memeorandum: U.S. Agrees to Slow Pullout of Troops From Afghanistan (New York Times)

5:05 PM ET, March 24, 2015

Top Items:

Israel Spied on Iran Talks — Ally's snooping upset White House because information was used to lobby Congress to try to sink a deal — Soon after the U.S. and other major powers entered negotiations last year to curtail Iran's nuclear program, senior White House officials learned Israel was spying on the closed-door talks.

Jason Zengerle / GQ:

What If Sarah Palin Were a Brain Surgeon? — Until two years ago, Ben Carson was a mild-mannered neurosurgeon—a hero to black America, the subject of a tender made-for-TV movie. Then he started raving about Nazis and America's demise. Now he's the Tea Party's great White House hope—and the GOP's worst nightmare.

Discussion: Mediaite, Political Wire, Business Insider, No More Mister Nice Blog, OnPolitics and Chicago

Scott Wong / The Hill:

Boehner ‘baffled’ by Israeli spying report — Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Tuesday he was “shocked” and “baffled” by reports the Israeli government had spied on sensitive U.S.-Iran nuclear talks and passed information to members of Congress to whip up opposition to a potential deal.

Discussion: Algemeiner.com, Mediaite, Business Insider, Guardian, Addicting Info, The Daily Caller, The PJ Tatler, RedState, The Times of Israel and Washington Post

Bret Stephens / Wall Street Journal:
The Orwellian Obama Presidency

Discussion: Jewish World Review, alicublog, Jerusalem Post, Power Line and Washington Free Beacon

Edward-Isaac Dovere / Politico:
James Baker blasts Benjamin Netanyahu

Discussion: Mediaite, Washington Post and Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Mike Levine / ABC News:
Video of White House Incident Released

Discussion: Politico

Washington Post:
Report: Israel spied on Iran-U.S. talks and shared information with lawmakers

Discussion: CNN, US News, Hot Air, Wall Street Journal, Mediaite, Business Insider and The Gateway Pundit

Edward-Isaac Dovere / Politico:
Barack Obama's top aide says Israeli ‘occupation’ must end

Discussion: Hot Air, Israel Matzav, RedState, The Hill, Associated Press, Mediaite and New York Magazine

Jennifer Jacobs / Des Moines Register:

Ted Cruz to sign up for government health care — Ted Cruz, one of the loudest critics of Obamacare, will soon be using it for health insurance coverage. — “We will presumably go on the exchange and sign up for health care and we're in the process of transitioning over to do that,” Cruz …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, ThinkProgress, Mediaite, Business Insider, Daily Kos, CNN and OnPolitics

CNN:

Ted Cruz going on Obamacare — Ted Cruz says he will enroll in Obamacare 01:47 — (CNN)Ted Cruz is going on Obamacare. — The newly announced Republican presidential candidate told CNN's Dana Bash on Tuesday that he will sign up for health care coverage through the Affordable Care Act — a law he has been on a crusade to kill.

Discussion: Political Wire, PoliticusUSA and Chicago

Charles C. W. Cooke / National Review:

Ted Cruz Should Try Speaking to People Instead of at Them

Discussion: Hot Air, No More Mister Nice Blog, Talking Points Memo, Rush Limbaugh and New York Times

Brendan James / Talking Points Memo:

Ted Cruz: I Started Listening To Country Music Because Of 9/11 (VIDEO) — Leaving no political stone unturned, newly-declared presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) had a very particular answer on Tuesday when asked about his taste in music. — “You know, music is interesting,” he said on CBS “This Morning.”

Discussion: Hit & Run, Slate and Mediaite

Matt Wilstein / Mediaite:

Rep. Peter King Threatens to Jump Off a Bridge if Cruz Gets GOP Nomination — Rep. Peter King (R-NY) appeared on CNN's The Situation Room Monday afternoon and when Wolf Blitzer asked him to explain his statement that compared Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) to a “carnival barker,” …

Discussion: BREITBART.COM, The Texas Observer, American Spectator, The Huffington Post, First Reading, US News, Progress Pond, Des Moines Register, Washington Monthly, Bloomberg Business and The Week

Danny Vinik / The New Republic:
Ted Cruz Cannot Be Serious

Discussion: Washington Post, The Daily Banter, FiveThirtyEight, Raw Story, Slate and Washington Monthly

Michael J Moore / Bloomberg Business:
Cruz's Wife Heidi to Take Unpaid Leave From Goldman

Discussion: Bloomberg View, ThinkProgress and Business Insider

New York Times:
Imagine President Ted Cruz

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, BREITBART.COM, The Moderate Voice, The Huffington Post, Daily Kos, Washington Post, Vox, Real Clear Politics, Bloomberg View, US News and Firedoglake

Helena Andrews / Washington Post:

The White House head florist is gone and rumors are flying about why — When White House chief pastry chef Bill Yosses left the executive mansion last summer, the president publicly mourned the loss of “the crust master's” mysteriously addictive pies. And when the first family's personal chef and pal …

Discussion: Washington Monthly, New York Post, Guardian, New York Magazine, Hullabaloo, Mediaite, Talking Points Memo, Business Insider, The Daily Caller, CBS DC and Politico

Angelina Jolie Pitt / New York Times:

Diary of a Surgery — LOS ANGELES — TWO years ago I wrote about my choice to have a preventive double mastectomy. A simple blood test had revealed that I carried a mutation in the BRCA1 gene. It gave me an estimated 87 percent risk of breast cancer and a 50 percent risk of ovarian cancer.

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Shakesville, KFOR-TV, ThinkProgress, Washington Post, FOX31 Denver, US News, CBS New York, Associated Press, Fox News Insider, Althouse, NBC News, Reuters, Mashable, CBS Chicago, Mediaite, WRIC-TV, Gawker, WGN-TV, NPR, CBS Los Angeles and abc30.com

Catherine Thompson / Talking Points Memo:

Washington Post Columnist Declares Ferguson Is The ‘Liberal Benghazi’ — Liberals have found an ideological bugaboo on par with Benghazi in the Michael Brown shooting, according to Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen. — “Ferguson has become the liberal Benghazi,” Cohen wrote in a column published Monday night.

Discussion: Progress Pond and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Richard Cohen / Washington Post:
Ferguson and Benghazi's troubling parallels

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Mediaite, Raw Story and Booman Tribune

BREITBART.COM:

Reports: MSM Reporters Give Hillary Clinton Standing Ovation after She Takes No Questions, Jokes about Email Scandal — On Monday evening, mainstream media reporters reportedly gave Hillary Clinton a standing ovation after she joked about her private email scandal and took no questions …

Discussion: John Hawkins' Right Wing News and The Gateway Pundit

Emily Schultheis / National Journal:
Hillary Clinton Offers the Media an Olive Branch—and a Lecture

Discussion: Power Line, Fox News and Washington Post

Zeke J Miller / TIME:
Clinton Jokes About Private Email and ‘Complicated’ Press Relationship

Discussion: Politico and FishbowlDC

Abdul Hakim-Shabazz / IndyPolitics.Org:

Coats Not Running for Re-Election — U.S. Senator Dan Coats has just informed Indy Politics that he will NOT run for another term in the U.S. Senate. — Coats said he deliberated for months before making his decision. He says he informed leadership this morning today of his decision.

Discussion: RSS Feed howeypolitics.com, Talking Points Memo and Outside the Beltway

Kyle Cheney / Politico:
Dems see glimmer of hope in Dan Coats' retirement

Discussion: Bloomberg Business

Brian Tashman / Right Wing Watch:

Phil Robertson Hypothesizes About Atheist Family Getting Raped And Killed — On Friday, “Trunews” host Rick Wiles aired a speech that Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty delivered at the Vero Beach Prayer Breakfast earlier that day, in which Robertson offered gruesome details about how an atheist father …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, PoliticusUSA, Friendly Atheist and Raw Story

Beka Economopoulos / The Natural History Museum:

An Open Letter to Museums from Members of the Scientific Community — To Museums of Science and Natural History: — As members of the scientific community we devote our lives to understanding the world, and sharing this understanding with the public. We are deeply concerned …

Discussion: Bloomberg Business, New York Times, InsideClimate News, Washington Post and John Hawkins' Right Wing News

James Hohmann / Politico:

Jeb's South Carolina firewall fails to take shape — His reservoir of support is neither as wide nor as deep as he might have hoped. — GREENVILLE, S.C.— Twice before, South Carolina has delivered for the Bush family. In 1988, it famously served as George H.W. Bush's firewall after he finished third in Iowa.

Discussion: US News

New York Times:

U.S. Agrees to Slow Pullout of Troops From Afghanistan — WASHINGTON — The United States will halt the withdrawal of 9,800 troops from Afghanistan, half of whom were scheduled to leave in the months ahead, and instead keep them in the country through the end of 2015.

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, Common Dreams, Outside the Beltway, Political Wire and Reuters

Tom Randall / Bloomberg Business:

Here's How $20 Oil Could Become a Reality If Storage Runs Out — The looming storage crisis explained … There's the makings of a crisis swirling in America's oil-storage tanks, and the next few months will determine whether it's a minor annoyance, or a major blow, to U.S. oil.

Discussion: KFOR-TV

Craig Giammona / Bloomberg Business:

Taco Bell Introduces Breakfast Biscuits in Bid for Morning Sales — (Bloomberg) — Taco Bell is sticking with the playbook that helped it muscle into the breakfast business last year: Take a breakfast sandwich, and put it in a taco. — The fast-food chain will introduce a new line of Biscuit Tacos …

Discussion: FOX31 Denver, USA Today and KFOR-TV

Nicole Flatow / ThinkProgress:

Supreme Court Justices Blast The Corrections System — Justices Stephen Breyer and Anthony Kennedy during a congressional hearing Monday, March 23. — CREDIT: Screenshot from C-SPAN — The prisons are one of the most misunderstood institutions of government. Solitary confinement drives individuals insane.

Discussion: Eschaton