The Commentariat -- September 8

I've posted a comments page on Gail Collins' column (linked below) on Off Times Square.

Adam Nagourney & Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times: "Mr. Romney and Mr. Perry began going at each other in the very first few minutes of the debate here at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum. Mr. Perry attacked Mr. Romney’s record of creating jobs in Massachusetts and his championing of health care legislation when he ran the state.Mr. Romney, in turn, cast Mr. Perry as a career politician. The exchanges between them grew steadily more intense during the opening moments of the debate and reflected the fact that both men have to some extent similar strategies: running on their records as governor." ...

... The Los Angeles Times has a liveblog of the debate here, and the New York Times has a liveblog here. ...

... The ABM Party -- Anybody But Mitt. Gail Collins: "The Republican nominating campaign has thus far been one long primal scream from party members desperate to avoid making Mitt Romney their nominee. Really, they will look at anybody. Remember the Donald Trump moment? Michele Bachmann, Front-Runner? Who knows where their glazed eyes will turn next? Rudy Giuliani is now running around saying that he might get in the race 'if I think we are truly desperate.' Which they would really, really, really have to be. The current front-running Mitt Alternative is Perry, possibly the first major presidential candidate opposed to the direct election of U.S. senators since the advent of the Bull Moose Party."

Former Vice President Al Gore in a blogpost on President Obama's decision to nix the EPA's new ozone standards:

Instead of relying on science, President Obama appears to have bowed to pressure from polluters who did not want to bear the cost of implementing new restrictions on their harmful pollution — even though economists have shown that the US economy would benefit from the job creating investments associated with implementing the new technology. The result of the White House’s action will be increased medical bills for seniors with lung disease, more children developing asthma, and the continued degradation of our air quality.

Vice President Joe Biden in a New York Times op-ed: "... a successful China can make our country more prosperous, not less. As trade and investment bind us together, we have a stake in each other’s success. On issues from global security to global economic growth, we share common challenges and responsibilities — and we have incentives to work together." CW: the essay includes some info I'd often wondered about (and which should have come out prominently in the debt ceiling debacle): "China holds just 8 percent of outstanding Treasury securities. By comparison, Americans hold nearly 70 percent."

Raymond Hernandez of the New York Times: "Linda E. McMahon, the wrestling mogul who spent $50 million of her own money in an aggressive but failed Senate run in Connecticut last year, will announce in the coming week that she ... will seek the [Republican] party nomination next year for the seat being vacated by Senator Joseph I. Lieberman.

CW: The First Time Ever I Agree with Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). Andrew Pollack of the New York Times: "The bill to overhaul the patent system that is now before the Senate contains a provision that could get an influential law firm off the hook for a possible $214 million malpractice payment.... Critics ... say it is really a special fix for one drug manufacturer, the Medicines Company, and its powerful law firm, WilmerHale.... Back in 2001, the company missed the deadline for applying for a patent extension by a day or two, potentially losing nearly four years of patent protection on its main drug, the anticoagulant Angiomax. The provision would guarantee that Medicines Company would get the extra patent protection, and it would relieve WilmerHale of a possible malpractice payment to its client. Senator Jeff Sessions ... is planning to propose an amendment to strip the provision from the bill."

News Ledes

ABC News: "U.S. authorities are scrambling to sort through information that the CIA developed in the past 24 hours indicating that at least three individuals entered the U.S. in August by air with the intent to launch a vehicle-borne attack against Washington, D.C. or New York around the anniversary of 9/11, according to intelligence officials. Officials say the alleged terror plot was initiated by new al Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's successor, who had pledged to avenge bin Laden's death earlier this year in a U.S. raid."

p>New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg addresses the terrorist threat:

Politico: "A federal appeals court on Thursday threw out two challenges to President Barack Obama's health care overhaul on procedural grounds. Delivering a two-pronged win to the Obama administration, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals said Virginia has no right to challenge the law’s requirement that nearly all Americans buy insurance. The court also said that Liberty University couldn’t challenge the law before the mandate goes into effect." NPR story here, with quite a good audio report. Here's a pdf of the rulings.

For news & views of the President's speech before Congress, see the September 9 Commentariat.

New York Times: Fed Chair Ben Bernanke said in a speech today that consumers are depressed -- they think the economy is worse than it is, and that's making them overly cautious.

President Obama will speak to a joint session of Congress about jobs creation at 7:00 pm ET. Count on the White House website to carry it live online.

The Commentariat -- September 7

Karen Garcia has an excellent post on the know-nothing Congress returning to do nothing except pass legislation written by their corporate buddies. She also delves into the weird results of a Rasmussen poll that finds the know-nothing American "likely voter" thinks teabaggers are smarter than the average Congressman. She adds a hilarious finale. ...

... I've put up an Off Times Square comments page on Garcia's post.

Click on cartoon to see slightly larger image.... Pollak's Website is here. Thanks to reader Bonnie for the link.

The Resurrection, Alpha Version. Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times: "The White House is in the midst of rebranding the president as a pragmatic problem solver prepared to set aside ideology to address a compelling need (see last week’s concession on ozone regulations), a reasonable man in an era dominated by extreme views.... He is frustrated ... at some of his own aides ... that he has been unable to rise above the morass of Washington and recapture the spirit that helped him win election. The frustration has led to internal divisions among some advisers over the scope of his economic address to a joint session of Congress on Thursday night."

David Espo of the AP: "President Barack Obama is expected to propose $300 billion in tax cuts and federal spending Thursday night to get Americans working again. Republicans offered Tuesday to compromise with him on jobs — but also assailed his plans in advance of his prime-time speech." ...

To those who say that our expenditures for Public Works and other means for recovery are a waste that we cannot afford, I answer that no country, however rich, can afford the waste of its human resources. Demoralization caused by vast unemployment is our greatest extravagance.... [W]e must make it a national principle that we will not tolerate a large army of unemployed and that we will arrange our national economy to end our present unemployment as soon as we can and then to take wise measures against its return. -- President Franklin Roosevelt ...

... David Woolner, a senior fellow at the Roosevelt Institute writing in Salon, advocates for a real WPA-style jobs program. "The American people ... have heard enough talk of cuts, cuts, cuts when, in the spirit of the New Deal, they would much rather heed a call to 'build, baby, build.'" ...

... Economics Prof. Lawrence Katz, in a New York Times op-ed, suggests several jobs-creation initiatives: a "net job-creation tax credit ... for private-sector employers...; "increased federal spending of at least several hundred billion dollars a year for the next two years"; and a revamped "work force investment and re-employment system." ...

... CW: Although I disagree with at least half of his ideas, William Walker, who heads a commercial real estate financing company has what will surely be my favorite Lede of the Week in a New York Times op-ed, and it's only Tuesday:

PRESIDENT OBAMA needs to go big. Jeffrey R. Immelt, chairman of the president’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, may have suggestions, but considering that Fortune 100 companies have killed 2.9 million jobs in America over the past decade while adding 2.4 million abroad, that may not be the best input. I’m an entrepreneur and I’m creating jobs. Here are eight suggestions." (Emphasis added.)

From the Communications Workers of America:

Why are you taking a big bite out of our active military benefits, our disabled benefits to pay for tax breaks for the wealthiest one percent of Americans? -- Dennis Holland, an unemployed engineer from Fort Myers, Florida, to Rep. Connie Mack (CoMa) (R-Fla.) The Naples News does not report any coherent response from CoMa. ...

... Americans United for Change, a labor-backed PAC: "When Republicans returned to their districts for their August recess, over and over again, they faced 'waving fingers' and shouts from their hometown over the GOP's lack of focus on job creation and their more-than-willingness to bring our economy to the brink of a recession to protect tax cuts for big oil and multi-millionaires." The site has a terrific interactive map that highlights comments & questions to MOCs made by ordinary Americans.

Andrew Leonard of Salon: on the Friday before Labor Day, the best time to release bad news (ask President O-Zone), Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac bury the news of their big suits against big banks -- a move many Americans have been waiting for since late 2008.

We said working folks deserved a break , so within one month of me taking office, we signed into law the biggest middle-class tax cut in history, putting more money into your pockets. -- President Obama, Labor Day speech 2011 ...

... Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post. Uh, no, you didn't. CW: Also, I'd give more weight to statement made in a prepared speech than to one made off-the-cuff.

Brad Plumer of the Washington Post writes "everything you need to know about patent reform in one post."

Robert Fisk of the U.K. Independent wonders why, on the ten-year anniversary of 9/11, almost no one has discussed the motivations of the terrorists, which were bound up in our support of Israel. Thanks to Kate M. for the link.

Right Wing World

"Tonight's Republican Debate -- the 19th Century or the Stone Age?" Bob Reich: "Listen tonight, if you can bear it, for anything other than standard Republican boilerplate since the 1920s — a wistful desire to return to the era of William McKinley, when ... immigrants were almost all European, big corporations and robber barons ran the government, the poor were desperate, and the rich were lived like old-world aristocrats. In the late 1050s and 1960s, the Republican Party had a brief flirtation with the twentieth century.... But the Republican Party that emerged in the 1970s began its march back to the 19th century. By the time Newt Gingrich and his regressive followers took over the House of Representatives in 1995, social conservatives, isolationists, libertarians, and corporatists had taken over once again." ...

... Oh, this is kinda fun. That sweetheart Karl Rove assesses the Republican presidential field:

    ... Ben Smith comments on Rove's assessment of Gov. Perry's book F'ed Up!: "It's hard to overstate what a liability "Fed Up!" -- published just last year -- is for a guy who is otherwise an extremely strong candidate. You have to take him at his word that he would never have written it if he'd planned to run; and he doesn't seem to have settled on a strategy for dealing with it."

Philip Rucker & Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: "Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney put forward a sweeping economic plan here Tuesday that he projected would boost annual economic growth by 4 percent, create 11.5 million new jobs and lower the nation’s unemployment rate to 5.9 percent over four years.... Romney’s prescription for the country’s ailing economy includes overhauling federal tax, regulatory, trade and energy policies. His is a collection of business-friendly ideas that fit neatly within the mainstream of the Republican Party, but with a few innovative proposals sprinkled throughout, namely tougher stances on China and labor unions." Here's the sweeping plan in pdf format. ...

     ... ** NEW. Jared Bernstein, writing in Salon gives us a concise, comprehensive review of Romney's "bold" plan: "By locking in the Bush high-end cuts, cutting the corporate tax, capping spending at 20 percent (implying large entitlement cuts), shifting health costs, cutting Social Security benefits, and punting on short-term job creation, this is far from a jobs plan that could help the middle class. It's more likely to prolong the downturn, hasten the growth of income inequality, and increase economic insecurity." (Emphasis added.)

     ... Ezra Klein comments. The Romney plan is the usual Republican fare -- deregulate, drill, death to unions -- but at least he has some actual conservative economists on his team. ...

     ... Eh. Steve Stromberg of the Washington Post: not only would Romney's "bold" plan be unlikely "to pump up the economy in the short-term," his promises of economic growth are hardly better than what the Congressional Budget Office has already projected under present conditions.

     ... Andy Kroll of Mother Jones: Romney's new plan is just like his old plan. But, hey, it's longer -- 160 pages of the same ole same ole. ...

     ... Chart Fraud. Oliver Willis grabs a chart from Romney's big plan in which "Romney counts negative job growth while Bush was president 2007- Jan 2009 as part of the 'Obama Recovery.' Talk about creating your own reality that has no resemblance to the truth." CW: I couldn't decide whether or to put the Romney plan in Right Wing World till Willis decided it for me. The plan ins't just standard boilerplate help-the-rich-stiff-the-poor, it's also a work of fiction. ...

     ... As Adam Serwer notes in Mother Jones, "With employment still hovering around nine percent, it's not like Romney needs to lie in order to go after Obama's record on the economy.... Why be so conspicuously dishonest about it? ...

... "The Soft Courage of Low Expectations." Dana Milbank thinks Rick Perry has done Mitt Romney a favor by releasing Romney from his last iteration as a teabagger panderer. The latest "New Mitt" is a little like one of the earlier "New Mitts":

The usually awkward Romney seemed in his element as he delivered his speech [on his economic plan], even if he was wearing a yacht-club blue blazer and tan gabardines on the floor of a truck repair shop.... As he again defended his curious formulation that 'corporations are people,' he sounded almost plutocratic. But it at least shows that the man who had been a frightened front-runner is now willing to state more boldly what his candidacy is about: the corporate establishment’s answer to Perry’s angry populism.

The Only Tax Cut I Don't Like Is an Obama Tax Cut. Rick Klein of ABC News: "Here’s a sentence you won’t read too often: Sen. Jim DeMint is coming out against a tax cut. It’s not just any tax cut. DeMint, R-S.C. – one of the most prominent tea party and anti-tax voices in the country – told ABC’s Jonathan Karl that he’s inclined to oppose President Obama’s proposal for an extension of the payroll tax cut." With video.

It Doesn't Take Some Teabaggers Long to Catch on. John Bennett of The Hill: "Wary that some are joining the grassroots conservative movement merely to sell books and enhance their celebrity status, a Tea Party group is putting the heat on former Alaska [Half-]Gov. Sarah Palin to make her presidential plans clear. In a Tuesday statement, Armed Forces Tea Party Patriots paints former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin as the prime example of that kind of behavior." CW: aw, c'mon how could they have guessed before this?

News Ledes

New York Times: Stewart Nozette, "a former senior government scientist who held the highest security clearances, pleaded guilty to espionage on Wednesday and agreed to a 13-year prison term for selling top-secret information on military satellites and other technology to an F.B.I. agent posing as an Israeli spy."

Washington Post: "Congress signaled Tuesday that it still cannot agree on how to get more money into the nearly depleted coffers of the beleaguered Federal Emergency Management Agency. Lawmakers are stuck in a dispute over how much additional funding FEMA should receive and whether that additional funding should be offset with cuts elsewhere."

AP: "One of the most destructive wildfires in Texas history is slowing down thanks in part to calming winds, but stretched-thin firefighting crews have yet to gain any control of the blaze that is plowing across rain-starved grasslands now littered with hundreds of charred homes." The Houston Chronicle story is here.

Washington Post: "The Federal Reserve is moving toward new steps aimed at lowering interest rates on mortgages and other kinds of long-term loans, without making another massive infusion of money into the economy. When Fed officials hold a pivotal meeting in two weeks, they will strongly consider buying more long-term Treasury bonds...."

New York Times: "Germany’s Constitutional Court upheld the legality of Berlin’s rescue packages for debt-stricken euro zone countries, but said any future bailouts must be approved by a parliamentary panel."

AP: "Libyan fighters have surrounded the ousted dictator Moammar Gadhafi, and it is only a matter of time until he is captured or killed, a spokesman for Tripoli's new military council said Wednesday. Anis Sharif would not say where Gadhafi had been found, but said he was still in Libya and had been tracked using high technology and human intelligence." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "The judge hearing the criminal trial of former President Hosni Mubarak has ordered testimony from the top two military officers now running the country."

Al Jazeera: "A bomb apparently hidden in a suitcase has exploded outside the high court in New Delhi, India's capital, killing at least 11 people and wounding 45 others, officials said."

AL Jazeera: "At least 25 people have been killed and several wounded in suicide bombings near a government compound in the Pakistani city of Quetta bordering Afghanistan."

Al Jazeera: "The trial of Hosni Mubarak has resumed to hear more testimonies after police witnesses suggested earlier this week that neither he nor his interior minister gave orders to shoot protesters during the successful uprising against his rule earlier this year." With video.

listen tonight, if you can bear it, for anything other than standard Republican boilerplate since the 1920s — a wistful desire to return to the era of William McKinley, when the federal government was small, the Fed and the IRS had yet to be invented, state laws determined worker safety and hours, evolution was still considered contentious, immigrants were almost all European, big corporations and robber barons ran the government, the poor were desperate, and the rich were lived like old-world aristocrats.

In the late 1950s and 1960s, the Republican Party had a brief flirtation with the twentieth century.

The Commentariat -- September 6

Joe Nocera: Rep. "Jim Cooper, a Blue Dog Democrat from the Nashville area, remembers the day when Congress still worked.... To Cooper, the true villain is not the Tea Party; it’s Newt Gingrich. In the 1980s, when Tip O’Neill was speaker of the House, 'Congress was functional,' Cooper told me. 'Committees worked. Tip saw his role as speaker of the whole House, not just the Democrats.' Gingrich was a new kind of speaker: deeply partisan and startlingly power-hungry." Read the whole column. ...

... I've posted a Nocera page on Off Times Square. ...

... CW: A Compelling Indictment of President Obama -- Joe Mason, a Country Doctor, for President (from the site Vote Third Party -- via Jim Fallows, who comments on the video):

Jon Cohen & Dan Balz of the Washington Post: "Public pessimism about the direction of the country has jumped to its highest level in nearly three years, erasing the sense of hope that followed President Obama’s inauguration and pushing his approval ratings to a record low, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. More than 60 percent of those surveyed say they disapprove of the way the president is handling the economy and, what has become issue No. 1, the stagnant jobs situation. Just 43 percent now approve of the job he is doing overall, a new career low; 53 percent disapprove, a new high." ...

... Nate Silver: "... jobs creation estimates put forward by economists have been biased upward. Negative surprises have been about twice as common as positive ones over the past 12 years." CW: that is, don't be surprised when you read that "jobs creation was lower last month than expected." More often than not, that will be the case because economists usually overestimate jobs growth, a set-up for "failure."

Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) in a Washington Post op-ed, on the goals of the deficit reduction supercommittee: "Debt and deficit reduction should be wrapped into a strong cord of job creation, budget cuts and revenue raisers. Pursuing them separately will weaken our efforts and could doom our mission." Clyburn is the third-ranking House Democrat & a member of the supercommittee. ...

... Dan Eggen of the Washington Post: "Nearly 100 registered lobbyists used to work for members of the supercommittee, now representing defense companies, health-care conglomerates, Wall Street banks and others with a vested interest in the panel’s outcome, according to a Washington Post analysis of disclosure data. Three Democrats and three Republicans on the panel also employ former industry lobbyists on their staffs. The preponderance of lobbyists adds to the political controversy surrounding the supercommittee, which will begin its work in earnest this week as Congress returns to Washington. The panel has already come under fire from watchdog groups for planning its activities in secret and allowing members to continue fundraising while they negotiate a budget deal."

Michael Fletcher of the Washington Post: "Until recently, most states ... have attacked their pension problems by cutting benefits for new hires while preserving retirement packages for current employees. Others have rolled over their pension debt by taking out loans or papering them over with what some have called unrealistic projections about investment earning and life expectancy. But with states facing, by one estimate, a combined $3 trillion in unfunded pension liabilities and the economic downturn continuing to dampen government tax revenue, states are beginning to make changes once considered unthinkable — such as cutting pensions for people in retirement."

Click on image to see McFadden's other suggestions.

New York Times Editors: "... we are skeptical that the [Obama] administration has a comprehensive strategy to help build up a government that Afghans would be willing to fight for." The editors outline several problems that must be addressed.

Bill Glauber of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel: "U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin of Madison announced Tuesday that she is entering the 2012 race to succeed retiring Democratic U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl. Baldwin is the first Democrat in the field and likely the front-runner for her party's nomination." Here's Baldwin's campaign site & here's her announcement video:

... AND Looks as if She's Running, Too. Noah Bierman of the Boston Globe: "Elizabeth Warren has yet to officially declare that she is running for US Senate, but the former presidential aide took another step yesterday.... Introducing Warren at the annual Labor Day breakfast yesterday, the president of the Greater Boston Labor Council compared her to the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy, while the state’s top union and Democratic political leaders stood and applauded her fiery keynote address at the event." You can watch Warren's speech here, but it's been recorded on ShakyCam, so maybe just listen.

Dem on the Take. Eric Lipton of the New York Times: Rep. Shelly Berkley's [D-Nev.] "actions were among a series over the last five years in which she pushed legislation or twisted the arms of federal regulators to pursue an agenda that is aligned with the business interests of her husband, Dr. Larry Lehrner."

Right Wing World

CW: I thought about covering this yesterday, but it's such a stupid story, that I'll let Steve Benen -- who shares my low opinion of it -- handle it for me. It seems Fox "News" & the usual suspects went nuts yesterday after Fox took a remark of James Hoffa, Jr.'s out of context. Not only did they wingers go into histrionics over what Hoffa didn't say, they faulted President Obama for not condemning Hoffa for saying what he didn't say. ...

     ... Or, as Dave Weigel asks, "Can we skip this little drama where conservatives pretend that Hoffa was ordering goon squads into action to pull Republican congressmen out of their homes and break their knees?"

"Al Gore's Texas Cheerleader," or How to Make the New Guy Look Good to Opposition Party Voters (and the scary music is a nice "Texas Chain-Saw Massacre" touch). Via Alex Altman of Time:

Fox "News": "Citing health reasons, veteran GOP strategist Ed Rollins stepped down as [Michele Bachmann's] campaign manager.... Speaking to CNN, where he was a contributor before the Bachmann campaign, the 68-year-old Rollins said the front-runners were now former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry. He said Perry's late entry into the race slowed Bachmann's buzz and fundraising. 'I think legitimately it's a Romney-Perry race,' he said.

News Ledes

New York Times: "Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta is supporting a plan that would keep 3,000 to 4,000 American troops in Iraq after a deadline for their withdrawal at year’s end, but only to continue training security forces there.... The recommendation would break a longstanding pledge by President Obama to withdraw all American forces from Iraq by the deadline."

New York Times: "The Obama administration said on Tuesday that it would seek to save the deficit-plagued Postal Service from an embarrassing default by proposing to give it an extra three months to make a $5.5 billion payment due on Sept. 30 to finance retirees’ future health coverage. Speaking at a Senate hearing, John Berry, director of the federal Office of Personnel Management, also said the administration would soon put forward a plan to stabilize the postal service, which faces a deficit of nearly $10 billion this fiscal year and had warned that it could run out of money entirely this winter."

New York Times: "Carol A. Bartz, >Yahoo’s chief executive, was fired Tuesday, ending a rocky two-year tenure in which she tried to revitalize the online media company."

New York Times: Richard Cordray, "the nominee to lead the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, told a Senate committee on Tuesday that he would make it a priority “to streamline and cut back” a mountain of regulations that has grown up over the last 30 years, which he said excessively burdened some banks and discourages them from lending money to consumers."

"Dear Mr. President." AP: "In a letter to [President] Obama Tuesday, Speaker John Boehner and House Republican Leader Eric Cantor asked the president to meet with the bipartisan leadership of Congress this week to discuss his proposals in advance of his jobs address Thursday to a joint session of Congress. The letter lists GOP proposals that have already passed the House that they said would be worthy of his consideration."

AP: "David Petraeus, the newly retired general with the megawatt media profile, was sworn in Tuesday as CIA director.... Retired last week after 37 years in the Army, Petraeus was sworn in by Vice President Joe Biden...."

Washington Post: "The College of William and Mary on Tuesday announced that [former Secretary of Defense Robert] Gates has been named the school’s next chancellor, an honorary appointment that will return the former secretary to his alma mater. Gates will succeed former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Connor, whose term ends in February."

New York Times: "Wall Street took a tumble at the opening of trading Tuesday, following a choppy day in Europe and Asia, as investors returned from the Labor Day holiday in the United States. The turmoil of recent weeks showed no signs of letting up, with gold rising to another record and the currency market jolted by action from the Swiss authorities to weaken the franc, which has soared because of its role as a haven."

AP: Wildfires have destroyed at leat 500 Texas homes. "At least 5,000 people were forced from their homes in Bastrop County about 25 miles east of Austin, and about 400 were in emergency shelters, officials said Monday. School and school-related activities were canceled Tuesday." ...

     ... Houston Chronicle: "The most destructive wildfire on record in Texas showed no signs of slowing down Monday, destroying 25,000 acres in Bastrop County and 476 homes, more houses than any single wildfire before and more than all other fires this year combined, according to the Texas Forest Service." ...

     ... Chronicle: "Firefighters continue this morning to battle a large wildfire that has blackened thousands of acres, forced hundreds of residents to flee and shut down several roads in Montgomery, Grimes and Waller counties."

AP: "The destructive remnants of Tropical Storm Lee rolled north Tuesday after spawning tornadoes, sweeping several people away, flooding roads and knocking out power to thousands across the South. More rain was expected in parts of Tennessee, where records have already been broken."

Al Jazeera: "A large convoy containing between 200 and 250 military vehicles Libyan armoured vehicles has crossed into Niger. Military sources from France and Niger told the Reuters news agency that the convoy, escorted by the Niger army, arrived in the northern desert town of Agadez on Monday. Amid the reports about the convoy, Libyan opposition fighters have been holding talks with tribal leaders in Bani Walid to enter the town peacefully. They are also negotiating with some tribes in Sirte, Gaddafi's hometown, to lay down arms." ...

... The Al Jazeera liveblog on Libya is here. ...

... Reuters: "Libyan forces plan to enter the pro-Gaddafi desert town of Bani Walid on Tuesday after reaching a deal with delegates from the town to avoid fighting, Al Jazeera television said. The pan-Arab news channel, citing the anti-Gaddafi forces, said the fighters were expected to enter the city after the deal is formalized, which would likely be around midday." ...

... Washington Post: "A chaotic and apparently ill-coordinated effort by rebels to track down Moammar Gaddafi is being led by competing factions of military commanders and bounty hunters, as well as Libyan commandos commissioned by civilian leaders. Libyans involved in the hunt say they are not getting much help from NATO, despite the alliance’s state-of-the-art electronic and aerial surveillance methods. Instead, they are relying on a deluge of human intelligence from informers and witnesses, but seem to be struggling to sift, process and share all the information that is coming in." ...

... The New York Times story, which is a comprehensive summary of reporting by other news agencies, is here. ...

... Guardian: "A Libyan rebel leader who was rendered to Tripoli with the assistance of MI6 [the British intelligence service] said on Monday that he had told British intelligence officers he was being tortured but they did nothing to help him. In a claim that will increase the pressure for further disclosure about the UK's role in torture and rendition since 9/11, Abdul Hakim Belhaj said a team of British interrogators used hand signals to indicate they understood what he was telling them."

Al Jazeera: "Turkey is 'totally suspending' all trade, military and defence industry ties with Israel, the Turkish prime minister said.... Turkey has not frozen military ties with Israel, Amos Gilad, the head of the Israeli defence ministry's diplomatic-security bureau, told Israel's Army Radio, saying that the Israeli military attache in Turkey is still serving as usual."

The Guardian has live video & a liveblog on ongoing testimony in the Rupert Murdoch phone hacking scandal. The front-page headline is "New Evidence Puts Pressure on James Murdoch [Rupert's son]." ...

... New York Times: "As the phone hacking scandal in Britain continues to gnaw at Rupert Murdoch’s media empire, a parliamentary panel opened new hearings on Tuesday, seeking to determine who knew about unauthorized voice mail intercepts ordered by the now defunct News of the World tabloid."