memeorandum: Lawmakers reject tax to pay for health reform (David Alexander/Reuters)

7:15 PM ET, July 12, 2009

Top Items:

She Broke the G.O.P. and Now She Owns It — SARAH PALIN and Al Sharpton don't ordinarily have much in common, but they achieved a rare harmonic convergence at Michael Jackson's memorial service. When Sharpton told the singer's children it was their daddy's adversaries, not their daddy …

Discussion: Blogs and Stories, The Moderate Voice, Firedoglake, TalkLeft, BuzzFlash.org, Alternate Brain and Newshoggers.com

Jordy Yager / The Hill:

McCain: Palin not a quitter — Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) defended his former running mate Sarah Palin on Sunday, saying she wasn't a quitter and that her decision to resign as governor was consistent with his own leadership qualities. — McCain said Palin did not tell him she was resigning …

Discussion: NewsBusters.org, Washington Monthly, The Swamp and Think Progress

Associated Press:

Palin: I'm Not Leaving Politics — McCain Says His Former Running Mate Simply “Changed Her Priorities” in Resigning as Alaska's Governor — (AP) Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said she's not only staying involved in national politics, but she plans to jump back into the national scrum when she leaves office at the end of the month.

Discussion: Pam's House Blend

Ralph Z. Hallow / Washington Times:
EXCLUSIVE: Palin plans to stay in politics

Discussion: Crooks and Liars, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, PERRspectives, The Huffington Post, Talk To Action, Riehl World View, The Page, Balloon Juice, Outside The Beltway, PoliBlog, Conservatives4Palin.com and TBogg

Barack Obama / Washington Post:

Rebuilding Something Better — Nearly six months ago, my administration took office amid the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression. At the time, we were losing, on average, 700,000 jobs a month. And many feared that our financial system was on the verge of collapse.

Discussion: Weekly Standard, Donklephant, Hot Air, Macsmind, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, The Page and Dean's World

Kbh / KeithHennessey.com:

Responding to the President's op-ed — I would like to respond to the President's Washington Post op-ed, “Rebuilding Something Better.” All quotes in this post are from the President. … The President and his team use this language to lower the bar against which they are measured.

Discussion: Commentary, The Swamp and Gateway Pundit

Isabel Vincent / New York Post:

FOLKS: O, FOR SHAME! — 'GIRL'S NO SEX SYMBOL!' — The Secret Service might want to put a new threat on its watch list: the mad-as-hell mama of the 17-year-old Brazilian beauty ogled by President Obama and French leader Nicolas Sarkozy at the G8 summit last week.

Discussion: JammieWearingFool and Gateway Pundit

Glenn Greenwald / Salon:

The Holder trial balloon: Abu Ghraib redux — (updated below - Update II - Update III) — Yesterday, I treated this new Newsweek report that Eric Holder is “leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices” as something to celebrate.

Discussion: The Daily Beast, American Power, The Huffington Post, Emptywheel, Sweetness & Light, Latest Open Salon Blog, Balloon Juice, The Nation, TalkLeft, Hullabaloo, D-Day, ATTACKERMAN, Don Surber, Townhall.com, Wizbang and Democrats.com

Carrie Johnson / Washington Post:
Probe of Alleged Torture Weighed

Discussion: Right Wing Nut House, Dr. Melissa Clouthier, The Caucus, New York Times, AMERICAblog News, American Power, THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, Atlas Shrugs, Washington Monthly, Prairie Weather, Obsidian Wings, The Atlantic Politics Channel and Newsweek

Tim F. / Balloon Juice:
Splitting Waterboarding The Baby

Discussion: Emptywheel and TalkLeft

WCBS-TV:

Teen Girl Falls In Open Manhole While Texting — Alexa Longueira Suffers Deep Cuts, Bruises After Landing In Raw Sewage, Blames DEP For Leaving Hole Unattended — NEW YORK (CBS) ― It was an accident waiting to happen — an open sewer and a 15-year-old girl who was texting while she walked.

Discussion: JONATHAN TURLEY, Polimom, Too, Jules Crittenden, The Moderate Voice, UrbanGrounds, American Power and Scared Monkeys

Matt Corley / Think Progress:

GOP Responds To Cheney's Concealment Of CIA Program With Strawmen And Shrugged Shoulders — Earlier this week, seven House Democrats on the Intelligence Committee released a letter revealing that CIA Director Leon Panetta had “recently testified to Congress that the agency concealed information …

Discussion: JONATHAN TURLEY, Sweetness & Light, The Hill, Washington Post, Washington Monthly and The Political Carnival

Washington Post:
Democrats May Investigate Secret Program

Discussion: Washington Times, Power Line, The Moderate Voice, The Confluence, This ain't Hell …, Newshoggers.com, Sister Toldjah and The Page

David Alexander / Reuters:

Lawmakers reject tax to pay for health reform — WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers on Sunday criticized a plan to raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for a $1 trillion healthcare overhaul and warned Congress was unlikely to meet President Barack Obama's goal of passing the measure by August.

Discussion: Eschaton

Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:

Will ObamaCare threaten medical innovation? — Glenn Reynolds argues that the wait lines for treatments in a single-payer system are not the biggest concern. In a Washington Examiner column, Glenn relates personal stories of how his family members have benefited from innovation in medical treatments …

Discussion: Jules Crittenden

Glenn Harlan Reynolds / Washington Examiner:
Glenn Reynolds on the hidden cost of national health care

Discussion: Liberal Values, Don Surber and TigerHawk

John O'Connor / The State:

Why tide against Sanford ebbed — Governor's wife, political realities helped put calls for resignation to rest — The shock had subsided. — Then Gov. Mark Sanford set the scandal ablaze again, saying he considered his Argentine lover his “soul mate” and saw her more often than he originally had said.

Discussion: Ben Smith's Blog and Taegan Goddard's …

Amy Goldstein / Washington Post:

In Supreme Court Pick Sotomayor, an Insider's Rise Meets an Outsider's Doubts — In Sotomayor, an Insider's Achievements Meet an Outsider's Insecurities — Within weeks of arriving in New Haven as a law student in the fall of 1976, Sonia Sotomayor fell in with a few first-year classmates whose ascent …

Discussion: Commentary