Colorado suspect was brilliant science student  —  DENVER (AP) — James Eagen Holmes came from a well-tended San Diego enclave of two-story homes with red-tiled roofs, where neighbors recall him as a clean-cut, studious young man of sparing words.  —  Tall and dark-haired …

RIP Alexander Cockburn; Leftist Global Warming ‘Heretic’  —  It has been announced that Alexander Cockburn, a columnist for The Nation and co-editor of CounterPunch, died yesterday.  Although Cockburn reflected a leftist viewpoint (mandatory if you write for The Nation) …

Is Mitt Romney Buying Twitter Followers?  —  Today we learn that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is apparently buying Twitter followers to inflate his popularity in social media.  The graph from 140Elect.com looks like a hockey stick:  —  For comparison, a graph of Barack Obama's …

Rupert Murdoch steps down from NI boards  —  Rupert Murdoch's grip on UK newspapers is loosening “finger by finger”, as he resigns string of directorships.  —  Rupert Murdoch has repeatedly insisted that he remains committed to his UK newspapers, vowing that he will remain a “very active chairman” of the publishing busines.

Obama effort spends more in June than it takes in  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — Amid a heavy barrage of advertising by opposing “super” political groups, President Barack Obama's re-election campaign spent more than it collected in June.  While outraised again by Republican Mitt Romney …

With Extreme Prejudice  —  How ABC News “investigates” a horrific crime.  —  “An off-duty Los Angeles police officer and three bodybuilder friends have been arrested for allegedly punching and kicking a New York man in an alley near a cafe on West Hollywood's Restaurant Row,” the Los Angeles Times reported July 30, 1991.

House Intel committee leaders repudiate Bachmann over letter  —  The leaders of the House Intelligence Committee criticized Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-Minn.) — a member of the panel — for circulating a letter earlier this week urging an investigation into efforts by the Muslim Brotherhood …

Coburn donates to Manchin, says fellow senator not beholden to special interests  —  Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) says he supports Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin's re-election because he believes Manchin is not beholden to short-sighted political interests.  —  Coburn recently gave $250 to Manchin's re-election campaign.

TPMDC  —  MSNBC's Chris Hayes: No Symmetry Between Fox News And MSNBC  —  Can you describe what you read, how you get the news?  —  I subscribe to a number of magazines.  I've always been a magazine lover from the time I was 11 or 12.  My dad subscribed to a bunch of magazines.

Post Aurora: Don't expect new gun laws  —  I served as Democratic policy director for the Colorado Senate minority in 2003 — when the state legislature passed the gun law package that is now the law in Colorado.  —  These bills had been delayed since the 1999 Columbine shootings.