Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

In an update to Small Victory for a Long-Term Single-Payer Strategy, I reported that “Rep. Anthony Weiner, (D-NY) will...make a motion before the House Energy & Commerce Committee to...replace H.R. 3200 [the hybrid, "public option plan] with H.R. 676 --- single payer Medicare for All."

In exchange for Weiner's agreement to withdraw his amendment during the House Energy and Commerce Committee health care markup session, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) promised to permit Weiner to bring H.R. 676 to a vote on the House floor.

But will the House leadership direct the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to provide a comparative cost analysis between single-payer and alternative plans so that Congress and the American people can make an informed choice? And why have they refused to do so so far?...

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IN TODAY'S AUDIO REPORT: The Democracy of Lobbyists; The forgeries of 'Clean Coal'... PLUS: Will Groucho Marx Republicans kill 'Cash for Clunkers'? ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail, cognitive dissonance? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (links below): Sydney Opera House may be singing the blues with climate change; World's Largest Solar Cooking System Installed in India; Electric Car Maker Expects Market to Heat Up; Unabated use of groundwater threatens Arizona's future ... PLUS: Google Puts Green House Gases on the Map....Literally!

Info/links on those stories and all the ones we talked about on today's episode follow below...

[Updated: Right on cue, the Teabaggers turn out to disrupt town hall meetings over the weekend. Video and details at end of article. ... UPDATED AGAIN: Lots more video now, the zombies come out all over the country.]

Are there simply no democratic (small "d") processes left that the Right isn't willing to corrupt to their own corporatized, nefarious purposes? It would seem not.

This from ThinkProgress, concerning the rightwing, corporate-sponsored (read: astroturf) "grassroots" FreedomWatch coalition, and their conveniently leaked talking points instruction memo [PDF] on how to create an appearance of dissension --- "Yell...Stand up and shout out...Rattle Him...Be Disruptive Early and Often" --- at upcoming town hall meetings back in Congressional districts over the August recess...

As detailed in the full memo, the strategy "worked," and media took the bait in the Himes' Town Hall event mentioned.

Over the weekend, far-right kook Michelle Malkin, for some reason, was allowed a seat at the roundtable on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos as if she was a legitimate voice.

She predicted (video here) that where Democrats and the White House have "vastly underestimated just how grassroots this movement is," they would soon face "townhalls-gone-wild" in the weeks ahead...

What kind of unspoken, tortured, internal conflict will this story cause for the far rightwing, gay-bashing, gun-loving, unquestioning supporters of Israel out there? Tangled webs amidst more tragedy.

Reuters lede...

Pam Spaulding at Houseblend has much more, including a late update detailing the death now of a third shooting victim. Here's some quick video...

Guest Editorial by Ernest A. Canning

"We killed the President that day. You could have been a part of it --- you know, part of history. You should have stayed. It was safe. Everything was covered in advance. No arrests, no real newspaper investigation. It was all covered, very professional." - Sworn deposition testimony provided in Hunt vs. Liberty Lobby, Inc. by Marita Lorenz, Fidel Castro's former girlfriend and CIA asset, recounting what her CIA recruiter, convicted Watergate burglar Frank Sturgis, told her after the assassination of JFK.

Sibel Edmonds' recent on-air revelation that, prior to 9/11, Osama bin Laden was relied upon by the Bush administration as a Central Asian asset, added one more disturbing piece to an incomplete puzzle, which, as could be expected, lent itself to a number of comments asking whether 9/11 was "an inside job." These, in turn, were summarily dismissed in another comment as "conspiracy theory."

Where does this concept of dismissing inquiry into momentous events as "conspiracy theory" come from?...

David Kurtz at TPM suggests: "How about a program where we can turn in the old, washed-up pundits and talking heads on the cable nets for ones that spew less dangerous emissions?"

And, in not entirely unrelated news, Glenn Greenwald offers the proper perspective on today's report that the corporate ownership of both Fox "News" and MSNBC have interceded into their news divisions' ongoing Olbermann v. O'Reilly Wars because, while it's been good for ratings for both of them, it's bad for the corporations.

To build on Kurtz' notion, how about if we turn in the old, washed-up, corporatized news outlets who live large on our public airwaves and government largesse as well?