• The Rude Pundit (Lee Papa) calls in at 6:30am Pacific to talk about the news over the Thanksgiving weekend.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• The Senate is set to begin debate today on health care reform. Some Dem senators say they’ll jump ship from the bill without tighter restrictions on abortion coverage. Others say they’ll go unless a government plan to compete with private insurance companies gets tossed overboard. Such concessions would enrage Liberals, the heart and soul of the party.

• Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich), the leading Senate Dem on military matters, said yesterday that President Obama’s anticipated plan for expanding troop levels in Afghanistan must show how those reinforcements will help increase the size of the Afghan security forces.

• White House officials fended off new questions about how a fame-seeking couple finessed their way into the president’s State Dinner last week while the aspiring reality-TV stars themselves began trying to sell their story for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Dr. Eric Chivian, founder and director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard, calls in at 7:30am Pacific to talk about the Climate Change Bill.

• Health care reform backers won a key victory Saturday night as the Senate voted to move ahead with a floor debate on a sweeping $848 billion bill. The 60-39 vote to prevent a GOP filibuster against the start of debate on Sen. Reid’s legislation broke down along party lines.

• Four U.S. service members were killed in the past 24 hours in Afghanistan, NATO forces said today. Three of the Americans died in southern Afghanistan yesterday. Two of them were killed by a bomb attack and the third in a separate firefight.

• Maj. Nidal Hasan, the Army psychiatrist charged with killing 13 people at Ft. Hood, is paralyzed from the chest down and doctors believe it will be permanent, his lawyer said yesterday.

• In this business week, which will be abbreviated due to Thanksgiving, investors will look to reports on home sales, unemployment and consumer confidence, and the start of the holiday shopping season on Friday for more insight into the direction of the economy.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Joe Decker, founder of GodHatesShrimp.com, calls in at 8:30am Pacific to talk about how ridiculous religious arguments against homosexuality are.

• Politely but firmly pressing for greater freedoms on China’s own turf, President Obama spoke in Shanghai this morning against censorship, saying tough criticisms of political leaders should be allowed and the free flow of information on the internet “should be encouraged.”

• While President Obama’s decision about sending more troops to Afghanistan is primarily a military one, it also has substantial budget implications that are adding pressure to limit the commitment. Governmental estimates place the cost of adding 40,000 troops at $40 billion to $54 billion a year.

• Today’s Commerce Department report on October retail sales is likely to set the tone for the rest of the week on Wall Street. Economists polled by Reuters predict retail sales rose 0.8 percent in October after at 1.5 percent drop in September. Stronger consumer spending is needed for any rebound, and disappointment is likely to send stocks falling today.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Mary Bonauto, Civil Rights Project Director at Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD), calls in at 7:30am Pacific to discuss the repeal of gay marriage in Maine.

• Hal Sparks joins us in studio at 8:05am Pacific for a special Monday edition of “Humpdays with Hal.”

• President Obama yesterday praised the “historic” House vote to pass a bill overhauling the nation’s ailing health care system, and said it is now time for the Senate to “take the baton” and complete its work. The House passed its health care bill late Saturday night by a 220-215 vote, with 39 Dems opposing and 1 GOPer supporting.

• The alleged Ft. Hood shooter apparently attended the same Virginia mosque as two 9/11 hijackers in 2001, at a time when a radical imam preached there. The FBI is looking into any possible associations.

• Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) has declared a state of emergency in Louisiana as Hurricane Ida heads toward the Gulf Coast. It’s the first hurricane to target the U.S. this season.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:30am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Morgan Hurley, reporter for SDGLN.com (San Diego Gay and Lesbian News), calls in at 8:30am Pacific to talk about her story regarding a proposed ban on divorces in California.

• Afghanistan’s Election Commission announced this morning that Saturday’s runoff election between Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah has been cancelled. Abdullah dropped out of the race yesterday, and the Obama administration said it was prepared to work with Karzai to combat corruption and confront the Taliban insurgency.

• GOP nominee in New York’s 23rd Congressional special election tomorrow, Dede Scozzafava, announced this weekend that she’s suspending her campaign. Her exit leaves Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman as the favorite to win the formerly hotly contested 3-way race. Scozzafava threw her support behind Dem Bill Owens.

• The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that just 2 percent of Americans younger than 65 would sign up for the public option plan under the health care bill that Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is steering toward House approval

• The New York Yankees beat the Philadelphia Phillies 7-4 last night to take a 3-1 lead in the World Series.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Comedian Sara Benincasa calls in at 8:30am Pacific to tell us about her columns for The Huffington Post and her upcoming tour dates.

• Both House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid are expected to make decisions this week in hopes the long-delayed health care reform bills can come to a vote early next month. Officials familiar with the Senate talks say businesses would not be required to provide health insurance, but large companies would owe significant penalties if any worker needs government subsidies to buy coverage on their own.

• Top lawmakers sparred yesterday over the timing of President Obama’s decision on how to move ahead in Afghanistan, with Republicans urging a quick move to boost troop levels and Dems counseling patience.

• President Obama declared the swine flu outbreak a national emergency, giving his health chief the power to let hospitals move emergency rooms offsite to speed treatment and protect non-infected patients.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Rep. Joe Sestak (D-PA) calls in at 8:30am Pacific to make a major announcement about his campaign to be senator from Pennsylvania.

• Three days after the world watched a giant balloon fly through the air as a tearful family expressed fears that their 6-year-old boy could be inside, authorities announced what millions already suspected: The whole thing was staged. Colorado authorities believe the event was a “publicity stunt” by the family to market themselves for a reality show.

• The White House will not commit to health care legislation that would cap insurance premiums or tax benefits, taking a wait-and-see approach as congressional negotiators seek a deal. President Obama will not demand that a final bill include a public option, though that’s his preference, advisers said yesterday.

• Defense Secretary Robert Gates is undertaking the tricky task of trying to persuade allies to remain committed to the war in Afghanistan even as the Obama administration debates whether to send more troops to fight. Allies like Japan and Great Britain, however, are showing signs of pulling back.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow for Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to co-host Right Wing World.

• Nicole Sullivan, formerly of Mad TV, calls in at 8:30am Pacific to tell us about the second season of her Lifetime series, “Rita Rocks.”

• The Obama administration is considering steps to ease the burdens of laid-off workers, including possible extensions of unemployment and health benefits, officials said Saturday. The administration has stopped short of calling for a second economic stimulus package to augment the $787 billion measure approved this year.

• The White House said yesterday it sees signs of progress in confronting Iran’s nuclear program while members of Congress endorsed authorizing tougher U.S. economic penalties against the Tehran government. International inspectors are to visit Iran’s newly disclosed uranium enrichment site on October 25.

• President Obama said Friday he has “no doubt” that Chicago put together the strongest bid it could to win the 2016 Olympics. He said he wished he had brought back better news from Friday’s voting in Copenhagen, where his personal appeal did not help his adopted hometown win.

• Eric Boehlert, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, calls in at 7:05am Pacific for a live edition of Right Wing World.

• Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard has test-fired one of the longest-range missiles in Tehran’s arsenal, state TV reported today. The missile is capable of striking Israel and U.S. Mideast bases and parts of Europe. It was the third round of tests meant to demonstrate the country’s preparedness for an attack.

• President Obama on Saturday resumed his push to overhaul the health care system, telling a Congressional Black Caucus conference that there comes a time when “the cup of endurance runs over.” He underscored that we’ve “been waiting for health reform since the days of Teddy Roosevelt… we cannot wait any longer.”

• The White House acknowledged for the first time Friday that it might not be able to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay by January as President Obama promised. They said resolving thorny legal issues and logistical questionsmeans the deadline may slip.

• Oscar-winning filmmaker Roman Polanski has been arrested in Switzerland on a decades-old arrest warrant stemming from a 1977 sex charge in California.

• President Obama launched a TV broadcast blitz yesterday to push his top domestic priority, a remake of the U.S. health care system that now rests in the hands of a pivotal but deeply divided Senate committee. Obama laid out what he called the “core principles” he required for health care reform that he says is targeted at middle-class families.

• Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, warns in an urgent, confidential assessment of the war obtained by The Washington Post that he needs more forces within the next year and bluntly states that without them, the 8-year conflict “will likely result in failure.”

• Conservatives descended upon Washington, D.C. over the weekend for the 2009 “Values Voter Summit,” the fourth annual gathering of like-minded political activists. Mike Huckabee won the 2012 Presidential Straw Poll taken at the event.

• “Mad Men” and “30 Rock” led a pack of Emmy winners who successfully defended their titles at last night’s show, while Australian Toni Collette of Showtime’s “United States of Tara” was honored as the best lead actress in a comedy series. Alec Baldwin (“30 Rock”), Bryan Cranston (“Breaking Bad”), and Glenn Close (“Damages”) all took home acting honors.

• Charlie Pierce, author of “Idiot America,” calls in at 7:30am Pacific to tell us why stupidity has become a virtue in America today.

• President Obama will try today to revive a stalled push for stricter oversight of Wall Street. Obama’s economic address in New York will also discuss plans to unwind the government’s involvement in the financial sector and call upon Wall Street firms to take responsibility and avoid reckless behavior.

• One apology is enough, a digging-in-his-heels Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) said yesterday, challenging Dem leaders who want him to say on the house floor that he’s sorry for yelling “You lie!” during President Obama’s health care speech.

• Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich) said Friday that the Obama administration shouldn’t send more U.S. combat troops to Afghanistan until it has worked first to boost the Afghan security forces. While other Dems are expressing doubt about sending more troops into Afghanistan, GOP-ers are backing Obama’s expected troop increase.

• An audio message purportedly from Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden has accused President Obama of being unable to fulfill his election pledge to pull U.S. troops out of Iraq.

• In a speech that drew fire even before he delivered it, President Obama is telling the nation’s schoolchildren he “expects great things from each of you.” Obama is scheduled to deliver the talk from a school in Virginia today. Conservatives have urged schools and parents to boycott the address, saying that Obama is using the opportunity to “indoctrinate” their children.

• President Obama insisted yesterday “the time is now” for healthcare reform as he geared up for a major address to Congress tomorrow aimed at getting his top domestic priority back on track. “It’s time to do what’s right for America’s working families,” Obama told a wildly cheering crowd at a Labor Day picnic held by the AFL-CIO in Ohio.

• After a nearly 40-day recess that was anything but restful, House Dems are returning to work today still unsettled over pending health care legislation. Conservatives are still leery of supporting a government-funded insurance option and Progressives are still threatening to bring down the legislation if it does not contain a robust version of the public option.

• Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), who is the Senate Finance Committee Chairman, has circulated a new proposal that could breathe new life into health care reform. Baucus’ proposal does not include a public option, but calls for health care cooperatives to be included in health care exchanges.

• CNN’s Paul Begala calls in at 7:05am Pacific to talk about health care reform, Libya, and the President’s vacation.

• The Justice Department’s ethics office has recommended reversing the Bush administration and reopening nearly a dozen prisoner-abuse cases, potentially exposing CIA employees and contractors to prosecution for brutal treatment of terrorism suspects.

• Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), the independent senator counted on by Dems in the health care debate, showed signs of wavering yesterday when he urged President Obama to postpone many of his initiatives because of the economic downturn.

• The First Family settled in yesterday for their vacation on Martha’s Vineyard not long after Hurricane Bill scampered away, leaving behind big waves and heavy rip currents for the Obamas.

• The Obama administration expects the federal deficit over the next decade to be $2 trillion bigger than previously estimated, White House officials said Friday, a setback for a president already facing a Congress and public wary over spending.

***Call the White House to let them know how you feel about health care reform… 202-456-1111

***Call Congress and let them know how you feel about health care reform.  (202)224-3121

• The Rude Pundit (Lee Papa) calls in at 6:30am Pacific to talk about the madness behind the health care reform town halls.

• President Obama’s administration signaled yesterday it is ready to abandon the idea of giving Americans the option of government-run insurance as part of a new health care system. They left open the chance for a compromise with the GOP that would include health insurance cooperatives instead of a government-run plan.

• This weekend in Colorado, President Obama invoked his own anguish over the death his grandmother as he challenged the notion that Dem efforts to overhaul the nation’s health care system would include “death panels” that decided who would get care and who wouldn’t.

• Thousands of people, including many Special Olympians, lined the street Friday outside a Cape Cod church where a private funeral Mass was being held for presidential sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver. Her only living brother, Sen. Ted Kennedy, who has been battling brain cancer, was not planning to attend his sister’s funeral.

• Hurricane Bill became the first hurricane of the 2009 Atlantic season as it continued to gain strength but remained far from shore this morning. Claudette, on the other hand, became the first tropical storm to hit the U.S. mainland this year when it made landfall in the Florida Panhandle around 1:00 this morning.

• The Rude Pundit (Lee Papa) calls in at 6:30am Pacific to talk about the beer summit and health care reform.

• Rich Galen, GOP Strategist at columnist at Mullings.com, calls in at 7:05am Pacific to give us the GOP perspective on “Cash For Clunkers,” health care reform, and Sen. Al Franken.

• The House Energy and Commerce Committee passed comprehensive health care reform legislation Friday, moving President Obama’s domestic priority one step closer to congressional approval. The committee’s bill will now be merged with two separate versions passed by other House panels before being considered by the full chamber in September.

• President Obama this weekend cited Friday’s Commerce department report showing that in the last few months the economy overall has done “measurable better than expected.” He credited his $787 billion economic stimulus program for much of that success. He cautioned the nation that full recovery will not happen overnight.

• The Obama administration is looking at creating a courtroom-within-a-prison complex in the U.S. to house suspected terrorists, combining military and civilian detention facilities at a single maximum-security prison. Officials are said to be eyeing sites in Michigan and Kansas.

• Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) announced Friday that he has an early form of prostate cancer, but he said the prognosis is good and he is going to be fine.

• Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) calls in at 7:30am Pacific to talk about health care reform, the economy, housing, and protections for consumers.

• Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND), a key senator in health care reform negotiations, said yesterday that his party lacks the votes to pass a bill through Congress on its own. Conrad is one of a handful of Senate Finance Committee members negotiating a compromise bill that would be the first bipartisan health care proposal.

• President Obama said Friday he spoke with the police officer who arrested a Harvard professor and told the officer he did not mean to malign the Cambridge Police department when he said police acted stupidly. Obama, the officer, and the professor have all agreed to sit down and have a beer together.

• Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin gave her final speech as Alaska’s governor yesterday before stepping down from her post, telling a Fairbanks crowd that she is resigning “to chart a new course to advance the state.”

• 4 years after his seventh Tour de France win, Lance Armstrong capped his return with an impressive 3rd place finish. Armstrong’s rival and teammate Alberto Contador won the race on Sunday.

• Administration officials defended President Obama’s broad health care proposals yesterday and urged a skeptical public not to judge the Dems’ overhaul until Congress writes the final version. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said that it’s “a work in progress,” and said “more will be done. The House and Senate are committed to working with the president to get this done.

• Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the top GOPer on the Senate committee reviewing Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination said yesterday her testimony did not settle his concerns about elevating her to the Supreme Court. “I was troubled by a number of the things the nominee has said, a number of the rulings she has made,” he said.

• The House Intelligence Committee will investigate whether the CIA broke the law by not telling Congress earlier about a secret program to deploy hit teams to kill individual Al Qaida members. Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) announced the investigation in a statement on Friday.

• A self-described “more contrite” South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford wrote an op-ed, published in newspapers around South Carolina yesterday, trying to win forgiveness after admitting to an affair and being incommunicado while he left the state for several days. He vowed to “begin the journey of trying to get things more right with you and others.”

• Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) calls in at 6:30am Pacific to talk about the Sotomayor hearings and about health care reform.

• The Rude Pundit (Lee Papa) calls in at 8:30am Pacific to talk about the Sotomayor hearings and Sen. Jeff Sessions’ racism.

• Sonia Sotomayor strongly asserted her adherence to the law while senators from both parties pressed her on her personal views on issues such as abortion, gun control, and executive powers on the third day of her Supreme Court confirmation hearings. Sotomayor consistently answered she needed to know the specifics of a particular case, such as applicable state statutes and other facts.

• One of several proposals to overhaul the U.S. health care system passed a Senate committee yesterday, with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) praising the $600 billion plan as a step toward his longtime goals. GOPers said it costs too much and would ration care to Americans.

• Iran’s crackdown on protests after its disputed presidential election has “shifted” its prospects for direct talks with the United States, but they remain on the table, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said yesterday.