memeorandum: 8,400 Security Clearance Holders Owe IRS $85 Million in Unpaid Taxes (Elizabeth Harrington/Washington Free …)

11:25 PM ET, October 31, 2013

Top Items:

Ryan Lizza / News Desk:

Obamacare's Three Per Cent — While President Obama was in Boston on Wednesday to deliver a speech at Faneuil Hall, he was also scheduled to attend a private meeting with friends and supporters. One of the well-wishers in attendance was Jonathan Gruber, an M.I.T. economist and an architect …

Discussion: Health Care Policy …, BREITBART.COM, Business Insider, Hot Air, BillMoyers.com, Washington Monthly, The Plum Line, The Dish and ABC News

Igor Bobic / Talking Points Memo:

CHART: ‘Winners And Losers From Obamacare’ — University of Michigan professor and senior Brookings fellow Justin Wolfers on Thursday created a chart depicting the “winners and losers” under the Affordable Care Act, sourced to a Ryan Lizza article that used estimates from M.I.T. economist Jon Gruber, a former adviser to Mitt Romney.

Discussion: Washington Monthly and Liberaland

ThinkProgress:

How To Spot A Fake Obamacare Horror Story — Since insurers have begun informing beneficiaries that their health care plans do not meet the new federal requirements of Obamacare, and will be either cancelled or significantly altered, the media has profiled countless middle class Americans …

Discussion: Liberaland, The Week, The Dish and Washington Monthly

Avik Roy / Forbes:

Obama Officials In 2010: 93 Million Americans Will Be Unable To Keep Their Health Plans Under Obamacare — On Wednesday, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius testified before Congress about the continuing issues with the rollout of Obamacare's health insurance exchanges.

Howard Fineman / The Huffington Post:
Another Obamacare Deadline Blunder Is Worrying Democrats

Discussion: CNN, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion and neo-neocon

Mike Lillis / The Hill:
Pelosi pushes back hard on dropped plans

Discussion: The Daily Caller, Weasel Zippers, americanthinker.com and The Lonely Conservative

David Firestone / Taking Note:
The Uproar Over Insurance ‘Cancellation’ Letters

Discussion: The Impolitic, The Raw Story and Right Wing News

Irin Carmon / msnbc.com:

'I'm showing my son mercy' — On their last night in Dallas, the ramen noodles and microwave popcorn were finished. The money for the motel had run out too. So on a hot August night Jessica and Erick Davis and their three young kids slept in the Mazda rented for the trip.

Discussion: The Plum Line, Washington Monthly, NewsBusters blogs and Lawyers, Guns & Money

Caitlin MacNeal / Talking Points Memo:
GOP State Rep. Calls Clarence Thomas ‘The Black Judge’

Discussion: Liberaland

Sharyl Attkisson / CBS News:

Obamacare enrollments got off to very slow start, documents show — (CBS News) WASHINGTON - For 31 days now, the Obama administration has been telling us that Americans by the millions are visiting the new health insurance website, despite all its problems.

Discussion: BuzzFeed, Mediaite, Scared Monkeys, Hot Air, Doug Ross, Conservative Intelligence …, Twitchy, Ed Driscoll, Conservatives4Palin and Weasel Zippers

Jonathan Martin / New York Times:

Book Details Obama Aides' Talks About Replacing Biden on 2012 Ticket — President Obama's top aides secretly considered replacing Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. with Hillary Rodham Clinton on the 2012 ticket, undertaking extensive focus-group sessions and polling in late 2011 when Mr. Obama's re-election outlook appeared uncertain.

Discussion: CNN, Washington Wire, Yahoo! News, Politico, Washington Post, Talking Points Memo, Hot Air, Weasel Zippers, Slate, The Week and Post Politics

ThinkProgress:

BREAKING: Senate Republicans Block Vote On Key Judicial Candidate, Daring Dems To Go Nuclear — Senate Republicans voted to hold up a key federal appeals court nominee Thursday, daring Senate Democrats to invoke what is known as the nuclear option and change the Senate rules with a simple majority vote.

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Liberaland

Sahil Kapur / Talking Points Memo:
GOP Threatens Mass Blockade Of Obama's Top Judges

Discussion: American Prospect, Daily Kos, PoliticusUSA, The Impolitic, Mock Paper Scissors, National Review and Mother Jones

Paul Sherman / Forbes:
Will The U.S. Supreme Court Defend Free Speech For The Little Guy?

Discussion: Hit & Run and SCOTUSblog

David Corn / Mother Jones:

WATCH: Ted Cruz's Dad Calls US a “Christian Nation,” Says Obama Should Go “Back to Kenya” — Want to understand where the tea party champion's hardcore views come from? Meet his father, Rafael. — In April, Rafael Cruz, the father of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), spoke to the tea party of Hood County …

DSWright / Firedoglake:
Ted Cruz's Father Tells Obama to “Go Back to Kenya”

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Hullabaloo, Mediaite and The Moderate Voice

Todd Starnes / Fox News:

Pentagon training manual: white males have unfair advantages — A controversial 600-plus page manual used by the military to train its Equal Opportunity officers teaches that “healthy, white, heterosexual, Christian” men hold an unfair advantage over other races, and warns in great detail about a so-called “White Male Club.”

Discussion: Weasel Zippers, The Gateway Pundit and The Right Scoop

ABC News:

Israeli Warplanes Strike Inside Syria for Fifth Time This Year … Israeli warplanes conducted an airstrike early today on a Syrian military facility near the northern Syrian port city of Latakia along the Mediterranean coast, a U.S. official confirms to ABC News.

Discussion: NNA

Yasser Okbi / Jerusalem Post:
Reports: Syrian air base destroyed in missile attack from sea

Discussion: Business Insider, The Jawa Report and Israel Matzav

Kristie Greco / FAA:

Press Release - FAA to Allow Airlines to Expand Use of Personal Electronics — For Immediate Release — WASHINGTON- The U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator Michael Huerta today announced that the FAA has determined that airlines …

Discussion: NBCNews, TIME, Business Insider, iDownloadBlog.com, The Week, Taking Note, Mashable, TechCrunch, Gawker, Wonkblog, The Switch, GeekWire, AllThingsD, White House.gov Blog, Guardian and CBS DC

Matthew L. Wald / New York Times:
F.A.A. Moves to Ease Electronics Ban, Opening the Runways to Angry Birds

Discussion: Business Insider, Outside the Beltway and Josh Blackman's Blog

US News:

Top Hospitals Opt Out of Obamacare — Americans who sign up for insurance on the state exchanges may not have access to the nation's top hospitals, Watchdog.org reports. — The Obama Administration has been claiming that insurance companies will be competing for your dollars under the Affordable Care Act …

Discussion: National Review, Hot Air, Weasel Zippers, The Right Scoop, The Lonely Conservative and Reuters

Townhall.com:

Debunking the Debunkers: Yes, Obamacare Rate Shock is Real — On October 26, The Los Angeles Times ran a story by Chad Terhune, documenting how many Californians feel lied as they are being forced out of their current health care plans due to Obamacare. — “All we've been hearing …

Discussion: PoliticusUSA, protein wisdom and NewsBusters blogs

Michael Hiltzik / Los Angeles Times:
Another Obamacare horror story debunked

Discussion: The Hugh Hewitt Show, The Week, Mediaite and Crooks and Liars

Ezra Klein / Businessweek:

How the iPod President Crashed: Obama's Broken Technology Promise — In the 2008 election, President Obama's advisers talked of their boss's belief that it was time for an “iPod government.” Obama, a technology addict who tools around on his iPad before going to sleep and who fought …

Discussion: TheBlaze.com, Business Insider and Yahoo! News

Joseph Goldstein / New York Times:

Court Blocks Stop-and-Frisk Changes for New York Police — A federal appellate court on Thursday granted a stay in the landmark police stop-and-frisk ruling in New York City, and removed the trial judge, Shira A. Scheindlin, from the case. — The United States Court of Appeals …

Discussion: Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion and Althouse

John Stanton / BuzzFeed:

Senate Blocks Nomination Of Sitting Member Of Congress For First Time Since Reconstruction — Senate Republicans block Obama's Housing Authority nominee — and show just how bad relations are in Congress these days. — Yuri Gripas / Reuters — WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans Thursday …

Discussion: Colorlines

Pete Kasperowicz / The Hill:
Thursday: Cory Booker and Mel Watt in the Senate

Discussion: Reuters, Politico, CNN and Daily Kos

Alex Pareene / Salon:

Obamacare is a mess, and liberals need to fix it — Democrats need to acknowledge that, and make it work for everyone — It has been a pretty lousy month for the idea that the American government is capable of expanding access to healthcare to the uninsured and underinsured.

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog

Jurassicpork / Welcome Back to Pottersville:

Assclowns of the Week #96: Treat or Treat, Kiss My Ass edition — (Thanks to Tengrain linking to this during his turn on Mike's Blog Roll at Crooks and Liars, this posting will get some decent exposure. After making the rent on November 1st, Mrs. JP and I will be seriously wiped out.

ThinkProgress:

BREAKING: Three Bush-Appointed Judges Reinstate Texas' Anti-Abortion Law — A panel of three Republican judges, all of whom were appointed by President George W. Bush, granted the state of Texas' request Wednesday night to reinstate a law that will force many of the state's abortion clinics to close their doors.

Discussion: The Raw Story

Norm Ornstein / NationalJournal.com:

The Right to Vote — It is becoming increasingly obvious that the Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder, which eviscerated the Voting Rights Act, is leading to a new era of voter suppression that parallels the pre-1960s era—this time affecting not just African-Americans …

Discussion: Guardian, Balloon Juice, A plain blog about politics and First Read

Robert Costa / National Review:

Paul: NSA ‘Could Be Spying’ on Obama — In light of a recent report, Senator Rand Paul (R., Ky.) fears the National Security Agency may be spying on President Barack Obama. “They could well be spying on the president, for all I know,” Paul says, in an interview with National Review Online.

Discussion: Hot Air and Reuters