memeorandum: Syria Tells Journalists Israeli Raid Did Not Occur (Hugh Naylor/New York Times)

1:25 PM ET, October 11, 2007

Top Items:

CNN Pins Blame On Democrats For Right-Wing Smear Of 12-Year Old Boy — This morning, CNN aired its first report on the right-wing smear campaign against 12-year old SCHIP recipient Graeme Frost. CNN pinned the blame on Democrats for assault on the Frost family.

Discussion: Wake up America, QandO, D-Day, Riehl World View, Suburban Guerrilla, The Liberal Avenger and Lawyers, Guns and Money

Michelle Malkin:

My reply to Respectable Liberal Blogger Ezra Klein and his fellow travelers; Plus: Hillary threatens S-CHIP critics — Update 1:00pm Eastern. Snort-worthy blue-on-blue spat of the day: ThinkProgress vs. CNN. — Snort-worthy reverse conspiracy theorizing of the day …

Time:

The Swift-Boating of Graeme Frost — A 12-year-old causes an Internet storm for speaking out in favor of the Children's Health Insurance Program. Says his father: "My family does not deserve this retribution"

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Firedoglake, Macsmind, Cliff Schecter, The Sundries Shack, Grasping Reality …, The American Street, The Carpetbagger Report, The Heretik, TIME: Swampland and Crooks and Liars

Sadly, No!:

Stalkin' Malkin Is Losing It — It's getting funnier and funnier. She's plunged straight off the deep end with this one: … Gad, it's like watching one of the Heathers write in her personal pity diary. All that's missing is angry complaints about Confederate Yankee and Ace turning into Swatch Dogs and Diet Coke Heads.

Discussion: RADAMISTO

Ezra Klein:

An Answer! — Michelle Malkin replies to my challenge for a debate about S-CHIP. Her answer? Of course not. She's afraid to debate policy on the merits. She has no interest in "a good-faith argument." She's here to swing the hatchet, and lacks either the interest or the aptitude to rise above that station.

Discussion: The Moderate Voice and D-Day

Faiz / Think Progress:

EXCLUSIVE: E-mail Reveals That McConnell Staffer Propagated Smear Campaign Against Graeme Frost — Yesterday, ThinkProgress reported that there was mounting evidence that a staffer for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) may have been involved in the right-wing campaign to smear Graeme Frost and his family.

Discussion: Eschaton, CommonDreams.org and The Garlic

Kevin Drum / Washington Monthly:
THE FEVER SWAMP....A plainly disgusted Karen Tumulty recaps …

Discussion: Brian Beutler

Carpetbagger / The Carpetbagger Report: CNN blames Dems for Frost family smear

Paul Steinhauser / CNN:

Gore to learn whether he'll win Nobel Peace Prize — WASHINGTON (CNN) — Will Al Gore add a Nobel Peace Prize to his Oscar and Emmy honors? — "An Inconvenient Truth," a documentary featuring the former vice president captured two Academy Awards in February.

Discussion: Times of London, CBS News, On Deadline, Sister Toldjah and Balloon Juice

Brent Budowsky / The Hill:
Al Gore for President

Discussion: The Huffington Post, The Swamp and TPMCafe blogs

Lewis Smith / Times of London:
Al Gore's inconvenient judgment

Discussion: Liberal Values, Gates of Vienna and RADAMISTO

David S. Broder / Washington Post:

Another Voice in the Choir — Fred Thompson did not disgrace himself in his first formal debate as a Republican presidential candidate, but he also did not dominate the stage full of White House hopefuls in Dearborn, Mich., on Tuesday. — At least three others — John McCain …

Discussion: Boston Globe, The Garlic, The Moderate Voice, MSNBC, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Politico, Redstate, PrairiePundit and Middle Earth Journal

Gail Collins / New York Times:
Calvin Coolidge Redux

Discussion: Grasping Reality …

USA Today:
Paul campaign fueled by Web cash and savvy

Discussion: techPresident

Susan Crabtree / The Hill:

GOP lawyer ties Rove to Siegelman case — House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) on Wednesday released an interview with GOP lawyer Dana Jill Simpson implicating former White House adviser Karl Rove in the prosecution and conviction of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman (D) on corruption charges.

Discussion: At-Largely, Donklephant and MyDD

Adam Cohen / New York Times:
The United States Attorneys Scandal Comes to Mississippi

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report and The Mahablog

Adam Zagorin / Time:
Rove Linked to Alabama Case

Discussion: The Next Hurrah, Crooks and Liars, Think Progress, TPMmuckraker, Hullabaloo, DownWithTyranny!, New York Times, PoliBlog (TM), The Carpetbagger Report and The Gavel

Editor and Publisher:

Ann Coulter on CNBC Show: Jews Need 'Perfecting' — NEW YORK Appearing on Donny Deutsch's CNBC show, "The Big Idea," on Monday night, columnist/author Ann Coulter suggested that the U.S. would be a better place if there weren't any Jewish people and that they had "perfected" themselves into — Christians.

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Eschaton, The Huffington Post, The Anchoress, Air America Radio, Roger L. Simon, Israellycool and Cliff Schecter

WorldNetDaily:

Giuliani 'doesn't deserve to live' — Terrorists threaten presidential candidate, cite Rudy's war stance, Arafat treatment — Saying Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani "doesn't deserve to live," Palestinian terror leaders are threatening to harm the former New York mayor …

Discussion: The Newshoggers, Comments from Left Field, Israel Matzav, PrairiePundit and The Van Der Galiën Gazette

Michelle Malkin:

Why did Google ban anti-MoveOn.org ads? — Update 10:45am Eastern. Want to see the banned ads? Here's the scoop from the guy who tried to place them. — Over the past few weeks, I've been driving home the little-noticed story about MoveOn.org bullying mom-and-pop Internet shop owners who criticized the General Petraeus ads.

Discussion: NewsBusters.org and Daily Pundit

Lance / Maine blog:
The anti-MoveOn ads Google won't let you see

Discussion: Moonbattery, Riehl World View and Conservative Belle

Hugh Naylor / New York Times:

Syria Tells Journalists Israeli Raid Did Not Occur — Foreign journalists perused the rows of corn and the groves of date palms pregnant with low-hanging fruit here this week, while agents of Syria's ever-present security services stood in the background, watching closely, almost nervously.

Discussion: Early Warning, Israel Matzav, Yourish.com, QandO and Jules Crittenden

Alex Berenson / New York Times:

Boom Times for Dentists, but Not for Teeth — For American dentists, times have never been better. — The same cannot be said for Americans' teeth. — With dentists' fees rising far faster than inflation and more than 100 million people lacking dental insurance, the percentage of Americans …

Discussion: CBS News, Connecting.the.Dots, Reason Magazine and Suburban Guerrilla

Lara Jakes Jordan / Associated Press:

Alberto Gonzales hires defense attorney — WASHINGTON - Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has hired a high-powered Washington lawyer to represent him in investigations of mismanagement of the Justice Department. George Terwilliger, a white-collar crime defense attorney …

Discussion: D-Day, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, Shakespeare's Sister, CNN Political Ticker and The Newshoggers

Marcella Bombardieri / Boston Globe:

Clinton vows to check executive power — Would curb use of signing statements — Senator Hillary Clinton said yesterday that if she is elected president, she intends to roll back President Bush's expansion of executive authority, including his use of presidential signing statements to put …

Discussion: Washington Wire, MSNBC, Moonbattery and Reason Magazine

Christopher Demuth / Opinion Journal:

Think-Tank Confidential — What I learned during two decades as head of America's most influential policy shop. — I have been presiding at the American Enterprise Institute for 21 years. Today I am announcing that I will step down before the end of 2008.

Discussion: The Corner, Chicago Boyz, Outside The Beltway and The Volokh Conspiracy

New York Times:

Turkey Angry Over House Armenian Genocide Vote — Turkey reacted angrily today to a House committee vote in Washington on Wednesday to condemn the mass killings of Armenians in Turkey in World War I as an act of genocide, calling the decision "unacceptable."

Discussion: PoliBlog (TM), The Glittering Eye, Guardian, Central Sanity and normblog