memeorandum: About-face: Tutu gets St. Thomas invite (Jeff Shelman/Minneapolis Star Tribune)

5:10 PM ET, October 11, 2007

Top Items:

EXCLUSIVE: E-mail Reveals That McConnell Staffer Propagated Smear Campaign Against Graeme Frost — Yesterday, ThinkProgress reported that there was mounting evidence that a staffer for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) may have been involved in the right-wing campaign to smear Graeme Frost and his family.

Discussion: American Prospect, TalkLeft, D-Day, Matt Ortega, Balloon Juice, The Carpetbagger Report, Shakespeare's Sister, Firedoglake, BuzzFlash.org, WHAS11 Political Blog, Interesting Times, The Garlic, The Liberal Avenger and Whiskey Fire

Faiz / Think Progress:

CNN Pins Blame On Democrats For Right-Wing Smear Of 12-Year Old Boy — This morning, CNN aired its first report on the right-wing smear campaign against 12-year old SCHIP recipient Graeme Frost. CNN pinned the blame on Democrats for assault on the Frost family.

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report, Townhall.com, QandO, The Newshoggers, Wake up America, D-Day, Riehl World View, Suburban Guerrilla and Lawyers, Guns and Money

Sadly, No!:
Stalkin' Malkin Is Losing It

Discussion: Balloon Juice, The Newshoggers, Pandagon, All Spin Zone, Bark Bark Woof Woof, RADAMISTO, Angry Bear and The Bellows

Time:
The Swift-Boating of Graeme Frost

Atrios / Eschaton:
And It Was McConnell's Office

Discussion: Think Progress and The Gavel

Kevin Drum / Washington Monthly:
THE FEVER SWAMP....A plainly disgusted Karen Tumulty recaps …

Discussion: Brian Beutler

Ezra Klein:
An Answer! — Michelle Malkin replies to my challenge for a debate about S-CHIP.

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, michellemalkin.com, UrbanGrounds and The Moderate Voice

Carla Marinucci / SFGate:

UPDATE - Gore cancels appearance at Boxer fundraiser — Sen. Barbara Boxer's office just contacted us to say former Vice President Al Gore has been called "overseas" for a trip related to his work on global warming and has canceled his scheduled appearance Thursday in San Francisco at a fundraiser for Boxer's re-election effort.

Discussion: On Deadline, michellemalkin.com, Hot Air, Blue Crab Boulevard and Taylor Marsh

Paul Steinhauser / CNN:

Will Gore add Nobel to Oscar and Emmy? — WASHINGTON (CNN) — Will Al Gore add a Nobel Peace Prize to his Oscar and Emmy honors? — "An Inconvenient Truth," a documentary featuring the former vice president captured two Academy Awards in February. The film focuses on Gore and his worldwide travels …

Discussion: Times of London, Gates of Vienna, Left in the West, The Democratic Daily, Gateway Pundit, Connecting.the.Dots and Balloon Juice

Chris Cillizza / The Fix:

Movement From the Gore-acle? — As regular Fix readers know, we have long been fascinated with former Vice President Al Gore and his future (or lack thereof) in elected politics. — The confluence of two recent stories has our Gore-dar buzzing again. The first was an ad that ran in the New York Times yesterday.

Discussion: JammieWearingFool

Brian Montopoli / CBS News:
Could Nobel Prize Spur Gore To Run In '08?

Discussion: MSNBC, If I Ran the Zoo, Attytood and Sister Toldjah

Brent Budowsky / The Hill:
Al Gore for President

Discussion: The Huffington Post, The Swamp and Make Them Accountable

Editor and Publisher:

Ann Coulter on CNBC Show: Jews Need 'Perfecting' — NEW YORK Appearing on Donny Deutsch's CNBC show, "The Big Idea," on Monday night, columnist/author Ann Coulter suggested that the U.S. would be a better place if there weren't any Jewish people and that they had "perfected" themselves into — Christians.

Discussion: The Huffington Post, The Atlantic Online, The Anchoress, Eschaton, Bookworm Room, The Opinion Mill, NewsBusters.org, Air America Radio, Roger L. Simon, Media Matters for America, Cliff Schecter, Israellycool and Chuck Adkins

Fox News:

Columnist Ann Coulter Shocks Cable TV Show, Declaring 'Jews Need to Be Perfected by Becoming Christians' — Slash-and-burn columnist Ann Coulter shocked a cable TV talk-show audience Monday when she declared that Jews need to be "perfected" by becoming Christians, and that America would be better off if everyone were Christian.

Discussion: Little Green Footballs, Mere Rhetoric, Hot Air, Debbie Schlussel, Sweetness & Light, Wonkette and FreeSpeech.com

Satyam / Think Progress:

Lynne Cheney: Terrorist Attacks Worldwide Don't Affect 'American Interests' — A frequent Bush administration talking point in defense of the "war on terror" is claiming that United States has not been attacked since 9/11. — Yesterday, Lynne Cheney, wife of Vice President Cheney …

Discussion: Matt Ortega and Angry Bear

Brian Faughnan / Weekly Standard: Hillary's Arrogant Foreign Policy

Glenn Greenwald / Salon:

GLENN GREENWALD: Warrantless eavesdropping and telecom amnesty — There is a lot of debate about what accounts for the decrepit state of our political press, but often overlooked is the sheer sloth and ignorance of journalists, who repeat what they are told without having any idea what they are talking about.

Discussion: TalkLeft

Christy Hardin Smith / Firedoglake:

Not Ready To Make Nice — Well this gets a big, fat "hell, no" from me. Via e-mail from Liz Rose of the ACLU on the draft Senate version of the FISA bill, which is not yet publicly available and not being widely shared for review either: … If they didn't do anything wrong, why should they get retroactive immunity?

Discussion: Open Left, The Newshoggers, Taylor Marsh, Corrente and Balloon Juice

Tom Hays / Associated Press:

Police: Columbia Won't Turn Over Video — NEW YORK (AP) — Columbia University has refused to turn over security videotape that could help identify who hung a noose on a black professor's office door, police said Thursday. — Investigators began asking on Wednesday for tapes from cameras in the building …

Discussion: The Corner, Gateway Pundit, Hot Air, Wake up America and Blue Crab Boulevard

NY Daily News:
Columbia professor: I will not stand for this!

Discussion: New York Post, michellemalkin.com and New York Magazine

Media Matters for America:

Gibson knew school shooter was white because "[b]lack shooters don't" shoot themselves; "they shoot and move on" … On the October 10 broadcast of his nationally syndicated Fox News Radio show, while discussing 14-year-old Asa H. Coon, who earlier that day shot four people at his Cleveland high school …

Discussion: Eschaton, Daily Kos, Whiskey Fire and ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES

Marc Santora / New York Times:

McCain's Health-Care Plan Focuses on Lower Costs — Senator John McCain, outlining his vision for reforming the health-care system by driving down costs, said today that he would seek to restructure the way medical providers are reimbursed, particularly in treating chronic diseases …

Discussion: The Swamp

John McCain 2008:
John McCain on Health Care

Discussion: Outside The Beltway, Ankle Biting Pundits and The Caucus

Rocky Mountain News:

Documents: Qwest was targeted — 'Classified info' was not allowed at ex-CEO's trial — The National Security Agency and other government agencies retaliated against Qwest because the Denver telco refused to go along with a phone spying program, documents released Wednesday suggest.

Discussion: TalkLeft, Eschaton, The Next Hurrah and The Carpetbagger Report

Marcella Bombardieri / Boston Globe:

Clinton vows to check executive power — Would curb use of signing statements — Senator Hillary Clinton said yesterday that if she is elected president, she intends to roll back President Bush's expansion of executive authority, including his use of presidential signing statements to put …

Discussion: Washington Wire, Moonbattery, TigerHawk and Reason Magazine