Whiskey Fire: The WaPo is running a contest to find America's next great pundit! Like Charles Krauthammer? More here and here (h/t Batocchio)

The New Republic: The never-ending lunacy of Betsy McCaughey

Oliver Willis: Wild West gun policy doesn't work

They gave us a republic: Nightowl Newswrap

The Rude Pundit: Photos and quotes that only confirm that atheism equals sanity

alicublog: Film threat

Since the wingnut blogs are scrambling to try to discredit him, good for Scott for coming out from the shadows. Will he get apologies for all the ugliness they've thrown at him? I don't think so either...

NY Times: (reg. req'd.)

The decision of an Army private who has been writing anonymously for The New Republic to reveal his identity has not quieted critics at the rival Weekly Standard who continue to question the accuracy of the soldier's deeply critical accounts from Iraq.

The statement from Scott Thomas Beauchamp on tnr.com.The soldier, Scott Thomas Beauchamp, a member of Company A, 1/18 Infantry, Second Brigade Combat Team of the First Infantry Division, posted a statement Thursday on The New Republic's Web site (tnr.com) saying, "It's been maddening, to say the least, to see the plausibility of events that I witnessed questioned by people who have never served in Iraq."

Private Beauchamp, who wrote "Baghdad Diarist" under the pseudonym Scott Thomas, said: "My Diarist, ‘Shock Troops,' and the two other pieces I wrote for The New Republic have stirred more controversy than I could ever have anticipated. They were written under a pseudonym because I wanted to write honestly about my experiences, without fear of reprisal. Unfortunately, my pseudonym has caused confusion."

Private Beauchamp recounted some grotesque incidents in his columns, including his own mocking of a woman disfigured by the war and accounts of a soldier who took joy in running over a dog in a Bradley fighting vehicle and another who found the top of a child's skull and wore it on his head as a joke.

HuffPo:

No one can criticize the GOP for failing to produce sophisticated propaganda that successfully exploits the hopes and fears of white middle Americans. But can the right-wing distraction factory woo minorities with the same techniques? Check out the following transcript of a new Republican ad targeting black voters in 10 battleground states this year and you be the judge:

BLACK MAN #1: "If you make a little mistake with one of your 'hos,' you'll want to dispose of that problem tout suite, no questions asked."

BLACK MAN #2: "That's too cold. I don't snuff my own seed."

BLACK MAN #1: "Maybe you do have a reason to vote Republican."

This ad was financed by J. Patrick Rooney, a white billionaire notorious for funding several misleading anti-Kerry ads that ran on urban radio stations in 2004. The money for Rooney's newest ad flowed through a little-known group called America's PAC, which was founded by Richard Nadler, a veteran Republican consultant who pushed Intelligent Design in Kansas public schools, declaring, "Darwin is bunk." Read on...

"If you saw climate scientists on the cable news shows and in the paper shortly after Katrina claiming that global warming wasn't a factor in the increased number of hurricanes last fall, odds are, you saw what one expert source told me was 'the most disgusting example of politically motivated deliberate disinformation I've ever witnessed". Now John B. Judis of The New Republic has broken the story that many, myself included, have been aware of and waiting for...read on