memeorandum: Samuelson on the fake debate on the public health plan (Robert J. Samuelson/Washington Post)

5:55 PM ET, October 26, 2009

Top Items:

Senate on Verge of Health Bill — Measure With Stiffer Penalties on Employers and Public Plan Could Come This Week — WASHINGTON — Top Senate Democrats are close to finalizing their health bill and could unveil a measure as soon as early this week that would include stiffer penalties …

Discussion: msnbc.com, The Politico, CBS News, The Hill, TPMDC, AmSpecBlog, Open Congress, Washington Post, USA Today, The Foundry, Politics Daily, Open Left, Wonk Room, Salon, The Corner on National …, Donklephant, The Daily Dish and Firedoglake

Glenn Thrush / Glenn Thrush's Blog:

Reid announces push for public option — Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced this afternoon that he plans to push ahead with a public health insurance option that includes an opt-out provision for states - even though he's currently short several votes for passage, according to people close to the situation.

Matt Sedensky / Associated Press:
Pelosi: Health care ‘public option’ needs new name

Discussion: Townhall.com and Verum Serum

Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:
Lincoln Non-Committal On Reid Plan For Public Option With Opt-Out

Discussion: CBS News, Washington Monthly, Michelle Malkin and Open Left

David M. Herszenhorn / Prescriptions:
Senator Reid Announces ‘Opt-Out’ Public Plan

Discussion: The Note, The Atlantic Politics Channel, The Politico, The Hill, New York Times, The Agonist, The Washington Independent and The Page

Brian Beutler / TPMDC:
Over White House Skepticism, Reid Likely To Go The Opt Out Route

Discussion: Firedoglake, TalkLeft, The Anonymous Liberal, The Plum Line, The New Republic, Bob Cesca's Awesome Blog!, Raw Story and Ben Smith's Blog

Jonathan Cohn / The New Republic:
Senate Dems to Obama: Um, a Little Help Here?

Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
SENATE REFORM BILL EARNS PLAUDITS.... Now that a Senate health care bill …

Discussion: Wonkette and TPMDC

Shailagh Murray / Capitol Briefing:
Reid says he will bring a health-care bill with public option

Discussion: Commentary

CNN:
Aide: Reid likely to include public option in Senate health care bill

Discussion: The Swamp, Washington Monthly, Open Left, Daily Kos, Congress Matters, Wonk Room, ABCNEWS and The Hill

Ezra Klein:
Congress tiring of reading the White House's tea leaves on the public option

Discussion: White House.gov Blog Feed, The Politico and MyDD

Club for Growth:

CFG Poll: Hoffman Leading in NY-23 — Hoffman Surges Into Lead in NY-23 — New CFG Poll shows Hoffman 31.3%, Owens 27.0%, Scozzafava 19.7% — Washington - A poll released today by the Club for Growth shows Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman surging into the lead in the special election …

Discussion: The Fix, Real Clear Politics, Hot Air, Michelle Malkin, Scorecard's Blog, Weekly Standard, FiveThirtyEight, The Other McCain, AmSpecBlog, The Washington Independent, Donklephant, American Spectator, Gateway Pundit, The Hill and TPMDC

Lydia Saad / Gallup:

Conservatives Maintain Edge as Top Ideological Group — Compared with 2008, more Americans “conservative” in general, and on issues — PRINCETON, NJ — Conservatives continue to outnumber moderates and liberals in the American populace in 2009, confirming a finding that Gallup first noted in June.

Discussion: Commentary, Washington Wire, The Caucus, The New Republic, Gateway Pundit, YID With LID, Erick's blog, Jules Crittenden, Donklephant, The Fix, Althouse, Newsweek Blogs and Politics Daily

Erick Erickson / Erick's blog:

REDSTATE EXCLUSIVE: Tim Pawlenty Endorses Doug Hoffman — With polling now showing NY-23 has come down to a two man race between Hoffman and Owens, the Democrat, momentum is clearly in Hoffman's favor. — Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota is now adding to the momentum becoming the first sitting Republican Governor to endorse Hoffman.

Discussion: NewsMax.com, CNN, The Atlantic Politics Channel, The Note, Hot Air, Salon, The Washington Independent, Conservatives4Palin.com, Real Clear Politics and American Thinker

Andy Barr / The Politico:

Newt: Hoffman support a ‘mistake’ — Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is warning conservative activists that their support for a third-party candidate in a key upcoming New York special election is a “mistake.” — In a video captured last week and posted on YouTube Friday …

Discussion: The Hill, National Review, Riehl World View, American Tory, Don Surber, American Power and The Other McCain

Reid Wilson / The Hill:
Pawlenty bucks GOP, endorses Hoffman

Discussion: RedState

Daniel Tencer / Raw Story:

RNC keeps racist pics on Facebook for nearly a week — Perhaps no one noticed. Perhaps no one cared. But hours after a liberal news forum brought attention to a series of days old controversial photos on the Republican National Committee's Facebook page, the photos were finally taken down.

Discussion: Media Matters Action Network, Think Progress, Mediaite and The Reaction

Jon Meacham / Newsweek:

The Great American Ideological Crackup — From the magazine issue dated Nov 2, 2009 — Shortly after the 2004 presidential election, I was chatting with a senior figure in the Democratic Party when, inevitably, the talk turned to why John Kerry had lost.

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog, Michael Calderone's Blog, American Power and Mediaite

Matea Gold / Los Angeles Times:
Fox News relishes Obama administration scorn

Discussion: Wizbang

The Politico:
Chamber: W.H. attacks are backfiring

Discussion: NY Daily News, Washington Post, MoJo Blog Posts, Daily Kos and Think Progress

Robert J. Samuelson / Washington Post:

Samuelson on the fake debate on the public health plan — In the health-care debate, the “public plan” is all things to all people. For supporters, it would discipline greedy private insurers and make health-care coverage affordable. For detractors, it's a way station on the path …

Discussion: Verum Serum, The Glittering Eye, Hit & Run, The Foundry and Betsy's Page

The White House: Missing the Boat on Cost Containment

Fred Hiatt / Washington Post:
Hiatt on the public option — Talk cloaks political inaction

Discussion: Obsidian Wings, The New Republic, Betsy's Page, JustOneMinute and Commentary

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:

CNN Drops to Last Place Among Cable News Networks — CNN, which invented the cable news network more than two decades ago, will hit a new competitive low with its prime-time programs in October, finishing fourth - and last - among the cable news networks with the audience that all the networks rely on for their advertising.

Discussion: The Daily Dish, Michael Calderone's Blog, DailyFinance, Politics Daily and TVNewser

Patrick Gavin / The Politico:

PRESIDENT OBAMA TIES GEORGE W. BUSH ON GOLF — President Barack Obama has only been in office for just over nine months, but he's already hit the links as much as President Bush did in over two years. — CBS' Mark Knoller — an unofficial documentarian and statistician of all things White House-related …

Discussion: Sister Toldjah, Mediaite, Althouse, The Swamp, Hot Air, The Jawa Report, NewsBusters.org and Outside The Beltway

Wolf Blitzerand / New York Post:

Anchors sink on ‘Jeopardy’ — CNN should consider banning its anchors from appearing on “Celebrity Jeopardy” after the humiliating defeats of — Soledad O'Brien. Wolf was blitzed last month, coming in last with minus-$4,600, behind comic — Andy Richter, a past winner who racked up $68,000 for charity.

Discussion: Michelle Malkin, JammieWearingFool and TVNewser

Seth Borenstein / Associated Press:

AP IMPACT: Statisticians reject global cooling — WASHINGTON — Have you heard that the world is now cooling instead of warming? You may have seen some news reports on the Internet or heard about it from a provocative new book. — Only one problem: It's not true, according to an analysis …

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Climate Progress

Political Punch:

NOW President on President Obama's All-Male Athletic Outings: 'It's Troubling' — We asked Terry O'Neill, the new president of the National Organization for Women, what she thought of those Democratic women and others quietly complaining about a “boy's club” atmosphere at the White House …

Discussion: Don Surber, Washington Post, THE WEEK News & Opinion, Lynn Sweet, Real Clear Politics and Outside The Beltway

Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:

The Importance of Being Earnest — Howard Fineman thinks Barack Obama is spending too much time on Olympia Snowe. He also says: … Why would you say someone is earnest “despite” a habit of quoting Longfellow? That seems like a very earnest thing to do. And are earnest people really generally likable?

Discussion: Ezra Klein

Newsweek:
Obama's pointless bipartisanship.

Discussion: The Nation, HorseRaceBlog and Taegan Goddard's …

New York Post:

Andy warns Rudy: Psst! I'm running — Andrew Cuomo has secretly notified Rudy Giuliani that he will run for governor next year, The Post has learned. — The confidential message, conveyed through intermediaries, was delivered to Giuliani recently and is expected to play a central role …

Discussion: msnbc.com and The Hill

Michael Crowley / New York Magazine:
The Indecider

Discussion: JSOnline and Des Moines Register

Tom Jensen / Public Policy Polling:

New Jersey Poll Preview — Some folks thought it was a little odd when Chris Christie went on the air with negative ads against independent candidate Chris Daggett a few weeks ago but it seems to have been a good idea. — Two weeks ago Daggett's fav/unfav was 30/24. Now it's 31/36.

Discussion: Taegan Goddard's …

Bruce Drake / Politics Daily: New Poll Shows Corzine With Comfortable Lead in N.J.

Washington Post:

U.S. tested 2 Afghan scenarios in war game — Obama and advisers evaluating exercise that used different troop levels — The Pentagon's top military officer oversaw a secret war game this month to evaluate the two primary military options that have been put forward by the Pentagon …

Discussion: Guardian, dot.comments, DownWithTyranny!, Cato @ Liberty, Fox News, Politics Daily, ATTACKERMAN, BLACKFIVE and The Washington Independent

Editor and Publisher:

Top 25 Daily Newspapers in New FAS-FAX — NEW YORK Here are the top 25 newspapers in the country ranked by daily (Monday-Friday) circulation for the six months ending September 2009 from the Audit Bureau of Circulations. The percent change compares the same six-month period ending September 2008.

Discussion: The Atlantic Business Channel, The Field on the Narcosphere, Michael Calderone's Blog and Philly.com

Paul Krugman / New York Times:

After Reform Passes — So, how well will health reform work after it passes? — There's a part of me that can't believe I'm asking that question. After all, serious health reform has long seemed like an impossible dream. And it could yet go all wrong.

Discussion: Washington Post, New Deal 2.0, The Atlantic Politics Channel, DailyHowler.com, Greg's Opinion and Ezra Klein