Poor Mojo's Newswire

With Democrats caught off guard, the clock started ticking on the bill's slog through the legislative process. Democratic leaders, who had planned to introduce the same bill without using funds committed to the stimulus, trudged into the chamber as Sen. Tom Coburn launched into an epic speech on the perils of deficit spending.... After about 20 minutes, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) interrupted Coburn to ask: "How long are you going to talk?" Coburn said he planned to talk for another 45 minutes. Reid turned around and left the room. He eventually returned with a motion to table Coburn's bill, which succeeded easily. After the vote, Coburn's office released a statement blaming Democrats for blocking benefits. "The 59 Senators who voted no," the statement said, "may be the only 59 people in the country who believe the federal government is running at peak efficiency and can't be trimmed to pay for unemployment benefits for families who are struggling."

Police are under scrutiny after a toddler was accidentally shot by officers aiming at a robbery and carjacking suspect at a fast food drive-through in Jacksonville last Friday. Authorities say 2-year-old old Daniel Crichton was shot in the arm and upper torso after a suspected bank robber forced his way into the car in which the toddler was seated. The child remains in critical condition.

A little-noticed provision of the health legislation has rescued federal support for a controversial form of sex education: teaching youths to remain virgins until marriage. ... But the funding was condemned by critics, who were stupefied by the eleventh-hour rescue. "To spend a quarter-billion dollars on abstinence-only-until-marriage programs that have already been proven to fail is reckless and irresponsible," said James Wagoner of the Washington group Advocates for Youth. "When on top of that you add the fact that this puts the health and lives of young people at risk, this becomes outrageous."

The man who berated and tossed dollar bills at a man with Parkinson's disease during a health care protest last week says he is remorseful and scared. "I snapped. I absolutely snapped and I can't explain it any other way," said Chris Reichert of Victorian Village, in a Dispatch interview. In his first comments on an incident that went viral across the Internet and was repeatedly played on cable television news shows, Reichert said he is sorry about his confrontation with Robert A. Letcher, 60, of the North Side. Letcher, a former nuclear engineer who suffers from Parkinson's, was verbally attacked as he sat before anti-health care demonstrators in front of Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy's district office last week. "...what I did was shameful," Reichert said. "I haven't slept since that day." "I made a donation (to a local Parkinson's disease group) and that starts the healing process." ... "I wanted this to go away, but it won't and I'm paying the consequences," Reichert said. "That was my first time at any political rally and I'm never going to another one," Reichert said. "I will never ever, ever go to another one."