memeorandum: RNC Chair On Paul Ryan's Remarks: Dems Always Waiting To ‘Pounce’ (VIDEO) (Caitlin MacNeal/Talking Points Memo)

3:35 PM ET, March 16, 2014

Top Items:

Doomed airliner pilot was political fanatic: Hours before taking control of flight MH370 he attended trial of jailed opposition leader as FBI reveal passengers could be at a secret location — Police are investigating the possibility that the pilot of missing Flight MH370 hijacked his own aircraft in a bizarre political protest.

Discussion: Telegraph, The Gateway Pundit, Reuters, Althouse, The PJ Tatler, Booman Tribune, Guardian and Corrente

New York Times:

Pilot Spoke to Air Controllers After Shutoff of Data System — SEPANG, Malaysia — A signaling system was disabled on the missing Malaysia Airlines jet before a pilot spoke to Malaysian air traffic control without hinting at any trouble, a senior Malaysian official said Sunday …

Discussion: JustOneMinute, neo-neocon, The Gateway Pundit, The Week, Hinterland Gazette and AMERICAblog News

Robert Mendick / Telegraph:

Malaysia Airline MH370: 9/11-style terror allegations resurface in case of lost plane — Possible plot investigated after Al-Qaeda supergrass told court that four or five Malaysian men planned a passenger airliner hijack — By Robert Mendick, Robert Verkaik in London, Dean Nelson in Kuala Lumpur and Malcolm Moore in Beijing

Discussion: The Gateway Pundit and Jihad Watch

Maureen Dowd / New York Times:

Dems in Distress — WASHINGTON — Scott Brown, the Republican who admitted he wore pink leather shorts on his first date with his wife-to-be, is back. — And Democrats are scared to death. — It's not that Democrats are particularly scared that the 54-year-old former Massachusetts senator …

Discussion: PoliticusUSA, No More Mister Nice Blog and Power Line

New York Times:

Obama Factor Adds to Fears of Democrats — WASHINGTON — Democrats are becoming increasingly alarmed about their midterm election fortunes amid President Obama's sinking approval ratings, a loss in a special House election in Florida last week, and millions of dollars spent by Republican-aligned groups attacking the new health law.

Discussion: The Gateway Pundit, Weekly Standard, Power Line, Right Wing News and National Review

Scott Johnson / Power Line:
Maureen Dowd finds the lightning bug

Discussion: Althouse

Alexandra Jaffe / The Hill: Scott Brown fires up Senate fight

Caitlin MacNeal / Talking Points Memo:

RNC Chair On Paul Ryan's Remarks: Dems Always Waiting To ‘Pounce’ (VIDEO) — This post has been updated. — Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus on Sunday addressed the controversy over Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-WI) remarks about a “culture problem” in inner cities of men not wanting to work.

Discussion: Hinterland Gazette and Hullabaloo

Jonathan Topaz / Politico:

RNC chair: Obamacare ‘main target’ — Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus called Obamacare “complete poison” on Sunday and vowed the GOP would continue to target the new health law in upcoming races. — Appearing on CNN's “State of the Union,” he called the Affordable Care Act the “main target” for Republicans.

Discussion: CNN and DNC Rapid Response

Carole Cadwalladr / Guardian:

Scarlett Johansson interview: ‘I would way rather not have middle ground’ — The star talks to Carole Cadwalladr about playing an alien in Under the Skin - Jonathan Glazer's low-budget sci-fi film set in Glasgow - and her role in the recent SodaStream controversy

Discussion: Israel Matzav and Israpundit

Andrew Cuomo / CNN:

CNN Poll: Rand Paul goes where his father never went — Washington (CNN) - Rand Paul has done something his father never did - top the list of potential Republican presidential candidates in a national poll. — According to a new CNN/ORC International survey, 16% of Republicans and independents …

Discussion: Scared Monkeys, Politico, OnPolitics and Liberaland

Tyler Cowen / Associated Press:

Crimea Through a Game-Theory Lens — A Russian occupation of Crimea raises the specter of the Cold War, in which the nuclear stalemate between the United States and the Soviet Union devolved into regional disputes around the world. — While military and political frictions made the biggest headlines …

Yahoo! News:

Crimea holds referendum to split from Ukraine — Simferopol (Ukraine) (AFP) - Crimeans took to the polls on Sunday for a referendum on breaking away from Ukraine to join Russia that has precipitated a Cold War-style security crisis on Europe's eastern frontier.

Discussion: The Week and Hinterland Gazette

Washington Post:
Crimeans begin voting on Russia referendum

Discussion: The New Republic and Washington Monthly

Caitlin MacNeal / Talking Points Memo:

McCain Compares Russia To A Gas Station — Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) on Sunday called for economic sanctions against Russia, arguing that they would be effective since its economy depends on oil and gas exports. — “Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country,” he said on CNN's “State of the Union.”

Christopher Clark / Spiegel Online:

What History Teaches Us About the Ukraine Crisis — On the 100th anniversary of World War I, it is tempting to compare events in Ukraine to 1914. But the current crisis bears little resemblance to the geopolitical situation of the time. The answers history provides are anything but singular and absolute.

Discussion: Outside the Beltway