Our guest columnist used to be famous for practicing journalism.

CLINTON: “Their campaign pollster said, ‘We’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers.’ Now that is true. I couldn’t have said it better myself — I just hope you remember that every time you see the ad.”

THE FACTS: Clinton, who famously finger-wagged a denial on national television about his sexual relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky and was subsequently impeached in the House on a perjury charge, has had his own uncomfortable moments over telling the truth. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky,” Clinton told television viewers. Later, after he was forced to testify to a grand jury, Clinton said his statements were “legally accurate” but also allowed that he “misled people, including even my wife.”

FACT CHECK: Clinton claims of compromise a stretch [AP, via TPM]

Word comes to us that Todd Akin’s going to be on Piers Morgan’s CNN gabfest at 2100 EDT.  In terms of strategy, it is horrendous.  In terms of comedy possibilities?  AWESOME. And thus I am proud to present this OPEN THREAD for y’all.  [BREAKING HARD — Rep. Todd Akin ran away! Bravely ran away, away! When danger reared its ugly head, he bravely turned his tail and fled!  Oh, man.  That’s POOR.]

[Remainder of post continues with salient info and so on and so forth.  Maybe.]

[A preface.] I know that I’ve been AWOL around here.  Lots of reasons — work, exhaustion, a rough battle with severe depression, yada, yada, yada.  But one other reason?  The bullshit was just too glaring.  If the snark is obvious, I would add nothing of worth.  Don’t speak unless you would improve the silence, and such.

But there was a EUREKA! moment today at Chicago Bureau World HQ this afternoon, which is explained post-jump.

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Our guest columnist is Daniel Halper, online editor for the Weekly Standard.

• “Biden: ‘I’d Trade Being Vice President in a Heartbeat for Having Won Daytona'” [3:59 pm, Tuesday]
• “Obama Has Plenty of Time to Drop Biden” [12:35 pm, Wednesday]
• “Is Today the Day?” [8:01 am, Thursday]

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“Perhaps further fueling speculation that Barack Obama may replace Joe Biden on the Democratic presidential ticket with, say, Hillary Clinton, take a look at part of the president’s schedule for today…” [Weekly Standard]

WSJ’s Phil Izzo:

49.1%: Percent of the population that lives in a household where at least one member received some type of government benefit in the first quarter of 2011.

Cutting government spending is no easy task, and it’s made more complicated by recent Census Bureau data showing that nearly half of the people in the U.S. live in a household that receives at least one government benefit, and many likely received more than one.

The 49.1% of the population in a household that gets benefits is up from 30% in the early 1980s and 44.4% as recently as the third quarter of 2008.

Not counted: Millionaire tax breaks, millionaire tax brackets, Social Security/Medicare limitation, mortgage deductions, corporate subsidies, federal sweetheart contracts…

Number of the Week: Half of U.S. Lives in Household Getting Benefits [WSJ]

“The $2 billion J.P. Morgan lost someone else gained.” —Mitt Romney, explaining what appears to be a novel economic theory. [WSJ]

Drudge:

OBAMA ADMITS FABRICATING GIRLFRIEND IN MEMOIR

Politico:

Though Dreams From My Father is an autobiography, and hence non-fiction, Obama makes no mention of this “compression,” nor is their any note by the publisher, Broadway Books. In fact, Obama only acknowledged the “compression” after [reporter David] Maraniss learned that [former Obama girlfriend Genevieve] Cook had no recollection of some of the events at which Obama said she was present.

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