• Unpopular elected official Harry Reid is just all about including the public option on the new health care bill. [New York Times]
• John Kerry is so busy and fulfilled chairing the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he totally doesn’t even have time to think about 2004. [Washington Post]
• A team of pilots flying a commercial airliner overshot their destination, the Minneapolis airport, by 150 miles yesterday. The FAA first blamed terrorism but is now blaming sleep, the terrorism of trying to stay awake at work. [CNN]
• Legislation stating that violence against gay people is, legally-speaking, a hate crime is THISCLOSE to becoming law. All Obama has to do is sign the dotted line, which he will. [Los Angeles Times]
• Barry is trying to convince Iran to fulfill all its uranium enrichment needs overseas somewhere. Iran is trying to cultivate an arsenal of nuclear weapons. These things may be mutually exclusive! [AP]
• Britain is still in the midst of its own recession. Ehh, and everyone though the third quarter was going to be the turnaround one for the economy over there. Alas. [Reuters]

Thursday, October 15 and Friday, October 16: Do liberals or conservatives produce fresher vegetables?  [White House Farmers Market, Capitol Harvest at the Ronald Reagan Building] MORE »

The official White House Flickr photo-porn stream has crassly brought POLITICS into the death of famous politician Ted Kennedy, by posting a set of pictures titled, “Remembering Senator Kennedy.” Yeah, more like “Remembering the Politician Ted Kennedy, instead of the apolitical national mascot we all loved as our own sort of Col. Sanders or whatever.” God, these Obamas …. [White House Flickr]

Uhh, question of immense literary and historical importance: What does Sarah Palin’s departure from politics mean for Sarah Palin’s nascent book about being involved in politics? Probably nothing! Recall back to May: HarperCollins proudly announced that it would be publishing Palin’s book about bein’ a soccer mom and bein’ a hockey governor and bein’ a mom to a transgendered pitbull, and whatever else, doesn’t even matter, because they paid her ~one billion dollars for the privilege of distributing her words to the American public. So will HarperCollins publish Sarah Palin’s book about being governor that afternoon she was governor on a dare, or will they force her to write about … whatever it is she plans to do that she thinks will affect political change more than being paid to affect political change (cuckolding Todd with Argentinian Todd,T erencio, on a sandmobile??)? MORE »

In the continuum of America’s Problems, right before everyone was concerned about the economy and right after the environment actually starting melting, there was the issue of the Muslins, a dangerous sect of Hawaiian Christian Platonists who went rogue for a few years, in Iraq. You’ll recall The War, yes? Anyway, few books about that thing, and how it’s still a problem, despite not being mentioned on any blogs for awhile. Also, there seems to be an early onslaught of nostalgia for capitalism going around, which in this week’s column is comically juxtaposed against the closing of one of DC’s most beloved bookstores, Vertigo Books. Irony! MORE »

The DC police are putting together a book with the 60 most notorious youth offenders so that people in-the-know will be kept abreast of these kids in the rosy-fingered dawn of their careers or something. It too has tenuous privacy implications, just like actual Facebook. [Washington Post] MORE »

A deer, which was being chased by a pack of dogs, which was being chased by Sarah Palin and a fleet of helicopters, which was being chased by that same deer, smashed into the window of a Greek restaurant in Silver Spring and then went to hide out in the bakery of a Giant. [WTOP] MORE »

Last time we checked in on notorious idiot wingnut Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, she was almost losing her safe House seat after proposing Witch Trials for every Democratic member of Congress, because of socialism. She squeaked by, though, and thank God, because she’s funny. With the SOCIALISM WITCH TRIAL SCANDAL finally out of the way, she’s speaking freely again. MORE »

HELP FIND THIS LOST D.C. DOG: This is Alli, a 17-month-old Newfoundland. She vanished the night of January 21, from Georgetown. Very nice dog, etc. Black nylon collar. [Find My Dog Alli] MORE »

It seems like just a million years ago when the 2006 midterm elections left the GOP crippled and destroyed. Ah, Cocktober and Blovember of yore, how we miss ye! Not really. But guess what? The campaign that began on November 8, 2006 is now over, pretty much! It is Election Day! MORE »

It’s now well after 1 p.m. and we haven’t heard anything from editor Jim Newell, so we have to assume he’s either in jail or rigorously pursuing his vow to “fuck 50 paultards” in the woods somewhere, or maybe in the reflecting pool. All we have are some drunken comments from the Wonkette operatives who bravely showed up at 9:30 a.m. to get drunk and make fun of the Ron Paul March of Liberty Upon Washington, the Scarlet Whore Snake City. MORE »