memeorandum: The Coming Two-Tier Health System (Scott W. Atlas/Wall Street Journal)

1:30 PM ET, May 2, 2014

Top Items:

Stephen F. Hayes / Weekly Standard:

Boehner to Form Select Committee on Benghazi — UPDATE: Other news organizations confirm the report below that House speaker John Boehner will announce the formation of a select committee on Benghazi, led by Rep. Trey Gowdy. — House Speaker John Boehner is “seriously considering” …

Discussion: protein wisdom, Washington Examiner, Business Insider, Daily Kos, No More Mister Nice Blog, Hot Air, The Right Scoop, ThinkProgress and The Gateway Pundit

John Dickerson / Slate:

Why the new Benghazi emails aren't a “smoking gun.” — Has the Benghazi “smoking gun” been found? Some White House critics believe that new documents wrestled from the White House by Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, prove that the Obama administration concocted a cover-up …

Discussion: CANNONFIRE, The Week, Taylor Marsh, Fox News, The Dish, Townhall.com, The Daily Banter and New York Times, more at Mediagazer »

Speaker.gov:

Boehner to Establish Select Committee on Benghazi … WASHINGTON, DC - House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) is announcing today that he intends for the House to vote to create a new select committee to investigate the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya that killed four Americans.

Discussion: Weekly Standard, Business Insider, RedState, The PJ Tatler, The Right Scoop and Associated Press

Washington Free Beacon:
NSC Spokesman: Dude, Benghazi Was Like Two Years Ago

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Fox News, Hot Air, The PJ Tatler, Twitchy, The Week, MichelleMalkin.com, The Right Scoop and Doug Ross

Mario Trujillo / The Hill:
Boehner calls on Kerry to testify about email in Benghazi subpoena

Discussion: Politico, CNN, Doug Ross, Balloon Juice, Mediaite and The Huffington Post

Michelle Jamrisko / Bloomberg:

Hiring in U.S. Kicks Into Higher Gear as Unemployment Plunges — The job-creation engine kicked into higher gear as U.S. employers boosted payrolls in April by the most in two years and the jobless rate plunged to the lowest since the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

Discussion: White House.gov Blog, Bloomberg View, The Gateway Pundit and Political Capital

Bill McBride / Calculated Risk:

April Employment Report: 288,000 Jobs, 6.3% Unemployment Rate — From the BLS: … Click on graph for larger image. — The headline number was well above expectations of 215,000 payroll jobs added. — The first graph shows the job losses from the start of the employment recession …

Discussion: Washington Monthly, National Review, CBS DC, Washington Post, Campaign for America's Future, Daily Kos and Business Insider

Nelson D. Schwartz / New York Times:

Report Shows Resurgence of Hiring but Has Downbeat Notes — The American economy gained steam in April, adding 288,000 jobs, while the unemployment rate fell to 6.3 percent, the lowest level since September 2008. — After a sharp slowdown in December and January, and a modest improvement since then …

Discussion: News Desk

Neil Irwin / New York Times:
Employment Picture: The Jobs Report Isn't as Good as It Looks

Discussion: Washington Post, The Dish, Hot Air, Washington Free Beacon and Bloomberg View

Nate Cohn / New York Times:
Midterm Calculus: Bursting the Democrats' Midterm-Turnout Bubble

Discussion: Washington Monthly and National Review

Lucia Mutikani / Reuters:
U.S. payrolls surge in April, jobless rate hits 5-1/2 year low

Discussion: ThinkProgress

Jeff Cox / CNBC:
Payrolls jump in April as thaw hits jobs market

Discussion: Patterico's Pontifications, Outside the Beltway and The Right Scoop

New York Post:

Disgraced Clippers owner Donald Sterling is battling cancer — This could wind up being a pretty short ban. — Disgraced racist Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling is battling cancer — surprising those around him by beating the final buzzer for as long as he has, sources told The Post on Thursday.

Discussion: The Daily Caller, The Point Forward, Deadspin, SBNation.com, ABC News and TMZ.com

Angel Jennings / Los Angeles Times:
L.A. head of NAACP resigns in wake of Sterling scandal

Discussion: NAACP, KTLA 5, New York Times, The Raw Story, The Week, Guardian, Mediaite and National Review

Olga Khazan / The Atlantic Online:
This Town Needs a Better Class of Racist

Discussion: ThinkProgress, New York Times, Washington Examiner, Althouse, Bloomberg View and SBNation.com

Paul Krugman / New York Times:

Why Economics Failed — On Wednesday, I wrapped up the class I've been teaching all semester: “The Great Recession: Causes and Consequences.” (Slides for the lectures are available via my blog.) And while teaching the course was fun, I found myself turning at the end to an agonizing question …

Discussion: This Is Brad DeLong's …, Vox Popoli and Shakesville

Tina Brown / The Daily Beast:

Don't Run for President, Hillary. Become a ‘Post-President’ Instead — The political world and her most fervent fans may be exercised about a presidential bid. But she should forget it. If she wins, it's too much stress for too little return. — I know as much as anyone …

Discussion: Politico, Taylor Marsh, The Week and Shakesville

Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post:

Obama's foreign policy of denial — Barack Obama's 949-word response Monday to a question about foreign policy weakness showed the president at his worst: defensive, irritable, contradictory and at times detached from reality. It began with a complaint about negative coverage on Fox News …

Discussion: Fox News and Armed Services Republicans

Anna Nemtsova / Washington Post:
Ukraine army launches assault on rebel stronghold

Discussion: Business Insider and VodkaPundit

Michael Tomasky / The Daily Beast:

Obamacare Truthers Get Caught in a Lie on Delinquency Rate — One way to make Obamacare look bad: Count as unpaid the new enrollees whose premiums aren't even due yet! — First, the Obamacare Truthers—the Republicans and conservatives who insist that every piece of remotely positive news …

Discussion: Daily Kos, Talking Points Memo, Yahoo! News, The Heritage Foundation and The Moderate Voice

Peggy Noonan / Wall Street Journal:

Apathy in the Executive — John Paul II and Obama: a study in leadership contrasts. — Rome — Friends and I kept seeing groups of Poles who'd taken planes or 20-hour bus rides to be here for the canonization of John Paul II. They did not look wealthy.

Discussion: The Dish and No More Mister Nice Blog

Shadee Ashtari / The Huffington Post:

Janice Hahn Walks Out Of Event After James Dobson Calls Obama The ‘Abortion President’ — Janice Hahn James Dobson Janice Hahn Video Robert Aderholt Prayer and Meditation Robert Aderholt National Day of Prayer Janice Hahn National Day of Prayer Obama Abortion Abortion James Dobson

Discussion: Right Wing Watch, LifeNews.com, Roll Call and The Raw Story

CNN:

First on CNN: Democrats eye February for 2016 kick-off — Washington (CNN) - The first votes cast in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination would take place in February 2016, according to a draft proposal under consideration by the Democratic National Committee.

Discussion: Washington Monthly

Scott W. Atlas / Wall Street Journal:

The Coming Two-Tier Health System — ObamaCare is already creating one class of care for the poor and middle class and another for the affluent. — With the unveiling of the Affordable Care Act's website, the public experienced a painful reminder of the consequences of the government's new authority over health care.

Discussion: Balloon Juice

Craig Timberg / Washington Post:

Apple, Facebook, others defy authorities, notify users of secret data demands — Major U.S. technology companies have largely ended the practice of quietly complying with investigators' demands for e-mail records and other online data, saying that users have a right to know in advance …