memeorandum: Walesa proclaims solidarity with Mitt (Jonathan Martin/Politico)

10:10 AM ET, July 31, 2012

Top Items:

CNN:

Romney aide loses cool, curses at press in Poland — Warsaw, Poland (CNN) - The traveling press secretary for Mitt Romney lost his cool and cursed at reporters who attempted to ask questions of the Republican presidential candidate in a public plaza near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Warsaw Tuesday.

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Mediaite, GOP 12, William K. Wolfrum Chronicles, Hotline On Call, ABCNEWS, National Review, Taegan Goddard's … and Towleroad News #gay, more at Mediagazer »

Jonathan Martin / Reuters:

Romney aide to reporters: ‘Shove it!’ — WARSAW—A Mitt Romney aide told reporters to “shove it” Tuesday morning after the American press corps here shouted questions at the presidential candidate. — As Romney was walking away from Pilsudski Square toward his vehicle …

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Daniel W. Drezner, FishbowlDC, TheBlaze.com, The Right Scoop, Business Insider, The Raw Story and The Mahablog

Roger Simon / Politico:

Mitt Romney should have stayed home from Europe — Maybe Mitt Romney should have just stayed in London and watched the dancing horses. — Or just stayed home. Even though his recent trip to England was largely a public relations disaster, he made a more serious mistake in his next stop …

Discussion: Mediaite and ABCNEWS

Shushannah Walshe / ABCNEWS:
White House Takes Note of Romney's Rocky Road Trip

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, NationalJournal.com, Guardian, ABCNEWS, Fire Andrea Mitchell!, Taylor Marsh, Liberal Values, The Democratic Daily, The Caucus, Hot Air, blog.sfgate.com, Mediaite and Wonkette

CNN:
Ehud Barak sings praises of Obama administration

Discussion: Politico, Financial Times, The Political Carnival and ThinkProgress

Rachel Rose Hartman / ABCNEWS:

Elizabeth Warren to open for Bill Clinton at Democratic convention — Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren announced late Monday that she is slated to open for former President Bill Clinton at this summer's Democratic National Convention. — “It will be an honor to share …

Discussion: CNN, Weasel Zippers and The Daily Caller

Washington Post:

Mitt Romney's foreign trip didn't go well. Does it matter? — Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney later today wraps up his foreign tour, a trip that drew a series of negative headlines and has left many Republicans wondering what exactly the GOP presidential nominee was hoping to accomplish.

Discussion: Politico and Daily Kos

Lydia Saad / Gallup:
In U.S., Bill Clinton at His Most Popular

Discussion: Boston Globe, msnbc.com, MarketWatch, Washington Wire, Political Capital, The Hill, CNN, The Moderate Voice, Washington Post, Politico and New York Times

CNN:
CNN's GUT CHECK for July 30, 2012

Discussion: Alan Colmes' Liberaland, The Hill and The Page

John Hinderaker / Power Line:

The Most Striking Thing About Mitt Romney's Overseas Trip... ...has been the press coverage. It has been hypercritical, to put it mildly. It started in England, where Romney's observation that certain logistical issues relating to the Olympic Games were “disconcerting” …

Discussion: Booman Tribune and Whiskey Fire

Amelia Chasse / Townhall.com:

For Women in 2012, A War on Stereotypes — In case you haven't heard, fellow women, we are at war. Barack Obama's new ad tells us that “it's a scary time to be a woman.” According to President Obama, we should vote to give him a second term on the sole ground that under a President Mitt Romney, we may not get free birth control.

Jonathan Martin / Politico:
Walesa proclaims solidarity with Mitt

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Reuters, Hot Air and americanthinker.com

Justin Sink / Ballot Box:

Romney campaign to announce VP selection via smartphone app — Mitt Romney's campaign announced Tuesday that supporters can sign up to be the first to learn of the presumptive Republican nominee's vice presidential choice by downloading a new smartphone app.

Discussion: CNN, Washington Monthly, Political Capital, Mediaite, USA Today and Washington Post

Stephen Moore / Wall Street Journal:

The Man Who Saved Capitalism — Milton Friedman, who would have turned 100 on Tuesday, helped to make free markets popular again in the 20th century. His ideas are even more important today. — It's a tragedy that Milton Friedman—born 100 years ago on July 31—did not live long enough …

Discussion: Cold Fury and americanthinker.com

John Stanton / BuzzFeed:

Republican Moderates Tire of Leaders' Tea Party Tilt — Speaker John Boehner has been trying to keep the right happy. Now he's facing restive moderates, House Republicans say. — House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio takes part in a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday …

Discussion: Hot Air, Syracuse Post-Standard and ThinkProgress

Cameron Joseph / Ballot Box:
Rep. LaTourette will retire at end of term

Discussion: Politico, Taegan Goddard's … and CNN

Joe Vardon / The Columbus Dispatch:
Republican lawmaker LaTourette won't seek re-election, sources say

Discussion: Daily Kos, Washington Post and Hotline On Call

Jeff Cox / CNBC:

Wall Street Already Betting On Who Wins in November — With just 100 days left until the U.S. presidential election, investors are beginning to make bigger bets on which candidate will carry the day. — One analysis concludes that last week's sharp three-day market surge can only mean …

Discussion: Applesauce, Wonkette, Scared Monkeys, Hot Air, The Gateway Pundit, The Lonely Conservative and The Other McCain

Richard A. Serrano / Los Angeles Times:

Exclusive: Five ATF officials found responsible for Fast and Furious — Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, co-authored a report finding that five senior ATF officials were responsible for the Fast and Furious operation.

Discussion: Hot Air, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, The PJ Tatler, Nice Deb and Fire Andrea Mitchell!

Mickey Kaus / The Daily Caller:

Mayhem at GM — This wasn't supposed to happen until Nov. 7: It's like the last act of Titus Andronicus over at GM corporate headquarters. — Two weeks ago, Opel chief Karl-Friedrich Stracke presented numbers to Dan Akerson. Akerson fires him. Opel gets two interim chiefs in a week.

Discussion: The Truth About Cars, americanthinker.com, Betsy's Page, Bloomberg and Vodkapundit

Jon Ham / Right Angles:

Newsweek's cover for next week? — As you all know by now, Newsweek this week featured a Mitt Romney cover with “The Wimp Factor” as the headline. It's a replay of an old hit job on President George H. W. Bush in 1992. This is an example of the media making up a meme and pushing …

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog and Power Line

Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
Newsweek: That heartless vampire capitalist is kind of a ... wimp?

Discussion: NationalJournal.com, Outside the Beltway and Patterico's Pontifications

Andy Bull / Guardian:

Ye's world record Olympic swim ‘disturbing’, says top US coach — • Chinese 16-year-old who swam faster than Ryan Lochte compared to East Germans — • John Leonard says gold medal time was ‘not believable to many people’ — China has become embroiled in the first doping controversy …

Discussion: World, Business Insider, New York Times, Deadspin and National Updates

Globe and Mail:

JOANNA SLATER — As a teenager growing up in Toronto, Dan Senor used to perform as a magician to earn money. These days, he is attempting a different kind of feat - getting Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney elected. — A senior foreign-policy adviser to Mr. Romney …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice

John Koblin / Deadspin:

NBC's No. 1 Tweeting Critic Has Been Suspended From Twitter — Guy Adams is The Independent's Los Angeles bureau chief. During the Olympics so far, he has carved out a nice spot on the how-much-NBC's-coverage-sucks beat. Now his Twitter account has been suspended—supposedly because NBC had it cut off after he complained:

Richard Sandomir / New York Times:
Olympic Viewers Have a New Reason to Complain, and the Means to Do It

Discussion: CNN, Mediaite, The Atlantic Online, Gizmodo, Guardian, Olympics, Business Insider, The Independent, Deadspin and Poynter, more at Mediagazer »

Joan Juliet Buck / The Daily Beast:

Joan Juliet Buck: Mrs. Assad Duped Me — Just before the Arab Spring, Vogue writer Joan Juliet Buck did an infamous interview with Syria's first lady. For the first time, she tells the story behind the debacle. — Late in the afternoon of Dec. 1, 2010, I got a call from a features editor at Vogue.

Discussion: New York Magazine, Jezebel and The New Republic

Erik Wasson / The Hill:

GOP scrambles for farm bill votes — House Republican leaders might not have the votes to pass a stopgap farm bill this week. — The scramble for votes has sparked speculation that leaders in the lower chamber might have to scrap their plan to deal with the politically sensitive issue.

Jennifer Epstein / Politico:

Obama confident he'd win if election were today — NEW YORK — With 99 days until Election Day, President Obama is confident he's in a winning position. — “If the election were held today, I think it would be close, but I think we'd win,” he said at a Monday night fundraiser here.

Discussion: Weasel Zippers, Pirate's Cove and The Gateway Pundit

Reuters:

Saudi woman allowed to compete in hijab — LONDON (Reuters) - A female Saudi fighter will take part in the Olympic judo competition after being allowed to wear an Islamic headscarf, or hijab, of a specific design, officials said on Monday. — Wojdan Ali Seraj Abdulrahim Shaherkani …

Discussion: The Jawa Report

Byron Tau / Politico:

White House: ‘Fabrication’ that Obama called off bin Laden raid — The White House called a report that President Obama called off the raid on Osama bin Laden three times a “fabrication.” — In a new book previewed by the Daily Caller, author Richard Miniter alleges that Obama called off …

Discussion: The Daily Caller, Scared Monkeys and BLACKFIVE

Liz Sly / Washington Post:

Syrian rebels seize rural territory while Assad forces focus on major cities — AL-BAB, Syria — War came late to this little farming town set amid rolling hills in the Syrian countryside east of Aleppo, where the absence of upheaval was long construed as an implicit signal of support …

Discussion: World

Victor Davis Hanson / PJ Media:

California: The Road Warrior Is Here — Where's Mel Gibson When You Need Him? — George Miller's 1981 post-apocalyptic film The Road Warrior envisioned an impoverished world of the future. Tribal groups fought over what remained of a destroyed Western world of law, technology, and mass production.

Discussion: Cold Fury, Infowars, Ed Driscoll and Vox Popoli