Top Items:
Glenn Greenwald / Salon:
The Washington Post fires its best columnist. Why? — (updated below - Update II - Update III) — One of the rarest commodities in the establishment media is someone who was a vehement critic of George Bush and who now, applying their principles consistently, has become a regular critic …
Discussion:
Latest Open Salon Blog, The Impolitic, Hullabaloo, The Sideshow, PERRspectives and Grasping Reality …
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Patrick Gavin / Michael Calderone's Blog:
Froomkin out at Washington Post (UPDATED) — POLITICO learned today that the Washington Post has terminated its relationship with liberal columnist/blogger Dan Froomkin. Froomkin authored the “White House Watch” blog and was told today that the blog had essentially run its course.
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
FROOMKIN OUT?.... When it comes to the paper's online presence, the Washington Post has made some very smart moves in recent months, most notably the additions of Greg Sargent's “The Plum Line” and the Who Runs Gov project, and Ezra Klein. — But this move, if accurate, is a step in the wrong direction.
Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
The Torture-Mongers vs Froomkin — The WaPo's statement drips with condescension: — Sometimes features must be eliminated, and this time it was the blog that Dan Froomkin freelanced for washingtonpost.com. — My italics. But Hiatt will publish op-eds peddling dishonest partial numbers …
Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
The WaPo's Best Blogger Is Fired — A simply astounding move by the paper - getting rid of the one blogger, Dan Froomkin, who kept it real and kept it interesting. Dan's work on torture may be one reason he is now gone. The way in which the WaPo has been coopted by the neocon right …
Chicago Tribune:
Senator questions firing of 3 inspectors general
Senator questions firing of 3 inspectors general
Discussion:
Political Punch, No Sheeples Here!, Riehl World View, Washington Times, Hot Air, Gates of Vienna, American Spectator, The Anchoress, neo-neocon, AmSpecBlog, Media Blog, Pundit & Pundette, Runnin' Scared, Right Wing Nut House, Blue Crab Boulevard, Flopping Aces, The Sundries Shack, Moonbattery, NO QUARTER and Z on TV
Ezra Klein:
Health Care Reform in Danger — Health reform is, I think it fair to say, in danger right now. The news out of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee was bad. The Congressional Budget Office had scored a partial bill and the result was a total fiasco.
Discussion:
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Ezra Klein:
EXCLUSIVE: The Finance Committee's Health Reform Outline — A Senate source just passed me the latest outline of the Senate Finance Committee's health reform proposal. This is the post-CBO revision. Apparently, after the committee staff received the scores, they dug deep and quickly developed …
The Huffington Post:
Daschle Urges Obama To Drop Federal Public Health Care Plan — The man once slated to head Barack Obama's health care system overhaul is now coming out against one of the chief components of that effort. — Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said on Wednesday that the Obama White House …
Discussion:
Firedoglake, Daily Kos, The Huffington Post, The Plum Line, Matthew Yglesias, Maggie's Farm, SEIU and The Note
Eric Etheridge / The Opinionator:
Health Care Reform D.O.A.? — What's the latest assessment from those closely monitoring health care reform? Prognosis negative. — “Health reform is, I think it fair to say, in danger right now,” wrote Ezra Klein this morning at the Washington Post. — “Attention fellow liberals …
Discussion:
Kaiser Health News, Balloon Juice, Blue Crab Boulevard, FiveThirtyEight, Democratic Strategist and Cato @ Liberty
Gorman Gorman / The Note:
Daschle Folds on Federal Public Health Care Plan
Daschle Folds on Federal Public Health Care Plan
Discussion:
The Huffington Post, Daily Kos, Time, ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES, The Foundry, Balloon Juice, AmSpecBlog, First Draft, Weekly Standard and AMERICAblog News
The Independent:
Robert Fisk: Secret letter ‘proves Mousavi won poll’ — They were handing out the photocopies by the thousand under the plane trees in the centre of the boulevard, single sheets of paper grabbed by the opposition supporters who are now wearing black for the 15 Iranians who have been killed in Tehran …
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Jimmy Orr / Christian Science Monitor:
Boxer scolds Army General for not calling her “Senator” — Ever wonder what Eric Cartman might sound like if he was in Congress? Wonder no more... California Senator Barbara Boxer is a Senator. And if you don't acknowledge it, she'll demand you acknowledge it. Even if you're a General in the United States Army.
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Joseph Curl / Press Association:
Bush takes swipes at Obama policies — Defends interrogations — Former President George W. Bush fired a salvo at President Obama on Wednesday, asserting his administration's interrogation policies were within the law, declaring the private sector not government will fix the economy and rejecting the nationalization of health care.
Discussion:
Top of the Ticket, Latest Open Salon Blog, msnbc.com, Washington Monthly, Hot Air, The Fix, Opinion L.A., No More Mister Nice Blog, Indecision Forever, DownWithTyranny!, At-Largely, The Swamp, Swampland, Political Punch, White House Watch, Think Progress, Washington Times, Megan McArdle, DISSENTING JUSTICE and Weekly Standard
Daily Mail:
Japan warns that North Korea may fire missile at U.S. on Independence Day — North Korea may launch a long-range ballistic missile towards Hawaii on American Independence Day, according to Japanese intelligence officials. — The missile, believed to be a Taepodong-2 with a range of up to 4,000 miles …
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Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
ALL-TIME LOWS.... I've seen a few Republican blogs today crowing about the latest national polls, which show some lukewarm support for some of White House's policy priorities. There are a couple of numbers, though, that should give them pause. — For one thing, President Obama's approval ratings still look quite strong.
Discussion:
Think Progress, US News, White House Watch, Washington Post and Bob Cesca's Awesome Blog!
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Economist.com l WASHINGTON / Democracy in America:
Or maybe the honeymoon's not over — IT'S possible to read …
Or maybe the honeymoon's not over — IT'S possible to read …
Chris Cillizza / The Fix:
The Most Important Number in Politics Today — Seventy-two percent. — That's the number of people in the new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll who say that President Obama inherited the “current economic conditions” gripping the country as compared to just 14 percent who said the situation was the result mostly of his policies.
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Andy Barr / The Politico:
Olive Garden pulls Letterman ads — Following a week of back and forth between CBS late night comic David Letterman and Sarah Palin over a crude joke he told about the Alaska Republican governor's daughter, the Olive Garden restaurant says it is cancelling all of its scheduled ads on Letterman's “Late Show” for the rest of the year.
Associated Press:
PETA wishes Obama hadn't swatted that fly — Rights group seeks compassion for curious and ‘least sympathetic animals’ — WASHINGTON - The group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals wants the flyswatter in chief to try taking a more humane attitude the next time he's bedeviled by a fly in the White House.
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Mark Leibovich / New York Times:
What Has 132 Rooms and Flies? — WASHINGTON — The White House is bugged!
What Has 132 Rooms and Flies? — WASHINGTON — The White House is bugged!
Discussion:
Hot Air
Josh Kraushaar / Scorecard's Blog:
Senator Beefcake? — Some revealing footage of Ohio Senate candidate Lee Fisher has emerged on YouTube, which features the bare-chested lieutenant governor sitting in his office writing a campaign memo. — “I just don't like being filmed at 12 in the morning when I'm exhausted and trying to do something …
Politics in Minnesota:
Two sources: Supreme Court ruling on U.S. Senate race to arrive tomorrow! — PIM has now heard from two sources on different sides of the Minnesota U.S. Senate race recount scene that the final Minnesota Supreme Court ruling is expected to arrive tomorrow, Thursday, June 18th.
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David Corn / MoJo Blog Posts: mojo:
Kenneth Starr Endorses Sotomayor — Kenneth Starr, the lawyer who chased after President Bill Clinton and his wife, said on Thursday that he supports President Barack Obama's first Supreme Court nominee, federal appeals court Judge Sonia Sotomayor. — Starr voiced his backing of Sotomayor …
Ben Smith / Ben Smith's Blog:
Gay Dems complain DNC cut off funding, drop support for Biden event — Theboard of directors of the National Stonewall Democrats are dropping their support for a June 25 DNC fundraiser with Vice President Joe Biden over, they wrote in an email obtained by POLITICO, a combination of policy slights …
Joe Nocera / New York Times:
Only a Hint of Roosevelt in Financial Overhaul — Three quarters of a century ago, President Franklin Roosevelt earned the undying enmity of Wall Street when he used his enormous popularity to push through a series of radical regulatory reforms that completely changed the norms of the financial industry.
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Economist:
The lessons of 1937 — In a guest article, Christina Romer says policymakers must learn from the errors that prolonged the Depression — AT A recent congressional hearing I cautiously noted some “glimmers of hope” that the economy could stabilise and perhaps start to rebound later in the year.
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David Weigel / The Washington Independent:
Bill Posey, Congressional Birther, Finds Some Friends and Bashes ‘Angry Woman’ Rachel Maddow — Rep. Bill Posey (R-Fla.), who has introduced a bill that would require future presidential candidates to provide proof of U.S. citizenship, has collected four more co-sponsors — Reps. John R. Carter …