memeorandum: Portman Fills the Gap in the GOP Presidential Field (John Feehery/Wall Street Journal)

3:25 PM ET, August 28, 2014

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How U.S. Interventionists Abetted the Rise of ISIS — Our Middle Eastern policy is unhinged, flailing about to see who to act against next, with little regard to consequences.

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Washington Post:

Obama's immigration decision could roil 2014 election — Both political parties are in a state of high anxiety over the possibility that President Obama will allow millions of illegal immigrants to remain in the country, fearing that White House action on the issue could change the course of November's midterm elections.

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Fox News:
Dems' last ditch hope: Force a shutdown to save the Senate

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TMZ.com:

Joan Rivers — Stops Breathing During Surgery ... (Update: Critical Condition) — STOPS BREATHING DURING SURGERY — (Update: Critical Condition) — EXCLUSIVE — 8:49 AM PT — The NYPD tells us ... Joan is currently in critical condition. — We're told ... at one point, Joan's heart stopped beating.

Discussion: CNN, E! Online, The Daily Caller, kdvr.com, The Huffington Post, Mashable, The Superficial, Gawker, KXAN-TV and BuzzFeed

Caitlin MacNeal / Talking Points Memo:

Chuck Todd Pushes RNC Chair: ‘Too Many Crazy White Guys’? — On MSNBC's “The Daily Rundown,” host Chuck Todd asked Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, on Thursday about report commissioned by two conservative groups that found that the Republican party …

Discussion: Politico, Mediaite and NewsBusters

Politico:
Exclusive: GOP poll of women: Party ‘stuck in past’

Discussion: Hot Air, The Daily Banter, NewsBusters, Ring of Fire, American Prospect, Daily Kos, Pharyngula, Shakesville, No More Mister Nice Blog, Taylor Marsh and Talking Points Memo

Max Fisher / Vox:

Let's be clear about this: Russia is invading Ukraine right now — TWEET SHARE +1 LINKEDIN EMAIL PRINT — There are two things happening between Ukraine and Russia right now. First, Russian and Ukrainian leaders are meeting in Belarus to negotiate a peace deal in the Ukrainian conflict …

Discussion: Washington Post, Mediaite, The Dish, New Atlanticist, The Verge, Guardian and New York Times

Isabel Gorst / Los Angeles Times:
Russians invading, says Ukraine leader; tanks reported crossing border

Discussion: BBC, AMERICAN DIGEST and National Review

CNN:
Official: Russian forces back rebels with tanks in eastern Ukraine

Discussion: Business Insider, Firedoglake, Weekly Standard and The PJ Tatler

The Huffington Post:

NRA: ‘Children Can Have Fun At The Shooting Range’ — WASHINGTON — Less than two days after a 9-year-old girl in Arizona accidentally shot and killed a gun range instructor who was showing her how to fire an Uzi, the National Rifle Association on Wednesday touted new ways for children to “have fun” at shooting ranges.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, The Raw Story, ABC News, Hullabaloo, PoliticusUSA, Hot Air and CNN

New York Times:
A 9-Year-Old at a Shooting Range, a Spraying Uzi and Outrage

Discussion: ThinkProgress, AMERICAblog News, The Mahablog and Outside the Beltway

Gail Sullivan / Washington Post:
Firing-range instructor hands 9-year-old an Uzi. Now he's dead.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, New York Times, The Dish, NBC News, Guardian, The Daily Banter and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Mark Follman / Mother Jones:
In Wake of Arizona Uzi Killing, NRA Tweets About Kids Having Fun With Guns

Discussion: The Raw Story, Mashable, Liberaland and CBS New York

Investor's Business Daily:

Holder Cut Left-Wing Groups In On $17 Bil BofA Deal — Extortion: Radical Democrat activist groups stand to collect millions from Attorney General Eric Holder's record $17 billion deal to settle alleged mortgage abuse charges against Bank of America. — Buried in the fine print of the deal …

Discussion: protein wisdom, Power Line, ProfessorBainbridge.com and National Review

Brent Budowsky / The Hill:

Why Hagan wins North Carolina — Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) is the target of what could be the most aggressive, dishonest, vindictive and lavishly financed negative campaign against any statewide candidate I've ever seen, yet according to the summary of polling from Real Clear Politics …

Alan I. Abramowitz / Sabato's Crystal Ball:

False Hope: Why Libertarians Won't Help Republicans Win the Youth Vote — The Republican Party has a major problem with young voters. According to national exit polls, the GOP has lost the under-30 vote by a wide margin in every election since 2004. In 2012, Barack Obama defeated Mitt Romney …

Discussion: CANNONFIRE, Washington Monthly and Hullabaloo

Charles M. Blow / New York Times:

Bill O'Reilly and White Privilege — Is white privilege real? Not according to Fox News's Bill O'Reilly. — This week O'Reilly debated the issue of white privilege with a fellow host and then returned to the topic the next day with this doozy of a statement:

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Mediaite, Fox News, Gawker and Booman Tribune

Garrett Epps / The Atlantic Online:

The Extreme Partisanship of John Roberts's Supreme Court — Like Barack Obama, the chief justice came into office promising an age of apolitical comity. And like the president, he has seen his dream die. — “Politics are closely divided,” John Roberts told scholar Jeffrey Rosen after his first term as chief justice.

Discussion: RedState

Milo Yiannopoulos / BREITBART.COM:

MUSLIM GANG RAPISTS ARE SPRINGING UP EVERYWHERE. WHY CAN'T WE BE HONEST ABOUT IT? — The notorious Sydney gang rapes in 2000 were committed by Lebanese Australians. Muslim men raped women and girls as young as 14. Australia, being a sensible sort of place, identified that the rapists …

Discussion: Vox Popoli

Martha P. Nochimson / Vox:

Did Tony die at the end of The Sopranos? — David Chase finally answers the question he wants fans to stop asking — The main topic of conversation about The Sopranos, seven years after the series finale, is still whether Tony Soprano, mob boss of North Jersey, is dead or not.

Discussion: Althouse, The Daily Banter, Mediaite, New York Times, Fox News Insider, CNN, The Verge, Gawker, The Daily Caller, SBNation.com and Inside TV

John Feehery / Wall Street Journal:

Portman Fills the Gap in the GOP Presidential Field — Jeb Bush is probably not running. Neither is Mitt Romney. Chris Christie is trying to hard to recover from Bridge-gate but that doesn't seem likely. — That means there is a huge gap in the Republican field: The responsible one.

Discussion: OnPolitics

Karen Shuey / LancasterOnline:

F&M College Poll: Corbett failing to gain ground in race with Wolf — Doris Berko and Cindy Butzer might live in the same town, but they find themselves on opposite sides of the political landscape. — Both women, who reside in Leola, were participants in the latest Franklin & Marshall College poll released Thursday morning.

Discussion: Booman Tribune

Detroit Free Press:

Schauer edges ahead of Snyder, 45% to 43%, in new governor race poll — LANSING — Democratic challenger Mark Schauer has edged ahead of Gov. Rick Snyder by two percentage points, according to a new poll of likely voters in the Nov. 4 election. — The results from EPIC-MRA of Lansing come …

Discussion: Prairie Weather

Fox News:

Sources say second American killed fighting with ISIS in Syria identified as Abdirahmaan Muhumed — A second American killed fighting with the Islamic State group in Syria has been identified as Abdirahmaan Muhumed, of Minneapolis, two sources told Fox News late Wednesday.

Discussion: myfoxtwincities.com, Gawker, Washington Free Beacon, National Review, Fox News Insider, The Gateway Pundit and The PJ Tatler

THE / Los Angeles Times:

Editorial Don't let Arizona and Kansas get away with potentially discriminatory voter registration rules — Arizona, which has become infamous for its hostility toward immigrants who are in the country illegally, lost an important case in the U.S. Supreme Court last year when the justices ruled …

Nicholas Kristof / New York Times:

Is Everyone a Little Bit Racist? — Let's start with what we don't know: the precise circumstances under which a white police officer in Ferguson, Mo., shot dead an unarmed black teenager named Michael Brown. — But here's what evidence does strongly suggest: Young black men in America suffer …

Discussion: Mediaite

Jeffrey M. Jones / Gallup:

Republicans' “Thought” to 2014 Election Exceeds Democrats' — GOP advantage more similar to those in 2002 and 2010 than in 2006 — PRINCETON, NJ — One in three Americans (33%) say they have given “quite a lot” or “some” thought to the 2014 midterm election, up from 26% in April.

Discussion: Washington Post