Man's Finger Bitten Off in Scuffle at Health Care Rally  —  THOUSAND OAKS — A 65-year-old man had his finger bitten off Wednesday evening at a health care rally in Thousand Oaks, according to the Ventura County Sheriff's Department.  —  Sheriff's investigators were called to Hillcrest and Lynn Road at 7:26 p.m.

Controversial Obama Administration Official Denies Being Part of 9/11 “Truther” Movement, Apologizes for Past Comments  —  A top environmental official of the Obama administration issued a statement Thursday apologizing for past incendiary statement and denying that he ever agreed …

Obama speech to students draws conservative ire  —  DALLAS — President Barack Obama's back-to-school address next week was supposed to be a feel-good story for an administration battered over its health care agenda.  Now Republican critics are calling it an effort to foist a political agenda on children …

House Liberals Write Directly To Obama: No Public Option, No Support  —  In a letter delivered to the White House moments ago, the two leaders of the bloc of House progressives bluntly told President Obama that they will not support any health care plan without a public option in it — and demanded a meeting to inform him face to face.

THE FABRIC IS STRONG, BUT IT'S NOT INDESTRUCTIBLE.... Time's Joe Klein reports from Arkansas, where he attended a town-hall event hosted by Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D).  He found an “astonishing” number of attendees who were absolutely certain that President Obama has “larded the government with communists.”

Extremism in Media's Glare  —  Health-care reform is said to be in trouble partly because of those raucous August town-hall meetings in which Democratic members of Congress were besieged by shouters opposed to change.  —  But what if our media-created impression of the meetings is wrong?

MSNBC removes Buchanan column from site  —  Pat Buchanan has received a lot of criticism recently for his column marking the 70th anniversary of the Nazi invasion of Poland, where the conservative pundit questions whether Hitler has gotten a bum rap.  —  By extension, MSNBC …

How Did Economists Get it So Wrong?  —  I. MISTAKING BEAUTY FOR TRUTH  —  It's hard to believe now, but not long ago economists were congratulating themselves over the success of their field.  Those successes — or so they believed — were both theoretical and practical, leading to a golden era for the profession.

Ezra Klein's Misplaced Dilemma  —  The usually observant Ezra Klein apparently thinks the problem we're having with health care reform is that Congressional “centrists” are more likely indifferent or hostile to whether reforms succeed than are the reform activists.

Black Caucus warns Obama on speech  —  Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)  —  CAN IT BE ANY CLEARER?  THE LEFTIST DEMOCRATS ARE DRIVING THE OBAMACARE AGENDA —  IT'S ALL ABOUT MORE ‘WELFARE & WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION’ BY THE SO-CALLED BLACK CAUCUS.  —  Posted By: WELFARE & WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION.

The Inexorable Logic of Iraq  —  Since U.S. troops withdrew from Iraq's cities, two months have passed, and so has the illusion that Iraq is smoothly transitioning to a normality free of sectarian violence.  Recently, Gen. Ray Odierno, commander of U.S. troops there, “blanched” when asked if the war is “functionally over.”

The Controversy Won't Stop...  SOURCE:  —  I read the front page of the NY Post this week and was happy to see that Mr. Spitzer is moving on with his life and considering getting back into politics.  Everyone makes mistakes.  Everyone deserves a second chance.  Me too, right?  Well, apparently not.

Rep. Charles Rangel Must Step Aside as Chairman of Ways and Means  —  FOR POLITICIANS with major bad news to release or to make public, there's no time like the dead of August to do it.  The thinking goes that the public won't remember a thing come September.  We hope Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) will have no such luck.

Biden ignores problems with stimulus  —  Money slow to trickle out and some spending priorities are questionable  —  “The Recovery Act is doing more, faster and more efficiently and more effectively than most people expected,” Biden said.  —  WASHINGTON - Vice President Joe Biden proclaimed …

Anti-Beck Backlash Hits Nauseating Extreme with “Murder and Rape” Meme (UPDATED THRICE)  —  The viral posters that compared Obama to the Joker and to Hitler feel tame compared to the latest nasty meme to hit the Internet: insinuating that Glenn Beck raped and killed a young girl in 1990.

Khadafy to United Nations: Abolish Switzerland!  —  Libya's Col. Moammar Khadafy has a beef with Switzerland and plans to ask the United Nations to abolish the tiny Alpine home of milk chocolate, cuckoo clocks and yodeling.  —  According to Swiss minister Christa Markwalder …