memeorandum: Let's just say it: The Republicans are the problem. (Washington Post)

9:05 AM ET, April 28, 2012

Top Items:

Ben Shapiro / BREITBART.COM:

WHAT ‘GUTSY CALL’?: CIA MEMO REVEALS ADMIRAL CONTROLLED BIN LADEN MISSION — Today, Time magazine got hold of a memo written by then-CIA head Leon Panetta after he received orders from Barack Obama's team to greenlight the bin Laden mission. Here's the text, which summarized the situation:

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, NO QUARTER, Rush Limbaugh, The Gateway Pundit, Little Green Footballs, TBogg and American Power

BuzzFeed:

McCain Goes Nuclear: “Shame On Barack Obama” — Republicans amp up attacks on Obama for campaigning on Bin Laden's slaying. “Shamelessly turning the one decision he got right into a pathetic political act of self-congratulation,” says McCain. — McCain and Mitt Romney last week in Arizona.

Discussion: Hullabaloo

Daniel Halper / Weekly Standard:

Obama Campaign Trots Out Bin Laden, Spikes the Football (Updated: Romney Responds) — Barack Obama's reelection campaign has released a new ad that focuses on the president's decision to go after Osama bin Laden: — The narrator in the ad is former President Bill Clinton.

Discussion: CNN and The PJ Tatler

Paul Waldman / American Prospect:
Cool Kids Versus Squares, Continued

Discussion: Balloon Juice and Booman Tribune

Dylan Byersand Josh Gerstein / Politico:
Obama talks bin Laden in rare sit room interview

Discussion: emptywheel, Weasel Zippers and Washington Free Beacon

Josh Lederman / Ballot Box:
McCain: Shame on Obama for hyping the death of bin Laden

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog and The Hill

ABCNEWS:
FLASHBACK: Obama Campaign Accused Clinton Of Using Bin Laden To ‘Score Political Points’ In 2008

Discussion: The Daily Caller, The Daily Dish, CNN, Livewire, Mediaite, HotAirPundit, The Raw Story, National Review, msnbc.com, Washington Post, Weasel Zippers, Little Green Footballs, Hot Air, Booman Tribune, American Prospect and Wonkette

Alexander Burns / Politico:

American Action Network pulls out of Lugar race — The American Action Network is pulling out of the Indiana GOP Senate primary, dropping its efforts on behalf of embattled Sen. Dick Lugar less than two weeks before the May 8 election, sources told POLITICO.

Discussion: americanthinker.com and Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion

Cameron Joseph / Ballot Box:

Super-PAC cuts off Lugar in Indiana — The American Action Network, a super-PAC that backs establishment Republicans, has pulled out of Indiana's Senate race, the latest bad omen for Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.). — “We've decided we're going to let this race play out,” AAN spokesman Dan Conston told The Hill Friday evening.

Sarah Palin / Facebook:

Mourdock For Indiana — I join commonsense conservatives in endorsing Richard Mourdock to be the next Senator from Indiana. Conservatives of all stripes are uniting behind Richard Mourdock. It's not just Indiana that benefits from sending the right Senator to serve for the right reasons …

Discussion: CNN, Washington Monthly, Mediaite, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Hot Air, ABCNEWS, GOP 12 and Conservatives4Palin

Justin Sink / The Hill:

Obama bashes Romney, GOP as ‘being in a time machine’ on women's issues — President Barack Obama said Friday that Republican positions on women's health issues were “appalling” and “offensive” and equated an effort to block his regulation to mandate free contraception to like …

Discussion: Right Wing News and The Gateway Pundit

Jennifer Epstein / Politico:

Obama: Mitt Romney ‘backward’ on women — President Barack Obama told a group of women on Friday that he has been their fiercest advocate and warned that Mitt Romney's positions on women's issues represent a step back in time. — “The choice between going backward or moving forward has never been so clear …

Discussion: Alan Colmes' Liberaland

ABCNEWS:

Obama Warns Women That Romney, GOP Will ‘Close Doors of Opportunity’ — President Obama warned women voters today that Republicans in Congress and presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney want to “close doors of opportunity we thought we'd kicked open a long time ago.”

Discussion: Weasel Zippers

Washington Post:

Let's just say it: The Republicans are the problem. — Rep. Allen West, a Florida Republican, was recently captured on video asserting that there are “78 to 81” Democrats in Congress who are members of the Communist Party. Of course, it's not unusual for some renegade lawmaker from either side …

Discussion: Eclectablog, Daily Kos, Hullabaloo and Balloon Juice

Annie-Rose Strasser / ThinkProgress:

Romney's Advice To Students: Borrow Money From Your Parents — If you're young and you want to start your own business, Mitt Romney's has some advice from you: Borrow money from your parents. At a “lecture” for students at Otterbein University in Ohio today, Mitt Romney told students that …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, The Impolitic and Balloon Juice

Natasha Singer / New York Times:

With Komen Image Hurt, Support for Affiliates Lags — Susan G. Komen for the Cure may have popularized the color pink as a universal symbol of breast cancer fund-raising. But these days, many of the breast cancer foundation's local affiliates are singing the blues.

Discussion: Balloon Juice

Toddstarnes / Fox News:

Anti-Bullying Speaker Curses Christian Teens — As many as 100 high school students walked out of a national journalism conference after an anti-bullying speaker began cursing, attacked the Bible and reportedly called those who refused to listen to his rant “pansy asses.”

Discussion: The Jawa Report and Campaign 2012

Matthew J. Franck / National Review:

Who Is Richard Grenell Anyway? — A couple days ago, Kevin Williamson blogged here that there is nothing of interest in the fact that Richard Grenell, a former Bush administration staffer at the U.N. mission and now appointed foreign-policy spokesman for the Romney campaign, is gay.

Washington Wire:
Romney Charters Jet From Campaign Treasurer

Discussion: Politico

Ismail Sameem / Reuters:

Elite Afghan soldier kills U.S. special forces mentor — (Reuters) - An elite Afghan soldier shot dead an American mentor and his translator at a U.S. base, Afghan officials said on Friday, in the first rogue shooting blamed on the country's new and closely vetted special forces.

Discussion: The Jawa Report, emptywheel and National Review

Washington Free Beacon:

Carney: ‘I Never Lie’ — Jay Carney said he never lies in his capacity as White House press secretary at a Friday scholarship lunch hosted by the White House Correspondents' Association: … Carney has made a number of questionable statements as press secretary, however.

Discussion: Politico and Hot Air

Landon Thomas, Jr / New York Times:

Spain Is Still Waiting for the Payoff From Austerity — LONDON — Since the onset of the debt crisis in Europe more than two years ago, defenders of the euro currency union have stuck to a basic argument: if the euro zone's weaker economies would only keep pursuing policies of austerity …

Discussion: Balloon Juice and The Raw Story

Tom Harper / This Is London:

Koo Stark sues Murdoch in US courts over phone hacking — Former actress Koo Stark is set to launch a phone-hacking claim against News Corporation in the US courts, bringing the scandal across the Atlantic to Rupert Murdoch's base. — Scotland Yard has told Ms Stark, 55 …

Discussion: New York Magazine, more at Mediagazer »

Sarah Kliff / Ezra Klein:

How the Prevention Fund is being spent — House Republicans want to use money earmarked for health reform's Prevention and Public Health Fund to hold down interest rates on student loans. The White House has threatened to veto the bill. So what's that money doing now?

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Hot Air, Democrats, Washington Post, ThinkProgress and Daily Kos

Linda Feldmann / Christian Science Monitor:

Obama's cool factor: what Romney can do to counter it (+video) — Instead of just ignoring Obama cool, the Republicans are taking it on and arguing why he should be voted out. A ‘super PAC’ supporting the Romney campaign has produced a new video for this purpose. — WASHINGTON