memeorandum: Thunder Road — WASHINGTON — I HAVE learned two things covering politics. (New York Times)

10:20 AM ET, January 12, 2014

Top Items:

Thunder Road — WASHINGTON — I HAVE learned two things covering politics. — One, first impressions are often right. John Edwards is slick. Hillary Clinton is expedient. W. was in over his head. Barack Obama is too much in his head. Chris Christie can be a bully.

Discussion: Althouse, Daily Kos and Washington Post

Maggie Haberman / Politico:

The unanswered ‘Bridgegate’ questions — Political scandals thrive on open questions, and Chris Christie's Bridgegate has plenty. — The political world was rocked last week when the New Jersey governor dismissed two of his advisers after emails showed they were involved in shutting …

Keith Laing / The Hill:

Christie scandal: 5 things we don't know — Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.) may have exhausted reporters' inquiries into his administration's involvement in the closing of lanes on the country's most heavily-traveled bridge, but there are still many unanswered questions in the unfolding political saga.

Discussion: Politico

Michael Isikoff / NBCNews:

Democrat heading bridge probe says Christie could be impeached if he knew of closures — The chairman of a New Jersey legislative panel investigating the George Washington Bridge lane closures said Gov. Chris Christie's top aides had engaged in a “cover-up” and the governor could be impeached …

Discussion: Liberaland and Mediaite

Karen Tumulty / Post Politics:

Tom Kean says Christie's leadership should give pause to voters nationally — Former New Jersey governor Thomas H. Kean, one of the state's most revered figures and a mentor to current Republican Gov. Chris Christie, contends that the leadership qualities Christie has shown while in office …

Discussion: The Agonist, Hot Air and Washington Post

New York Times:
Imagining President Christie

Discussion: Weasel Zippers

Michael Linhorst / NorthJersey.com:
Incoming NJ Assembly speaker to renew the subpoena power of panel in GWB scandal

Discussion: Washington Monthly

Alexander Burns / Politico:
The GOP's tarnished golden boys

Discussion: Taegan Goddard's …

Alexander Bolton / The Hill:

Democrats plead with Obama to abandon Social Security cut — Democratic senators are pleading with President Obama to abandon his proposal to trim Social Security benefits before it becomes a liability for them in the midterm elections. — The president proposed a new formula …

Discussion: The Agonist

Andrew J. Bacevich / Los Angeles Times:

The misuse of American might, and the price it pays — The United States no longer knows how to win wars, but it continues to start them. — “These days the United States absolves itself of any responsibility to finish wars that it starts,” writes Andrew J. Bacevich. (Edel Rodriguez / For The Times / January 11, 2014)

Jeffrey Goldberg / Bloomberg:

Ariel Sharon Never Changed — Shortly after the eruption of the second Palestinian intifada in 2000 — an uprising allegedly, though not actually, triggered by an infamous Ariel Sharon walkabout atop the Temple Mount in Jerusalem — I was visiting Sharon's ranch in southern Israel for the harvest holiday of Sukkot.

Discussion: The Times of Israel, The Daily Beast, Weekly Standard, BBC, National Review, Power Line, Jerusalem Post and New York Times

Ben Birnbaum / The New Republic:

Ariel Sharon, 1928-2014 — He ultimately confronted the right wing. Will Netanyahu do the same? — One day at the Knesset in the early eighties, then-Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon passed a left-wing lawmaker in the hall and said hello, but the lawmaker pretended not to notice.

Molly K. Hooper / The Hill:

Rep. Darrell Issa's agenda in 2014: IRS, Benghazi and Fast and Furious — Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) in 2014 will pursue the IRS scandal, the deadly Benghazi attack and the botched Fast and Furious operation in what will likely be his last year as the House GOP's chief investigator.

Discussion: Prairie Weather

Nicholas Confessore / New York Times:

A National Strategy Funds State Political Monopolies — By his third year as chairman of the Alabama Republican organization, Mike Hubbard believed his party had just about everything it needed to win control of the State Legislature. — He had a plan: an 88-page playbook for the 2010 campaign …

Discussion: Prairie Weather and Liberaland

Shadee Ashtari / The Huffington Post:

U.S. Supreme Court To Hear Anti-Abortion Group's Case For Lying In Political Ads — WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday said it will hear a challenge to an Ohio law that forbids candidates and issue groups from making false campaign statements. — The case, involving …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, Hullabaloo and The Raw Story