Debt-Limit Harakiri  —  Mitch McConnell isn't selling out Republicans.  —  Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell said yesterday he's concluded that no deal to raise the debt ceiling in return for serious spending restraint is possible with President Obama, and who can blame him?

One by one, bars get tapped out  —  Hundreds of bars, restaurants and stores across Minnesota are running out of beer and alcohol and others may soon run out of cigarettes — a subtle and largely unforeseen consequence of a state government shutdown.  —  In the days leading up to the shutdown …

No yelling at Obama today  —  Carney reminded journalists, “I used to be where you are, and I used to ask questions.”  —  AP Photo  —  A long-running tiff between the White House press corps and the West Wing over presidential access flared anew today when press secretary Jay Carney faced off …

Body of Leiby Kletzky, missing 8-year-old boy, found dismembered; pieces in Dumpster, refrigerator  —  The body parts of a missing 8-year-old Brooklyn boy were found Wednesday in a Dumpster and the refrigerator of a man suspected in his disappearance, police said.

Mitch McConnell: We Must Rewrite The Constitution Because ‘Elections’ Haven't ‘Worked’  —  Speaking on the Senate floor this morning, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) offered what may be the most concise summary of conservative constitutionalism ever spoken …

GOPer wants FBI probe of Rupert Murdoch  —  New York Republican Pete King is calling on the FBI to investigate whether Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation hacked into the voicemail accounts of Sept. 11 victims, calling the allegations of the scandal “disgraceful.”

Romney, Johnson Reject Anti-Gay-Marriage Pledge  —  Bob Vander Plaats, an influential Iowa conservative who unveiled his anti-gay-marriage pledge last week, may have gone too far. … Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney outright rejected the “Marriage Vow” written by Mr. Vander Plaats and his advocacy group, The Family Leader.

Austrian driver's religious headgear strains credulity  —  Having received his driving licence, Niko Alm now wants to get pastafarianism officially recognised  —  An Austrian atheist has won the right to be shown on his driving-licence photo wearing a pasta strainer as “religious headgear”.

Palin nemesis goes nude  —  GOP presidential hopeful Sarah Palin and her family are the subjects of a profile by George Gurley in the September issue of Playboy, according to sources.  Insiders say the story will run next to a four-page nude pictorial of Mercede Johnston, the sister of Bristol Palin's estranged baby daddy, Levi.

BELTWAY CONFIDENTIAL  —  Washington gets $200 billion a month, Social Security costs $50 billion a month, and Obama is threatening to starve Grandma?  —  President Obama told CBS News today that he “cannot guarantee that those [Social Security] checks go out on August 3rd if we haven't resolved this issue.

Police charge mother in Nashville airport altercation  —  Woman refused to let officers screen daughter  —  A 41-year-old Clarksville woman was arrested after Nashville airport authorities say she was belligerent and verbally abusive to security officers, refusing for her daughter to be patted down at a security checkpoint.

Rick Perry's Confederate past  —  Rick Perry made national headlines in 2009 when, during a speech to a Tea Party group, he floated the possibility that Texas could secede from the union.  But the governor's substantive ties to the neo-Confederate movement may be deeper than previously known.

Laughably bogus poll tries to ‘prove’ Obama is losing Jewish support  —  Republicans are touting yet another poll that purports to predict the end of the Jewish allegiance to the Democratic Party.  Citing a new poll by Republican John McLaughlin and Pat Caddell, the GOP's favorite “Democrat …

Prosecute News Corp.  —  The U.S. government should go after Murdoch's media company for its corrupt practices and revoke its TV licenses if it's found guilty.  —  Bribery, illegal wiretapping, interference in a murder investigation, political blackmail, and rampant disregard for both the truth and basic decency.

Mumbai: Explosions shake India's financial hub  —  Police told local media that eight people had been killed and more than 100 wounded.  —  One explosion was reported in the Zaveri Bazaar, another in the Opera House business district and a third in Dadar district.

Pessimism deepens as economic concerns rise: Reuters/Ipsos poll  —  (Reuters) - Americans are deeply pessimistic about the future as economic concerns rise and White House talks on raising the U.S. debt limit sputter, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday.

Tea party members tackle a new issue: manatees  —  Everybody knows what the tea party members oppose.  High taxes.  Big government.  Obama's health care plan.  High-speed rail.  —  Now, for at least some local tea party members, there's one more to add: manatee protection.

Arabs Not So Hot On Obama, U.S.  —  James Zogby's Arab American Institute has some bad news for the Obama administration regarding its outreach to the Muslim world, finding that the U.S.' approval is “ lower than at the end of the Bush Administration, and lower than Iran's favorable ratings.”

6 fake Democrats fall, setting stage for GOP recalls  —  Six fake Democratic candidates put up by the Republican Party to buy time for Republican state senators subject to recalls accomplished that job Tuesday, but none of them did the unexpected and knocked off a real Democrat.

Katie Pavlich Operation Fast and Furious: Designed to Promote Gun Control  —  “Internal ATF emails seem to suggest that ATF agents were counseled to highlight a link between criminals and certain semi-automatic weapons in order to bolster a case for a rule like the one the DOJ announced yesterday [Monday].”

Settled in Albany, Gay Marriage Draws Opposition  —  Laura L. Fotusky, the town clerk in Barker, N.Y., a small community north of Binghamton, looked at the calendar, looked at her Bible and knew what she had to do.  —  She drafted a letter to the Town Board and said she would resign on July 21 …

Did the CIA Really Use Fake Vaccinations to Get bin Laden?  —  I had no intention of getting into this, with so many other meat-and-potatoes topics backed up — the rise of debt, the fall of Murdoch, technology, airplanes, Chinese troubles, the historical role of McConnell and Cantor, you name it.