memeorandum: The Good, Racist People — Last month the actor Forest Whitaker … (Ta-Nehisi Coates/New York Times)

3:50 AM ET, March 8, 2013

Top Items:

Obama Administration Responds To Rand Paul On Drones — The U.S. government cannot target an American citizen who is not engaged in combat on American soil, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Thursday during his daily press briefing. — Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, New Republic, Donklephant, Hit & Run, Washington Monthly, American Power, Mother Jones, Firedoglake, Lawyers, Guns & Money, Taylor Marsh, The Maddow Blog, Lawfare, The Reaction and FP Passport

Lois Romano / Politico:

Rand Paul: ‘Seriously’ weighing 2016 bid — Before Thursday, Rand Paul — tea party firebrand — hadn't vaulted into the top tier of Republican power players. — But all that seemed to change this week. The Kentucky Republican senator showed serious clout by holding a 13-hour filibuster …

Discussion: Mediaite, BuzzFeed, Hot Air, NationalJournal.com and National Review

Luke Johnson / The Huffington Post:

Rand Paul Filibuster Leaves Senate Democrats Struggling To Explain Absence — WASHINGTON — While many Senate Democrats said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) raised legitimate concerns about the Obama administration's drone program during his epic filibuster of John Brennan's nomination as CIA director …

Discussion: Hit & Run, Shakesville, The Last Refuge, Crooks and Liars and Post Politics

Grace Wyler / Business Insider:

IT'S WAR: John McCain And Lindsey Graham Just Ripped Into Rand Paul On The Senate Floor — U.S. Sen. John McCain blasted fellow Republican Rand Paul on the Senate floor this morning for his 13-hour filibuster to block John Brennan's confirmation as CIA Director. — “Calm down, Senator,” McCain said, in an apostrophe to Paul.

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, Little Green Footballs, Washington Examiner, Washington Post, The Huffington Post, Washington Times, The Hinterland Gazette, Firedoglake, American Spectator, The Impolitic, No More Mister Nice Blog, Hit & Run, Weasel Zippers, Ricochet Conversations Feed, Taylor Marsh and The Week

Justin Sink / The Hill: Holder: US has no authority to kill Americans with drones on US soil

Daniel Strauss / The Hill:
Paul fires back: Sens. McCain, Graham think the ‘whole world is a battlefield’

Discussion: NO QUARTER USA NET and Weasel Zippers

Sarah Wheaton / New York Times:
Senate Confirms Brennan as C.I.A. Chief

Discussion: Slate, Politico, Lowering the Bar, Outside the Beltway, Guardian, The Maddow Blog and Gawker

Carl Hulse / New York Times:
2 G.O.P. Senators Assail Colleague's Filibuster Over Drones

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Mother Jones, The PJ Tatler, Lawfare and Hit & Run

Aaron Blake / Washington Post:
John Brennan confirmed as CIA director following White House drone statement

Discussion: CNN, News Desk, The Fix, ACS Blog, Mediaite, Pew Research Center, The Dish, p m carpenter's commentary, The Reliable Source, The Plum Line, Post Politics, Daily Kos and Shakesville

Politico:
Paul: Pro-drone Republicans on ‘wrong side of history’

Discussion: BuzzFeed, CNN and The Hill

Kate Nocera / Politico:
Rand Paul filibuster blasted by John McCain, Lindsey Graham

Discussion: Power Line

Internet Broadcasting / WPLG-TV:
Rand Paul ‘happy’ with drone response, ready to allow vote

Discussion: The Week, Hit & Run and ProfessorBainbridge.com

Senator Ted Cruz:
Press Release of Senator Cruz

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Lawfare, Jihad Watch, Weasel Zippers, Althouse and New York Times

Catalina Camia / Associated Press:
Rand Paul filibuster ranks among Senate's longest

Discussion: FP Passport, The Daily Caller and ABCNEWS

Daniel Halper / Weekly Standard:
Holder's Letter to Rand Paul: ‘No,’ the U.S. Can't Use Drone to Kill Citizen Not Engaged in Combat on U.S. Soil

Discussion: Hot Air, The Jawa Report, Washington Times and The Gateway Pundit

Walter Shapiro / Yahoo! News: Rand's stand: How the filibustering blusterer made the Senate (briefly) a better place

Wall Street Journal:
Rand Paul's Drone Rant

Bill Clinton / Washington Post:

It's time to overturn DOMA — In 1996, I signed the Defense of Marriage Act. Although that was only 17 years ago, it was a very different time. In no state in the union was same-sex marriage recognized, much less available as a legal right, but some were moving in that direction.

Discussion: The Caucus, Power Line, Telegraph, The New Civil Rights Movement, CNN, msnbc.com, The Hill, Associated Press, Politico, Gawker, The PJ Tatler and The Week

Lee Smith / Weekly Standard:

Samira Ibrahim Speaks — Yesterday, THE WEEKLY STANDARD first reported that the State Department was about to bestow an International Woman of Courage Award on an anti-Semite and 9/11 fan. Egypt women's rights activist Samira Ibrahim had left a record on her Twitter feed of statements quoting Hitler …

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Israel Matzav, Washington Free Beacon, Hot Air, Weasel Zippers and The Gateway Pundit

Shira Kallus Zwebner / The Times of Israel:

Yup, Samira probably sent those tweets — The row over Samira Ibrahim's tweets (written up by my fellow blogger Marc) is raging. Mainstream US journalists are now beginning to cover the story, and Jeffery Goldberg has written that the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum raised concerns …

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Twitchy, Israel Matzav, American Power and National Review

Bradley Klapper / The Huffington Post:
US postpones award for Egyptian woman over tweets

Discussion: Politico, Israel Matzav, Weasel Zippers and Weekly Standard

Ta-Nehisi Coates / New York Times:

The Good, Racist People — Last month the actor Forest Whitaker was stopped in a Manhattan delicatessen by an employee. Whitaker is one of the pre-eminent actors of his generation, with a diverse and celebrated catalog ranging from “The Great Debaters” to “The Crying Game” to “Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai.”

Discussion: Smartypants

Ed Kilgore / Washington Monthly:

The Racism of “Good People” — If you are a white person who has on occasion felt aggrieved at the persistence of allegations of white racism in America, do yourself and your conscience a favor and read Ta-Nehisi's Coates' guest column today in the New York Times.

Discussion: Hullabaloo

Carl Levin:

Sen. Carl Levin announces he will not seek re-election in 2014 — WASHINGTON - Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., announced today that he will not seek re-election in 2014. He released the following statement: — I have decided not to run for re-election in 2014.

Discussion: Daily Kos, emptywheel, The New Civil Rights Movement, The Agonist and National Review

Carl Levin / CNN:
Sen. Levin won't seek re-election in 2014

Discussion: Politico and Liberal Values

Cameron Joseph / Ballot Box: Levin retirement leaves Dems defending fourth open seat in 2014 cycle

Chris Christie / CNN:
TRENDING: Poll: Clinton, Christie fare best in possible 2016 showdowns

Discussion: Politico

Talking Points Memo:

Fox News Host Offer To Pay For One Week Of White House Tours — Fox News Host Eric Bolling on Thursday offered to pay for one week's worth of White House tours after the administration temporarily suspended them due to cutbacks under sequestration. “If I can get the White House doors open …

Discussion: Mediaite

Jennifer Epstein / Politico:
White House tours cost $74,000 a week for Secret Service

Discussion: Hot Air, The Daily Caller, The Hill, TheBlaze.com and Weekly Standard

New York Times:

New York Hearing Set as Son-in-Law of Bin Laden Is Caught — WASHINGTON — Osama bin Laden's son-in-law was recently arrested in the Middle East, was transferred to the United States and is now in a New York jail, according to two people briefed on the matter.

Discussion: Hot Air and Politico

Brian Ross / ABCNEWS:
Homeland Chair: Osama bin Laden's Son-in-Law ‘Cooperating’

Discussion: Mediaite and The Jawa Report

Devin Leonard / Businessweek:

How Disney Bought Lucasfilm—and Its Plans for ‘Star Wars’ — One weekend last October, Robert Iger, chief executive officer of Walt Disney (DIS), sat through all six Star Wars films. He'd seen them before, of course. This time, he took notes. Disney was in secret negotiations to acquire Lucasfilm …

Discussion: Outside the Beltway, FirstShowing.net and Deadline.com

John Hinderaker / Power Line:

New Study Finds Firearms Laws Do Nothing to Prevent Homicides — That's the headline you should be seeing, but won't. Instead, you will see headlines like this one, on CNN: “Study links gun laws and lower gun mortality.” Or this one, from the Chicago Tribune: “States with strict gun laws found to have fewer shooting deaths.”

Discussion: Reuters, archinte.jamanetwork.com, Clayton Cramer's Blog and CNN

Tim McDonnell / Mother Jones:

The Scariest Climate Change Graph Just Got Scarier … Back in 1999, Penn State University climate scientist Michael Mann released the climate change movement's most potent symbol: The “hockey stick,” a line graph of global temperature over the last 1,500 years that shows an unmistakable …

Discussion: sciencemag.org, jobsanger, Dot Earth and Hullabaloo

Travis Waldron / ThinkProgress:

Pelosi Backs Bill That Would Raise Minimum Wage To $10 An Hour — House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday called on Republican House leadership to take up legislation recently introduced by Rep. George Miller (D-CA) and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) that would raise the federal minimum wage above $10 an hour.

Discussion: The Hill and The Raw Story

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:

Obama sets end-of-July goal for bipartisan agreement on deficit — President Obama wants to complete a grand bargain to reduce the deficit by the end of July, an aggressive timeline coinciding with the expiration of the nation's debt limit. — Obama told a small group of Republican senators …

Peter Schroeder / The Hill:

Senators blast financial regulators over ‘prosecution-free zone for large banks’ — Financial regulators faced relentless questioning Thursday from senators frustrated the nation's largest financial institutions haven't faced tougher penalties and more prosecutions for corporate malfeasance.

Discussion: msnbc.com, Politico, Booman Tribune and Blue Mass Group

Politico:

Lisa Madigan moves toward run in Illinois — Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan spoke with several of the nation's top progressive groups during a visit to Washington D.C. last week, further fueling expectations that the popular Democrat will run for governor in 2014.