Top Items:
Emily Pierce / Roll Call:
Collins Tries to Stop Bunning Filibuster — Senate Republicans sought Tuesday to insulate themselves from the damage caused by Sen. Jim Bunning's (R-Ky.) filibuster of a bill that would extend unemployment and health benefits and highway programs. — Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) …
Discussion:
New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Swampland, pandagon.net, Top of the Ticket, TPMDC and The Washington Independent
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Manu Raju / The Politico:
Bunning's fiscal hardball jams GOP — Fresh off last week's high-profile White House summit, Republicans were eager to continue the health care debate they think they've been winning for months. — Then came Jim Bunning. — The Kentucky GOP senator's unilateral decision to block …
Jordan Fabian / The Hill:
Collins joins Dems in urging Bunning to drop benefits objection — Republican Sen. Susan Collins (Maine) took to the Senate floor Tuesday to try to advance stalled unemployment and COBRA healthcare benefit extensions, but Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) objected again.
McClatchy Washington Bureau:
Who really gets hurt when GOP's Bunning blocks this bill?
Who really gets hurt when GOP's Bunning blocks this bill?
Discussion:
Washington Post, Lexington Herald-Leader, Hotline On Call, Bluegrass Politics, The Sundries Shack, CBS News, New York Times, The Humble Libertarian, Gateway Pundit, The Hill, The Impolitic, Right Wing Nut House, PERRspectives, DownWithTyranny!, Left Coast Rebel, Prairie Weather, Washington Monthly, ourfuture.org/blogs_chrono/*, The Lonely Conservative and WLKY-TV
Jason Horowitz / Washington Post:
Hotheaded Emanuel may be White House voice of reason — Rahm Emanuel is officially a Washington caricature. He's the town's resident leviathan, a bullying, bruising White House chief of staff who is a prime target for the failings of the Obama administration.
Discussion:
AMERICAblog News, msnbc.com, The Atlantic Online, Ezra Klein, Matthew Yglesias, Firedoglake, ATTACKERMAN, Taylor Marsh, The Confluence, Hot Air, New York Magazine, Guardian, Ben Smith's Blog, Commentary, Prairie Weather, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Fix, Grasping Reality …, DISSENTING JUSTICE, Emptywheel, Wonk Room, PostPartisan, The Washington Independent, The Page, Althouse, Jules Crittenden and Gawker
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New York Times:
Obama to Highlight Cost in New Health Bill Push — WASHINGTON — President Obama this week will begin a climactic push to rally restive Congressional Democrats to pass major health care legislation by hammering the argument that the costs of failure will be higher insurance premiums and lost coverage for individuals and businesses.
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
Feel the Kausmentum — With the valuable Glenn Reynolds and Jonah Goldberg endorsements in hand, Mickey Kaus' bid for a Democratic Party primary win is looking more solid than ever. — That said, I'm going to go counter-counterintuitive here and say that if some weird process put Mickey Kaus …
Discussion:
Winds of Change.NET
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Dennis Romero / LA Daily:
CORRECTED: Mickey Kaus Takes Out Papers For U.S. Senate Run — Pioneering political blogger Mickey Kaus took out papers [filed] to run for U.S. Senate in California, he told LA Weekly. The Venice resident said he'll run this year against Barbara Boxer for her seat.
William A. Jacobson / Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion:
Coffee Party Parasites — The New York Times and Washington Post are promoting a group called the “Coffee Party” organized by filmmaker Annabel Park. — The Coffee Party is a political parasite which presents itself as something it is not. As reported in the NY Times [see update below] …
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Kate Zernike / New York Times:
Coffee Party, With a Taste for Civic Participation, Is Added to the Political Menu — Fed up with government gridlock, but put off by the flavor of the Tea Party, people in cities across the country are offering an alternative: the Coffee Party. — Growing through a Facebook page …
Ben Smith / The Politico:
Ford bolts; Zuckerman rises — Harold Ford gave many reasons for his decision not to launch a primary challenge against Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, but he didn't mention a decisive one: The emergence of a richer, stronger center-right challenger whom many of Ford's potential supporters …
Discussion:
Glenn Thrush's Blog, The Caucus, The Daily Caller, Mediaite, The Washington Independent, Top of the Ticket and CNN
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Harold Ford Jr / New York Times:
Why I'm Not Running for the Senate
Why I'm Not Running for the Senate
Discussion:
City Room, Democracy in America, CNN, Mediaite, Vanity Fair, Top of the Ticket, The Reaction, Washington Monthly, USA Today, Crooks and Liars, Indecision Forever, Think Progress, Michael Calderone's Blog, Commentary, OpenSecrets.org, TPM LiveWire, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Atlantic Online, The Eye, The Daily Politics and Open Left
Ben Smith / Ben Smith's Blog:
Health care by Easter? — With AP suggesting that nine “no” Democrats in the House could switch to “yes,” Inside Health Policy has a timeline: — According to [a] Democratic memo, the timeline may be: Step one: The House passes the Senate's health reform bill by March 19.
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Jonathan Cohn / The New Republic:
Memo Outlines Possible Easter Recess Timeline
Memo Outlines Possible Easter Recess Timeline
Discussion:
The Daily Dish, The Hill, Firedoglake, Washington Monthly, The Greenroom and National Review
Orrin Hatch / Washington Post:
Reconciliation on health care would be an assault to the democratic process — America's Founders gave us a system of governance designed to limit government power and maximize liberty. The legislative branch is different from the executive, and the Senate is different from the House.
Discussion:
Bark Bark Woof Woof, The Plum Line, Washington Monthly, Capital Gains and Games blogs, SpeakEasy, Wonk Room and TPMDC
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Scott Collins / Los Angeles Times:
Roger Ebert takes to Twitter to give tea party followers a thumb's down — The film reviewer is aiming barbs at Sarah Palin and other conservatives. — Who's the biggest scourge of the tea party movement these days? It might be film critic Roger Ebert, who lately has been tossing brickbats …
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
THE RESULTS OF THE HCR SUMMIT.... President Obama is scheduled to outline his vision on moving forward with health care reform tomorrow, but today the president wrote to congressional leaders from both parties, explaining several areas of agreement with Republicans.
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Patterico's Pontifications:
Debunking Some Emerging ACORN Liberal Myths — This post debunks several liberal myths about ACORN that have emerged in recent weeks — many from Eric Boehlert of Media Matters and Brad Friedman. — POSING AS PIMP AT ACORN — Liberal Myth: James O'Keefe did not pretend to be a pimp inside ACORN.
Discussion:
Media Matters for America, StarkReports.com, The Jawa Report, pandagon.net and The BRAD BLOG
The Huffington Post:
GOP Sen. Kyl: Unemployment Benefits Make People Not Want To Get A Job — WHAT'S YOUR REACTION? — A debate on the Senate floor Monday over unemployment compensation crystallized, at least for a moment, the divide between the two parties in Washington. — Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona …
Discussion:
Swampland, Don Surber, Washington Monthly, Raw Story, DISSENTING JUSTICE and Economist's View
Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
Another American media failure — In the years after the the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the subsequent failure to find WMD, the American media flagellated itself publicly over its lack of skepticism of Bush administration cassus belli claims. We endured reams of essays about the supine nature …
Ed O'Keefe / Washington Post:
Postal Service expected to announce ‘significant changes’ — The U.S. Postal Service will release projections Tuesday that confirm for the first time the suspicion that mail volume will never return to pre-recession levels. In response, the agency is pushing anew for a dramatic reshaping …
William Wan / Washington Post:
Same-sex marriage leads Catholic Charities to adjust benefits — Employees at Catholic Charities were told Monday that the social services organization is changing its health coverage to avoid offering benefits to same-sex partners of its workers — the latest fallout from a bitter debate …