memeorandum: Rep. Ryan: Republicans can't play the ‘villain’ in Obama's ‘morality play’ (Jonathan Easley/The Hill)

5:25 PM ET, January 26, 2013

Top Items:

Thomas Beaumont / bigstory.ap.org:

AP NEWSBREAK: HARKIN WON'T SEEK 6TH SENATE TERM — You are here — Home » United States Congress » AP NewsBreak: Harkin won't seek 6th Senate term — CUMMING, Iowa (AP) — U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin will not seek re-election in 2014, the Iowa Democrat said Saturday.

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, Washington Post, Roll Call, Washington Monthly, Weasel Zippers, Hot Air, The Raw Story, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Washington Free Beacon, Washington Times and Ballot Box

James Hohmann / Politico:

Harkin retirement: Jump ball in Iowa — Democratic Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin announced Saturday he will not seek re-election in 2014, giving Republicans a shot at picking up his seat but increasing the likelihood of a contentious GOP primary. — “It'll be wide-open as far as both parties,” Republican state chairman A.J. Spiker said.

Discussion: Outside the Beltway

Eric Jones / harkin.senate.gov:

Senator Harkin Announces His Plans for the Future — Thanks Iowans for dedication during his nearly 40 years in public service - outlines full HELP Committee agenda for next two years — CUMMING, Iowa - Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) today issued the following statement on his plans for the future …

Discussion: Addicting Info

Jeremy Herb / Ballot Box:
Harkin won't seek another term in Senate

Discussion: CNN

Jennifer Jacobs / USA Today:
Iowa Sen. Harkin will not seek re-election

Discussion: Michelle Malkin, Wake up America and Daily Kos

Russell Berman / The Hill:

Boehner full of regret over ‘fiscal-cliff’ moves — Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is sharing his regrets about his “fiscal-cliff” strategy, less than a month after the House bitterly swallowed a last-minute deal hatched in the Senate. — In a private speech to the Ripon Society on Tuesday …

Discussion: The Agonist and The PJ Tatler

Jonathan Easley / The Hill:

Rep. Ryan: Republicans can't play the ‘villain’ in Obama's ‘morality play’ — Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Saturday warned that President Obama was working to delegitimize the Republican Party, and urged conservatives not to fall into the president's trap by playing the villain.

Discussion: CNN, Little Green Footballs and The Reaction

Russell Berman / The Hill:

Boehner says bipartisan group ‘basically’ has deal on immigration — Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is voicing confidence in the prospects for immigration reform in the House, saying that a bipartisan group of lawmakers “basically [has] an agreement” after more than three years of secret talks.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Post Politics and Washington Post

Donovan Slack / Politico:

Obama wants country to appreciate Hillary — President Barack Obama said Friday that he wanted to do a joint interview with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton because he wants the country to appreciate the extraordinary role she has played in his administration.

The New Yorker / Page-Turner:

What Nate Silver Gets Wrong — Can Nate Silver do no wrong? Between elections and baseball statistics, Silver has become America's secular god of predictions. And now he has a best-seller, “The Signal and the Noise,” in which he discusses the challenges and science of prediction …

Discussion: Brad DeLong

Joanna Stern / ABCNEWS:

Starting Today, It's Illegal to Unlock Your Cellphone — You likely have a cellphone that you bought from a carrier, like AT&T, Verizon or Sprint, and that phone only works on that carrier's cellular and data network — unless you “unlock” it. — That is a software process that allows …

Discussion: LewRockwell.com Blog

Scott Keyes / ThinkProgress:

Republicans' Effort To Rig Electoral College Gets National Backing — Former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell (R), who was the chief elections officer when the state experienced massive voting problems in 2004, is planning to lead a national effort to rig the electoral college in favor …

Discussion: Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Addicting Info and The Atlantic Online

Gary Heinlein / detroitnews.com:
Michigan legislators weigh changes to Electoral College rules

Discussion: New York Times, No More Mister Nice Blog, Mother Jones, Naked Politics, The Maddow Blog, FiveThirtyEight and Business Insider

Stephen K. Bannon / BREITBART.COM:

PALIN: 'WE HAVEN'T YET BEGUN TO FIGHT!' —EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH BREITBART NEWS — In my research for the film I made on Governor Palin, The Undefeated, I was constantly amazed at the anti-establishment stands she took at every step in her rise to power.

Discussion: The Hill, more at Mediagazer »

Jim Angle / Fox News:

Social Security's disability trust fund could fail to cover all benefits early as 2016 — As President Obama faces pressure on the left to defend federal entitlement programs from the benefit cuts that the Republicans say are necessary to keep the programs solvent decades down the road …

Discussion: Weasel Zippers and The PJ Tatler

Jeremy Herb / The Hill:
Thune: Democrats must pass a budget

Discussion: CNN

Jeremy W. Peters / New York Times:

Gay Lawmakers' Growing Presence Suggests Shift in Attitudes — WASHINGTON — When Mark Takano ran unsuccessfully for Congress twice in the early 1990s, his opponents tried to smear him as a “homosexual liberal” and a “nutzoid.” One of them even had pink fliers printed that asked, “A Congressman for Riverside ... Or San Francisco?”

Discussion: Towleroad News #gay and Althouse

Abby Livingston / Roll Call:

Five Races in Which the Gun Debate Matters — In the aftermath of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Conn., the politics of gun control turned upside down — or so the proponents of increased firearms regulations would like to believe. The reality, however …

Discussion: Booman Tribune