Top Items:
Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:
CIA Admits That Info About Torture Briefings For Dems May Not Be Accurate — As I noted below, newly released documents appear to show that according to the CIA, officials briefed Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats back in 2002 about the use of torture techniques on terror suspects.
Discussion:
Think Progress, The Atlantic Politics Channel, The Daily Dish, American Street, Emptywheel, Democrats.com and Raw Story
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Josh Gerstein / Josh Gerstein's Blog:
40 Hill briefings on interrogations disclosed
40 Hill briefings on interrogations disclosed
Discussion:
White House Watch, Secrecy News, Commentary, PoliGazette, THE WEEK News & Opinion and Shakesville
Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:
CIA Documents Don't Prove Pelosi Was Told Of Waterboarding
CIA Documents Don't Prove Pelosi Was Told Of Waterboarding
Discussion:
Weekly Standard, Talking Points Memo, Politics Daily, Human Events, Raw Story, Taylor Marsh, Political Byline, Democrats.com, RedState and Daily Kos
CNN:
Palin pulls out of White House Correspondents' Dinner — WASHINGTON (CNN) — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin will miss a chance to chat up President Obama this weekend because she's cancelling plans to attend the White House Correspondents' dinner, but she's got a good excuse.
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Mary Ann Akers / The Sleuth:
Gonzo Goes (Back) to Washington — Guess who's coming to dinner? Well, the man who may be the biggest surprise guest at this weekend's White House Correspondents' Association dinner isn't exactly an international celebrity, or a sex symbol, or a man of power.
Paul Krugman / New York Times:
Stressing the Positive — Hooray! The banking crisis is over! Let's party! O.K., maybe not. — In the end, the actual release of the much-hyped bank stress tests on Thursday came as an anticlimax. Everyone knew more or less what the results would say: some big players need to raise more capital …
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Brutally Honest:
Someone at Best Western gets it — If this ad doesn't present a story worth telling, nothing does: — With props to Bob McCarty.
Discussion:
Dr. Melissa Clouthier
Haaretz:
Jerusalem worried over breakdown of U.S.-Israel cooperation under Obama — Senior officials in Jerusalem expressed concern recently over the sharp decline in the coordination between Israel and the United States on security and state affairs since President Barack Obama's entered the White House …
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Dan Eggen / Washington Post:
Diminished Conservative Groups Gear Up for Supreme Court Nomination Battle — Conservatives Prepare For Underdog Role — When John G. Roberts Jr. was nominated to the Supreme Court as chief justice, a pro-Republican group called Progress for America had $18 million in the bank.
Discussion:
Politics Daily, The Hill, Political Punch, MSNBC, The Fix, New York Times, The BLT and Right Wing Watch
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Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
The NYT Finally Prints “Torture” — Here we have it in broad daylight: the New York Times' cowardice in the face of its own government. In an obit today, the editors manage to use the word “torture”. It's in an obit. The obit runs: — Col. Harold E. Fischer Jr. …
Discussion:
Prairie Weather
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Dennis Hevesi / New York Times:
Harold E. Fischer Jr., an American Flier Tortured in a Chinese Prison, Dies at 83
Harold E. Fischer Jr., an American Flier Tortured in a Chinese Prison, Dies at 83
Discussion:
Salon
Satyam Khanna / Think Progress:
Obama sends handwritten letter to gay soldier ousted from the military promising to repeal DADT. — In January, Sandy Tsao, an army officer based out of St. Louis, MO, told her superiors that she is gay — a violation of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell law. Tsao then wrote to President Obama …
Discussion:
Washington Monthly, Taylor Marsh, Salon, glaadBLOG.org, Raw Story, The Bilerico Project and Democracy in America
Katherine Mangu-Ward / Reason:
Your Yard Sale Is Illegal — Thinking of having a yard sale this weekend? Before you do, be sure to consult CSPC Publication #254 [PDF]. — This handy 28-pager from the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reminds the American people that, thanks to the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act …
Michelle Cottle / The New Republic:
It's Church not Prayer That Makes Us Good — Mike Gerson has a column up today laying out some of the key findings to be featured in Bob Putnam and David Campbell's upcoming book, “American Grace,” that I mentioned on Wednesday. — In a nutshell, writes Gerson:
Discussion:
MoJo Blog Posts
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Michael Gerson / Washington Post:
The Book ‘American Grace’ and How the Young View Religion
The Book ‘American Grace’ and How the Young View Religion
Discussion:
Reason
Stephanie Condon / CBS News:
Arabic Linguist Fired From Army For Being Openly Gay — In spite of President Obama's declared stance against the “don't-ask-don't-tell” policy that keeps openly gay individuals out of the military, the U.S. Army on Thursday told Lt. Dan Choi he is being dismissed for publicly revealing his homosexuality.
Discussion:
The Volokh Conspiracy
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Jack Healy / New York Times:
U.S. Jobless Rate Hits 8.9%, but Pace of Losses Eases — The United States economy lost 539,000 jobs in April, the government reported on Friday, a sign that the relentless pace of job losses was starting to level off slightly. — A year ago, the loss of more than half a million jobs …
Evan Halper / Los Angeles Times:
U.S. threatens to rescind stimulus money over wage cuts — The Obama administration threatens to rescind billions in stimulus money if Gov. Schwarzenegger and lawmakers do not restore wage cuts to unionized home healthcare workers. — Reporting from Sacramento — The Obama administration …
Discussion:
No Sheeples Here!, Hot Air, The Strata-Sphere, The Volokh Conspiracy, Shot in the Dark and Pajamas Media
Frank Newport / Gallup:
Democrats Do Best Among Generation Y and Baby Boomers — Republicans do better among Generation X — PRINCETON, NJ — Although Democrats currently enjoy a party identification advantage over Republicans among Americans at every age between 18 to 85, the Democrats' greatest advantages come among …
DealBook:
Dissident Chrysler Group Is Likely to Disband — The withdrawals of OppenheimerFunds and Stairway Capital Management will likely drop the group, calling itself the Committee of Non-TARP Lenders, below 5 percent of Chrysler's $6.9 billion in secured debt, this person said.
Debra Burlingame / Wall Street Journal:
Obama and the 9/11 Families — The president isn't sincere about ‘swift and certain’ justice for terrorists. — Printer — Friendly — In February I was among a group of USS Cole and 9/11 victims' families who met with the president at the White House to discuss his policies regarding Guantanamo detainees.
Discussion:
Weekly Standard, Power Line, Wake up America, Pundit & Pundette, TigerHawk and Flopping Aces
Peter Whoriskey / Washington Post:
Under Restructuring, GM To Build More Cars Overseas — The U.S. government is pouring billions into General Motors in hopes of reviving the domestic economy, but when the automaker completes its restructuring plan, many of the company's new jobs will be filled by workers overseas.
Megan McArdle:
Canadian Exceptionism — Canada is one of the few countries without a major banking crisis. Weirdly, this was also true in 1930. I've seen this list of the success factors for Canadian banks in several places. I want to believe it, but . . . ..it doesn't seem to be as simple as “Canadian banks are more tightly-regulated”.
David A. Skeel Jr / AMERICAN.COM:
Why the Chrysler Deal Would Horrify a New Dealer — The use of a sham sale of the sort the New Dealers thought they had forever eliminated will cause mischief in future bankruptcy cases. — The Obama administration has closely patterned itself on the famous opening year of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal.