memeorandum: The end of race — Scan the news on any given day in America … (Gov. Bobby Jindal/Politico)

9:35 AM ET, August 26, 2013

Top Items:

Jeffrey Goldberg / Bloomberg:

Samantha Power on the Duty to Intervene — This week, the Barack Obama administration's most eloquent and ardent advocate for humanitarian intervention overseas, Samantha Power, the ambassador to the United Nations, tweeted the following about the alleged Syrian chemical weapons attack …

Discussion: Booman Tribune and Taegan Goddard's …

Telegraph:

Navy ready to launch first strike on Syria — Britain is planning to join forces with America and launch military action against Syria within days in response to the gas attack believed to have been carried out by President Bashar al-Assad's forces against his own people.

Discussion: Via Meadia, Outside the Beltway, Weasel Zippers, CANNONFIRE and BBC

Eliot A. Cohen / Washington Post:

Syria will require more than cruise missiles — Eliot A. Cohen teaches at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He directed the U.S. Air Force's Gulf War Air Power Survey from 1991 to 1993. — In 1994, after directing the U.S. Air Force's official study of the Persian Gulf War …

Discussion: Weekly Standard and WorldViews

Oliver Holmes / Reuters:

Syria lets U.N. inspect gas attack site, Washington says too late — BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria agreed on Sunday to let the United Nations inspect the site of a suspected chemical weapons attack, but a U.S. official said such an offer was “too late to be credible” and Washington was all but certain …

Discussion: Booman Tribune, The Daily Caller, The Gateway Pundit, The Economic Collapse, ABC News, Weasel Zippers and The Moderate Voice

New York Times:

Confident Syria Used Chemicals, U.S. Mulls Action — WASHINGTON — Moving a step closer to possible American military action in Syria, a senior Obama administration official said Sunday that there was “very little doubt” that President Bashar al-Assad's military forces had used chemical weapons …

Discussion: BBC, Foreign Policy, Guardian, Wall Street Journal and NPR

Madeline Chambers / Reuters: U.S. spy agency bugged U.N. headquarters: Germany's Spiegel

Russell Berman / The Hill:

Colin Powell warns Republican voter ID laws will backfire — Former Secretary of State Colin Powell on Sunday predicted that Republican attempts to pass voter ID laws would “backfire” by energizing minorities to vote them out of office. — Powell took aim at efforts on the state legislature level …

Discussion: Hot Air and The Moderate Voice

Bryce Covert / ThinkProgress:
Colin Powell On Republican Voting Restrictions: 'It's Going To Backfire'

Discussion: Crooks and Liars

Anja Crowder / ABC News: Cokie Roberts: Changes to Voting Rights ‘Downright Evil’

Reid J. Epstein / Politico:
Powell calls Martin verdict ‘questionable’

Discussion: Weasel Zippers, Scared Monkeys and CNN

Bloomberg:

No Tolerance for Russia's Anti-Gay Games — The International Olympic Committee is letting Russia off far too easy. Russia has argued nonsensically that its new anti-gay law is in keeping with the Olympic Charter's protections against discrimination, and the IOC simply has accepted it.

Discussion: AMERICAblog News

Niall Stanage / The Hill:

Black lawmakers lament flaring of racial tensions under Obama — When President Obama follows in Dr. Martin Luther King's footsteps on Wednesday with an address at the Lincoln Memorial, he will face a nation where race remains the great divide. — Black lawmakers say the election …

Discussion: Jammie Wearing Fools

Kim Severson / New York Times:

Challengers to South Carolina Senator Are Lining Up on the Right — LAKE WYLIE, S.C. — Some of the early shots in the Republican primary battle against Senator Lindsey Graham have been fired from this tiny community on northern border of the state where the Civil War began.

Discussion: msnbc.com

Conn Carroll / Washington Examiner:

Market innovation, not government regulations, are the key to keeping college costs down — “Over the last month,” President Obama said in Buffalo, N.Y., on Thursday, “I've been out there talking about what we need to do as a country to make sure that we've to a better bargain for the middle class …

Discussion: UrbanGrounds

Washington Post:

Despite backlogs, VA disability claims processors get bonuses — Mary Shinn/News21 - Sean Meade was an Army National Guard soldier who was deployed to Iraq during 2006 and 2007. He filed a disability claim in 2008 for back problems and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Discussion: Outside the Beltway

Evan McMurry / Mediaite:

Obama Flag at March on Washington Gets Twitter Riled Up — We know a picture is worth a thousand words. Apparently it's also good for fifty stars. — An American flag with President Barack Obama's face where the fifty stars normally go caused a bit of a stir on Twitter, where some objected to the …

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog, The Moderate Voice, The Hinterland Gazette, Scared Monkeys, Michelle Malkin, The Gateway Pundit, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Twitchy and Weasel Zippers

Lisa Daftari / Fox News:

Muslim Brotherhood's bid to scapegoat Christians failing, say Egyptians — As their nation descends into violent chaos, Egyptians are increasingly blaming the Muslim Brotherhood, despite attempts by the Islamist group to scapegoat Christians and the military, according to several sources who spoke to FoxNews.com from Cairo.

Discussion: Weasel Zippers

David D. Kirkpatrick / New York Times:
Egypt Widens Crackdown and Meaning of ‘Islamist’

Discussion: Via Meadia and Hullabaloo

Lauren Russell / CNN:

Police: 9-year old intentionally kills grandmother — (CNN) — An 8-year-old Louisiana boy intentionally shot and killed his elderly caregiver after playing a violent video game, authorities say. — Marie Smothers was pronounced dead at the scene with a gunshot wound to the head …

Discussion: Business Insider, Hot Air and AL.com