memeorandum: Commander in Chief's Appalling Action with Our Troops (Sarah Palin/Facebook)

4:05 PM ET, April 8, 2011

Top Items:

Who Really Wants a Shutdown? — President Obama does, but the GOP's strategy is a lot less clear. — For people who keep saying they don't want a government shutdown, Washington's warring parties are sure acting like they can't wait for it to happen. Since the policy stakes …

Discussion: Washington Examiner, The Caucus, Betsy's Page, neo-neocon, Don Surber, BizzyBlog and The Atlantic Online

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:

Biden gets fed up during spending talks — Vice President Joe Biden got visibly upset during late night White House talks on avoiding a government shutdown. — Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) told reporters Friday morning that Biden doesn't get upset very often …

Discussion: ABCNEWS, NationalJournal.com and Weasel Zippers

Tanya Somanader / ThinkProgress:

Three Anti-Abortion Republicans Tell House GOP To Drop Planned Parenthood Rider To Avoid Shutdown — If Congress fails to reach a budget deal, the government will shut down at midnight tonight — an event that would hinder economic recovery and withhold payment to soldiers.

Discussion: PERRspectives, Outside the Beltway, The Raw Story, NationalJournal.com, Daily Kos, The Reaction and TPMDC

The Politico:

White House hopes last-minute heroics keep government running — Republicans have hit President Barack Obama for being out of touch, disengaged and unwilling to lead on the budget negotiations — and Democrats aren't wild about his taste for last-minute heroics either.

Discussion: msnbc.com, Hot Air, Guardian, The Monkey Cage and TPMDC

Michael O'Brien / The Hill:

GOP senator: Republicans should move on from defunding Planned Parenthood — Republicans should “move on” from insisting on defunding Planned Parenthood in a 2011 spending bill, a Republican senator said Friday. — With less than 24 hours to go until a shutdown, Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) …

Discussion: Firedoglake, TPMDC, Washington Monthly, NewsBusters.org blogs and National Review

Travis Waldron / ThinkProgress:

Defending Riders, Sen. Kyl Falsely Claims 90 Percent Of Planned Parenthood's Services Are For Abortion — With the government mere hours away from shutdown, the budget debate has centered around policy riders that GOP lawmakers insist must be included in any funding bill.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, CBS News, Guardian, The Raw Story, The Nation and ECHIDNE of the snakes

Pat Garofalo / ThinkProgress:
GRAPHIC: Democrats Have Met Republicans More Than Halfway On Spending Cuts

Discussion: Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Bloomberg and Washington Monthly

Ezra Klein / Washington Post:
What Planned Parenthood actually does

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, News Desk, The Nation and AMERICAblog News

Washington Post:
Both parties continue talks over elusive 2011 budget deal

Discussion: TPMDC, The Hill, Runnin' Scared, New York Times, The Hill, Boing Boing, Washington Monthly, Free exchange, Booman Tribune, Taylor Marsh, Wonk Room, Outside the Beltway, White House.gov Blog, GayPatriot, JustOneMinute and AMERICAblog News

Jay Newton-Small / Swampland:
Is This Really All About Abortion?

Discussion: National Review, The Atlantic Online, Mother Jones, CNN and The Politico

Carl Hulse / New York Times:
No Accord in Budget Talks as Policy Fights Hamper Deal

Discussion: The Caucus, Virginian-Pilot, The Hill, The Democratic Daily, Pajamas Media, TPMDC, The Politico, Firedoglake, Washington Monthly, The Hill, The New Republic, Taylor Marsh, Swampland and The Page

New York Times:
Shutdown Near, No Sign of Compromise

Discussion: The Politico, Christianity Today, New York Magazine, Wonkette and Daily Kos

The Politico:
Government shutdown: John Boehner brushes off budget deal talk

Discussion: Pat Dollard

Daniel Strauss / The Hill:
Bachmann wants ‘clean’ bill to fund government for one week

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, Associated Press and The Politico

The Note:
Sen. Schumer: Public Will Blame Boehner for Shutdown

Discussion: PewResearch.org, Ben Smith's Blog, ABCNEWS, Washington Post and George's Bottom Line

Brian Beutler / TPMDC:
Reid's Final Offer To GOP: Drop Planned Parenthood Rider Or Cause A Government Shutdown

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Washington Post, Wonk Room and Talking Points Memo

Meredith Shiner / The Politico:
Senate Democrats plan one-week stopgap

Discussion: Guardian and Daily Kos

Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
Breaking: Budget deal? Update: Not yet; Reid says Planned Parenthood higher priority than funding government

Discussion: NationalJournal.com, The Hill, The Blaze, Weasel Zippers, The Gateway Pundit, The Jawa Report and Pundit & Pundette

Matt Finkelstein / Political Correction RSS:
Sen. Coburn Says House Republicans Should Drop Contentious Riders

Discussion: The Daily Dish and ThinkProgress

Nate Silver / FiveThirtyEight:

Vote-Counting Error In Wisconsin Points to Incompetence, Not Conspiracy — When Kathy Nickolaus, the county clerk in Waukesha County, Wisconsin, spoke to the press on Thursday after revealing that she had failed to count more than 14,000 ballots in the hotly contested state supreme court election …

Discussion: American Thinker, Washington Monthly, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Firedoglake, No More Mister Nice Blog and Moe Lane

Daily Kos:

Why Prosser needed EXACTLY +7500 votes.... In WI, a recount at state-expense is triggered if an election is within .5% if the candidate requests it, and we have a fully verifiable paper trail to audit election results. That means in this election with approximately 740k for Kloppenburg and 739k for Prosser …

Discussion: Seattle Times, Reuters, Pundit Press, Right Wing News, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Booman Tribune, The BRAD BLOG, Brilliant at Breakfast, blue cheddar and JSOnline

Ian Millhiser / ThinkProgress:
Wisconsin Republican County Clerk Claims She Misplaced 7,500 Votes For Justice Prosser, Her Former Boss

Discussion: Guardian, Los Angeles Times and blue cheddar

host.madison.com:
High-profile lawyers retained for possible Supreme Court recount

Discussion: New York Times, TPMDC, Wall Street Journal and Hotline On Call

Amanda Terkel / The Huffington Post:
Wisconsin Election Surprise: David Prosser Gains 7,500 Votes After ‘Human Error’ In Waukesha County (VIDEO)

Discussion: The Foundry, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, Wisconsin Radio Network, host.madison.com, blue cheddar, Liberty Street, Daily Kos and Crooks and Liars

David Brooks / New York Times:

The Ryan Journey — For decades, academics and think tankers have been proposing plans to avert a fiscal catastrophe. The ensuing debates were always sedate, high-minded affairs. Now Republican political leaders have come up with a bold proposal of their own and the atmosphere is totally different.

Discussion: The Incidental Economist, National Review, The New Republic, Mother Jones, Free exchange, Daily Kos and Marginal Revolution

Paul Krugman / New York Times:

Ludicrous and Cruel — Many commentators swooned earlier this week after House Republicans, led by the Budget Committee chairman, Paul Ryan, unveiled their budget proposals. They lavished praise on Mr. Ryan, asserting that his plan set a new standard of fiscal seriousness.

Discussion: Alan Colmes' Liberaland, American Times, National Review, That Mr. G Guy's Blog, News Desk, Lawyers, Guns & Money, Eschaton, ourfuture.org/blogs_chrono/*, Paul Krugman, Whiskey Fire and Yglesias

Ezra Klein / Washington Post:
The Democrats have a plan for controlling health-care costs. Paul Ryan doesn't.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, The Incidental Economist, Mother Jones, CNN, ourfuture.org/blogs_chrono/* and Paul Krugman

Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
Dissents Of The Day — The in-tray is still bulging with fury over Paul Ryan.

Discussion: The Incidental Economist, Balloon Juice and No More Mister Nice Blog

The Star-Ledger Editorial Page:

Christie takes a cheap shot at Springsteen — He can't help himself, our governor. In less than a year and a half, he's demonized more people than the Salem witch trials — if they had been run by Judge Judy: Democrats. Teachers. Superintendents. Public workers. State Supreme Court justices.

Discussion: Eschaton

Dan Joseph / CNSNews:

Rep. Louise Slaughter: GOP Freshmen Came to Washington ‘To Kill Women’ — (CNSNews.com) - Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) said today that the new Republicans elected to the House of Representatives last November came to Congress “to kill women.” She also likened Republican efforts …

Discussion: LifeNews.com, The Politico, msnbc.com, Sister Toldjah, Pajamas Media, Moonbattery, NewsBusters.org blogs, The Lonely Conservative, Verum Serum, Raw Replay and Pirate's Cove

Sarah Palin / Facebook:

Commander in Chief's Appalling Action with Our Troops — Yesterday the House passed H.R. 1363, which funds our Department of Defense and our military for the rest of the year at their current levels. It allows for the continuation of current military operations, which is pretty important when you're fighting three wars.

Discussion: Cubachi, GOP 12 and The Gateway Pundit

Kevin Drum / Mother Jones:

Paying for What We Get — Andrew Sullivan writes today that healthcare costs are skyrocketing and there are basically two way to rein them in: … I think half of this is right, but the other half betrays a fundamental (though common) misconception about how politics actually works.

Discussion: Yglesias and The Incidental Economist

Andrew Sullivan / The Daily Dish:
Rationing One Way Or Another

Discussion: The Atlantic Online and The Politico

Patricia Sellers / Fortune:

Cathie Black vows to come back: “I'm a warrior” — Few career falls are as swift and spectacular as Cathie Black's. — It took just 95 days for the former boss of Hearst Magazines — and alum of the Fortune Most Powerful Women list — to get ousted as chancellor of New York City public schools.

Discussion: Ben Smith's Blog and Runnin' Scared

David Brody / The Brody File:

Brody File Exclusive: Donald Trump Explains Pro-Life Conversion — In an exclusive interview with The Brody File, Donald Trump explains why he changed his view from pro-choice to pro-life. — He says one of the main reasons was because one of his close personal friends chose to keep his child rather than have an abortion.

Discussion: LifeNews.com, GOP 12 and National Review

G-A-Y / Good As You:

G-A-Y Exclusive: National Organization For Marriage tour organizer/Facebook moderator does startling about-face; Exposure to NOM could lead to unintended side effects — Louis Marinelli first came on our radar late last spring, when he started Tweeting under the name “NOMUpdates”: