Those who observe American media, and observe what passes for Legacy Media’s “criticism” of our American media, have long been irritated by the Washington Post’s declaration that Howard Kurtz’s disclosure of his CNN role (host of “Reliable Sources” and media critic) satisfies WaPo readers that he has no conflict between his CNN role and his WaPo role, even when writing about CNN. Moved up the Versailles foodchain to Washington Bureau Chief (of the Daily Beast, but still….) Howie will retain his CNN Sunday hosting role.

As I noted in this post, the front page NYT story putting Petraeus in charge of the paramilitary groups I will call “JUnc-WTF,” which are deployed in allied countries, reminded me of Eric Massa’s allegations that Dick Cheney and Petraeus were plotting a coup (though, as Massa describes it, it sounds more like an “election challenge”).

According to a big new story from New York Times’ Mark Mazzetti, David Petraeus signed a classified directive — the Joint Unconventional Warfare Task Force Execute Order — last September approving the deployment of small special operations teams to go into friendly (Saudi Arabia and Yemen) and unfriendly (Iran and Somalia) countries to collect intelligence.

Totally aside from any merits of the ethics charges against Massa, recall that Norm Dicks, Jack Murtha, Jim Moran and Roland Burris all had their ethics charges dismissed in December. And then quelle suprise! Roland Burris, who had been threatening to withhold his cloture vote over the Senate bill without a public option, instantly became a convert. The rest were all safely in the “yes” column in the House. You could pretty much eat live babies on TV and get your ethics complaint dismissed if you were ready to play ball and vote for PhRMAcare.

Eric Massa hosted his weekly radio show on his last day as the Congressman and intimated that the Democratic Party pushed him out of his seat to pick up a vote on health care. He also detailed the charges against him and said he would perhaps rescind his resignation if the move to toss him from Congress became a “national story.”

he Hotline is reporting that Eric Massa will resign on Monday, and cites House Democrats “pressuring” him to leave Congress.

Last night, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s office confirmed that Eric Massa, the freshman Democrat who will retire from Congress after only one term, citing health reasons, faces an allegation of “misconduct” charges from a former male staffer. However, the AP would not characterize the allegation beyond that. Further, the New York Times story on the retirement would only say there was an allegation that he “harassed” a member of his staff. This is consistent with Massa’s take that he used “salty language” on occasion.

Ending one of the shorter political careers in recent memory, Rep. Eric Massa, a freshman Democrat in a swing seat, will not seek re-election, possibly because of a recurrence of the cancer that almost took his life several years ago.

Many have asked if the progressives in the House will stick together and keep the health care bill from passing if it has mandates but no public option. My answer is: it depends.

I’m frankly not sure how they hope to hold this thing together, because the one thing members fear more than anything is losing their seats. Rahm never worries about the progressives because they have no financial base and they’re in strong Democratic districts, so they risk a lot less voting for a bailout than those in close seats. This time around, there may be enough progressives who are willing to join with the Blue Dogs and vote against a bill with a mandate, but no public option alternative, to push it over the top (or under the minimum of needed votes, as the case may be).

The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2009, one of the most sweeping regulatory changes to the financial industry since the Great Depression, passed the House of Representatives today by a final vote of 223-202. On final passage, 27 Democrats voted no along with every Republican voting.