memeorandum: It's Better Than The Rest (Matthew Yglesias)

11:15 PM ET, June 17, 2008

Top Items:

Obama Pushes Back on McCain Camp Terrorism Attacks — Responding to charges by the campaign of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz, that comments he made to ABC News indicate he has a “naive” pre-9/11 view of terrorism, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, told reporters Tuesday that Republicans are not trying …

Discussion: Hot Air, No More Mister Nice Blog, Flopping Aces, Marc Ambinder, Commentary, Comments from Left Field and Redstate

Domenico Montanaro / MSNBC:

WOULD BIN LADEN GET HABEAS RIGHTS? — From NBC/NJ's Adam Aigner-Treworgy — SAN ANTONIO, Texas — According to the McCain campaign's top foreign policy advisor, Obama equals Clinton — at least when it comes to fighting terrorism. — On a conference call with reporters that took place this morning …

Discussion: Ben Smith's Blogs, The Anonymous Liberal, PoliBlog (TM), Weekly Standard Blog, Commentary and Spin Cycle

Alexander Marquardt / CNN:
Obama responds to McCain camp on terrorist prosecution

Discussion: TalkLeft

Zzaki / Political Punch:
McCain Camp Pounces on Obama Comments From ABC News Interview

Discussion: TPM Election Central, John McCain Report blog, Marc Ambinder, Stop The ACLU, The Hill, Confederate Yankee, Flopping Aces, Comments from Left Field, Weekly Standard Blog, GINA COBB, The Washington Independent, Hot Air, National Review, Liberal Values and The Sundries Shack

Associated Press: Obama: Bin Laden still free because of GOP tactics

George F. Will / Washington Post:
Contempt Of Courts — The day after the Supreme Court ruled …

Discussion: The Corner, DownWithTyranny!, Power Line, Weekly Standard Blog, The Seminal, PERRspectives Blog, War in Context, PoliBlog (TM), Angry Bear, Salon, Los Angeles Times and Below The Beltway

James Gerber / Political Radar:
Kerry: McCain Bin Laden Argument ‘Phony’

Discussion: Weekly Standard Blog

Fox News:
Candidates' Advisers Accuse Each Other of Weak ‘Mindsets’ on Terror Fight

Discussion: Needlenose

Tim Conneally / BetaNews:

AP sets up a toll booth for bloggers citing its stories — The AP's disharmony with bloggers may have only just begun, as the alternative it's now offering to being served with takedown notices involves paying an up-front sum for excerpting online articles — as few as five words.

Discussion: michellemalkin.com, Hot Air, Patterico's Pontifications, The Daily Whim, Donklephant, Buck Naked Politics, Legal Blog Watch, Comments from Left Field, Macsmind, The Jawa Report, Unqualified Offerings, QandO and Little Green Footballs

Kos / Daily Kos:

More on the AP idiots … Hey AP — that's 120 words. Have your lawyers call my lawyers. — Media experts are swarming over the AP's takedown notice against two bloggers, claiming that no one is allowed to excerpt from AP stories anymore. Remember the AP's idiotic assertion:

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, AMERICAblog News, Eschaton, Democrats.com, culturekitchen and Ali Eteraz

Jane Hamsher / Firedoglake:

$12.50 For Five Words? “Bite Me” Indeed, AP — So AP wants to charge bloggers for “fair use” content. Good luck with that. Many are going to boycott them as a result, but one notable blogger is taking another tack. — Markos: … Which brings up a good point.

Discussion: The Moderate Voice

NY Daily News:

Rush & Molloy: Feud for thought — For once, pundit Arianna Huffington is a woman of few words. — As politicians and journalists of every stripe mourn Tim Russert, the NBC newsman's longtime antagonist has yet to express condolences or any belated admiration.

Discussion: The Huffington Post

Faiz / Think Progress:

Rep. Darrell Issa politicizes Russert's death. — This afternoon, the House of Representatives took up a resolution honoring the life of Tim Russert. Following speeches by several speakers who issued heartfelt condolences, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) brazenly exploited Russert's death …

Discussion: PERRspectives Blog and Calitics

SteveK / TVNewser:

How F&F Became WPITW — Keith Olbermann gave Fox & Friends the gold on the Worst Persons list last night. — That's the short story. The long story has actually very little to do with either the Countdown anchor or the FNC morning show. It goes back to Friday night …

Discussion: Ed Driscoll.com and FishBowlDC

Jack Shafer / Slate:
The Canonization of Saint Russert

Discussion: Hullabaloo, Spin Cycle and FishBowlDC

NY Daily News:

Hil and Obama, together again: First joint appearance to rally her donors — Hil and Obama, together again — Hillary Clinton will join Barack Obama for a joint appearance in Washington next week to persuade her donors to begin giving to the Democrats' nominee, the Daily News has learned.

Discussion: NO QUARTER, Taylor Marsh, TIME.com, Boston Globe and Wake up America

Andrew Malcolm / Top of the Ticket:

Hillary Clinton's campaign photo album's got something missing — For those of you who still can't quite accept the fact that Hillary Clinton is gone, finished, beaten, defeated as a Democratic presidential candidate, her campaign has just posted an online photo album. — For a walk down memory lane, go here.

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Democracy in America

Glenn Greenwald / Salon:

Targeting Steny Hoyer for his contempt for the rule of law — (updated below - Update II - Update III) — It is now definitively clear that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is the driving force behind a bill — written by GOP Sen. Kit Bond — to vest the President with vast …

Discussion: TalkLeft, Firedoglake, Newshoggers.com, Washington Monthly, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, The Hill, Hullabaloo, Crooks and Liars, DownWithTyranny!, Unqualified Offerings and The Sideshow

Francis De Luca / John W. Pope Civitas Institute:

N.C. Poll: McCain Leads Obama 45-41 — Both Candidates Improve Standing with Base — Raleigh, NC - After solidifying the Democratic nomination for President, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) has pulled to within four points of Republican nominee Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in North Carolina according …

Discussion: FiveThirtyEight.com, TalkLeft, Daily Kos and Donklephant

Nate Silver / The New Republic:
Today's Polls: Yes, Obama's Still Bouncing

Discussion: Daily Kos

Matt Stoller / Open Left:

Dear Chuck Todd and NBC: Iraq Matters — Chuck Todd calls Moveon's latest ad, featuring a mother asking McCain not to kill her child with irresponsible warmongering in Iraq, ‘shameless’. — I didn't notice any outcry from NBC when Progress for America aired this ad …

Discussion: MyDD and The Talent Show

John Amato / Crooks and Liars:
Chuck Todd disses Move On's new ad: ‘I think it was a borderline shameless ad’

Discussion: AMERICAblog News

Tom Lasseter / McClatchy Washington Bureau:

Militants found recruits among Guantanamo's wrongly detained — GARDEZ, Afghanistan — Mohammed Naim Farouq was a thug in the lawless Zormat district of eastern Afghanistan. He ran a kidnapping and extortion racket, and he controlled his turf with a band of gunmen who rode around in trucks with AK-47 rifles.

Discussion: Firedoglake, Think Progress and Prairie Weather

Dan Froomkin / Washington Post:
Torture's Bad Seeds

Discussion: Think Progress, Balkinization, Emptywheel, Hullabaloo, Guardian and ACLU Blog

Tennessee Center for Policy Research:

For Immediate Release: June 17, 2008 — Gore's personal electricity consumption up 10%, despite “energy-efficient” home renovations — NASHVILLE - In the year since Al Gore took steps to make his home more energy-efficient, the former Vice President's home energy use surged more than 10% …

Discussion: Post Politics, Stop The ACLU, Don Surber, Sister Toldjah, Wake up America, Hot Air, Argghhh! and PoliPundit.com

Jonathan Martin / Jonathan Martin's Blogs:

So much for Obama's Hispanic problem? — Chuck Todd and the First Read guys capture something that really stood out to me in that Nevada poll I wrote up yesterday: Obama's much-buzzed-about shortcomings with Latinos don't appear to be real.

Carrie Budoff Brown / The Politico:

Are Dems talking about McCain's age in ‘code’? — In a campaign year marked by flare-ups surrounding comments that have offended one group or another, John McCain and Barack Obama have moved on to the next sensitive battleground: the question of McCain's advanced age.