Senate GOP Folding Over Health Care Reform [updated]  —  I am told quite reliably that in a meeting today on Capitol Hill, Republican Senators began to rapidly move toward concessions on health care because they are afraid they cannot hold their members.  Some Republicans are now thinking of supporting a government program.

Dems Discussing Public Option With Opt-Out Clause: The Silver Bullet?  —  WHAT'S YOUR REACTION?  —  Senate Democrats have begun discussions on a compromise approach to health care reform that would establish a robust, national public option for insurance coverage but give individual states the right to opt out of the program.

Franken Wins Bipartisan Support For Legislation Reining In KBR's Treatment Of Rape  —  In 2005, Jamie Leigh Jones was gang-raped by her co-workers while she was working for Halliburton/KBR in Baghdad.  She was detained in a shipping container for at least 24 hours without food, water …

This, Apparently, Is Not a Joke — By: Kathryn Jean Lopez  —  Barack Obama has this hanging in the White House:  —  It proves a gift to Nick Schulz.

McCaughey And Me  —  I said my piece about this on this blog a while back.  I do not think it's professional to air the specifics of internal battles after the fact, and I take full responsibility for being the editor of the magazine that published the piece.  I accepted an award for it.

Thugs attack two transvestites... who turn out to be cage fighters wearing fancy dress  —  Two thugs who attacked what they thought were a pair of transvestites picked on the wrong men - when their intended victims turned out to be cage fighters on a night out in fancy dress.

Rep. Waters: ‘Many members’ suffer from disclosure problems like Rep. Rangel  —  “Many members” of Congress suffer from the same disclosure issues as the embattled Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), one of his congressional allies suggested Wednesday.  —  Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) …

Tom Shales: I'm Shocked to Be Told I Minimized Polanski's Crime!!  Here, Let Me Do It Again!  —  From a Washington Post chat with Tom Shales today (thanks to several readers): … I'm sure it was you, Tom Shales.  Evidently you need the citation, so here it is, from a column of yours dated June 9, 2008:

Reagan and Obama  —  Is America a city on a hill or a country in decline?  —  Ronald Reagan believed in America.  —  One way he expressed this faith was through the image of “a shining city on a hill,” a phrase Reagan uttered in one form or another in many of his speeches …

Election 2010: Louisiana Senate  —  Louisiana Senate: GOP Candidates Lead by Double Digits  —  Senator David Vitter holds a 10-percentage-point lead over Democrat Charlie Melancon in an early look at Louisiana's 2010 General Election.  The first Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 survey …

Health care reform: Saving American lives  —  Keith Olbermann on what really matters when it comes to health reform  —  SPECIAL COMMENT  —  Since August 23rd of this year I have interacted daily with our American Health Care system and often done so to the exclusion of virtually all other business.

Deep Denial  —  Toughened by their frontier ethos, steeled by serial wars, Israelis are not prone to flattery.  Most, in fact, eschew using the closest equivalent to the Hebrew word for flattery—chanupa— in favor of the derisive Yiddish-derivative, firgun.

Wells Fargo Will Raise Credit-Card Rates Ahead of Law  —  Oct. 7 (Bloomberg) — Wells Fargo & Co. plans to raise interest rates on a majority of credit-card customers by 3 percentage points before federal rules limiting such increases take effect, a company executive said.

Gun Show Undercover  —  Ever wonder how criminals are able to get guns so easily?  It's depressingly simple.  On any given weekend, at dozens of gun shows held in states across the country — criminals can buy guns from “private sellers” who are not required to perform background checks.

Ayers Dreams of Obama — By: Jonah Goldberg  —  I am not sure what to make of the story that Ayers has now admitted to writing Obama's autobiography.  If it pans out, that is to my mind a very big story.  Stay tuned.  But I do think I should revise my earlier pooh-poohing of Jack Cashill's effort to prove the Ayers-Obama connection.

NOW blasts Letterman over affairs with staff  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — The National Organization for Women has sharply criticized comedian David Letterman, accusing him of promoting a hostile, uncomfortable work environment.  —  “The latest Letterman controversy sheds new light …

New plan might allow Dems to slip public option through Senate  —  Senate Democrats desperate to find a way to pass a health care bill that includes a federal insurance plan may have come up with a way to do it without putting moderate members who oppose it in political jeopardy.

Religion Largely Absent in Argument About Cross  —  WASHINGTON — A Supreme Court argument on Wednesday about the fate of a cross in a remote part of the Mojave National Preserve in southeastern California largely avoided the most interesting question in the case: whether the First Amendment's ban …