico / Think Progress:
New 'War Czar' Advocated Troop Withdrawals To 'Undercut Perception Of Occupation'
New 'War Czar' Advocated Troop Withdrawals To 'Undercut Perception Of Occupation'
David Johnston / New York Times:
President Intervened in Dispute Over Eavesdropping — President Bush intervened in March 2004 to avert a crisis over the National Security Agency's domestic eavesdropping program after Attorney General John Ashcroft, Director Robert S. Mueller III of the F.B.I. and other senior Justice Department aides …
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David Stout / New York Times:
Gonzales Pressed Ailing Ashcroft on Spy Plan, Aide Says — On the night of March 10, 2004, a high-ranking Justice Department official rushed to a Washington hospital to prevent two White House aides from taking advantage of the critically ill Attorney General, John Ashcroft, the official testified today.
Logan Murphy / Crooks and Liars:
GOP Debate II: Romney - "Double Guantanamo" — During the second GOP debate, Fox News' Brit Hume sets up a hypothetical situation where three terrorist attacks occur at shopping malls in major cities. A fourth attack is thwarted and that would-be attacker, who we know has information about an impending …
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Steven Erlanger / New York Times:
News Analysis: Reality Overtakes the Illusion of Unity in Gaza — A third day of deadly clashes between Hamas and Fatah fighters suggests that the Palestinian unity government, put together under Saudi auspices at the end of March, is something of a fiction.
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Kevin Drum / Washington Monthly:
HEALTHCARE IN AMERICA....The Commonwealth Fund has released its latest comparison of healthcare performance among various countries, and you can read all about it here. However, since I know you're all busy people, I'll just cut to the chase: we suck. Despite the fact that we see doctors less often …
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Dan Berrett / Pocono Record:
Pleasant Valley defends handling of complaint against teacher — BRODHEADSVILLE — The Pleasant Valley School District administration defended its handling of a complaint against a popular history teacher, which helped spark a lawsuit filed against the district.
One Jerusalem:
VIDEO EXCLUSIVE:: Semi-protected Schools, Damaged Homes and Kassam Rockets: A Day in the Life of Sderot — Yesterday I had the privilege of visiting the city of Sderot. Sdert is a city of 20,000 people located directly east of Northern Gaza. In the last seven years …
Brandon Keim / Wired News:
New Phytoplankton Model May Revise Warming Estimates — Global climate models are missing a good chunk of plant information that could significantly alter long-term climate change predictions. A new technique for modeling phytoplankton — microscopic plants in the upper layers of the Earth's waters …