CNN talks to officials in Mississippi about the deep personal toll flooding has had on local residents and businesses.
John King, USA is on the road tonight broadcasting from Tunica, Mississippi where the flooding has devastated the economy. John King is taking a helicopter ride to get aerials of the flooding with the local sheriff of Desoto Co. Sheriff Bill Rasco. The Mississippi River in Memphis, usually a half-mile wide, now measures 3 miles across so the visuals should be amazing. Make sure to tune in tonight @ 7p ET.
Every day we ask influential politicos to send us their top three bullet points that are driving the day's conversation inside and outside Washington.
RedState.Com Editor Erick-Woods Erickson:
– The President goes to Texas. Will he announce disaster assistance for the fires?
– John Boehner draws a line in the sand on the debt ceiling. But will he move the line like the House GOP did on spending cuts?
– Forget politics for just a minute - pray for the folks along the Mississippi River. You know it's bad when even snakes are seeking higher ground.
Senior Political Columnist for TheDailyBeast.com John Avlon:
– Pakistan Scrutiny Intensifies: Talking to OBL’s three widows is a small concession given the intensity of questions Pakistan will be facing going forward. The divisions between the ISI, the military and the elected government are clearer than ever – and the USA’s long-term strategic alliance with India just got stronger. Predator drone strikes into Pakistan have quieted – for now – but they will ratchet back up with actionable intelligence from the OBL HQ. Two of the many open questions: how much cooperation will the USA’s billions in aid get us; and how secure are their nukes?
– NY-26 Special Election Heats Up: The fight is on in Jack Kemp’s old district and Democrat Kathy Hochul seems to be doing surprisingly well in the polls. In part, this is a measure of the aging population and the backlash against Medicare Reform proposals put forward by Paul Ryan. Sadly, Medi-scare still works. John Boehner sees the race as an important enough bell-weather to campaign personally for GOP nominee Jane Corwin, but a Tea Party candidate running as an independent, Jack Davis, is polling north of 20%, dividing the center-right vote. Can anyone spell Scozzafava?
– Newt Announces: The GOP 2012 field just got more crowded and contentious but no clearer. Fresh on the heels of a NYT front-page piece on his wife Callista, the architect of the 1994 Republican Revolution is making a final stab at history and announcing a presidential run on Wednesday. But what we’ve really got is a Tale of Two Newts: the thought leader and the base-panderer. For the clearest example of this year’s Newt, contrast his ‘red-white-and-blue agenda’ 2007 book ‘Real Change’ with his ‘Kenyan anti-Colonial’ rhetoric from earlier this year. Sadly, it seems as though he’s calculated that irresponsibility is the clearest path to this year's GOP nomination.
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