Sherrod Story False  —  It isn't true.  —  Shirley Sherrod's story in her now famous speech about the lynching of a relative is not true.  The veracity and credibility of the onetime Agriculture Department bureaucrat at the center of the explosive controversy between the NAACP …

Sherrod: “We Must Stop The White Man And His Uncle Toms ...”  —  First, a note of heartfelt appreciation for Joan Walsh of Salon.  Her moving post on Charles Sherrod - in defense of his wife, Shirley - provided the inspiration required to dust off my Google skills.

Tancredo will run for governor as American Constitution Party candidate  —  Republican Tom Tancredo, right, supported Scott McInnis' gubernatorial bid last November.  Now, Tancredo is saying he will run for governor.  (Matt McClain, Special to the Denver Post)

Raw Journolist emails on 'Palin's Downs child'  —  I actually hesitate to bring this up...  But is anyone following this:  —  Adam Serwer  —  Dylan Matthews  —  Obama absolutely cannot touch this.  Even if it's true.  —  I think the press would justify covering it on the issue of trust …

The Right and the Climate  —  Climate change legislation has been dying in the Senate for months now, but Harry Reid's decision to finally admit as much — in the midst of an endless East Coast heat wave, no less — has supporters of cap-and-trade casting about for somebody to blame.

EFF Wins New Legal Protections for Video Artists, Cell Phone Jailbreakers, and Unlockers  —  San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) won three critical exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) anticircumvention provisions today, carving out new legal protections …

Obama slams GOP on Disclose Act  —  President Obama called out Senate Republicans on Monday for holding up a vote on a contentious piece of campaign finance legislation.  —  Senate Democrats plan to vote on cloture for the Disclose Act on Tuesday, though it remains unclear whether they have the 60 votes necessary to end debate.

Tennessee Lt. Gov: Religious Freedom May Not Count For Muslims (VIDEO)  —  Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, currently running third in the state's Republican gubernatorial primary race, says he's not sure if Constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion apply to the followers of the world's second-largest faith, Islam.

The (Possible) Mother of All Battles: What If a Conservative Supreme Court Justice Retires?  —  This is not a prediction.  I don't know how to see into the future, and I've long lamented the besetting journalistic sin of confidently asserting what's going to happen.

Deportation of illegal immigrants increases under Obama administration  —  In a bid to remake the enforcement of federal immigration laws, the Obama administration is deporting record numbers of illegal immigrants and auditing hundreds of businesses that blithely hire undocumented workers.

Why WikiLeaks' War Logs Are No Pentagon Papers  —  The Wikileaks documents on the Afghanistan War have brought suggestions such as this one (from The New York Times, the newspaper that published both) that they represent “the Pentagon Papers of our time.”  Not quite.  —  Here are a few quick thoughts on the analogy:

BP boss Hayward to get immediate £600,000 pension  —  Mr Hayward has been the public face of BP's response to the spill  —  BP chief executive Tony Hayward will get an immediate annual pension worth about £600,000 ($930,000) when he leaves in October, the BBC has learned.

The Care and Feeding of the Liberal Psyche  —  I have a Netroots Nation wrap piece up at The Daily Beast saying that progressive activists are depressed and the White House hasn't done very much to offer the kind of psychic goodies that keep people's spirits up: … My prescription to cure the malaise is Elizabeth Warren:

The Democratic Fisc  —  The White House budget office offers a scorecard on Obamanomics.  —  Democrats have been running Congress for nearly four years, and President Obama has been at the White House for 18 months, so it's not too soon to ask: How's that working out?

Senate hopeful Buck regrets criticism of Tea Party birthers  —  Republican U.S. Senate hopeful Ken Buck called Tea Partyers questioning the authenticity of President Barack Obama's birth certificate “dumba—s” to a Democratic operative recording his comments without his permission.

Rangel: ‘Trauma,’ ‘more alleged violations’  —  After sounding defiant in his first round with reporters just now, embattled Rep. Charles Rangel sounded sad and seemed downcast and somewhat gaslit as he talked about how “traumatic” he had found the experience.

Senate Judiciary GOP wants hearing on alleged DOJ bias  —  Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee have requested a hearing to investigate alleged racial bias within the Department of Justice, according to a letter sent Friday to committee chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.).

What went wrong with stimulus  —  The original stimulus package should've been bigger.  Rep. David Obey, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, says the Treasury Department originally asked for $1.4 trillion.  Sen. Kent Conrad, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, wanted $1.2 trillion.

Senator Barbara Boxer: serving in the military is like being a member of Congress  —  At a campaign event over the weekend in Inglewood, California, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer seemingly equated being a politician to serving in the military — and an Iraq War veteran supporting Boxer's November opponent is calling on her to apologize.

Who Cooked the Planet?  —  Never say that the gods lack a sense of humor.  I bet they're still chuckling on Olympus over the decision to make the first half of 2010 — the year in which all hope of action to limit climate change died — the hottest such stretch on record.

No more ‘me first’ mentality on entitlements  —  The fiscal crisis in Europe has awoken Americans to the enormous challenge we face from entitlements.  The promises our country has made over the past few decades, combined with changing demographics and rising costs, have put us on a path to national insolvency.

McCain On The Iraq War: ‘We Already Won That One’  —  Earlier this month, law professor Marjorie Cohn and Iraq Veterans Against the War board chairman Geoff Millard attended a reception to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the normalization of relations between the U.S. and Vietnam and spoke with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).

More States “Competitive” in Terms of Party Identification  —  Democrats lose ground, while Republicans gain  —  PRINCETON, NJ — More states are politically competitive this year than was the case in 2009, as fewer Americans nationwide identify with the Democratic Party.