To Hell with You People  —  Look, I am past exhausted talking about liberal media bias.  It's real, we all know it, and people who deny it aren't even fooling themselves.  But some things just have to be pointed out.  This morning I watched the first 15 minutes of the Today Show.

Pelosi: My Deficit Committee Members Will Oppose All Entitlement Benefit Cuts  —  The debt limit fight is over, but the fight over entitlement programs will continue for months.  In the weeks ahead, the leaders of both parties in both the House and Senate will name three members each …

Saving Matt Damon  —  Many conservatives think of Matt Damon as another stuck-on-himself multi-millionaire liberal in Hollywood who says one thing but lives otherwise.  —  But I think of him as a friend of Ben Affleck, who is married to Jennifer Garner, who grew up in Charleston, West Virginia …

Moody's, Fitch Affirm U.S. Ratings While Warning of Downgrades  —  Moody's Investors Service and Fitch Ratings affirmed their AAA credit ratings for the U.S. while warning that the ratings could be downgraded if lawmakers fail to enact debt reduction measures and the economy weakens.

Who gains from debt deal?  The Pentagon, for one  —  WASHINGTON — The last-minute deal that Congress is considering to raise the federal debt limit probably will mean trillions of dollars in government spending reductions for most agencies.  But one department stands to gain: the Pentagon.

Woodpecker-Saving Daughter Costs Mom $500, Possible Jail Time  —  “I've just always loved animals,” said Skylar Capo.  “I couldn't stand to watch it be eaten.”  —  Skylar couldn't find the woodpecker's mother, so she brought it to her own mother, Alison Capo, who agreed to take it home.

GOP winning the larger argument over government  —  In recent days, the debt ceiling deal — which just passed the Senate and is about to be signed by the President — has sparked a fair amount of handwringing among liberals who worry that the fight shows the left has lost the larger argument …

Rachel Maddow Extends MSNBC Contract (Exclusive) … MSNBC has extended Rachel Maddow's contract in a new multi-year deal that will keep the primetime host at the cable news network well beyond the 2012 presidential election.  —  The announcement is expected to come Tuesday at the network's portion …

Moderate Senate Dems prepare a balanced budget amendment  —  One of the big victories by tea-party Republicans in the debt-ceiling measure signed into law Tuesday was securing a requirement that Congress vote later this year on a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.

Fiscal Conservatives Barred from Supercommittee  —  Will Senate Republicans be able to prevent tax hikes?  —  The debt ceiling deal will pass the Senate early this afternoon.  No suspense there.  But the vote will be worth watching for another reason: Three Republican Senate sources tell TWS …

Dow Plunges 265 Points  —  Stocks plunged amid worries over the state of the economy, pushing the market to its longest losing streak in nearly three years and sending the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index to a 2011 closing low.  —  The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled 265.87 points, or 2.2%, to 11866.62.

Virginia Republican Numbers  —In another sign of his strength as he prepares to enter the Presidential race Rick Perry leads the Republican field in Virginia, pointing to the possibility for him to be a very strong candidate particularly in the South.  He gets 20% to 16% for Mitt Romney …

CNN/ORC Poll: Most Americans dislike debt deal, think lawmakers acted like ‘spoiled children’  —  (CNN) - A majority of Americans disapprove of the deal struck Sunday by President Barack Obama and congressional leaders that will raise the country's legal borrowing limit …

Bush lawyers advising Romney  —  Mitt Romney is mining the George W. Bush White House for legal talent to advise his presidential campaign — including a key person behind the controversial Justice Department memos authorizing waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

Spain and Italy rush to quell fresh crisis  —  By Richard Milne in London and Victor Mallet in Madrid  —  Spanish and Italian politicians rushed to formulate a fresh response to the debt crisis engulfing their two countries as their borrowing costs hit new euro-era highs on Tuesday.

Joe Lieberman Says U.S. Should Cut Social Security To Pay For Fighting ‘The Islamist Extremists’  —  This past April, right-wing war hawk John Bolton suggested during an interview on Fox News that the United States should cut Social Security and Medicare to finance the defense budget.

Debt ceiling cost to taxpayers: $1.7 billion  —  NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The debt ceiling debacle has just cost U.S. taxpayers more than $1.7 billion.  —  That's the amount of additional interest the government had to pay investors Monday to sell Treasury bills that finance its operations.

Gingrich slams Obama's “Paul Krugman presidency”  —  Newt Gingrich invokes the liberal economist and New York Times columnist.

What Obama Forgot About Change in Washington  —  So after all that, what did we get, really?  — $91 billion a year in promised cuts for 10 years.  That's about 6% of last year's federal budget, and it is subject to approval by future Congresses.  This is evocative of what happened in 1981 …

Iran Nuclear Program  —  Related articles, background features and opinions about this topic.  —  Sabotaging Iran's Nuclear Program  —  Mossad Behind Tehran Assassinations, Says Source  —  The funeral of Darioush Rezaei on July 24.  Mossad has been blamed for the killing.

Tooth Fairy cutbacks: Economy at root  —  (CNN) — Getting the Tooth Fairy to pony up in this sagging economy has been like pulling teeth.  —  A recent survey found that the national going rate has seen a 40-cent decline this year: From $3 to $2.60.  —  What's worse?

For lesson in shared sacrifice, send Congress to boot camp  —  Editor's note: Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré commanded the military response to Hurricane Katrina.  He retired from the U.S. Army in 2008 after 37 years, sits on the board of the Stevenson Disaster Management Institute …

Stocks Slump More Than 2% Despite Debt Vote  —  A Senate vote to pass the debt ceiling plan on Tuesday may have averted the potential for the United States to default on its obligations, but it failed to lift investors' spirits.  The Dow Jones industrial average slumped 266 points by the close of trading …