memeorandum: Obama's Defense — Jann Wenner reports in Rolling Stone today … (Kevin Drum/Mother Jones)

6:00 PM ET, September 28, 2010

Top Items:

Jann S. Wenner / Rolling Stone:

Obama in Command: The Rolling Stone Interview — In an Oval Office interview, the president discusses the Tea Party, the war, the economy and what's at stake this November — The following is an article from the October 15, 2010 issue of Rolling Stone. — We arrived at the southwest gate …

Alexander Mooney / CNN:

Obama: Fox News is ‘destructive’ to America — (CNN) - President Obama is pulling no punches when it comes to Fox News, declaring the cable news outlet to be “destructive to [America's] long-term growth.” — In a more than 8,000-word interview with Rolling Stone Magazine …

Discussion: The Politico, Washington Monthly, Doug Ross, PostPartisan, Weasel Zippers, Pajamas Media, Ben Smith's Blog and GayPatriot

The FOX Nation:

President of the United States Loves Gangsta Rap — From Rolling Stone: … My iPod now has about 2,000 songs, and it is a source of great pleasure to me. I am probably still more heavily weighted toward the music of my childhood than I am the new stuff.

Discussion: Althouse, Swampland, Gawker, The New Republic and Marbury

Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:

A PASSIONATE PLEA.... President Obama sat down with Rolling Stone's Jann Wenner and Eric Bates two weeks ago, chatting for an hour and a quarter for a new cover story. The discussion covered a lot of ground, and led to some fascinating exchanges on subjects ranging from Fox News to Tea Partiers, health care to global warming.

Discussion: Rolling Stone, Mediaite, TalkLeft, Wonk Room, Political Punch, CNN, Frank Chow: Asian and Wonkette

Kevin Drum / Mother Jones:
Obama's Defense — Jann Wenner reports in Rolling Stone today …

Discussion: Salon and TalkLeft, more at Mediagazer »

Tedsliver / CBS News:
Obama: Democratic Voter Apathy “Inexcusable”

Discussion: ECHIDNE of the snakes, Weasel Zippers, Creative Minority Report, TalkLeft, The Daily Caller, Pundit & Pundette and Politics Daily

Laurie Goodstein / New York Times:

Basic Religion Test Stumps Many Americans — Americans are by all measures a deeply religious people, but they are also deeply ignorant about religion. — Researchers from the independent Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life phoned more than 3,400 Americans and asked them 32 questions about the Bible …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, Tablet Magazine, Online NewsHour, CNN, Verum Serum, Pharyngula, Gawker, Mediaite, New York Magazine and Prairie Weather

Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life:

U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey — Executive Summary — Atheists and agnostics, Jews and Mormons are among the highest-scoring groups on a new survey of religious knowledge, outperforming evangelical Protestants, mainline Protestants and Catholics on questions about the core teachings …

Discussion: Matthew Yglesias, features.pewforum.org, Runnin' Scared, The Volokh Conspiracy, The League of Ordinary …, EconLog, CNN, Weasel Zippers, Shakesville, Telegraph, Politics Daily, Pam's House Blend, Advocate and USA Today

Jamelle Bouie / American Prospect: Nonbelievers, Privilege, and Religious Knowledge.

Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life:
Nonreligious Knowledge

Discussion: The Political Carnival and msnbc.com

Manu Raju / The Politico:

DeMint vows roadblock — South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint warned Monday evening that he would block all legislation that has not been cleared by his office in the final days of the pre-election session. — Bret Bernhardt, DeMint's chief of staff, said in an e-mail to GOP aides that his boss …

Discussion: CNN, Ezra Klein, Firedoglake, Open Congress, Opinion L.A., Oliver Willis, Outside the Beltway, Free exchange, Alan Colmes' Liberaland and Washington Monthly

Ian M. / Think Progress:

DeMint To Trigger The Senate's Doomsday Device — Two weeks ago, the Progress Report warned of a nightmare scenario where a single senator decides to object to virtually every measure being considered by the Senate, a maneuver could effectively bring the entire body to a screeching halt.

Discussion: Matthew Yglesias, Center for American Progress, Wonkette, Blue Gal and Weasel Zippers

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:

Democrats to stuff 20 bills into post-election lame-duck session — Democrats are considering cramming as many as 20 pieces of legislation into the lame-duck session they plan to hold after the Nov. 2 election. — The array of bills competing for floor time shows the sense …

Discussion: AMERICAblog Gay, Doug Ross, The Sundries Shack, Right Wing News, Wake up America, AMERICAblog News and NRSC

Ezra Klein:
Did Jim DeMint just take control of the Senate?

Discussion: Weigel

Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:

Another Christine O'Donnell embellishment: She misleadingly claims she studied at Oxford — In another move that will raise further questions about Christine O'Donnell's embellishment of her education record, she claims she studied at the University of Oxford — but a look at her actual record shows …

Discussion: Think Progress, The Atlantic Online, TPMDC, Guardian, Mediaite, Talking Points Memo, Mock, Paper, Scissors, Washington Monthly, Outside the Beltway, Little Green Footballs, Wonkette, Daily Kos, New York Magazine and msnbc.com

Quinnipiac University:

Angry Voters Push McMahon Closer In Senate Race, Quinnipiac University Connecticut Poll Finds; But Most Voters Say Her Ads Are Annoying — Propelled by Connecticut likely voters who say they are “angry” with government, former wrestling executive Linda McMahon, the Republican U.S. Senate candidate …

Greg Sargent / The Plum Line:

Dear White House: Here's how to handle the left's “whining” — I had planned to avoid the whole battle over Joe Biden's demand that the Democratic base “stop whining,” because it's impossible to wade into this topic without getting caught up in a food fight over whether Obama and Dems …

Discussion: Ezra Klein, Emptywheel, Eschaton, Pam's House Blend and The Agonist

Peter Daou:
How a handful of liberal bloggers are bringing down the Obama presidency

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Crooks and Liars, George's Bottom Line, Shakesville, HillBuzz, New York Times, MyDD, Pajamas Media, New York Times, New York Magazine, Firedoglake, Suburban Guerrilla, The Confluence, Taylor Marsh, Indecision Forever, Althouse, Scared Monkeys and No More Mister Nice Blog

Kendra Marr / The Politico:
President Obama: 'I'm a Christian by choice'

Discussion: Ben Smith's Blog and The Plum Line

FactCheck.org:

Rep. Grayson Lowers the Bar — The Florida Democrat manipulates video to make his opponent seem to urge wives to ‘submit’ to husbands. He didn't. — We thought Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida reached a low point when he falsely accused his opponent of being a draft dodger during the Vietnam War …

Andy Barr / The Politico:
Rep. Alan Grayson's ‘Taliban’ ad backfires

Discussion: Hullabaloo, TalkLeft and iOwnTheWorld.com

Allan Hall / Telegraph:

First World War officially ends — The First World War will officially end on Sunday, 92 years after the guns fell silent, when Germany pays off the last chunk of reparations imposed on it by the Allies. — The final payment of £59.5 million, writes off the crippling debt …

Discussion: newsfeed.time.com, Cato @ Liberty, Wonkette and Outside the Beltway

Robert Weisman / Boston Globe:

Harvard Pilgrim cancels Medicare Advantage plan — Harvard Pilgrim Health Care has notified customers that it will drop its Medicare Advantage health insurance program at the end of the year, forcing 22,000 senior citizens in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine to seek alternative supplemental coverage.

Discussion: Weekly Standard, Questions and Observations, The Apothecary, AmSpecBlog and The Incidental Economist

Sky News:

Multi-Attack Terror Plot On European Cities — Alex Watts, Sky News Online — Intelligence agencies have intercepted a terror plot to launch Mumbai-style attacks on Britain and other European countries, according to Sky News sources. — Sky's foreign affairs editor Tim Marshall …

Discussion: The Jawa Report and Weasel Zippers

Chris Stirewalt / Fox News:

Fox News Polls: Democrats Face Tough Job Building Senate Firewall — When President Obama arrives in Wisconsin for a campus rally on Tuesday, he'll be visiting a state where his party and his policies are in big trouble with voters. — Democrats are hoping to build a firewall with cash infusions …

Discussion: FoxNews.com, The Spot, TPMDC and Taegan Goddard's …

The Politico:

GOP pushes for Charlie Rangel, Maxine Waters trials — In an extraordinary public statement, all five Republican members of the House ethics committee are calling on Democrats to schedule ethics trials for Reps. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) before the November elections.

Discussion: CNN and Swampland

TechCrunch:

Tim Armstrong: We Got TechCrunch! — I'm very pleased to announce that we have acquired TechCrunch. Details are in the press release below, and I'm sure founder Michael Arrington will have a few words to say as well. This is a great complement to our continued investment in world class content.

Discussion: Hillicon Valley, Runnin' Scared, Silicon Alley Insider and GigaOM, more at Mediagazer »

Thomas Beaumont / Des Moines Register:

Iowa Poll: Likely voters give Obama poor marks — President Barack Obama is scheduled to return today to Iowa, where a new Des Moines Register Iowa Poll shows a solid majority of likely voters disapprove of his performance. — The first-term Democrat will not be campaigning …

Discussion: The Fix, Real Clear Politics, CNN and The Page

Timothy Noah / Slate:

Why income distribution can't be crowd-sourced. — Earlier this month I published a 10-part Slate series (PDF; serial version; slide show) about the 30-year rise in income inequality that Princeton's Paul Krugman has dubbed “The Great Divergence.” In the first installment, I noted that in 1915 …

Discussion: National Review, Matthew Yglesias and ourfuture.org/blogs_chrono/*

Michael O'Brien / The Hill:

Pelosi: ‘I fully expect to be speaker of the House five weeks from now’ — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she still expects to have her job in five weeks after voters head to the polls. — Pelosi, the top Democrat in the House, whose job as speaker makes her third in line to the presidency …

Discussion: CNN, The Politico, Media Decoder, The Atlantic Online and Weasel Zippers

Annys Shin / Story Lab:

Charges dismissed against Md. man who taped traffic stop — A Harford County Circuit Court judge Monday dismissed wiretapping charges against Anthony Graber, a motorcyclist who was jailed briefly after he taped a Maryland state trooper who stopped him for speeding on I-95.

Discussion: Instapundit and The Agonist

Pamela Geller / Atlas Shrugs:

FOX Business: Hate Sponsor CAIR on Steroids, Waterboy Bob Beckel Squeal and the Ground Zero Mosque — I have been doing a lot of media, and Atlas readers are well aware of the campaign of destruction of freedom defenders by the leftist/Islamic machine. — Tonight's Ground Zero mosque segment …

Discussion: YID With LID, Right Wing News, Mediaite, Weasel Zippers, Israpundit, Big Journalism, Pajamas Media and NewsBusters.org

Threat Level:

Unpublished Iraq War Logs Trigger Internal WikiLeaks Revolt — A domino chain of resignations at the secret-spilling site WikiLeaks followed a unilateral decision by autocratic founder Julian Assange to schedule an October release of 392,000 classified U.S. documents from the war in Iraq, according to former WikiLeaks staffers.

Discussion: ReadWriteWeb and Little Green Footballs

Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:

Pity the Northeast Corridor — If the Boston-to-Washington megalopolis were its own country it would have over five times the population of Sweden and a population density higher than any European country. In other words, nobody woud say it was an area unsuited to intercity passenger rail.

Discussion: Economix