memeorandum: Edward Snowden: I believed in U.S. ‘nobility’ (Tal Kopan/Reuters)

5:40 PM ET, July 8, 2013

Top Items:

At Least 43 Die as Soldiers Said to Open Fire on Morsi Backers — By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and KAREEM FAHIM — CAIRO — Egyptian soldiers opened fire on hundreds of unarmed supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi early Monday as they were praying before dawn outside the facility …

Discussion: Financial Times, Guardian, Daniel W. Drezner, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, msnbc.com, Taylor Marsh, ThinkProgress, The Hugh Hewitt Show, The Dish, americanthinker.com, Outside the Beltway, FP Passport, Daled Amos, Lawfare and Wake up America

Breanna Edwards / Politico:

Rand Paul slams ‘military junta’ support — Sen. Rand Paul lashed out Monday against neoconservatives on Twitter for supporting the “military junta” in Egypt and arguing for continued monetary aid to the country, whose armed forces recently ousted the sitting president, Mohamed Morsi.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Right Turn, TheBlaze.com and Alan Colmes' Liberaland

Peter Baker / The Caucus:
Obama Administration Rules Out Suspension of Aid to Egypt in Near Term

Discussion: msnbc.com

New York Times:
The Perils of a 'People's Coup'

Discussion: Taylor Marsh, Commentary Magazine and normblog

Al Jazeera English:
Massacre in Cairo deepens Egypt crisis

Discussion: Yahoo! News, New York Times, Gawker, Shakesville and The Agonist

Reuters:
At least 42 killed in Egypt, Islamists call for uprising

Discussion: Associated Press, The Jawa Report, Via Meadia, Informed Comment, neo-neocon, The Dish, Weasel Zippers and AEIdeas

Daniel Ellsberg / Washington Post:

Snowden made the right call when he fled the U.S. — Daniel Ellsberg is the author of “Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers.” He was charged in 1971 under the Espionage Act for theft and conspiracy for copying the Pentagon Papers. The trial was dismissed in 1973 after evidence …

Discussion: Taegan Goddard's …, Guardian, War Is A Crime .org, Gawker, Business Insider and msnbc.com, more at Mediagazer »

Guardian:

Edward Snowden: ‘The US government will say I aided our enemies’ - video interview — In the second part of an exclusive interview with Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, former NSA contractor Edward Snowden contemplates the reaction from the US government to his revelations …

Discussion: Esquire, The Spectacle Blog, Mediaite, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Alan Colmes' Liberaland and Business Insider

Tal Kopan / Reuters:

Edward Snowden: I believed in U.S. ‘nobility’ — In a new video released by The Guardian, Edward Snowden says he once believed in the “nobility” of the U.S. government's causes but grew disillusioned. — The video contains more excerpts from a June 6 interview with Snowden in Hong Kong that The Guardian had previously not released.

Discussion: The Hinterland Gazette, Alan Colmes' Liberaland and Business Insider

Jeff Cohen / The Huffington Post:

How Do You Know When President Obama Is Lying? MSNBC Won't Tell You — I was a young person when I first heard the quip: “How do you know when the President is lying? His lips are moving.” At the time, President Nixon was expanding the war in Vietnam to other countries and deploying the White House …

Discussion: Mediaite, The Daily Caller and National Review

Catalina Camia / Associated Press:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry to declare political plans — Texas Gov. Rick Perry is scheduled to announce Monday plans for his political future, leaving open the question of whether he'll seek an unprecedented fourth term next year or try again to seek the White House.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Taylor Marsh, Outside the Beltway, Jezebel, Austin American-Statesman and Daily Kos

John Schwartz / New York Times:

Perry Will Not Seek Re-election as Texas Governor — SAN ANTONIO, Tex. — Rick Perry, the longest-serving governor of Texas and an unsuccessful Republican presidential candidate in 2012, announced that he would not seek another term in Austin but would instead “pray and reflect and work to determine my own future path.”

Discussion: A plain blog about politics

Jay Root / The Texas Tribune:
Rick Perry Won't Run for Re-election

Discussion: Politico, Trail Blazers Blog, Texas on the Potomac, Grits for Breakfast and American Spectator

Beth Matusoff Merfish / New York Times:
My Mother's Abortion — BOULDER, Colo. — ON June 25 …

Discussion: American Spectator and Pirate's Cove

Steven Yaccino / New York Times:

Schools Seeking to Arm Employees Hit Hurdle on Insurance — As more schools consider arming their employees, some districts are encountering a daunting economic hurdle: insurance carriers threatening to raise their premiums or revoke coverage entirely. — During legislative sessions this year …

Discussion: msnbc.com, Mediaite, Yahoo! News and The Raw Story

Victor Epstein / USA Today:
Kansas law thrusts Iowa insurer into gun debate

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Balloon Juice, No More Mister Nice Blog and Taegan Goddard's …

Wall Street Journal:

The White House says you can sign up ‘without further verification.’ — The White House seems to regard laws as mere suggestions, including the laws it helped to write. On the heels of last week's one-year suspension of the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate to offer insurance to workers …

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Wonkblog, CNNMoney.com, Right Turn, Hot Air, Power Line, American Power and Washington Examiner

John Fund / National Review:
Why Obamacare Threatens Immigration Reform

Discussion: Washington Examiner, Washington Post, Washington Monthly, The Plum Line and RealClearPolitics Video Log

Lydia Saad / Gallup:

TV Is Americans' Main Source of News — Preferred news source varies by age, education, and politics, among other factors — PRINCETON, NJ — Television is the main place Americans say they turn to for news about current events (55%), leading the Internet, at 21%.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Weasel Zippers, Hot Air, Politico, Mediaite, The Verge, NewsBusters, Poynter and TheBlaze.com, more at Mediagazer »

Radley Balko / Salon:

“Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”: The new warrior cop is out of control — Overwhelming paramilitary force is on the rise — Sal Culosi is dead because he bet on a football game — but it wasn't a bookie or a loan shark who killed him. His local government killed him …

Discussion: protein wisdom and Business Insider

Dan Abrams / ABC News:

Analysis: George Zimmerman Probably Won't Be Convicted of Murder or Manslaughter — Here's Why — I drew a legal conclusion on “Good Morning America” Saturday that would have surprised the Dan Abrams who covered the George Zimmerman case leading up to, and shortly after, his arrest.

Discussion: Taylor Marsh, Scared Monkeys, Mediaite, Booman Tribune, The Gateway Pundit, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Patterico's Pontifications and The Strata-Sphere

Lizette Alvarez / New York Times:
Zimmerman Case Has Race as a Backdrop, but You Won't Hear It in Court

Discussion: JustOneMinute and Althouse

John Hudson / Foreign Policy:

Cameras Catch Mystery Break-In at Whistleblower's Law Firm — The offices of a Dallas law firm representing a high-profile State Department whistleblower were broken into last weekend. Burglars stole three computers and broke into the firm's file cabinets.

Discussion: Hot Air, Sister Toldjah, Business Insider, americanthinker.com, The Daily Caller, The Raw Story, Wake up America, Jammie Wearing Fools, Michelle Malkin, Weasel Zippers, Patterico's Pontifications, The PJ Tatler, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion and Instapundit

Alexandra Jaffe / Ballot Box:

Lautenberg's son blasts ‘show horse’ Booker as family endorses Pallone — The family of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) on Monday endorsed Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D) in the New Jersey Senate race and criticized frontrunner Cory Booker (D) as a glory-seeking “show horse” who lacks their father's work ethic.

Discussion: Politico and CNN

Elizabeth Harrington / CNSNews:

101M Americans Get Food Aid from Federal Gov't; More Than the Number of Private Sector Workers — (CNSNews.com) - The number of Americans receiving subsidized food assistance from the federal government has risen to 101 million, representing roughly a third of the U.S. population.

Discussion: Real Time Economics, Moonbattery, Weasel Zippers, Questions and Observations, The PJ Tatler and The Lonely Conservative

Maggie Haberman / Politico:

Hillary Clinton's answer to the has-been charge — Republicans in search of an attack line against Hillary Clinton have begun to cast her as a tired relic of the past — an implicit contrast to their own bench of up-and-comers like hip hop-listening Marco Rubio and libertarian-leaning Rand Paul.

Discussion: CNN, Taegan Goddard's …, Yahoo! News, Althouse, Shakesville and msnbc.com

Paul Krugman / New York Times:

Defining Prosperity Down — Friday's employment report wasn't bad. But given how depressed our economy remains, we really should be adding more than 300,000 jobs a month, not fewer than 200,000. As the Economic Policy Institute points out, we would need more than five years of job growth …

Discussion: MoneyBeat, Marginal Revolution, Daily Kos and Paul Krugman

Ben Smith / BuzzFeed:

Eliot Spitzer Is Nothing Like Anthony Weiner — He's a f**king steamroller. — Spitzer poses for a selfie after watching Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testify on Capitol Hill last July. — Via: Jonathan Ernst / Reuters — Eliot Spitzer's attempt to return to public life …

The Texas Tribune:

Texas Senators Reopen Debate on Abortion Regulations … For many Texas senators, Monday's Health and Human Services Committee hearing was the first opportunity to discuss proposed abortion legislation since Sen. Wendy Davis' much-publicized filibuster in the first special session.

Discussion: Yahoo! News and Daily Kos

Glenn Harlan Reynolds / New York Post:

Who's a journalist? — Don't let Uncle Sam decide — Sen. Dick Durbin thinks it's time for Congress to decide who's a real reporter. In The Chicago Sun-Times last week, he wrote: “Everyone, regardless of the mode of expression, has a constitutionally protected right to free speech.