memeorandum: Jerry Brown, urged to run for president, won't rule out 2016 bid (Mark Z. Barabak/Los Angeles Times)

5:50 PM ET, December 17, 2013

Top Items:

‘This Is the End of the Presidency’ — Tracking the same horrible second-term path as Bush, can Obama learn from the past? — Claiming a mandate he never had, the newly reelected president foisted a bold agenda upon Congress and the public, then watched it collapse within months …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Politico, The Dish, Hit & Run, Mediaite, Outside the Beltway and ABC News, more at Mediagazer »

Washington Post:

Post-ABC poll: Obama, Republicans, Health care and 2014 midterm — Poll Questions

Discussion: The Plum Line, The Daily Caller, CNN and National Review

Brett LoGiurato / Business Insider:
Obama's Current Approval Rating Is The Ugliest Since Nixon

Discussion: TIME, The Week and Ed Driscoll

The Fix:
Haters gonna hate. But they plan to vote Republican.

Discussion: Rush Limbaugh, Politico, The Daily Caller, Talking Points Memo, No More Mister Nice Blog, Los Angeles Times, Washington Monthly and ABC News

Gary Langer / ABC News:
A Drop in Opposition to Obamacare Helps Stabilize a Struggling Presidency

Discussion: Daily Kos and NewsBusters

Edward Snowden / folha.uol.com.br:

An Open Letter to the People of Brazil — Atualizado em 17/12/2013 às 08h11. — Six months ago, I stepped out from the shadows of the United States Government's National Security Agency to stand in front of a journalist's camera. — Espionage Whistleblower Edward Snowden to Seek Asylum in Brazil

Discussion: Firedoglake, CNN, KTOO, Little Green Footballs, BuzzFeed, Gawker, World News, The Hinterland Gazette, Guardian, New York Times and Mashable, more at Mediagazer »

Emily Bazelon / Slate:

Snap Out of It — If this judge doesn't buy the legal basis for the NSA's intrusive phone snooping, no one should. — If you have been lulled into a state of somnolence about former government contractor Edward Snowden's revelations that the government is collecting records …

Discussion: New York Times, Hit & Run, The Atlantic Online, The Volokh Conspiracy, BillMoyers.com, Politico, Close Read, The Dish and Washington Post

New York Times:

A Powerful Rebuke of Mass Surveillance — For the first time since the revelation of the National Security Agency's vast dragnet of all Americans' telephone records, a federal court has ruled that such surveillance is “significantly likely” to be unconstitutional.

Kim Hjelmgaard / USA Today:
Snowden to Brazil: Swap you spying help for asylum

Discussion: Business Insider, Techdirt, TechCrunch, The Week, The Verge, The Daily Caller, First Read, BillMoyers.com and New York Times, more at Mediagazer »

Scott Lemieux / American Prospect:
Four Takeaways from Yesterday's NSA Ruling

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog, NYT Bits, Poynter, Lawyers, Guns & Money and Firedoglake

Guardian:
Edward Snowden offers to help Brazil over US spying in return for asylum

Discussion: Rasmussen Reports, WorldViews, The PJ Tatler and RT

New York Times:
U.S.-Germany Intelligence Partnership Falters Over Spying

Discussion: Guardian, Hot Air and American Prospect

Bradley Brooks / Associated Press:
Snowden Petitions Brazil For Asylum In Exchange For Help With Spying

Discussion: Outside the Beltway and Patterico's Pontifications

Seung Min Kim / Politico:

White House to tap Microsoft exec to fix HealthCare.gov — The White House is tapping the private sector for its next point man to oversee the troubled Obamacare website. — The administration is set to announce that Kurt DelBene, an executive at Microsoft, will succeed Jeff Zients …

Discussion: Twitchy, CNN, Ed Driscoll, TheBlaze.com, Hot Air, Weasel Zippers, Mediaite and Gigaom

David Martosko / Daily Mail: Obama ‘hijacks’ tech executive meeting to make ‘PR pitch’ on Obamacare website fix instead …

Kathleen Sebelius / HHS.gov:
Former Microsoft Executive Kurt DelBene To Replace Jeff Zients

Discussion: Wonkblog, Talking Points Memo, Post Politics, The Verge, “The Lid”, Business Insider and First Read

Jessica Meyers / Politico:
Tech giants get Obama's ear on NSA

Discussion: Guardian, The Verge and Business Insider

David Brooks / New York Times:

The Thought Leader — Little boys and girls in ancient Athens grew up wanting to be philosophers. In Renaissance Florence they dreamed of becoming Humanists. But now a new phrase and a new intellectual paragon has emerged to command our admiration: The Thought Leader.

Discussion: Capital New York, Business Insider, Paul Krugman, Mediaite, No More Mister Nice Blog and Patterico's Pontifications

Charles P. Pierce / Esquire:

WAS IT SOMETHING WE SAID? — Moral Hazard, the Irish setter owned for photo-op purposes by New York Times columnist David Brooks, sat at the window of the farmhouse and watched the sparrows dance upon the new-fallen snow. There was a warm glow about the room from the blazing fireplace …

Discussion: Balloon Juice

Rep. Jim Matheson / Facebook:

When I launched my first campaign in 1999, I knew that the arc of my public service would have many chapters. It has been a tremendous privilege to serve the people of Utah during my time in the United States House of Representatives, but my time in the House should not be the sum total of my service.

Discussion: Power Line, Talking Points Memo, Hot Air, Post Politics, Weekly Standard, Ricochet Conversations Feed, Rothenblog, Roll Call, Daily Kos, The Rothenberg Political …, Weasel Zippers, The Daily Caller, The Gateway Pundit and First Read

The Hill:

Rep. Wolf retires after 17 terms — Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) announced Tuesday he will retire from Congress after 17 terms, opening up a competitive House seat in Northern Virginia. — Wolf, 74, has represented his district in North Virginia since 1981 and is the longest-serving member from the state.

Discussion: Politico

Deirdre Walsh / CNN:
GOP congressman's retirement could put key district in play

Discussion: Outside the Beltway

Abby Livingston / Roll Call:
Frank Wolf Will Not Seek Re-Election (Updated)

Discussion: Post Politics, Talking Points Memo, The Rothenberg Political …, Rothenblog and Daily Kos

Mark Z. Barabak / Los Angeles Times:

Jerry Brown, urged to run for president, won't rule out 2016 bid — Some are urging California Gov. Jerry Brown to run a fourth time for president, in part to stop the front-runner, Hillary Rodham Clinton. (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images / May 23, 2013) — If he weren't the nation's oldest governor …

Discussion: Washington Monthly and Liberaland

Eric Lach / Talking Points Memo:

Exclusive: Inside Steve Stockman's Disgusting, Condemned Campaign Office (PHOTOS) — Those looking for dirt on Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX) need look no further. TPM has obtained photographs taken by the local officials who recently shut down Stockman's campaign office in Webster, Texas.

Discussion: Mediaite

Elizabeth Stoker / The Week:

Why conservatives just don't get Pope Francis' anti-poverty crusade — U.S. conservatives like to pair the cross and the coin, but that's not the case elsewhere around the world — O — n Sunday, Pope Francis matter-of-factly announced that he was not actually a Marxist, telling Italy's La Stampa, “The Marxist ideology is wrong.

Bret Stephens / Wall Street Journal: Of Jane Fonda and Pope Francis

Bloomberg:

Accidental Tax Break Saves Wealthiest Americans $100 Billion — Sheldon Adelson makes no secret of his disdain for the estate tax. — “How many times do you have to pay taxes on money?” the casino magnate asks, leaning on a blue cane on the cobblestones of Wall Street on a crisp October morning.

Discussion: The Raw Story, ThinkProgress and Gawker

Sherry Jacobson / Dallas Morning News:

Texas congressmen take aim at Affordable Care Act's navigators — Dozens of Obamacare supporters attended Monday's congressional hearing at the Eisemann Center in Richardson. Luis Veloz, 20, of Dallas told the crowd that he and his family do not have health insurance.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Mediaite, The Raw Story and NewsBusters

Nathan Allen / Grist:

Reddit's science forum banned climate deniers. Why don't all newspapers do the same? — In addition to my career as a PhD chemist, I am one of a select few who enjoy the privilege of moderating content on reddit.com's science forum. The science forum is a small part of reddit, but it nonetheless enjoys over 4 million subscribers.

Discussion: Twitchy and ThinkProgress

Isaac Chotiner / The New Republic:

Q&A: The Top North Korean Expert Explains What Happened to Kim Jong Un's Uncle — The purge and execution last week of the uncle of North Korea's ruler, Kim Jong Un, has sparked worried questions from international observers about his grip on the nuclear-armed country.

Discussion: New York Times and The Week

James Hohmann / Politico:

Internal Rick Scott poll: Charlie Crist up in Florida — Charlie Crist leads Florida Gov. Rick Scott by 4 percentage points in an internal poll conducted by Scott pollster Tony Fabrizio. — The survey, taken in late November and obtained Tuesday by POLITICO, puts Crist …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo and Naked Politics