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Obama and the Bureaucratization of Health Care — The president's proposals would give unelected officials life-and-death rationing powers. — Printer — Friendly — Writing in the New York Times last month, President Barack Obama asked that Americans “talk with one another …
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Too late for Obama to turn it around? — Plus: The left's visionaries lost their bearings on drugs — but the GOP is led by losers — What a difference a month makes! When my last controversial column posted on Salon in the second week of August, most Democrats seemed frozen in suspended animation …

Media Challenge: Will They Take The Palin Bait? — Sarah Palin, the former Republican vice presidential candidate, has every right to submit an opinion piece on health care to the Wall Street Journal's op-ed page, and they've got every right to print it. — But Palin's existence …


Palin No Longer Writing Her Own Script — It's already been pointed out by several others that Sarah Palin has a new ghostwriter on staff and that she is clearly not the auteur of her most recent scribbles on Facebook and most certainly not the primary author of her op-ed yesterday in the Wall Street Journal.


Obama to Endorse Public Plan in Speech — WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama, in a high-stakes speech Wednesday to Congress and the nation, will press for a government-run insurance option in a proposed overhaul of the U.S. health-care system that has divided lawmakers and voters for months.
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Why the public option matters — Most arguments against the public option are based either on deliberate misrepresentation of what that option would mean, or on remarkably thorough misunderstanding of the concept, which persists to a frustrating degree: I was really surprised to see Joe Klein worrying …
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TalkLeft, The League of Ordinary …, QandO, The Mahablog, The Huffington Post, Left in the West, TPMDC, Verum Serum, Stop The ACLU and D-Day

Tide turns against public option on eve of President Obama's address — Political momentum appeared to swing sharply against the public health insurance option prized by liberals Tuesday, on the eve of President Barack Obama's address to a joint session of Congress.

Despite Fears, Health Care Overhaul Is Moving Ahead — WASHINGTON — The conventional wisdom, here and around the country, is that the centerpiece of President Obama's domestic agenda — remaking the health care system to cut costs and cover the uninsured — is on life support and that only a political miracle could revive it.

Pelosi and Reid Tell President: We Have the Votes; President Wants Bill Passed Soon
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CNN, Scared Monkeys, Pat Dollard, Hot Air, Pajamas Media, Don Surber, New York Times, The Politico and Conservative Dallas


'We're pinned down:' 4 U.S. Marines die in Afghan ambush — Smoke billows up Tuesday after a suicide bomber blew himself up near the military entrance to Kabul's airport, killing at least three. Read the story. (Photo by Hal Bernton of the Seattle Times.)
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Attacks on Sunstein Frustrate Conservative Fans — On January 8, The Wall Street Journal broke the news that Harvard Law School Professor Cass Sunstein would be nominated to run the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. It was a surprising choice for a job, created in 1980 …


Times Reporter Is Freed in Afghan Raid That Kills Aide — Stephen Farrell, a New York Times reporter held captive by militants in northern Afghanistan, was freed in a military commando raid early Wednesday, but his Afghan interpreter was killed during the rescue effort.
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Again: Media, and Wikipedia, Blackout on Kidnapping of ‘NYT’ Reporter in Afghanistan
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Mediaite

Our One-Party Democracy — Watching both the health care and climate/energy debates in Congress, it is hard not to draw the following conclusion: There is only one thing worse than one-party autocracy, and that is one-party democracy, which is what we have in America today.
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The Corner on National …, The Volokh Conspiracy, Reason, Gawker, The League of Ordinary … and Climate Progress


After Thesis Uproar, McDonnell's Strongly Worded Comments on Gays Resurface — ‘Homosexual Conduct’ Comments ‘Irrelevant’ to Campaign, He Says — In January 2003, then-Del. Robert F. McDonnell helped gavel in one of the most extraordinary judicial reappointment hearings in Virginia history …


‘Doctors told me it was against the rules to save my premature baby’ — Sarah Capewell begged them to save her tiny son, who was born just 21 weeks and five days into her pregnancy - almost four months early. — They ignored her pleas and allegedly told her they were following national guidelines …

Election 2010: Massachusetts Democratic Senate Primary — Coakley Takes Early Lead In Race To Fill Kennedy's Senate Seat — State Attorney General Martha Coakley is the early leader in the Democratic race to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the death of longtime Massachusetts Senator Edward M.

With one simple sentence, ABC News confirms the death of Beltway journalism — It's from an online report about the Obama school “controversy,” and it's written by Dan Harris. In his piece, Harris notes that conservatives pre-emptively blasted Obama's stay-in-school speech even though conservatives …

As an Exotic Mortgage Resets, Payments Skyrocket — Edward and Maria Moller are worried about losing their house — not now, but in 2013. — That is when the suburban San Diego schoolteachers will see their mortgage payments jump, most likely beyond their ability to pay.
Discussion:
Below The Beltway

NSA-Intercepted E-Mails Helped Convict Would-Be Bombers — The three men convicted in the United Kingdom on Monday of a plot to bomb several transcontinental flights were prosecuted in part using crucial e-mail correspondences intercepted by the U.S. National Security Agency, according to Britain's Channel 4.
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Dick Cheney 'put airline bomb plot case in jeopardy with arrest order …
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Wonkette, The Daily Dish, Emptywheel, The Reaction, Counterterrorism Blog, War in Context and D-Day

U.S. ‘Unlikely’ to Recoup Auto Outlay, Panel Finds — The federal government is unlikely to recoup all of the billions of dollars that it has invested in General Motors and Chrysler, according to a new congressional oversight report assessing the automakers' rescue.

Chambliss: Obama must express ‘humility’ in Wed. speech — Voters' reaction to the idea of a public option means the president must express “humility” in his health care address Wednesday night, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) said Tuesday. — “I think what you're looking at is folks …
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Freedom's Lighthouse
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Cramdown Is Back: Banks Against Homeowners, Round 2 — Cramdown is back. — House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) tells the Huffington Post he plans to revive the effort to give bankruptcy judges the authority to renegotiate home mortgages …

Less Spocky, More Rocky — As soon as I started covering Barack Obama, I knew he was going to be trouble. — Not Global Trouble, like W. and Dick Cheney. Or Hanky-Panky Trouble, like Bill Clinton and John Edwards. Or Tedious Trouble, like John Kerry and Michael Dukakis.


Overspending on Debit Cards Is a Boon for Banks — When Peter Means returned to graduate school after a career as a civil servant, he turned to a debit card to help him spend his money more carefully. — So he was stunned when his bank charged him seven $34 fees to cover seven purchases …

Let's End the Fear-Mongering Over Abortion — Item: “President Obama and top Democratic congressional leaders are pushing hard for health care bills that would result in federal government funding of abortion on demand!” warns the National Right to Life Committee.
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AmSpecBlog