memeorandum: Hillary Chuckles; Pundits Snort (Howard Kurtz/Washington Post)

2:05 PM ET, October 3, 2007

Top Items:

Bush vetoes child health insurance bill — WASHINGTON (CNN) — President Bush on Wednesday vetoed legislation expanding a children's health insurance program by $35 billion over five years. — Bush exercised the veto at 10 a.m. ET before leaving the White House for a trip to Lancaster …

Discussion: CQ.com, The Politico, Three Wise Men, Wake up America, McBlogger, NewsBusters.org, The Gate, Comments from Left Field, Burnt Orange Report and Right Voices

Jonathan E. Kaplan / The Hill:

SCHIP slips as Dems trip over message — Democratic leaders on Tuesday moved quickly to shift public attention to President Bush's expected veto of a children's health insurance program from a surtax to pay for the war in Iraq. — Democrats had been reveling in their good fortune …

Discussion: The Swamp and Right Voices

Jennifer Loven / Associated Press:

Bush vetoes child health insurance plan — WASHINGTON - President Bush, in a sharp confrontation with Congress, on Wednesday vetoed a bipartisan bill that would have dramatically expanded children's health insurance. — It was only the fourth veto of Bush's presidency …

Discussion: MyDD, Daily Kos, The Gun Toting Liberal™, Left in the West, Pam's House Blend, The Carpetbagger Report and Macsmind

Shaun Mullen / The Moderate Voice:

S-CHIP Bill Vetoed Behind Closed Doors — President Bush this morning quietly vetoed a bill with broad bipartisan support that would have expanded the State Children's Health Insurance Program. Unlike previous vetoes on federally-funded stem cell research and Iraq troop withdrawals …

Discussion: AFL-CIO Weblog and BlueOregon

Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:
Vetoland, Population: 4 — President Bush increased the number …

Discussion: The Anchoress

Michael Abramowitz / Washington Post:
Bush Vetoes Children's Health Insurance Plan

Discussion: The Huffington Post, TalkLeft, Connecting.the.Dots and Raising Kaine

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy / The Huffington Post:
My Challenge to the President

Discussion: The Sundries Shack and Democratic Strategist

Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:
They Met A Tax They Didn't Like! — Wisconsin Rep. David Obey …

Discussion: The Swamp

Caren Bohan / Reuters:
Bush vetoes bill on children's health care

Discussion: Power Line

Washington Post:

Clinton Widens Lead in Poll — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has consolidated her place as the front-runner in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination, outpacing her main rivals in fundraising in the most recent quarter and widening her lead in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Discussion: AFT, New York Times, Washington Wire, MoJoBlog, Burkean Reflections, The Caucus, Democratic Strategist, The Carpetbagger Report, TalkLeft, Connecting.the.Dots, Oliver Willis, the talking dog, Captain's Quarters, BuzzMachine, TIME and Newsweek

Sam Youngman / The Hill:

Edwards says Obama using stolen ideas — Former Sen. John Edwards's (D-N.C.) campaign widened its sights Tuesday to include Democratic rival Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) and his foreign policy speech commemorating the five-year anniversary of his first speech against the Iraq war.

Discussion: Des Moines Register, The Swamp, CNN Political Ticker, Hot Air, protein wisdom, Outside The Beltway, Taylor Marsh, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, The Politico, The Carpetbagger Report, The Caucus and Air America Radio

Quinnipiac University News and Events:

October 3, 2007 - Clinton Tops Giuliani By 11 Points In New York State, Quinnipiac University Poll Finds; Favorite Son And Daughter Dominate Party Primaries — Sen. Hillary Clinton leads the Republican front-runner, former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani 52 - 41 percent in the 2008 …

Discussion: The Swamp, The Daily Politics and No More Mister Nice Blog

Howard Kurtz / Washington Post:

Hillary Chuckles; Pundits Snort — Clinton's Robust Yuks Lead To Analysis of Appeal of Laughter — Forget the cleavage. It's now about the cackle. — No joke: Hillary Clinton's laugh is now being analyzed, scrutinized and, yes, mocked as if it were a sound barrier on her glide path …

Discussion: Horses Mouth, Des Moines Register, Shakespeare's Sister, Brendan Nyhan and Sadly, No!

Richelieu / Weekly Standard:

Media Blasphemy — Another day, another blasphemy against rational political analysis by the media. This time, a new national poll from the Washington Post complete with howls of new insight: It's over. … Media polling is strange journalism. The media both creates a story by conducting …

Discussion: The Corner

Chris Cillizza / The Fix:
Parsing the Polls: Inside the Clinton Surge

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report, Raising Kaine, Open Left and TIME

Byron York / National Review Online:

Limbaugh Makes His Case — On Monday evening, September 24, Rush Limbaugh was struck by a story that appeared on ABC's World News with Charles Gibson. "A closer look tonight at phony heroes," Gibson said in his introduction to the report, which was about men who claim to be veterans but are not.

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Think Progress, Weekly Standard, Hot Air, Ezra Klein, Betsy's Page, PrairiePundit, TigerHawk, RIGHTWINGSPARKLE and Little Green Footballs

Logan Murphy / Crooks and Liars:
Latest Vote Vets Ad: Rush - Say It To My Face

Discussion: skippy the bush kangaroo and The Moderate Voice

Hugh Hewitt / Townhall.com:
Rush And The Left's Great Snarl

Discussion: Power Line and michellemalkin.com

Tom Maguire / JustOneMinute:
Times - Limbaugh A "Victim", Like MoveOn

Discussion: Hot Air, Right Wing News and Gateway Pundit

Media Matters for America:
Limbaugh: VoteVets lied to soldier in ad, "strapp[ed] those lies …

Discussion: MoJoBlog, Baltimore Sun, All Spin Zone, News Hounds and Think Progress

Carl Hulse / New York Times:
Limbaugh Latest Target in War of Condemnation

Discussion: Brilliant at Breakfast, The Carpetbagger Report, The Radio Equalizer, michellemalkin.com, Daily Kos, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, Fox News, All Spin Zone, The BRAD BLOG, Norwegianity, Wake up America, Think Progress, QandO, Seeing the Forest, MyDD, Army of Dude and Wizbang

Patrick Ruffini:

Kos Traffic Numbers Inflated by 60% — Yesterday, I had the good "fortune" of being frontpaged on Daily Kos. The post sat atop the site for two hours. According to Google Analytics, the link produced 1,164 visitors yesterday. — For the traffic behemoth Kos is portrayed as, that seems low …

Discussion: Outside The Beltway, techPresident, Riehl World View, Personal Democracy Forum and GINA COBB

Griff Witte / Washington Post:

Pakistan Seen Losing Fight Against Taliban And Al-Qaeda — PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan's government is losing its war against emboldened insurgent forces, giving al-Qaeda and the Taliban more territory in which to operate and allowing the groups to plot increasingly ambitious attacks …

Discussion: The Swamp, CBS News, PrairiePundit, Middle Earth Journal, ParaPundit, On Deadline and Truthdig

John Stossel / Real Clear Politics:

Control Your Own Health Care — Candidates for president have plans to get more people health insurance. Some would compel us to buy it; others would use the tax code to encourage that. Regardless, insurance is the magic that will solve our health-care problems.

Discussion: Liberal Values, The Glittering Eye, QandO, Blue Crab Boulevard and PrairiePundit

Associated Press:

Soldiers hunt dissidents in Myanmar — YANGON, Myanmar - Soldiers announced that they were hunting pro-democracy protesters in Myanmar's largest city Wednesday and the top U.S. diplomat in the country said military police were pulling people out of their homes during the night.

Discussion: Gateway Pundit, Wizbang, Associated Press, Jules Crittenden, Blue Crab Boulevard, Truthdig and AMERICAblog

New York Times:

From Errand to Fatal Shot to Hail of Fire to 17 Deaths — It started out as a family errand: Ahmed Haithem Ahmed was driving his mother, Mohassin, to pick up his father from the hospital where he worked as a pathologist. As they approached Nisour Square at midday on Sept. 16 …

Discussion: The RBC, Majikthise, Firedoglake, The Atlantic Online, Middle Earth Journal, rubber hose, Brilliant at Breakfast and Three Wise Men

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:

Rudy does end run around the right's leaders — Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, the Republican frontrunner in national polls, has avoided meeting with the nation's most powerful socially conservative leaders, and instead is taking his appeal directly to conservative activists at the local level.

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report, Right Wing Watch and JoinRudy2008