For Obama, Decision to Remove General Came Quickly  —  WASHINGTON — By the time he woke up Wednesday morning, President Obama had made up his mind.  —  During the 36 frenetic hours since he had been handed an article from the coming issue of Rolling Stone ominously headlined “The Runaway General …

Prosecutor: Al Gore was focus of sex crime inquiry in Portland  —  The Multnomah County District Attorney's Office confirmed today that a woman who alleged unwanted sexual contact by Al Gore reported it to police in 2006, and the prosecutor's office was briefed by the Portland Police Bureau in late 2006 and January 2007.

Confidence Wanes in Obama, U.S. Outlook  —  Americans are more pessimistic about the state of the country and less confident in President Barack Obama's leadership than at any point since Mr. Obama entered the White House, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll.

Harry Reid's son leaves last name out of first campaign ad  —  Nevada gubernatorial candidate Rory Reid (D) is on the air with his first campaign ad and it's missing one thing: his last name.  —  Reid, the son of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), doesn't say his name at any point during the ad …

G.O.P. Bears Down on Kagan as Hearings Near  —  WASHINGTON — After weeks of lying low, Republicans on Wednesday began stepping up their attacks on Elena Kagan, and are laying the groundwork to oppose her confirmation to the Supreme Court by casting her as a partisan Democrat who has spent more time practicing politics than law.

Liberal Dems' battle to cut defense spending reaches a turning point  —  A growing number of centrist Democrats say they're open to trimming Pentagon spending in the face of record budget deficits and mounting public debt.  —  Liberal Democrats for years have called for cuts to the massive defense budget to no avail.

MoveOn Scrubs “General Betray Us” Page From Website . . . Update: Flashback to 2007, Obama Skipped Senate Vote to Condemn MoveOn . . . Update 2: Rationale Page Also Flushed. . .  It was there the last time Google cache took a screen shot of it (June 18th), so it was scrubbed sometime between then and today.

General McChrystal's Twitters  —  Get short, timely messages from Gen. Stanley McChrystal on Twitter:  —  DAY 1  —  In Paris with my Kabul posse — Bluto, Otter, Boon, Pinto, Flounder.  Plus some newbie.  Guys call him Scribbles.  —  ∗  —  Suite's getting pretty crowded.

BP Is Pursuing Alaska Drilling Some Call Risky  —  The future of BP's offshore oil operations in the Gulf of Mexico has been thrown into doubt by the recent drilling disaster and court wrangling over a moratorium.  —  But about three miles off the coast of Alaska, BP is moving ahead …

Focus U.S.A. / ‘The U.S. will have to confront Iran or give up the Middle East’  —  Amitai Etzioni, professor of International Relations at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., believes the only option available to contain Iran's atomic ambitions is a series of assaults on its non-nuclear facilities.

Group of youths attack Jewish dance group  —  BERLIN - A Jewish dance group was attacked with stones by a group of children and teenagers during a performance at a street festival in the Germany city of Hannover, police said Thursday.  One dancer suffered a leg injury and the group then canceled their performance.

Mandatory Bar Parking  —  I've complained often about the scourge of mandatory parking minimums and the damage they wreak on our economy, our communities, our public health, and our environment.  Jonathan Hiskes raises the particularly absurd example of mandatory parking at bars:

Chicken Little-ing Lieberman's ‘Kill Switch.’  —  If you track tech politics closely, there's a good chance you can spot a Declan McCullagh column before you glance at the byline.  McCullagh, a reporter and commentator for CNET, has a tendency to hang any tech news of the day on an anti-government framework …

Video: Cops arrest Christians for handing out gospel at Dearborn Arab festival?  Update: Pushback  —  Via Powerline, so insane is this that I'm paranoid there's a key detail missing somewhere that might explain the whole thing.  Could the Christians have been trespassing on private property, maybe?

The Emerging Republican Minority  —  The Center for American Politics' Ruy Teixeira, one of the top political demographers in the country, has a new paper out in which he examines the two major party coalitions, with a focus on the current and future prospects of the Republican Party.

Sheldon Whitehouse: Thank ‘Republican Debt Orgy’ For Current Deficit  —  WHAT'S YOUR REACTION?  —  A trio of Senate Democrats took the floor Tuesday evening to denounce the Republican party for its unwillingness to add the cost of extended unemployment benefits to the deficit.

Gillard takes up PM role in Parliament  —  Julia Gillard's partner Tim Mathieson say his life is about to change.  —  Julia Gillard has taken her place at the House of Representatives despatch box as the nation's first woman Prime Minister.  —  Ms Gillard, sworn in 90 minutes earlier …

Raining Oil in Louisiana?  Not Likely [Updated]  —  The Internet is swirling with rumors today that a gloppy mixture of oil and Corexit (the primary dispersant used in the BP disaster) is raining down on Louisiana.  Evidence is thin, and based almost entirely on the video below, but we have to wonder—is this even possible?

Memo: Schwarzenegger ready to slash workers to minimum wage  —  Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger plans to cut the pay of state workers to minimum wage if a timely budget accord is not reached, according to a memo sent Wednesday from the director of the governor's Department of Personnel Administration to state agency and department heads.

Low Approval of Congress Points to High Seat Change in Nov.  —  President's party on average loses 29 seats when Congress approval is below 40%  —  PRINCETON, NJ — Americans continue to give Congress low approval ratings this year, with 20% approving in the latest USA Today/Gallup poll.