Cheat Sheet
The Best In Brief
Please register to manage your email preferences and comment on the site.
Wednesday night, Obama may have called the public option merely a "means" to the more important end of ceasing "insurance-company abuses" and creating affordable coverage for the uninsured, but Congress' Democratic leadership may not agree. Politico reports that there's rising tension over the public option between House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Wednesday evening Hoyer was telling reporters that a reform bill sans public option could survive when Pelosi shot to the mike and cut him off, saying that any such bill "must have a public option." Traditionally, the two have been rivals who are sometimes effective allies—with Hoyer serving as ambassador to the conservative Blue Dogs while Pelosi channels the progressive wing of the party—although the brutal need for compromise is straining their relationship. It may be that Pelosi's public-plan defense is necessary for the unified bill she plans to pass through the House, while Hoyer's more open stance reflects what Politico called the "true endgame"—melding the liberal House bill with the conservative one that is expected to eke through the Senate.
Osama bin Laden may still be at large, but his flock, it seems, is getting smaller: Under heavy pressures in Pakistan, al Qaeda is having difficulty attracting new recruits, according to The Guardian. The organization is increasingly relying on its affiliates in Yemen and North Africa, which are disorganized and have much less popular support. Apparently, attacks by CIA drones and disruptions of al Qaeda communications have lowered morale in al Qaeda’s “core,” which has been reduced to a senior leadership of six to eight men. The Guardian also reports that al Qaeda’s relationship with the Taliban is souring, increasing the chances of acquiring intelligence that will lead to bin Laden’s capture.
Smooth sailing from here on out? Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said Thursday that the financial system no longer needs such "extraordinary support" from the government programs created after last September's collapse of Lehman Brothers. Citing evidence of a growing economy and the falling cost of credit, Geithner said special loan and guarantee programs will be scaled back, and, in a separate announcement, Treasury officials said they expected financial institutions to repay an additional $50 billion over the next 12 to 18 months. (So far, $70 billion has been repaid.) Though many programs will stick around for a long time, several special loan programs will end or be smaller than previously expected. But despite Geithner's positive tone, the Congressional Oversight Panel cautioned that many big problems remain.
Is Ahmadinejad going soft? Iran has proposed a global system for eliminating nuclear weapons and made an offer for some diplomatic talks. The moves were met with skepticism but not total dismissal from the U.S. State Department, which notes that Iran still refuses to discuss ending its own uranium-enrichment program. The top political aide to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave the proposal to the U.N. Security Council and Germany Wednesday, and also offered to help Western countries deal with terrorism, Afghanistan, and other issues. The aide noted Tehran's proposal was similar to one President Barack Obama made in April. A State Department spokesman explained, "It's not really responsive to our greatest concern, which is obviously Iran's nuclear program… We'll be looking to see how ready Iran is to actually engage, and we will be testing that willingness to engage in the next few weeks."
Despite Glenn Beck’s best attempt to dig up dirt on Cass Sunstein, the Harvard Law professor won Senate confirmation Thursday to be President Obama’s director of regulatory affairs. Sunstein, who is known for blending behavioral economics with politics, drew dissent from both the left and the right wings: Environmentalists worried that Sunstein’s cost-benefit approaches would hurt their field, whereas Jon Kyl (R-AZ) accused Sunstein of supporting preferential treatment for young people and wanting to give animals lawyers. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) threw his support behind Sunstein, calling him “fair and not anti-business,” and his moderate voice won the day: Sunstein’s confirmation vote was 57 to 40.
For the first time, Afghanistan's Electoral Complaints Commission has deemed ballots from last month's presidential election invalid after finding "clear and convincing evidence of fraud" in three regions that strongly supported President Hamid Karzai. The country's presidential election was criticized for falsified ballots, intimidation tactics, and other forms of deception. The ECC quarantined results from 600 stations this week in Paktika, Kandahar, and Ghazni, where they suspected wrongdoing. Though Karzai passed the 50-percent mark (meaning he would not need to face a second round of voting), the commission has the authority to demand a recount or remove any candidate from the election. The ECC reportedly found unfolded ballots, uniformity of markings, lists of voters with fabricated card numbers, and other "indicators of fraud." Some reporters suggest it could take months to sort out the results of the election.
Whodathunk? After critics argued that female track star Caster Semenya might actually be a man, the International Association of Athletics Federations ordered a medical exam—and discovered that the 18-year-old South African is of ambiguous gender, with both male and female organs. Semenya has neither a womb nor ovaries, and testosterone levels three times those of the average woman (the spoils of a set of internal testes). The New York Daily News reports the IAAF has yet to decide whether Semenya will be permitted to keep the gold medal she won last month at the world championships in Berlin, and whether she will be allowed to compete in the future. Semenya had previously protested the medical exam, saying “God made me the way I am and I accept myself.”
Oprah Winfrey is so desperate to get the first interview with Jaycee Lee Dugard that she's taken an unprecedented step: She actually called her producers. The New York Post reports that Oprah's desire to interview the now-29-year-old who was raped, kidnapped, and held captive for 18 years led her to actually ask her people to work on it. The talk queen said, "It's the first time I have ever called up my producers and said, 'Are we on this story? Because I want that interview!'"
After nearly three decades with ABC News, 20/20 host John Stossel is leaving the network for Fox News. The self-proclaimed voice of all things egalitarian allegedly has plans to host a two-hour weekly show on Fox Business and will also reportedly make both daytime and prime-time appearances on Fox News. According to TVNewser (via The Huffington Post), Stossel is expected to sign a multiyear deal with the Rupert Murdoch-owned network. The announcement about the newsman comes just one week after news broke that newly retired Charlie Gibson’s spot on ABC News would be given to Good Morning America’s Diane Sawyer.
Sex just got a little less warty. Federal health advisers have said that the FDA should approve Merck's vaccine Gardasil for men, as it protects against male genital warts, the Associated Press reports. Gardasil is currently used in women to prevent cervical cancer caused by the human papillomavirus, or HPV, which also causes genital warts. If the FDA takes the panel's recommendation, the market for Gardasil could potentially double, although analysts don't think men will use the vaccination because genital warts usually clear up on their own. The panel also recommended approval of Cervarix, GlaxoSmithKline's version of the vaccine, which protects against the virus that causes cervical cancer, but not the two strains of HPV that cause 90 percent of genital warts, as Gardasil does. A Leerink Swann analyst suggested that Cervarix could take up to 25 to 30 percent of the HPV-vaccine market.
Evidently, bong hits help people forget about the recession... and line their pockets. Driven by strict border control stemming the flow of drugs from Mexico, the demand for domestically grown marijuana is at a record high, the Associated Press reports. Police have destroyed plants worth $12 billion in the nation's weed-growing hot beds of California and Appalachia. According to the head of marijuana eradication for the Office of Drug Control Policy's Appalachian High Density Drug Trafficking Area, the recession has hit Appalachia "more severely than the rest of the country" and for longer, and is causing locals to supplement their income with plots of marijuana. The recession doesn't mean fewer buyers either—the demand for marijuana appears to rise with the unemployment rate.
President Obama did it again: Two out of three Americans who watched President Obama’s speech on Wednesday night say they favor his health-care plans—a 14-point gain among speech watchers. In a CNN poll, 67 percent of speech watchers support the plan, while 29 percent oppose it.
We all knew she liked to dance—turns out Ellen DeGeneres likes singing, too. The Daytime Emmy-winning talk-show host will be American Idol’s fourth judge in the show’s upcoming ninth season. DeGeneres says she’s watched the show from the beginning. As a fan, “getting this job is a dream come true, and think of all the money I’ll save from not having to text in my vote,” she said in a statement on Wednesday night. DeGeneres will replace Paula Abdul, who left the show amid swirling rumors that the aging pop star was offended by the relative size of her salary compared to megawatt Idol personalities Simon Cowell and Ryan Seacrest. DeGeneres admits that she has fewer music-industry credentials than her judging peers, but “[h]opefully I’m the people’s point of view, because I’m just like you. I sit at home and I watch it.”
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is known to Americans as a) the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and b) the terrorist with the extremely hairy shoulders in this photo. That photo was taken during his capture in March 2003 and is so unattractive that it presented a bit of a problem to other jihadists who want to glorify him. Now, al Qaeda researcher Jarret Brachman has uncovered a new photo of KSM circulating among the jihadists in which he is virtually unrecognizable—wearing a red turban and a flowing white robe. Brachman points out that this means al Qaeda is likely gearing up to glorify KSM: “Al Qaeda has a new brand, and it came from the bottom-up. This was, in my read, a grassroots, self-organizing campaign for al Qaeda to put KSM back on the map, to add him back into the Founding Myth.”
Is this the price of freedom? The rescue of New York Times reporter Stephen Farrell cost of the life of his Afghan interpreter, Sultan Munadi. British special forces raided the compound where Farrell was being held, and in the ensuing firefight, Munadi was shot dead and left behind as the troops brought the American to safety. Resentment of NATO forces is growing in Afghanistan in the wake of several military missions that resulted in civilian deaths, The Washington Post reports, and though the Brits expressed sorrow at Munadi's death, many Afghans remain upset, arguing that his death proves international forces care more about Western lives than Afghan ones. Some compared the incident to one in 2007, when an Italian journalist was freed but his driver and interpreter were left behind to be killed by the Taliban.
The head of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, said in a speech Wednesday that banks lost control of certain products and lacked important measuring tools in the run-up to the financial crisis. He also said that the outrage over Wall Street compensation was "understandable and appropriate." One senior European banker said that Blankfein's talk, which was given at a banking conference in Germany, was aimed squarely at the local audience, even while it is certain to be heard back home: “Blankfein was clearly trying to placate the locals and show some kind of contrition. But I agree with what he said—these were silly bets and they were absolutely useless.” In recent months, criticism against the success of Goldman Sachs in the face of the economy's downturn has been on the rise.
God should really stop telling people to hijack planes. Jose Flores, the man who briefly hijacked a jetliner as it landed in Mexico City from Cancun, said he did so after a divine revelation, the Associated Press reports. Flores said Wednesday's date, 09/09/09 was the satanic number 666 inverted. The Bible-wielding self-described pastor showed a flight attendant his "bomb," merely a juice can with lights attached, as the plane was landing and said that he and three others were hijacking the plane. Evidently the three others were "the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost," as he later told police. Flores, a drug addict convicted of armed robbery in Bolivia, ordered the pilot to circle Mexico City seven times and asked to speak with Mexican President Felipe Calderon, to warn him of an impending earthquake. None of the 103 passengers and crew were harmed.
The hits just don't stop coming. Italian businessman Giampaolo Tarantini told prosecutors that he paid five women 1,000 euros, or roughly $1,500, each to spend the night with Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and provide "sexual services." Twenty-five others attended lavish parties with the prime minister over an 18-month period. But Tarantini wasn't done talking. He provided the names of the women and dates of the parties, where Champagne was served and jewelry given away as presents. Tarantini said he gave drugs to at least one of the woman. "I thought at the time that girls and cocaine would be the keys to achieving success in society," he told investigators.
First comes nomination, then the critics. Glenn Beck is urging his devotees to dig up dirt on Harvard Law Professor Cass Sunstein, Obama's nominee to head the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Beck's tweet for scoops on Wednesday comes days before he's to be voted on. What will they find? Newsweek blog The Gaggle notes that Sunstein’s support for animal rights—including the suggestion that if "sheep are going to be used to create clothing, their conditions must be conducive to their welfare"—has already earned the ire of Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Saxby Chambliss (R-GA). Another problem area could be Sunstein's argument that waiting lists for organ transplants would be shortened if people had to opt out of organ donation instead of opting in, a view that has been interpreted as support for forcible organ harvesting. Widely respected by conservative intellectuals (The Wall Street Journal's editorial page approved of his nomination), Sunstein has written to GOP senators affirming his deep support for the Second Amendment. But will it be enough to mollify Glenn Beck’s army, still high on the success of ousting green-jobs czar Van Jones?
Someone dig out the dunce cap: Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larson said that the Democrats are looking into options, including censure, for punishing Joe Wilson, the South Carolina congressman who heckled President Obama during Wednesday’s speech. Wilson issued an apology Wednesday night, but Larson said it was not enough. “I think minimally everybody agrees that there ought to be an apology, and certainly a public apology on the floor of the House for that incident,” Larson said. “Minimally.” Since last night, Wilson’s 2010 opponent has raised more than $100,000.
Mamas can't let their babies grow up to be cowboys anymore, even in Argentina. The Washington Post reports that the lifestyle of the romantic gauchos, who used to herd cattle on the fertile pampa, a swath of plains bigger than Texas, is coming to an end. This year, 15 million animals, roughly a third of Argentine cattle, spend their lives on American-style feedlots, pumped with antibiotics and gorged on grain, instead of roaming on the plains and chomping on grass. Driven by export restrictions and price controls designed to make beef cheap, and subsidies for corn, many farmers have switched from cattle to crops over the past decade. On a feedlot, 7,000 cows take up almost 12 acres, but to raise the same number of animals on grass would require 13,000. The change in cultivation has left a bad taste in traditionalists' mouths. One member of the traditional Argentine Angus Association alleged that grass-fed beef has less cholesterol in it because the animal has to "roam great distances to eat," while beef connoisseurs alleged that feedlot beef tastes more like pork.
President Obama told Congress Wednesday night that he was not the first president to try to reform health care, but he is determined to be the last. Obama called for partisan fighting to end—"Now is when we must bring the best ideas of both parties together, and show the American people that we can still do what we were sent here to do. Now is the time to deliver on health care."—and for members of Congress to remember that, "[E]veryone in this Congress gets affordable insurance. And it’s time to give every American the same opportunity that we’ve given ourselves." The president also gave a nod to his former campaign rival, John McCain, citing one of his proposals on health-care reform, to which the Arizona senator responded with a thumbs up. He urged members not to drop a public insurance option, saying, "I will not back down on the basic principle that if Americans can’t find affordable coverage, we will provide you with a choice."
Melanie Oudin, the 17-year-old "instant star" of the tennis world, ended her run at this year's U.S. Open Wednesday night as spectacularly as she began it. Oudin wowed crowds as she won her first four matches (all against Russians), which catapulted her from obscurity to a Tonight Show booking in a week. Her streak didn't last, though, and on Wednesday, Caroline Wozniacki sent the blonde phenom home with an "awkward" 6-2, 6-2 defeat in which "Oudin made only 11 winners and committed 43 unforced errors, a disastrous ratio," ESPN reports. Still, observers say that despite letting pressure get to her head, Oudin's got staying power: Tony Bennett, singer and avid tennis fan, raves, "She has the crowd in the palm of her hands… She's going to be a permanent star."
Steve Jobs took to the stage at an Apple event in San Francisco Wednesday, marking his first major appearance since a five-month medical leave this year. Jobs opened up by acknowledging the generosity of the organ donor who gave him the new liver that saved his life. The New York Times blogged that he "looks well, though as thin as when he left the company in January." Jobs then went on to tout the latest improvements to the iPhone and iTunes, and also unveiled a new music format called iTunes LP that is meant, according to Jobs, to "get people to buy music albums again." Google's CEO, Eric Schmidt, was also spotted at the event.
Countless politicians have been caught in awkward positions in earshot of a hot mic, but the case of Michael Duvall, a Republican California Assemblyman, outdoes them all: Following a shockingly graphic caught-on-tape conversation about sexual adventures with two women—one of whom is reportedly an energy lobbyist and neither of whom is his wife—Duvall resigned from office Wednesday. Duvall, who is vice chairman of the Committee on Utilities & Commerce and a champion of “family values,” whispered such raunchy comments as, "So, I am getting into spanking her. Yeah, I like it. I like spanking her. She goes, 'I know you like spanking me.' I said, 'Yeah! Because you're such a bad girl!'" and "She wears little eye-patch underwear... And so she’s all, she’s all, ‘I am going up and down the stairs, and you’re dripping out of me!’ So messy!” into a microphone that fed into the legislature’s in-house TV station and are quickly becoming a viral hit on YouTube.
Two documents that are going to make South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford’s life a whole lot worse: First, 60 of the South Carolina House’s 72 Republicans have called on him to resign, in a clear sign that, should he hold on to his seat, he will be impeached. (The House’s 51 Democrats would likely join them in voting for impeachment.) Also, Sanford’s wife, Jenny, has hired a book agent. Jenny’s agent sent out the proposal September 6, and they will talk to potential bidders this week.
You win some, you lose some? South Carolina Republican Rep. Joe Wilson threw himself into infamy (No. 1 trending topic on Twitter Wednesday night) by yelling "You lie!" during President Obama's health-care speech to Congress. The heckling was in response to the president's assertion that a public-insurance option would not cover illegal immigrants. Sen. John McCain quickly denounced the outburst while being interviewed on Larry King Live, saying it was "totally disrespectful. [Wilson] should apologize immediately." Looks like Joe was listening: Wilson issued a red-faced apology for his "lack of civility" later last night. "I let my emotions get the best of me... While I disagree with the president's statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable." Politico notes that Wilson's outburst violates House Republicans' rules of decorum, which bars presidential insults "such as referring to him as a 'hypocrite' or a 'liar.'"
Iran has enough fuel to make a quick but dangerous run for a nuclear weapon, yet intelligence reports indicate that the country has stopped short of taking the final steps to making a bomb, The New York Times reports. An American official told the International Atomic Energy Agency Tuesday that Iran has the "possible breakout capacity" to turn its stockpile of uranium into bomb-grade material. The statement was likely aimed at putting pressure on allies to increase sanctions against Iran if the country does not agree to sit down at the negotiation table. The Israelis, it seems, believe the situation is even worse than the Americans: They think the Iranians are closer to designing a bomb than the U.S. does. ”We’re all looking at the same set of facts,” one senior Israeli intelligence official told The Times. “We are interpreting them quite differently than the White House does.”
The rumors of Emma Watson's helicopter arrival at Brown are greatly exaggerated, although the Telegraph reports that that the actress is "so excited" to be starting college. The Harry Potter star's boyfriend, Jay Barrymore, jetted in to meet Watson as she attempts to blend in. On her website, the actress also said she was "having the most amazing time," at Brown, had "already met so many incredible people," and is "over [her] jet lag now" and ready for classes to start.
