Top Items:
USA Today:
‘Un-American’ attacks can't derail health care debate — Americans have been waiting for nearly a century for quality, affordable health care. — Health coverage for all was on the national agenda as early as 1912, thanks to Teddy Roosevelt's Bull Moose presidential run.
Discussion:
Think Progress, Weekly Standard, The Huffington Post, The Corner, Top of the Ticket, Moe_Lane's blog, Townhall.com, Gateway Pundit, JammieWearingFool, Glenn Thrush's Blog, Los Angeles Times, Confederate Yankee, Washington Examiner, Daily Dose, Stop The ACLU, The Moderate Voice, No More Mister Nice Blog, Outside The Beltway, Wizbang, The Right Coast, Riehl World View, The Swamp, Sense of Events, YID With LID, QandO, Boston Globe, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Flopping Aces, The Jawa Report, JustOneMinute, Balloon Juice, Blue Virginia, The Atlantic Politics Channel, Political Byline, NewsBusters.org, Scared Monkeys, Right Wing News, The Plum Line, Taylor Marsh, Atlas Shrugs, Donklephant, American Power, Raw Story, Hot Air, Freedom's Lighthouse, The Sundries Shack, Patterico's Pontifications, Below The Beltway, theblogprof, Macsmind, Blue Crab Boulevard, The Next Right, Politics Daily, GayPatriot, TPMDC, Perfunction, Liberal Values, Don Surber, Pundit & Pundette, The Strata-Sphere, Michelle Malkin and neo-neocon
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Mary Katharine Ham / Weekly Standard:
SEIU Recruits Obamacare Supporters to ‘Drown Out Voices’ in Conn. (Pelosi Will Be Appalled at the 'Un-Americanness') — Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer decided to double down on some pretty distasteful messaging today, calling some of the opposition to health care reform, “un-American” …
Peter Slevin / Washington Post:
Key Democrat Feels the Heat in Indiana District After Voting for House Health-Reform Plan — BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — “The war's on,” says Rep. Baron P. Hill, and he's not talking about a conflict overseas, but a battle over health care in his own back yard, where thousands of people are trying to tell him what to do, some not so nicely.
Debra J. Saunders / San Francisco Chronicle:
Dissent is patriotic - not — Imagine it's four years ago …
Dissent is patriotic - not — Imagine it's four years ago …
Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
Hoyer, Pelosi call protests against ObamaCare “un-American”
Hoyer, Pelosi call protests against ObamaCare “un-American”
Discussion:
Townhall.com, The Huffington Post, The Swamp, Dr. Melissa Clouthier, Think Progress and JammieWearingFool
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
GLADNEY THE UNINSURED ACTIVIST.... Over the last few days, a conservative activist in St. Louis named Kenneth Gladney seems to have become something of a cause celebre in far-right circles. Depending on which version of events you choose to believe, Gladney either initiated or was involved …
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Zaid Jilani / Think Progress:
Right Wing's Anti-Health Care Icon Is Uninsured, Seeking Donations To Pay For Care — Last week, during a scuffle between health care town hall protesters and SEIU members at a town hall hosted by Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-MO), anti-health care reform protester Kenneth Gladney was injured and required hospitalization:
Andrew Breitbart / Washington Times:
I am Kenneth Gladney — OPINION/ANALYSIS: — The first round of protests against the Obama administration's chaotic and rapid-fire expansion of government came in the form of grass-roots “tea parties,” which were predictably met with scorn by the Democrat-Media Complex …
Wall Street Journal:
Taliban Now Winning — U.S. Commander in Afghanistan Warns of Rising Casualties — By YOCHI J. DREAZEN in Kabul and PETER SPIEGEL in Washington — The Taliban have gained the upper hand in Afghanistan, the top American commander there said, forcing the U.S. to change its strategy …
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Ross Douthat / New York Times:
The Unfunny Truth — It's been a melancholy summer for social conservatives. Their movement is fighting a rearguard battle in Barack Obama's Washington. A cluster of family-values politicians — some of whom bunked down in the same Christian-sponsored D.C. townhouse …
Discussion:
Matthew Yglesias, Sadly, No!, Cafe Talk Aggregator, pandagon.net, First Draft and Ezra Klein
Southern Beale:
Don't talk to me about death panels, Sarah Palin. — You, who so carelessly bolstered a lie about healthcare reform to score a cheap political point; you, the most craven of political opportunists, who fearmongers about some dystopian socialist/fascist fantasyland; you …
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Michelle Malkin:
Rep. Tsongas tries to explain why Congress is exempt from Obamacare. Fails. — Herein lies the ultimate Achilles' Heel of Obamacare. Watch as Democrat Rep. Niki Tsongas of Massachussetts attempts to explain why Congress is exempt from the government health care takeover mandates.
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Paul Krugman / New York Times:
Averting the Worst — So it seems that we aren't going to have a second Great Depression after all. What saved us? The answer, basically, is Big Government. — Just to be clear: the economic situation remains terrible, indeed worse than almost anyone thought possible not long ago.
Robert J. Samuelson / Washington Post:
Obama's Health Care Plan Just Expands Status Quo — “The status quo is unsustainable for families, businesses and government.” — President Obama, June 13 — One of the bewildering ironies of the health-care debate is that President Obama claims to be attacking the status quo when he's actually embracing it.
Discussion:
Left in the West, Blue Crab Boulevard, The Glittering Eye, The Atlantic Business Channel and Hullabaloo
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Jonathan Cohn / The Treatment:
I Didn't Wake Up Planning to Write About Samuelson
I Didn't Wake Up Planning to Write About Samuelson
Discussion:
Ezra Klein
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
If Only We Had Some Means of Taking Rich People's Money and Devoting it to Public Purposes — Internal Revenue Service headquarters, Washington DC (cc photo by cliff1066) — I don't think it should come as a shock that the Obama administration's efforts to reign-in or reform compensation policies …
Discussion:
The Atlantic Business Channel, MoJo Blog Posts, New York Times, Wonk Room and American Power
Jeffrey M. Jones / Gallup:
Obama Job Approval: Highest in D.C., Hawaii, Vermont — PRINCETON, NJ — From the time Barack Obama took office as president until the end of June, 63% of Americans, on average, approved of the job he was doing. The breakdown of his half-year approval ratings at the state level shows …
New York Times:
Obama Says Immigration Changes Must Wait Till 2010 — GUADALAJARA, Mexico — President Obama said Monday that efforts to change the immigration system would be a major focus for his administration only next year, after other major priorities were accomplished, including passage of a new health care system.
Discussion:
TalkLeft
Heather / Crooks and Liars:
The McLaughlin Group: Pat Buchanan and Monica Crowley Claim the Government Wants to Promote Suicide to Save Money — John McLaughlin uses Pat Buchanan's fear mongering framing for his question on end of life counseling to begin this segment. Buchanan claims that to save money …
Discussion:
The Moderate Voice
CNN:
CNN Poll: Dems becoming less popular but no gains for GOP — WASHINGTON (CNN) — A new national poll indicates that the Democratic party's becoming less popular with voters. But the CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey, released Monday, suggests that the Republican party has not been able to capitalize on the Democrats' downturn.
Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:
George Soros Pledges $5 Million To Bankroll Health Care Reform Push, Group Says — In another sign of the urgency gripping the pro-health care reform camp, billionaire George Soros has pledged to sink $5 million into the fight, the group getting the money confirmed.
Jacob Gershman / New York Magazine:
Why Neoconservative Pundits Love Jon Stewart — Back in April, when the debate over torture was roaring, Jon Stewart invited Cliff May, a national-security hawk and former spokesman for the Republican Party, to come on The Daily Show and defend waterboarding. May was hesitant.
Jay Bookman:
It doesn't take Stephen Hawking to figure this one out — The conservative opinion magazine Human Events was reputedly Ronald Reagan's favorite read, and to this day fancies itself the house organ for the hard-right intelligentsia. Among those published regularly in its pages are such luminaries as Newt Gingrich and Ann Coulter.
Discussion:
Talking Points Memo, The New Republic, Ezra Klein, Matthew Yglesias, Washington Monthly, Wonkette and Newshoggers.com
Rasmussen Reports:
On Health Care, 51% Fear Government More Than Insurance Companies — When it comes to health care decisions, 51% of the nation's voters fear the federal government more than private insurance companies. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 41% hold the opposite view and fear the insurance companies more.
Think Progress:
Gates ‘Furious’ That Brownback And Roberts Placed A Hold On McHugh's Army Secretary Nomination — President Obama named Rep. John McHugh (R-NY) in June as his nominee to become the next Secretary of the Army. Last week, the Senate Armed Services Committee approved his nomination by voice vote …
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
The New Urbanity — This is a point I've made casually before, but it seems Professor Arthur Nelson has a new paper spelling out in detail the implications of demographic change for the built environment. In particular, even if you assume no shift in underlying preferences regarding cities versus suburbs …
David Kurtz / Talking Points Memo:
Where Are The Doctors? — I did not envision that we could get this far down the road toward fundamental health care reform with so little input in the public discourse from physicians. Sure, the AMA has come out in favor of the House bill that includes public option.
Ryan / The Bellows:
Sympathy for Cyclists — I think a lot of people were a little mystified by Atrios' “cyclists are a bunch of dangerous lawbreakers” posts, that being a fairly auto-oriented sentiment and Atrios being a pro-urban type. I'll count myself among them. I really can't say that I've ever …
Jonathan Martin / Ben Smith's Blog:
Sect'y Clinton sharply dismisses question about what her “husband thinks” — He may have been in the headlines last week for his rescue mission to North Korea, but Bill Clinton is not the secretary of State. — As the lady who is reminded a Congolese student and the world today: