Top Items:
Wall Street Journal:
The Fall Guy — CIA Director Leon Panetta getting sacked by his own team. — Printer — Friendly — In the game of political football that is today national security, spare a thought for CIA Director Leon Panetta. Quarterbacking is hard enough without getting sacked by your own team.
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Washington Post:
Holder's Decision To Probe CIA Hints At a New Dynamic — About five weeks ago, faced with a crucial decision on how to react to brutal CIA interrogation practices, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. concluded that it would be all but impossible to follow President Obama's mandate to move forward …
Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
Discussion:
Althouse, Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, Stop The ACLU, Gateway Pundit, JammieWearingFool and Jules Crittenden
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Mark Hemingway / The Corner on National Review Online:
‘One of his favorite topics of humor was Chappaquiddick’ — By: Mark Hemingway
‘One of his favorite topics of humor was Chappaquiddick’ — By: Mark Hemingway
Discussion:
WAMU 88.5, protein wisdom, Townhall.com, NewsBusters.org, theblogprof, Flopping Aces, SFGate, AmSpecBlog, Weasel Zippers, The Sundries Shack, Gateway Pundit and Don Surber
Matt Corley / Think Progress:
Local official to Bachmann: 'I'll be danged if I am going to give up my Social Security because of socialism.' — In Lake Elmo, Minnesota yesterday, Rep. Michele Bachmann held a “raucous” town hall meeting to discuss health care reform that was filled with “deafening cheers and a few jeers.”
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St. Petersburg Times:
Crist picks George LeMieux to fill Senate seat — Gov. Charlie Crist turned to his political shadow and former chief of staff, George LeMieux, to stand in as Florida's U.S. senator until Crist can win the seat himself in the 2010 election. — Crist entered the hushed Senate chambers …
Discussion:
Salon
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Paul Kane / Capitol Briefing:
With LeMieux Pick, the Dawn of a New Era of Appointed Senators
With LeMieux Pick, the Dawn of a New Era of Appointed Senators
Discussion:
Taegan Goddard's …
Kevin Sack / New York Times:
Dealing With Being the Health Care ‘Villains’ — LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Max Shireman says that when he looks in the mirror he does not see the monster the politicians have made him out to be. — Sure, he could stand to lose a few pounds. And there was that speeding ticket last year for going 40 in a 30-mile-an-hour zone.
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David Cho / Washington Post:
Banks ‘Too Big to Fail’ Have Grown Even Bigger — Behemoths Born of the Bailout Reduce Consumer Choice, Tempt Corporate Moral Hazard — When the credit crisis struck last year, federal regulators pumped tens of billions of dollars into the nation's leading financial institutions …
Discussion:
The Agonist, Ezra Klein, The Confluence, Gawker, John Stossel's Take, EconoPundit and AMERICAblog News
Declan McCullagh / CNET News:
Bill would give president emergency control of Internet — Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet. — They're not much happier …
Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post:
A Strategy to Save Obamacare, But at What Cost — Obamacare Version 1.0 is dead. The 1,000-page monstrosity that emerged in various editions from Congress was done in by widespread national revulsion not just at its expense and intrusiveness but also at the mendacity with which it is being sold.
Discussion:
Ezra Klein, The New Republic, Outside The Beltway, The Glittering Eye, Betsy's Page and Don Surber
Attaturk / Firedoglake:
Gutless Cowards — Observe the man who undoubtedly receives medicare speaking in an Iowa town hall meeting with Senator Charles Grassley earlier this week: … Observe that Grassley says NOTHING to dissuade the gentlemen from his thesis or desire. — This has happened again, and again, and again in the last month.
Ben Calhoun / NPR:
‘Reading Rainbow’ Reaches Its Final Chapter … For 26 years, Reading Rainbow host LeVar Burton (left) shepherded kids through the exciting world of books. The show, which fostered a love of reading, was the third longest-running program in PBS history, outlasted only by Sesame Street and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
Ellen Nakashima / Washington Post:
Bush's Search Policy For Travelers Is Kept — Obama Officials Say Oversight Will Grow — The Obama administration will largely preserve Bush-era procedures allowing the government to search — without suspicion of wrongdoing — the contents of a traveler's laptop computer …
David Brooks / New York Times:
The Great Gradualist — In the days since Ted Kennedy's death, the news programs have shown and re-shown the unforgettable ending of his 1980 Democratic convention speech — the passage from Tennyson and the beautiful final lines: “The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”
Discussion:
Time, ABCNEWS, Washington Post, Washington Times, New York Times, Commentary, marbury and The Moderate Voice
Gil Hoffman / Jerusalem Post:
‘Post’ poll: Only 4% of Jewish Israelis think Obama is pro-Israel — The number of Israelis who see US President Barack Obama's policies as pro-Israel has fallen to four percent, according to a Smith Research poll taken this week on behalf of The Jerusalem Post.
Paul Krugman / New York Times:
Till Debt Does Its Part — So new budget projections show a cumulative deficit of $9 trillion over the next decade. According to many commentators, that's a terrifying number, requiring drastic action — in particular, of course, canceling efforts to boost the economy and calling off health care reform.
Lisa Demer / Anchorage Daily News:
SarahPAC taken to task by feds for illegal contributions — OOPS: Mistakes on political donations blamed on software. — ldemer@adn.com — Former Gov. Sarah Palin's political action committee gave excessive contributions to two well-known Republicans and also is facing demands …
Philip Rucker / Washington Post:
Late Senator's Staff Became The Other Kennedy Family — Behind each of Edward M. Kennedy's legislative victories was a vast coterie of staffers who became Washington legend. They meticulously packed the senator's black briefcase each evening with tabbed, underlined and dog-eared briefing papers.
Discussion:
OpenSecrets.org, The Caucus, New York Times, New York Times, Balloon Juice, The Page, The Democratic Daily and Associated Press
Boston Globe:
Legislature must act quickly on interim Senate appointment — THE DEATH Tuesday of Senator Edward M. Kennedy puts Massachusetts at half strength in the US Senate at a precarious time. Massachusetts lawmakers will only worsen the situation if they fail to take steps to assure a timely replacement.
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
The Pentagon's Parking Lot — I think it's great that the newest Pentagon auxiliary structure will be the DOD's greenest office building yet but if they really wanted to be environmentally conscious they wouldn't have located it “a mere 7 miles down I-395 at Mark Center,” …
Discussion:
DCmud
Andrew Malcolm / Top of the Ticket:
Obama defies safety advocates, shuns bike helmet, looks great, ignites debate — In an obvious bid to broaden public support for his troubled healthcare reform plans, a vacationing President Obama has now taken to defying the advice of safety advocates at both the federal and state levels.
Natalie Erlich / CNBC.com:
1,000 Banks to Fail In Next Two Years: Bank CEO — The US banking system will lose some 1,000 institutions over the next two years, said John Kanas, whose private equity firm bought BankUnited of Florida in May. — “We've already lost 81 this year,” Kanas told CNBC. “The numbers are climbing every day.
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
MAKING THE PUBLIC OPTION OPTIONAL.... Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R) of Texas has been one of the leading right-wing agitators against health care reform. It was a little odd, then, to see Armey accidentally tell The Economist that the public option may be a good idea.
The Politico:
Burton defends new vacation — After a mid-August trip to America's national parks and a weeklong vacation on Martha's Vineyard, President Obama plans ... ... to take a little more time away from the office next week. — Obama will head to Camp David on Wednesday, Sept. 2 …
Discussion:
Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion
Charles Hurt / New York Post:
OOPS! CHARLIE FORGOT THIS $1M HOUSE — REALTY BITES TAX-THEM-NOT-ME RANGEL — WASHINGTON — Rep. Charles Rangel failed to report as much as $1.3 million in outside income — including up to $1 million for a Harlem building sale — on financial-disclosure forms he filed between 2002 and 2006, according to newly amended records.
Bobby Ghosh / Time:
Pakistan's Non-Campaign Against the Taliban — Despite strenuous entreaties by top U.S. officials, Pakistan has abandoned plans to mount a military offensive against the terrorist group responsible for a two-year campaign of suicide bombings across the country.
Andrew Belonsky / Gawker:
In True Psycho Fashion, Phillip Garrido Had Blog, Heard God — Oh, look! Phillip Garrido, the maniac who kidnapped Jaycee Dugard 18 years ago, kept her in his horrific backyard and then twice impregnated her, has a blog! And it's scary! — Not satisfied with being a kidnapping rapist …
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
THE PEARLSTEIN PLAN.... The Washington Post's Steven Pearlstein has written some pretty powerful columns on health care reform lately — some of which I enthusiastically endorse, some of which I found less persuasive — but today's piece is, in effect, the Pearlstein Plan.