memeorandum: Lawmakers get tentative deal on payroll tax, jobless benefits (Reuters)

11:25 AM ET, February 15, 2012

Top Items:

Here's Romney's Plan To Take Out Santorum — A brutal, two-front attack from the campaign and the SuperPAC. “The expectation is that Santorum, just given his personality, is going to whine like crazy,” said a Romney advisor — Santorum at the Conservative Political Action Conference last week.

Brian Montopoli / CBS News:

Poll: Obama holds edge over GOP hopefuls — CBS News Poll analysis by the CBS News Polling Unit: Sarah Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Fred Backus and Anthony Salvanto. — President Obama holds a significant lead over each of his potential Republican opponents in the general election …

Discussion: CBS News, The Caucus, American Spectator, THEROOT.COM, Swampland, Daily Kos, americanthinker.com, American Power, Ricochet Conversations Feed, US Politics, THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS and ThinkProgress

Wall Street Journal:

Gingrich's Main Backer Plays Two Angles — Casino Mogul Adelson Weighs New Funding to Boost Former Speaker and to Help Romney Keep Santorum at Bay — Billionaire Sheldon Adelson, by far the biggest financial backer of Newt Gingrich's presidential bid, is preparing to open his wallet again.

Discussion: The Hill, ABCNEWS, Taegan Goddard's … and National Review

William Kristol / Weekly Standard:

Going After Rick — America is going bankrupt, Iran is going nuclear, the Obama administration is going after religious liberty. And Mitt Romney is going after Rick Santorum. — Which is fine (sort of). Romney's in a political fight, and politics ain't beanbag, as Romney has tried to say.

Discussion: American Spectator

Michael Scherer / Swampland:

Rick Santorum Wants to Fight ‘The Dangers Of Contraception’ — Candidates often say things when polling in the single digits that come back to haunt them when they start leading the polls. Last October, Rick Santorum gave an interview with an Evangelical blog called Caffeinated Thoughts …

Discussion: Washington Post, Hit & Run, Taylor Marsh, The Daily Caller, Hot Air, The Reaction, Betsy's Page, The PJ Tatler, Outside the Beltway, RADAMISTO, GOP 12 and Political Insider

Lucy Madison / CBS News:
Poll: Most back mandating contraception coverage

Discussion: Washington Monthly, New York Times, Outside the Beltway, Campaign 2012, The Daily Dish, Hullabaloo, Daily Kos, The Page, Pew Research Center … and Gallup

Christian Heinze / GOP 12:
VIDEO: Romney watches Santorum new attack ad

Discussion: Weekly Standard

Gene Healy / Reason:
Santorum Is Severely Wrong

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Eunomia, Hit & Run and Campaign 2012

CNN:
CNN Poll: Gender and income gaps in GOP nomination battle

Discussion: Politico, The Daily Caller, The Huffington Post, Shakesville, Reuters, Detroit Free Press, ABCNEWS, The Caucus, Hot Air, Washington Wire, CBS News and Washington Post

Rosalind S. Helderman / Washington Post:
Mitt Romney faces major test in Michigan primary, once thought an easy win

Discussion: Patterico's Pontifications and The Atlantic Online

Andrew Restuccia / The Hill:

White House issues veto threat for House transportation bill — The White House on Tuesday threatened to veto a wide-ranging transportation package from House Republicans. — The administration raised concerns about a provision to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, and argued …

Discussion: Politico and ThinkProgress

Ian Swanson / The Hill:

Boehner delays highway bill vote — Speaker John Boehner is delaying a vote on the $260 billion transportation bill that was scheduled this week. — Boehner (R-Ohio) told his conference Wednesday morning that it was “more important that we do it right than that we do it fast” …

Discussion: National Review, Transportation Nation and RedState

Reuters:
Lawmakers get tentative deal on payroll tax, jobless benefits

Discussion: The Enterprise Blog and Alan Colmes' Liberaland

Jennifer Steinhauer / New York Times:
Tentative Deal Reached to Preserve Cut in Payroll Tax

Discussion: Mediaite, Campaign 2012, The Maddow Blog, The Caucus and Daily Kos

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:
McConnell staying at arm's length

Discussion: ThinkProgress and Prairie Weather

Megan Ruyle / The Hill:
Facing objections from left and right, Boehner splits up transportation bill

Discussion: Politico and Connecting.the.Dots

Sara Burrows / Carolina Journal Online:

Preschooler's Homemade Lunch Replaced with Cafeteria “Nuggets” — State agent inspects sack lunches, forces preschoolers to purchase cafeteria food instead — RAEFORD — A preschooler at West Hoke Elementary School ate three chicken nuggets for lunch Jan. 30 because a state employee told …

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, Sister Toldjah, The Lonely Conservative, Rush Limbaugh, Hit & Run, The PJ Tatler, LewRockwell.com Blog, National Review and Pundit & Pundette

Matthew Boyle / The Daily Caller:
Nanny state report: NC school officials confiscate preschooler's homemade lunch

Discussion: americanthinker.com and The Gateway Pundit

Matt Willoughby / nccivitas.org:
State Inspectors Searching Children's Lunch Boxes: “This Isn't China, Is It?”

Discussion: Wizbang and Hot Air

Will Rahn / The Daily Caller:

Media Matters tax-exempt status may face new scrutiny from Congress — Congressional Republicans are now interested in examining the Media Matters For America's tax-exempt status, The Daily Caller has learned. Doing so would cause the GOP to wade into the complex world of tax laws that govern …

Discussion: US Politics, Riehl World View and American Power

Meredith Dake / Breitbart.tv:

Dershowitz: I Won't Vote For Obama If Associated With ‘Stalinist Bigots’ Media Matters — Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz told BreitbartTV Editor Larry O'Connor on the Governor Paterson Show on WOR that the Media Matters organization is full of “radical Stalinists” and says the White House …

Discussion: Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Big Government, The Daily Caller, Scared Monkeys, Big Journalism and Israel Matzav, more at Mediagazer »

David Martosko / The Daily Caller:
TheDC top ten: Interesting nuggets from Media Matters' 2010 tax records

Discussion: Hot Air, UrbanGrounds, Big Journalism and Crooks and Liars, more at Mediagazer »

Maggie Fox / NationalJournal.com:

Reid to Allow Vote on Rescinding Contraception Rule — Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., relented on Tuesday and now says he'll allow a Senate vote on an amendment that would reverse the White House's controversial requirement that all insurers provide birth control free of charge to women.

Discussion: Campaign 2012 and Hot Air

Sam Baker / The Hill:
Reid will allow vote on repeal of administration's birth control mandate

Discussion: LifeNews.com, The Mahablog and ThinkProgress

Sam Stein / The Huffington Post:
Birth Control Amendment ‘Dangerous,’ Obama Spokesman Says

Discussion: ThinkProgress, The Hill, Feministing, Washington Post and The Maddow Blog

Brendan DeMelle / DeSmogBlog:

Heartland Institute Exposed: Internal Documents Unmask Heart of Climate Denial Machine — Internal Heartland Institute strategy and funding documents obtained by DeSmogBlog expose the heart of the climate denial machine - its current plans, many of its funders, and details that confirm …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, ThinkProgress, msnbc.com, Suburban Guerrilla and Guardian

Richard Littlemore / DeSmogBlog:
Heartland Insider Exposes Institute's Budget and Strategy

Discussion: ThinkProgress

The Gallup Organization / Gallup:

Health Costs, Gov't Regulations Curb Small Business Hiring — Nearly half of small-business owners name these issues — PRINCETON, NJ — U.S. small-business owners who aren't hiring — 85% of those surveyed — are most likely to say the reasons they are not doing so include …

Discussion: Reuters, americanthinker.com and The Lonely Conservative

Investor's Business Daily:

Why Do Democrats Want to Protect Voter Fraud? — Suffrage: A new study finds that nearly 2 million dead people remain on voter registration rolls. So tell us again why Democrats oppose voter ID laws that would help prevent these errant registrations from being exploited?

Discussion: UrbanGrounds

msnbc.com:

Chavez allies attack new opponent Capriles as Jewish, gay — Venezuelan presidential hopeful Henrique Capriles, seen at a rally in La Guaira Jan. 27, has been attacked over his sexuality, Jewish ancestry and his selection as opposition candidate. — Allies of President Hugo Chavez …

Discussion: Weasel Zippers, americanthinker.com and Jammie Wearing Fools

Brendan Sasso / The Hill:

FCC moves to kill LightSquared over GPS interference concerns — The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) moved to reject LightSquared's planned wireless network on Tuesday after the president's top adviser on telecom issues said there is “no practical way” to prevent the network from disrupting GPS devices.

Discussion: Hot Air, more at Techmeme »

Stephen Pollard / Telegraph:

For once, Richard Dawkins is lost for words — Atheists' arrogance is their Achilles' heel, as a cringemaking radio performance has proved. — Lord Sacks, the Chief Rabbi, has made an exceptional contribution to public life — Which of us hasn't groaned when the Rev Giles Fraser …

Discussion: Guardian and Vox Popoli