Jill Abramson to exit New York Times  —  New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson announced Wednesday that she will leave the paper, two sources familiar with the news informed POLITICO.  Managing editor Dean Baquet will take over as executive editor, effective immediately.

AMAZING VIDEO: Cat saves boy from dog attack in Southwest Bakersfield  —  BAKERSFIELD - A cat came to her best friend's rescue Tuesday when the young boy was attacked in his driveway in Southwest Bakersfield.  —  The surveillance video shows the boy playing on his bicycle when a dog sneaks up behind him and grabs his leg.

Harry Reid Says He “Can't Vote” For Obama's Controversial Judicial Pick  —  “Unless I have a better explanation, I can't vote for him,” the Senate majority leader said of Michael Boggs.  —  U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV).  —  Jonathan Ernst / Reuters / Reuters

New Benghazi Investigation Spooks GOP Leaders  —  It's not just the Democrats who are opposed to a new select committee looking into the Benghazi attacks.  Many top Republicans are uneasy, too.  —  Last Wednesday, as the House was preparing for its new investigation into the Benghazi attacks …

US using drones to find kidnapped Nigerian girls  —  The U.S. is now using unmanned drones in the search for hundreds of Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by the Islamist group Boko Haram, the White House said Wednesday.  —  The deployment of drones comes in addition to manned surveillance flights …

Climate Change Deemed Growing Security Threat by Military Researchers  —  WASHINGTON — The accelerating rate of climate change poses a severe risk to national security and acts as a catalyst for global political conflict, a report published Tuesday by a leading government-funded military research organization concluded.

Our Second Black President?  —  For years, we've had a running conversation about how much or whether the often vitriolic, seemingly gut level opposition to President Obama is tied to his race as opposed to simple partisanship, opposition to policies and more.

Eric Cantor's tea party opponent in Va. primary may be picking up momentum  —  RICHMOND — There was a time when House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) sympathized with the tea party's frustration with Washington.  —  Now, he's engaged in open warfare with the GOP's insurgent wing.

Bill Clinton Defends Hillary On Benghazi, Rove Attacks  —  Former President BIll Clinton said at the Peterson Foundation Fiscal Summit on Wednesday that his wife handled the attack in Libya appropriately and that he was “dumbfounded” by Karl Rove's suggestion she suffered brain damage from a fall in 2012

Georgia Senate Frontrunner Touches Republicans' Third Rail, Suggests Raising Taxes  —  The Georgia Republican contenders for U.S Senate have made a lot of outrageous assertions, from calling evolution a lie “straight from the pit of hell” to proposing that poor students sweep floors to pay for lunch.

Nebraska Senate Nominee Says Religious Beliefs Can Justify Breaking Any Law  —  “[O]ur right to the free exercise of religion is co-equal to our right to life,” according to the campaign website of Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican who won his party's nomination to the United States Senate on Tuesday.

The Origins of “Privilege”  —  The idea of “privilege”—that some people benefit from unearned, and largely unacknowledged, advantages, even when those advantages aren't discriminatory —has a pretty long history.  In the nineteen-thirties, W. E. B. Du Bois wrote about the “psychological wage” …

Newark's Voters Choose New Mayor and New Path  —  Councilman Ras Baraka, the fiery scion of a militant poet, was elected mayor of Newark on Tuesday, signaling a likely shift in the direction that New Jersey's largest city had embarked upon for most of the last decade.

In 2014 Primaries So Far, Good News for Incumbents  —  With Tuesday's elections in Nebraska and West Virginia, we are now seven states deep into the 2014 primary season.  Already, nominations have been decided in nearly 100 of the nation's 435 congressional districts.

Price for Nevada dad to see state's school files on his kids: $10G  —  When Nevada dad John Eppolito requested data collected by the school system on his four kids he was told it would cost more than $10,000.  —  Nevada dad John Eppolito got a bad case of sticker shock when he asked state education officials …

Georgia Accused Of Sentencing Transgender Woman To ‘Torture’  —  Georgia's prison officials will have to explain themselves in court if they continue to refuse hormone therapy to transgender inmates, warns a letter delivered to the state's Department of Corrections on Tuesday …

Liberal Columnist Insists Again That Chris Stevens Wasn't Murdered In Benghazi  —  Republicans remain convinced that the Obama administration deliberately avoided labeling the attacks in Benghazi an act of terrorism.  But that alleged “cover-up” has nothing on a recent characterization by Eleanor Clift.

Stopping Keystone Ensures More Railroad Tank-Car Spills  —  Pipelines in the U.S. carry 25 times more oil than tank cars do, yet derailments are by far the biggest threat.  —  The Keystone XL Pipeline got another nail in its coffin Monday, in the form of a Senate energy vote that excluded the pipeline issue.