AnnotatedOpinions.com

Two hot buttons: Senate and House bills limit coverage for illegal immigrants and abortion. But critics aren’t satisfied. [LA Times]

The Republican Health Plan: The Republican House bill is not reform: it does little to reduce the number of uninsured, and much of the savings on premiums comes from reduced coverage. [New York Times]

As medical costs take over government, Dems duck … [USA Today]

Italy got it right: CIA renditions are wrong – The conviction of 23 Americans in the abduction of Muslim cleric Abu Omar may be largely symbolic, but it sends an important message to the Obama administration. [LA Times]

A Bad Way to Spend Money: Extending the home buyer’s tax credit is wasteful; instead, Congress should help people avoid foreclosure. [New York Times]

A Honduras hijacked by ideology: How Senate Republicans could throw the country into chaos. [Washington Post]

Afghanistan’s forgotten class: After the fall of the Taliban, many Afghan women shed their burqas, opened schools, entered Parliament. [Boston Globe]

Beyond the Spin: Hope didn’t heal the divide: A year after Obama’s election, America’s racial rifts are deep and persistent. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

The vaccine screw-up [Chicago Tribune]

Corzine can blame himself: By Gabriel Gardner There seems to be a consensus developing in the media that this week’s election results suggest a national GOP resurgence. This fails to recognize that the result in New Jersey was actually due to Gov. Corzine’s shortcomings in office. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

GOP at war with itself: Re-education camps with Sarah Palin and Glen Beck? [Washington Post]

What Reagan was really trying to do at the Berlin Wall [LA Times]

Mistrial by Google: Increasingly, courts have had to warn jurors that blogging or searching the Web during trial jeopardizes the very foundations of the judicial system. [Boston Globe]

Tribal Chiefs and the President: President Obama has taken important steps to address the economic and social problems facing American Indians. [New York Times]

Here’s what’s wrong with World Series: It’s still our greatest sports spectacular. But the World Series needs some fixing. So do the American and National League playoffs that lead up to it. [USA Today]

Our heroes, this day and the year-round [USA Today]

[AO: Here are excerpts from an op-ed by Jay Bookman in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Bookman takes us back to 1961 Reagan to illustrate how ridiculous some of the arguments against Healthcare reform really are. ]

Judging from conservative rhetoric, the debate over health-care reform is in truth a fight over the future of American democracy and capitalism. Stopping the health-care bill is being described as an essential step toward restoring America to its rightful owners and rightful course. . . .

In a recording back in 1961, Reagan patiently explained, step by step, how the then-controversial proposal to create Medicare would lead to an America in which freedom was a distant memory. In post-Medicare America, government would dictate to its citizens where they would be allowed to live, what they would be allowed to study and what career they could pursue.

It’s a great case study in how elusive the line between reality and fantasy can be, particularly in the hands of a master illusionist.

Reagan begins by noting that under Medicare, the federal government would pay doctors for the care they provide. From that single data point, he weaves a portrait of America that none of us would recognize. . . .

Today, almost half a century later, we know how things turned out. Medicare did become law, as Reagan feared, but the rest of his horror story never came to pass. Government is not dictating where we can live or what we can study or what career we can enter. We remain a free people, in many ways far more free than we were in 1961.

A Long Way Down: Because many if not most Americans gained little to nothing from the Bush “growth” years, they have found themselves especially vulnerable to the recession. [New York Times]

Fiery rhetoric of Obama’s critics [Chicago Tribune]

The Wyden Alarm: If the Energizer Bunny of health-care reform is worried, we ought to be, too. [Washington Post]

Sen. Ron Wyden

The man who hated hunger: He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Science, and the Congressional Gold Medal. [Boston Globe]

Doctors overwhelmingly back a public option [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]

Rapping Joe’s Knuckles: The pressure from House Democrats, and a handful of Republicans, on Joe Wilson to apologize was a rare triumph for civility in a country that seems to have lost all sense of it. [New York Times]

Behind the right’s attack on Obama: Don’t be fooled by the grass-roots image of the tea partyers and the ‘10thers.’ [LA Times]

Merrill bonus case highlights how shareholders get fleeced [USA Today]

Palin, DeMint should take lessons from this guy [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]

Apply the law equally: By dropping a charge against a prominent blogger — but not others charged with the same crime — the US attorney’s office violated the principle of equal treatment. [Boston Globe]

Truth About Lending: Congress should pass a bill that would simplify the student loan system — and save the country nearly $90 billion over the next decade. [New York Times]

From ACORN, a mighty controversy grows: After the release of several videos highlighting atrocious behavior by some of its workers, the liberal advocacy group needs to clean house. [LA Times]

Gulf stewardship: Red snapper catch quotas work Introduction of quotas for the red snapper catch works, and should be a model. [Houston Chronicle]

Smirk Street: Did you ever get the feeling that the person you’re talking to seems to be listening attentively but is actually thinking about squeezing in one more weekend at the beach before it gets too chilly? [Philadelphia Inquirer]

H1N1 smarts: With swine flu having struck more than a million Americans since spring and the H1N1 vaccine still weeks away, the nation’s public health system is bracing for a deluge of patients. [USA Today]

What Sweeney Won: Two of the AFL-CIO chief’s organizing triumphs could reverse unions’ fortunes. [Washington Post]