memeorandum: Defiant Sam Brownback vows to move toward zero income tax — and make Kansas even more unequal (Luke Brinker/Salon)

3:20 PM ET, January 16, 2015

Top Items:

Kerry Brings Paris a ‘Big Hug’ And James Taylor After Attacks — Secretary of State John Kerry, the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit France since Islamic militant attacks in Paris left 17 dead, met with French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and French President Francois Hollande to offer condolences this morning.

Discussion: Mashable, Taylor Marsh, Outside the Beltway, Bloomberg Politics, neo-neocon, New York Magazine, Washington Free Beacon and Mediaite

Derek Hunter / The Daily Caller:

Apology Tour: John Kerry Brings James Taylor To Paris To Play 'You've Got A Friend' [VIDEO] — Under fire for being a no-show at the Paris March Against Terrorism, the Obama administration sent Secretary of State John Kerry to Paris today to give a “big hug” to the French.

Discussion: protein wisdom, Twitchy, TPNN, The PJ Tatler, Hit & Run and National Review

Aaron Blake / Washington Post:
That time John Kerry got James Taylor to sing 'You've got a friend' to France

Discussion: Hit & Run, RedState, Shakesville and Moe Lane

Matthew Lee / Associated Press:
Kerry offers ‘big hug’ to Paris after attacks

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Fox News Insider and Associated Press

Speaker.gov:

12 Taylor Swift GIFs for you — 1. Last week, President Obama announced his latest idea to provide “free” community college to millions of Americans. It sounded exciting at first... 2. But then, we got to thinking... 3. Free?! Is he using magic money? Nothing is free. So we did a little math.

Discussion: ThinkProgress, Weekly Standard, US News, Daily Mail, Hit & Run, TheBlaze.com, Washington Post, New York Times, The Verge, OnPolitics, Mediaite, New York Magazine and BuzzFeed

Justin Gillis / New York Times:

2014 Was Hottest Year on Record, Surpassing 2010 — Last year was the hottest in earth's recorded history, scientists reported on Friday, underscoring scientific warnings about the risks of runaway emissions and undermining claims by climate-change contrarians that global warming had somehow stopped.

Discussion: New York Magazine, Prairie Weather, Lawyers, Guns & Money and Gothamist

NASA:

NASA, NOAA Find 2014 Warmest Year in Modern Record — The year 2014 ranks as Earth's warmest since 1880, according to two separate analyses by NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) scientists. — The 10 warmest years in the instrumental record, with the exception of 1998, have now occurred since 2000.

Discussion: Politico, ThinkProgress, Washington Post, Liberal Values, Vox, Common Dreams, The Verge, EcoWatch, Chicago, Boing Boing and Climate Etc.

Chris Mooney / Washington Post:
It's official: 2014 was the hottest year in recorded history

Discussion: Guardian and Joe. My. God.

Washington Post:

Holder limits seized-asset sharing process that split billions with local, state police — Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. on Friday barred local and state police from using federal law to seize cash, cars and other property without evidence that a crime occurred.

Discussion: Gawker, Hit & Run, The Verge, Hullabaloo, Cafe Hayek and Instapundit

Michael D. Shear / New York Times:

Obama and Senator Robert Menendez Spar on How to Handle Iran — President Obama and Senator Robert Menendez traded sharp words on Thursday over whether Congress should impose new sanctions on Iran while the administration is negotiating with Tehran about its nuclear program, according to two people who witnessed the exchange.

Discussion: Washington Post, Progress Pond, The PJ Tatler and Washington Free Beacon

ABC News:
President Obama Vows to Stand With Allies Against ‘Scourge’ of Terrorism

Discussion: Politico and Associated Press

Manu Raju / Politico:
Obama to Senate Dems: 'I'm going to play offense'

Discussion: ABC News, US News, Daily Mail, neo-neocon, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Fox News, Algemeiner.com, Daily Kos, Bloomberg and The Hill

Luke Brinker / Salon:

Defiant Sam Brownback vows to move toward zero income tax — and make Kansas even more unequal — His supply side economic experiment has been an utter disaster, but Brownback can't be bothered — Here's what Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback's supply side economic experiment has wrought …

Discussion: Washington Monthly

Jonathan Shorman / Topeka Capital-Journal: Brownback promises income taxes will continue to fall

Tim Alberta / National Journal:

Ben Carson to the GOP Establishment: I'm Not ‘Crazy’ — The political novice with eyes on 2016 auditions before the RNC and blames his zealot image on the mainstream media. — CORONADO, Calif. — Ben Carson—a Washington outsider, a world-renowned neurosurgeon, a favorite among tea-party insurgents …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Liberaland, Mediaite and Joe. My. God.

Mark Joyella / Adweek:

Jim Clancy Leaves CNN After 34 Years — CNN confirms longtime correspondent Jim Clancy has left the network after nearly 34 years. Clancy made the announcement to colleagues in an email obtained by TVNewser, calling CNN “one of the greatest news organizations in the world” and “a family to my own family.”

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Mediaite, Algemeiner.com, The Daily Caller, Washington Free Beacon and Jewish Telegraphic Agency, more at Mediagazer »

Rocco Parascandola / NY Daily News:

EXCLUSIVE: Married NYPD cop accused of kissing, groping rape victim after booze-filled night in Seattle — Detective Lukasz Skorzewski was investigating the rape of a 24-year-old woman when he flew to Seattle, drank with her all night and got physical with her in a hotel room, the college student alleges.

Discussion: Raw Story, New York Magazine and Gothamist

Yvonne Dean-Bailey / Campus Reform:

All-women's college cancels ‘Vagina Monologues’ because it's not feminist enough — Mount Holyoke College, an all-women's school, announced in a campus-wide email that the Theatre Board has cancelled its annual production of the “Vagina Monologues.” — The board has decided to retire …

Discussion: Jezebel, Mediaite, The Daily Caller, Althouse and The PJ Tatler

Elizabeth Nolan Brown / Hit & Run:
Women's College Cancels ‘Vagina Monologues’ Because It Excludes Women Without Vaginas

Discussion: John Hawkins' Right Wing News, ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES, Power Line and Patterico's Pontifications

Ahiza Garcia / Talking Points Memo:

VIDEO: Ex-Navy SEAL Pretends To ‘Choke Out’ Obama — Chris Heben had an unusual year in 2014. — The former Navy SEAL made national headlines in March when he was shot by what he described as three black assailants. Then he was in the news again in September when prosecutors alleged he'd lied to police about the ordeal.

Discussion: Liberaland, Mediaite and Raw Story

Politico:

RNC rolls out 2016 debate schedule — The committee plans to partner mainstream organizations with conservative commentators and outlets. — CORONADO, Calif. — The Republican National Committee will announce Friday that it has sanctioned nine presidential primary debates …

Discussion: Adweek

David A. Graham / The Atlantic Online:

For Whom the Muezzin Calls — When I was working on the student paper at Duke, we'd get a letter to the editor once a year or so that would lament that the university had lost touch with its religious roots as Trinity College, a Methodist school. The correspondents would invariably cite …

Discussion: Duke Today, The Daily Caller, New York Magazine, Gawker, Friendly Atheist, Washington Post, Fox News, American Spectator, NPR and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Ian Millhiser / ThinkProgress:

If You Want To Understand What's Happened To The Supreme Court, You Need To Listen To Rand Paul — Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) is an odd place to seek counsel on the Constitution. As a Senate candidate in 2010, Paul told a Louisville editorial board that he opposed the federal ban on whites …

Discussion: Lawyers, Guns & Money

BBC:

Belgium Verviers plot ‘aimed to kill police’ — A suspected jihadist group targeted in a major anti-terror raid on Thursday had been planning to kill policemen in the street and at police stations, Belgian prosecutors say. — The planned attacks were imminent, they said …

Discussion: USA Today, Reuters, ABC News, Fox News, Hot Air, Tablet Magazine and NPR

Jethro Mullen / CNN:
European counterterrorism officials scramble to identify potential threats

Discussion: Washington Free Beacon, Algemeiner.com, The Daily Beast and Hot Air

Adam Lusher / The Independent:

The mystery of shellshock solved: Scientists identify the unique brain injury caused by war — When the war poet Wilfred Owen wrote of “men whose minds the Dead have ravished” he was attempting to describe the mysterious effects of shellshock which started appearing during the First World War and of which he himself was a sufferer.

Discussion: FOX News Radio

Peggy Noonan / Wall Street Journal:

Don't Do It, Mr. Romney — He'd have been a better president than Obama. That's not nearly enough. — Hershey, Pa. — A conversation with a Republican governor who is a possible presidential aspirant: — I told him I'd been thinking about something and wanted his response.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, The American Conservative, Progress Pond, No More Mister Nice Blog, Political Wire and John Hawkins' Right Wing News