Top Items:
Robert Kagan / Washington Post:
Obama's Conundrum: Shunning Iran's Opposition — The turmoil in Iran since last week's election has confused the foreign policy debate here in the United States in interesting ways. Supporters of President Obama, who until very recently had railed against the Bush administration's …
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M. Duss / Wonk Room:
Open Letter To Robert Kagan — First, let me just express sympathy for your situation. These last years have been extraordinarily unkind to your grand theories about the transformative potential of American explosives. President Bush's “global war on terror,” the invasion of Iraq …
Sabina Amidi / Jerusalem Post:
‘Hamas helping Iran crush dissent’ — Palestinian Hamas members are helping the Iranian authorities crush street protests in support of reformist presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, two protesters told The Jerusalem Post On Tuesday. — They made their allegations as rioting …
Caitlin Taylor / Political Punch:
President Obama: On Key Policies, Not Much Difference Between …
President Obama: On Key Policies, Not Much Difference Between …
Discussion:
The New Republic, Wall Street Journal, Jeffrey Goldberg, No More Mister Nice Blog and RealClearWorld
ABC News:
Extraordinary scenes: Robert Fisk in Iran — The long-standing Middle East correspondent for The Independent, Robert Fisk, is defying the government crackdown on foreign media reporting in Iran. — As he explains, he has been travelling around the streets of Tehran all day and most of the night and things are far from quiet:
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Nazila Fathi / New York Times:
Bracing for New Protests, Iran Issues Media Warning — TEHRAN — Tehran braced for a possible third day of defiance by opposition supporters on Wednesday after Iran's leaders failed to halt huge demonstrations against last week's disputed election results. — Placed on the defensive …
Discussion:
CNN, Associated Press, Reuters, Pajamas Media, BBC, The Washington Independent, The Daily Dish, Media Decoder, Washington Monthly, The Foundry, The Spirit of Man, New York Magazine, The Corner, Silicon Alley Insider, ATTACKERMAN, Wall Street Journal, Commentary, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, Wake up America, Townhall.com, Air America Media blogs, Washington Post and THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS
Wall Street Journal:
Iranian Accuses U.S. of ‘Intolerable’ Meddling — Recount Set as Iran Seethes — A picture posted on Twitter's photo-sharing website TwitPic by the user madyar shows supporters of defeated Iranian presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi marching on Krimkhan Bridge during a rally in Tehran on Wednesday.
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
Strategic Nonviolence — Jon Chait observes that “For a revolution to succeed, it generally needs one of two things to happen: Either it needs its own weapons, or it needs mass defections by the state security forces.” He also sees some evidence that some elements of the security forces may be contemplating defection.
Discussion:
The New Republic
Alec MacGillis / Washington Post:
Out of Washington, Edwards Finds Worries Remain — John Edwards says he has few illusions. He knows the picture many Americans hold of him is not a pretty one. He also knows that even before he was engulfed in tabloid scandal, his electoral appeal had limits.
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
ENSIGN, WHOA.... Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't much care what Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) does in his personal life. What he does in his bedroom is his business. — But the larger context of this story matters a great deal. Stupid personal mistakes are easily overlooked; breathtaking hypocrisy isn't.
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Ali Frick / Think Progress:
Bachmann Boasts About Breaking The Law: I'm Refusing To Fill Out The Census — Next year, the 2010 Census will be sent to every American household, as required by the U.S. Constitution. The far right has issued dire warnings of the Census; on a May 29th episode of Bill Bennett's radio show …
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Byron York / Washington Examiner:
Fired AmeriCorps IG responds: White House charges are false — Fired AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin strongly denies the White House's claim that he was “confused, disoriented [and] unable to answer questions” at a May 20, 2009 board meeting of the Corporation for National and Community Service …
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Jeffrey Young / The Hill:
Dems reel on healthcare — Congressional Democrats and the White House are scrambling to regain their footing after a series of setbacks has stalled political momentum to reform the nation's healthcare system. — Despite having a popular president in the White House and comfortable majorities in Congress …
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New York Times:
Poll Finds Unease With Obama on Key Issues — A substantial majority of Americans say President Obama has not developed a strategy to deal with the budget deficit, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, which also found that support for his plans to overhaul health care …
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John Aravosis / AMERICAblog News:
Barney Frank throws us under the bus. Lauds incest brief. Says language was appropriate. — Well, it seems a trip to the Oval Office is all openly gay congressman Barney Frank needs to stab his community in the back. After criticizing the DOJ's anti-gay DOMA brief this morning …
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Ta-Nehisi Coates:
Nathan Bedford Forrest Has Beautiful Eyes — Of the many reckonings that black people of honest political consciousness must endure, the appointment with black slavery is the most agonizing. I don't mean the appointment with the notion of white people as the enslavers of our ancestors …
Discussion:
Lean Left
Sandra Tsing Loh / The Atlantic Online:
Let's Call the Whole Thing Off — SADLY, AND TO my horror, I am divorcing. This was a 20-year partnership. My husband is a good man, though he did travel 20 weeks a year for work. I am a 47-year-old woman whose commitment to monogamy, at the very end, came unglued. This turn of events was a surprise.
Washington Examiner:
Weekly Standard sold to Washington Examiner parent company — Clarity Media Group CEO Ryan McKibben announced today that the company had acquired The Weekly Standard magazine, which he characterized as “one of the most highly respected publications of public policy and political commentary in America.”
Discussion:
Michael Calderone's Blog, Wonkette, NewsBusters.org, Ben Smith's Blog, Gawker, Don Surber and New York Magazine
New York Post:
‘I CAN HAVE 2 VOTES’ — ESPADA'S DEADLOCK ‘SOLUTION’: GIMME SENATE SUPERPOWERS — ALBANY — Renegade Democratic Sen. Pedro Espada claimed yesterday he and his Republican allies are forging an explosive new plan to give him an unprecedented two votes to break the newly emerged deadlock in the state Senate.
Megan McArdle:
Paul Krugman's Prophetic Prescience — Wow. Just . . . wow. … As Arnold Kling says, there's a paragraph I'm sure glad I didn't write.
Kevin Drum / MoJo Blog Posts:
Healthcare CEOs Shoot Themselves in the Foot — Yesterday the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations decided to investigate the practice of recission. This is when you pay your premiums for years to a healthcare insurer, then get sick, and then have your insurance cancelled.
Eric Boehlert / Media Matters for America:
I'm pretty sure this is why Juan Williams isn't allowed to associate himself with NPR when he appears on The O'Reilly Factor — If folks didn't see this clip from Monday night, it's a beaut. Not only does the reliable O'Reilly backstop Juan Williams eagerly assure the host that he was right …
Igor / Wonk Room:
GOP Introduces Bill To Derail Comparative Effectiveness Research — On Monday, Sens. Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and Pat Roberts (R-KS) introduced the “Preserving Access to Targeted, Individualized, and Effective New Treatments and Services (PATIENTS) Act of 2009,” …
McClatchy Washington Bureau:
In huge change, Obama'd strip Fed of credit card oversight — Elizabeth Warren, who chairs the Congressional Oversight Panel overseeing bailout spending, talks to McClatchy reporters about the president's proposed regulatory changes. — WASHINGTON — Among the sweeping changes …
Discussion:
Felix Salmon, Crooks and Liars, Washington Post, Prairie Weather, The Confluence and White House Watch
Martin Wolf / Financial Times:
The recession tracks the Great Depression — Green shoots are bursting out. Or so we are told. But before concluding that the recession will soon be over, we must ask what history tells us. It is one of the guides we have to our present predicament. Fortunately, we do have the data.
Tom Elia / The New Editor:
Maureen Dowd Thinks You're an Idiot — The New York Times' Maureen Dowd has written a piece that seems to indicate that President and Mrs. Obama are responsible for providing the rest of the nation with good examples of how we should eat. — Seriously. — Dowd writes:
CNN:
Iran's soccer team wears symbolic green bands — TEHRAN, Iran (CNN) — Members of Iran's national soccer team wore green arm and wrist bands Wednesday during their World Cup qualifying match against South Korea. — The team does not normally wear green bands.
Anne Schroeder Mullins / Anne Schroeder's Blog:
No name-calling — If you want to score a meeting with Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), know this: His scheduler/office manager, Elizabeth Becton, is to be addressed by her full name — not Liz or any other variant. — An executive assistant at McBee Strategic recently learned this the hard way.
Dana Goldstein / American Prospect:
IRAN AND THE VEIL. — Photo from Tehran by Farhad Rajabali, via Flickr — The photos coming out of Tehran demonstrate, movingly and beautifully, that women are on the front lines of the protests taking place there, veils and all. The images reminded me of President Obama's focus …
Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
No Recognition Of Ahmadinejad — This is the first and absolute requirement of all Western governments. The disgusting visuals of Medvedev and Ahmadinejad yesterday must not be repeated. Here an Iranian exile makes a moving and clear plea for our solidarity with the people of Iran:
Discussion:
American Power, Stephen M. Walt, Outside The Beltway, The Atlanticist and Weekly Standard
The New Republic:
Twitter Vindicated? — Andrew responds to my complaint, citing Joshua Kucera's fact-checking, about Twitter's accuracy. Score a point for Andrew/Twitter on the specific example about crowd sizes, although I'm still a Twitter skeptic. (My sense is that many other tweets have generated …