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Polling in Iran Shows Real Support for Ahmadinejad — The election results in Iran may reflect the will of the Iranian people. Many experts are claiming that the margin of victory of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the result of fraud or manipulation, but our nationwide public opinion survey …
Discussion:
Weekly Standard, The Politico, Behind the Numbers, The Daily Dish, Wall Street Journal, The Moderate Voice, The Atlantic Politics Channel, New York Times, Abu Muqawama, Outside The Beltway, Open Left, FiveThirtyEight, Jules Crittenden, The Huffington Post, BBC, Registan.net, Agence France Presse, The Independent, Commentary, Danger Room, Sister Toldjah, Daniel W. Drezner, Right Wing Nut House, The Mahablog, Gawker, lgf 2.0, Obsidian Wings and RealClearWorld
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Iran protest cancelled as leaked election results show Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came third — Iran's reformist presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi has called off a major rally to protest last Friday's election results, amid claims police had been cleared to open fire on protesters.


Shots fired at huge Iran protest — Huge crowds cheered Mir Hossein Mousavi when he appeared at the rally — Shots have been fired at a rally in Iran where hundreds of thousands of people were demonstrating against last week's presidential election results.
Discussion:
CNN, Reuters, PERRspectives, Neuroworld, ShortWoman, On Deadline, The Duck of Minerva, Think Progress and Xinhua News Agency

Tide Turning? — For much of the weekend it seemed that the Iranian reformists were set for one of those righteous defeats, in which a united phalanx of state power stands down rioting protesters who must be content that their defiance will lay the groundwork for change not today but at some unknown point in the future.

Top Cleric Calls for Inquiry as Protesters Defy Ban in Iran
Discussion:
Aljazeera, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, The Daily Dish, The Lede, Danger Room, Reuters, Ta-Nehisi Coates, The New Republic, QandO and Gawker

Shots fired as 100,000 march through Tehran
Discussion:
New York Times, Matthew Yglesias, Democracy in America, Outside The Beltway, Hot Air, Time, A Blog For All and ATTACKERMAN

‘Extraordinary Amount of Wishful Thinking’ by US
Discussion:
Associated Press, The Atlanticist, Washington Post, Jeffrey Goldberg and The Washington Independent

Why is Dennis Ross being ousted as Obama envoy to Iran? — Dennis Ross, who most recently served as a special State Department envoy to Iran, will abruptly be relieved of his duties, sources in Washington told Haaretz. An official announcement is expected in the coming days.
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Dennis Ross, Out As Special Envoy To Iran; Was He Ousted Because He's A Jew Or A Bit Hawkish On Nukes? — The news that Dennis Ross, long time State Department strategist and peace processor, is being bounced as special envoy to Iran comes from an article by Barak Ravid in the reliable (at least on these matters) Ha'aretz.

“Conservatives” Are Single-Largest Ideological Group — Percentage of “liberals” higher this decade than in early '90s — PRINCETON, NJ — Thus far in 2009, 40% of Americans interviewed in national Gallup Poll surveys describe their political views as conservative, 35% as moderate, and 21% as liberal.
Discussion:
Washington Monthly, Commentary, Hot Air, Democratic Strategist, Townhall.com and The Hill's Blog Briefing Room


Details Set for Remake of Financial Regulations — WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is expected Wednesday to propose the most sweeping reorganization of financial-market supervision since the 1930s, a revamp that would touch almost every corner of banking from how mortgages are underwritten …
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The Case for Financial Regulatory Reform — Over the past two years, we have faced the most severe financial crisis since the Great Depression. The financial system failed to perform its function as a reducer and distributor of risk. Instead, it magnified risks, precipitating …

Obama Open to Reining in Medical Suits — WASHINGTON — The American Medical Association has long battled Democrats who oppose protecting doctors from malpractice lawsuits. But during a private meeting at the White House last month, association officials said, they found one Democrat willing to entertain the idea: President Obama.
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Fareed Zakaria GPS Redeems CNN's Iran Coverage — A couple of years ago, I was at a party, locked deep in conversation with a former producer at CNN. And I recall that one of the things we had talked about was the media's coverage of Hurricane Katrina. I remember telling …
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Pol: Gorilla is ‘related’ to First Lady … A prominent South Carolina Republican killed his Facebook page Sunday after being caught likening the First Lady to an escaped gorilla. — Commenting on a report posted to Facebook about a gorilla escape at a zoo in Columbia, S.C., Friday …
Discussion:
Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Politics Daily, Washington Monthly, Opinion L.A., The Moderate Voice, TPMDC, Feministe, WyBlog and FITSNews


Cheney: I Hope Panetta Was ‘Misquoted’ in Claiming My Wish for Attack — After the CIA director apparently told The New Yorker that he thinks the former vice president is crossing his fingers for another attack on America, Dick Cheney says he hopes his “old friend” didn't really say those words.
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The hunks of Washington — Washington is a magical place, a place where the onetime victims of boyhood gym-locker entombment can grow up to become the objects of affection, admiration, compulsive fandom, BlogSpot pages and Cafe Press T-shirts. — It is, safe to say, the only place where Ari Fleischer could have a stalker.
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Kristol: Memo to Conservatives — There have been very good grounds to criticize President Obama's foreign policy so far. There will be much more to criticize over the next three and a half years. — But he is our president. We could be at an historical inflection point in Iran.

Seeking Answers on IG Firing, Sen. Grassley Asks About Possible Role of First Lady's Office — In an email and fax sent late Friday, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, demanded that Alan D. Solomont, the chairman of the Corporation for National and Community Service, provide “any and all records …
Discussion:
TPMMuckraker
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Exclusive: House Dems Planning Major Changes To Secret CIA Briefings Of Congress — In a move that could spark another fight with the GOP over CIA intelligence and secrecy, House Dems are quietly preparing to make major changes to the ways the CIA briefs Congress on covert actions …

Obama rejects single payer — An effective rhetorical tack on Obama's campaign was casting his health care plan as a middle ground between private sector greed and a government takeover, and in an address to the American Medical Association today, he took a version of that tack in selling his public plan to that tough crowd:
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Japanese Translator of Rushdie Book Found Slain — The Japanese translator of “The Satanic Verses,” by Salman Rushdie, was found slain today at a university northeast of Tokyo. — The translator, Hitoshi Igarashi, 44 years old, was an assistant professor of comparative culture who reportedly studied in Iran in the 1970's.
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An Enemy of the World — The Islamic Republic regime in Iran …
Discussion:
Jeffrey Goldberg

Stay the Course — The debate over economic policy has taken a predictable yet ominous turn: the crisis seems to be easing, and a chorus of critics is already demanding that the Federal Reserve and the Obama administration abandon their rescue efforts. For those who know their history …


Is Sonia Sotomayor Mean? — · The White House is fond of pointing out that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor has more years on the bench, as a trial court and appellate judge, than any previous Supreme Court nominee. — With that record comes not just hundreds of written opinions, but thousands of oral arguments.