Our afternoon guest columnist is noted political figure Stormy Daniels.

After months of careful deliberation and consult as to the true nature of my political affiliation I am ready today to declare that should I seek the office of US Senator from the great state of Louisiana that I will do so as a Republican.

While this decision has not been an easy one, recent events regarding Republican National Committee fundraising at Voyeur, an LA based lesbian bondage themed nightclub finally tipped the scales.

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The Heritage Foundation downgrades the U.S. from a “free” country to “mostly free.” Right behind the lowest “free” country: Canada. [via Political Wire]

This video is unpleasant to watch; unless you have reason to, we suggest that you don’t.

What it shows is a group of civilians being massacred from an Apache helicopter in Baghdad on July 12, 2007. Among those killed was a Reuters photographer and his driver; two children were injured during additional fire, after a van pulled up to help the wounded.

The video, background materials, and additional research was posted Monday by WikiLeaks:

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Black Eagle, during the Easter Egg Roll, said this:

President Obama said Monday that he was revamping American nuclear strategy to substantially narrow the conditions under which the United States would use nuclear weapons, even in self defense.

[snippety snip]

…The United States is explicitly committing not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states that are in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, even if they attacked the United States with biological or chemical weapons, or launched a crippling cyberattack.  Those threats, he argued, could be deterred with “a series of graded options” — a combination of old and newly designed conventional weapons.  “I’m going to preserve all the tools that are necessary in order to make sure that the American people are safe and secure,” Mr. Obama said during the interview in the Oval Office.

Well. 

Haven’t looked at The Corner yet, but I’m guessing they’d be somewhat lukewarm to the idea.

“With its tales of uplift and pluck, [Sarah Palin’s] ‘Real American Stories’ trades in the kind of easy sentimentality that provokes eye rolls among those of us who work in media while quickening the pulse and patriotic ardor of almost everyone else.” Oh, and it lost viewers. [NYT, TVNewser]

“Rumor has it that Aaron Sorkin is the leading candidate to snag the film rights to The Politician, the memoir written by John Edwards’s former aide Andrew Young.” [New York, via Political Wire]

John McCain to Newsweek: “I never considered myself a maverick.”

The McCain Mutiny [Newsweek, via Political Wire]

New Ad Calls McCain ‘The Original Maverick’ [NYT, 8/5/2008]