Reid: ‘Why Would We Want To’ Help One Kid With Cancer?  —  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) asked why Senate Democrats would want to fund the National Institutes of Health to “help one child who has cancer” Wednesday when asked that question by CNN reporter Dana Bash.

EXCLUSIVE VIDEO: McDonald's Employee Admits Being Paid $15 to Protest WW2 Veterans (UPDATED)  —  Yesterday I reported from the National World War Two Memorial on several members of Congress crashing the barricades set up by the National Park Service that were keeping out several hundred Honor Flight veterans …

Meet Butch Matthews, A Republican Who Came To Love Obamacare After Realizing It Will Save Him $13,000  —  61-year-old Butch Matthews, left, with his wife Debbie  —  Butch Matthews is a 61-year-old former small business owner from Little Rock, Arkansas who used to wake up every morning at 4 …

Obama to Wall Street: This time be worried  —  Obama to Wall Street: You should be concerned this time  —  In an exclusive interview with CNBC's John Harwood, President Obama says Wall Street should be concerned about the ongoing impasse between him and House Republicans over funding the government and the debt limit.

Grover Norquist on Ted Cruz: ‘He pushed House Republicans into traffic and wandered away’  —  Grover Norquist is the president of Americans for Tax Reform and the creator of the anti-tax pledge that nearly every Republican in Congress has signed.  We spoke on Tuesday about the government shutdown and its consequences for his agenda.

Juan Linz's Bad News for America  —  The Yale political scientist died this week.  His life's work tells us that American democracy is doomed.  —  Juan Linz, the distinguished Yale political scientist, died on Tuesday morning in New Haven, Conn., at the age of 86.

Boehner to GOP: Grand Bargain in the Works  —  House Republicans tell me Speaker John Boehner wants to craft a “grand bargain” on fiscal issues as part of the debt-limit deliberations, and during a series of meetings on Wednesday, he urged colleagues to stick with him.  —  The revelation came quietly.

Exclusive: Mia Farrow and Eight of Her Children Speak Out on Their Lives, Frank Sinatra, and the Scandals They've Endured  —  See a slide show of Mia's children and quotes from Orth's piece.  —  Twenty years after Vanity Fair special correspondent Maureen Orth reported on the sexual-abuse …

Bank CEOs huddle with Obama  —  Top banking executives emerged from a meeting with President Obama on Wednesday warning of the “extremely adverse” consequences of a national default.  —  Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein said there is broad agreement in the banking industry that the debt ceiling …

BREAKING: Iowa Sen. Kent Sorenson resigns after report finds he received money from Bachmann campaign  —  By Jason Noble and Jennifer Jacobs  —  Kent Sorenson, the Iowa state senator embattled over accusations that he inappropriately received pay from at least one presidential campaign …

Cruz warns shutdown could lead to terrorist attacks  —  Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) warned on Wednesday that the government shutdown could leave the United States vulnerable to terrorist attacks.  —  “If, God forbid, we see an attack on the United States because the intelligence community …

Tom Clancy, Best-Selling Master of Military Thrillers, Dies at 66  —  Tom Clancy, whose complex, adrenaline-fueled military novels spawned a new genre of thrillers and made him one of the world's best-known and best-selling authors, died on Tuesday in Baltimore.  He was 66.

Why Are So Many People in a Blind Rage These Days?  —  Paul Waldman, as he so often does, says what I've been thinking: … Roger that.  But then he adds this: … This is conventional wisdom, of course.  The reason the tea party caucus isn't willing to compromise is because there's no pressure on them to compromise.

THIS IS WHAT THEY WANT  —  Let's just spitball a bit here.  Right now, even if their campaign of public vandalism ended at this very moment, the Republicans would still have three-quarters of a loaf because the status quo ante would be a federal budget at (or beneath) the spending levels mandated by The Sequester.