Hundred-Million-Dollar Punch Line

• How do we know this Jane Harman story has legs? TheNew York Timesis reporting on it now, one whole day after the news broke onCongressional Quarterly's blog. [ New York Times ]

• Banks are just sittin' on their TARP money instead of lending it out to the taxpayers who coughed up the cash in the first place. [ ABC News ]

• The accused "Craigslist Killer," a man arrested for killing a masseuse at a fancy Boston hotel, is a BU student with a devoted fiancee. [ AP ]

• Everybody is laughing at President Obama's request to his cabinet to find $100 million whole dollars in spending cuts in the budget. [ US News and World Report ]

• The Iranian President's speech at the UN racism conference could have been evenmoreobjectionable if he hadn't extemporaneously omitted a Holocaust-denial remark from his prepared text, so just be thankful. [ AP ]

• Miss California totally could have become Miss USA if Perez Hilton hadn't asked her that question about gay marriage. [ Newsday ]