memeorandum: Blackwater to Guard G-Men Investigating Blackwater (Paul Kiel/TPMmuckraker)

4:20 PM ET, October 3, 2007

Top Items:

Bush vetoes child health insurance bill — WASHINGTON (CNN) — President Bush on Wednesday vetoed legislation expanding a children's health insurance program by $35 billion over five years. — Bush exercised the veto at 10 a.m. ET before leaving the White House for a trip to Lancaster …

Discussion: Power Line, Reuters, Taylor Marsh, CQ.com, All Spin Zone, The Politico, Comments from Left Field, NewsBusters.org, The Gate, Burnt Orange Report, Three Wise Men, McBlogger, Wake up America and Right Voices

Jennifer Loven / Associated Press:

Bush vetoes child health insurance plan — WASHINGTON - President Bush, in a sharp confrontation with Congress, on Wednesday vetoed a bipartisan bill that would have dramatically expanded children's health insurance. — It was only the fourth veto of Bush's presidency …

Discussion: MyDD, Pam's House Blend, The Opinionator, The Democratic Daily, The Gun Toting Liberal™, Daily Kos, The Carpetbagger Report, Left in the West, Truthdig and Macsmind

Jonathan E. Kaplan / The Hill:

SCHIP slips as Dems trip over message — Democratic leaders on Tuesday moved quickly to shift public attention to President Bush's expected veto of a children's health insurance program from a surtax to pay for the war in Iraq. — Democrats had been reveling in their good fortune …

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, The Swamp and Right Voices

Shaun Mullen / The Moderate Voice:
S-CHIP Bill Vetoed Behind Closed Doors

Discussion: Firedoglake, AFL-CIO Weblog, The Van Der Galiën Gazette and BlueOregon

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy / The Huffington Post:
My Challenge to the President

Discussion: The Sundries Shack and Democratic Strategist

Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:
Vetoland, Population: 4 — President Bush increased the number …

Discussion: The Anchoress

McClatchy Washington Bureau:
Bush veto strategy threatens Republicans

Discussion: New York Times, The Carpetbagger Report and Brendan Nyhan

Washington Post:

Clinton Widens Lead in Poll — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has consolidated her place as the front-runner in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination, outpacing her main rivals in fundraising in the most recent quarter and widening her lead in a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Sam Youngman / The Hill:

Edwards says Obama using stolen ideas — Former Sen. John Edwards's (D-N.C.) campaign widened its sights Tuesday to include Democratic rival Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) and his foreign policy speech commemorating the five-year anniversary of his first speech against the Iraq war.

Discussion: New York Times, The Politico, Des Moines Register, protein wisdom, Taylor Marsh, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, Hot Air, CNN Political Ticker, The Carpetbagger Report, Outside The Beltway, The Swamp, The Caucus and Air America Radio

The Atlantic Online:
As Edwards Focus On Education, An Education Union Endorses Hillary Clinton

Discussion: AFT, Open Left and theGarance.com

Richelieu / Weekly Standard:
Media Blasphemy — Another day, another blasphemy …

Discussion: The Corner and The Fix

David Weigel / Reason Magazine:

Ron Paul: Five Million Dollar Man — Ron Paul's campaign confirms that it collected $5,080,000 in the third quarter of fundraising. That's more than double the campaign's second quarter haul of $2.4 million; it's also as much as "comeback" candidate John McCain has reportedly raised.

Discussion: blog.ronpaul2008.com, All Spin Zone, National Review and RealClearPolitics

The Atlantic Online:

Ron Paul Raises Five Times As Much As Huckabee — Oh me of little faith. Ron Paul cannot be dismissed as a gadfly; the chance for him to outperform expectations rises exponentially with additional million dollars he raises. 5.08m is real money. There must be, within the Republican Party, a vein of anti-war libertarian sentiment.

Discussion: The Van Der Galiën Gazette and race42008.com

Reid Wilson / RealClearPolitics:

Exclusive: Paul Tops $5 Mil For Quarter — Texas Congressman Ron Paul, an anti-war libertarian making his second run at the White House, will report having raised $5.08 million in the third quarter. The number, which rivals those of John McCain and Bill Richardson, was boosted thanks …

Discussion: Hot Air

Patrick Ruffini:

Kos Traffic Numbers Inflated by 60% — Yesterday, I had the good "fortune" of being frontpaged on Daily Kos. The post sat atop the site for two hours. According to Google Analytics, the link produced 1,164 visitors yesterday. — For the traffic behemoth Kos is portrayed as, that seems low …

Discussion: Yourish.com, Riehl World View, Hot Air, techPresident, Clayton Cramer's BLOG, Outside The Beltway, Personal Democracy Forum and GINA COBB

James Gordon Meek / NY Daily News:

Blackwater to guard FBI team probing it — WASHINGTON - When a team of FBI agents lands in Baghdad this week to probe Blackwater security contractors for murder, it will be protected by bodyguards from the very same firm, the Daily News has learned. — Half a dozen FBI criminal investigators based …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo

Maureen Dowd / New York Times:
Sinking in a Swamp Full of Blackwater

Discussion: Commentary and Alternate Brain

Paul Kiel / TPMmuckraker:
Blackwater to Guard G-Men Investigating Blackwater

Discussion: Firedoglake, BuzzFlash.org and Talking Points Memo

Jonah Goldberg / The Corner:

The Drug War, And Other Problems — Yesterday's brief discussion of the drug war is still eliciting lots and lots of email, as it always does. It's funny, I'd say the biggest source of my own self-censorship isn't political correctness, fear of controversy, or even aversion to copious hate mail (I get that any way).

Andrew Sullivan / The Atlantic Online:
A Conservative Approach — I'm always bashing the Cornerites …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice

Voice of America:

Iranian University Invites Bush to Speak — An Iranian university has invited U.S. President George W. Bush to speak about such issues as the Holocaust, terrorism and human rights. — Iran's Fars news agency reports Ferdowsi University in the northeastern city of Mashhad asked Mr. Bush …

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, Comments from Left Field, The Newshoggers, Booman Tribune, At-Largely and The American Street

New York Times:

From Errand to Fatal Shot to Hail of Fire to 17 Deaths — It started out as a family errand: Ahmed Haithem Ahmed was driving his mother, Mohassin, to pick up his father from the hospital where he worked as a pathologist. As they approached Nisour Square at midday on Sept. 16 …

Discussion: The RBC, Firedoglake, Majikthise, Middle Earth Journal, rubber hose, The Atlantic Online, Three Wise Men and Brilliant at Breakfast

Pamela Hess / Associated Press:

Senate Approves Intelligence Bill — WASHINGTON — The Senate has scrapped its bid to obtain the archive of daily intelligence briefings given to the president on Iraq prior to the 2003 invasion. — That request was among several controversial provisions dropped from an intelligence bill …

Griff Witte / Washington Post:

Pakistan Seen Losing Fight Against Taliban And Al-Qaeda — PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan's government is losing its war against emboldened insurgent forces, giving al-Qaeda and the Taliban more territory in which to operate and allowing the groups to plot increasingly ambitious attacks …

Discussion: CBS News, The Swamp, PrairiePundit, ParaPundit, Middle Earth Journal, On Deadline and Truthdig

Darin Murphy / The Huffington Post:

Weak Has a Face, and It's Pelosi's — If there was any doubt before, which there wasn't, it's gone now. Watching Nancy Pelosi on The View yesterday morning provided the final proof that the backbone of the House is only as strong as its speaker. Her body language said it all.

Paul J. Gough / Hollywood Reporter:

One-man show at ABC o'seas bureaus — NEW YORK — After two decades of cutbacks in international bureaus, ABC News is bucking the trend by creating one-person operations that will dramatically boost its coverage in Africa, India and elsewhere. — The small offices, staffed by a reporter-producer …

Discussion: CBS News and Romenesko

Ben Nuckols / Associated Press:

Blind people: Hybrid cars pose hazard — BALTIMORE - Gas-electric hybrid vehicles, the status symbol for the environmentally conscientious, are coming under attack from a constituency that doesn't drive: the blind. — Because hybrids make virtually no noise at slower speeds when they run solely …

Discussion: Moonbattery