WH withdraws call for students to ‘help’ Obama  —  The Obama administration late Wednesday withdrew a recommendation that school children who watch a video featuring President Obama next week write about how they might “help the president” as part of a classroom assignment.

Sentenced to death on the NHS  —  Patients with terminal illnesses are being made to die prematurely under an NHS scheme to help end their lives, leading doctors warn today.  —  In a letter to The Daily Telegraph, a group of experts who care for the terminally ill claim that some patients are being wrongly judged as close to death.

“I pledge to be of service to Barack Obama”  —  As if I needed any more evidence to bolster today's column about the Obama junior lobbyist campaign in America's schools, here's another item fresh from the headlines in Utah:

9/11 Ad for WWF Causes Tsunami of a Crisis for DDB Brasil  —  Apology Doesn't Stave Off Global Compensation; Video Version Surfaces  —  An obscure ad that ran once in a small Sao Paulo newspaper months ago has come back to haunt DDB Brasil and its conservation client, the WWF in Brazil …

Kennedy Memoir Talks of Chappaquiddick, J.F.K. and Other Presidents  —  In a memoir being published posthumously, Senator Edward M. Kennedy talks remorsefully about the car accident that claimed the life of Mary Jo Kopechne - a turn of events many consider a chief reason that he was never able …

Buchanan's Apologia for Hitler  —  As if some neocon were setting out to parody dovish thinking on contemporary issues, paleocon Pat Buchanan has gone and written a “blame Britian first” account of the origins of World War II.  Apparently, according to Buchanan, Hitler was just seeking …

Greer Condemns Obama's Attempt to Indoctrinate Students  —  Tallahassee- Â Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer today released the following statement condemning President Obama's use of taxpayer dollars to indoctrinate America's children to his socialist agenda.

Potential Senate candidacy  —  While my family is obviously the priority, and 38 Studios is a priority, I do have some interest in the possibility.  That being said, to get to there from where I am today, many many things would have to align themselves for that to truly happen.

STAFF AS ‘FORGETFUL’ AS THE BOSS  —  WASHINGTON — Charlie Rangel's “forgetfulness” is apparently contagious.  —  Two of his top aides are among about a dozen highly paid staffers on the powerful tax-writing Ways and Means Committee who have filed a flurry of amendments correcting their financial-disclosure statements since 2002.

I have been abducted by aliens, says Japan's first lady  —  Move over Michelle, watch your backs, Carla and Sarah.  There's a new kid on the first lady block, and she looks like upstaging the lot of you.  —  Miyuki Hatoyama, wife of Japan's Prime Minister-elect, Yukio Hatoyama …

Department of Education Deletes Line About How Schoolkids Can Help Obama — By: Jim Geraghty  —  It appears there are two versions of the preparatory materials for the president's address to schoolchildren floating around, one with language urging teachers to have students write letters …

Accountability, but at What Cost?  —  My friend and fellow columnist Eugene Robinson has written a characteristically passionate and well-reasoned piece commending Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to name a special counsel to examine possible law-breaking by interrogators of terrorist subjects during the last administration.

The Obama Administration: MIA on Afghanistan?  —  So I was on the Newshour last night debating Afghanistan with a favorite of this blog and its readers, Andrew Bacevich.  As readers of this blog know, I am uncomfortable when placed in the position of being expected to lustily defend the war.

SPITZER'S BABE SLAPS THE SNOBS  —  TELLS WOMEN: YOU'RE NO BETTER THAN ME!  —  The high-paid escort who notoriously romped with disgraced ex-Gov. Eliot Spitzer has a message to New York ladies: You're no better than me!  —  “Get real and get over yourself,” Ashley Dupre bluntly tells all the women out there who “just love to judge.”

CNN poll: 9 in 10 think U.S. still in recession  —  CNN Deputy Political Director  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — Nearly 9 in 10 Americans say the country's still in a recession, according to a new national poll.  —  Eighty-seven percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation …

DNA to free another inmate  —  Winston-Salem man has served 14 years after being convicted of raping 2 girls  —  A 49-year-old man who has served more than 14 years of a life sentence for raping two teenage sisters will be released today after DNA tests determined that he wasn't the attacker.