Yesterday the US Navy made it first attempt to launch a fully-autonomous carrier-based Navy Drone. Check out the photo here. Both visually, and in terms of its intended use, it goes a lot further toward something like an unmanned fighter jet than what we normally think of as a drone. Take a look.

Senator’s letter to constituent elides his vote against background checks.

It’s still not clear why the news of the IRS’s inappropriate targeting of conservative groups broke when and where it did last Friday — and no one was as perplexed as those in the audience when it happened. Eric Lach reports.

Soldier assigned to coordinate sexual assault prevention at Ft. Hood under investigation for “abusive sexual contact” and being a pimp.

As we reported a short time ago, those blockbuster White House emails which showed the White House aggressively massaging the fabled Benghazi talking points turn out to have been doctored. Doctored, edited, choose your verb. They were altered to make it look like the White House was more focused on the talking points than it actually was.

So what happened. A short time ago, ABC responded and said basically, what’s the problem? “Assuming the email cited by Jake Tapper is accurate, it is consistent with the summary quoted by Jon Karl,” an ABC spokesperson told Erik Wemple of the Washington Post. Read More

It was a very busy day across the board, not least for people who like to compare things to Watergate.

Full-size version.

You wouldn’t know it from the public debate in Washington, to put it mildly, but the federal deficit is actually falling and falling rapidly. According to new CBO projections out today, assuming no changes to current law, this year’s deficit will be $642 billion, the lowest since 2008. Chart after the jump … Read More

It seems like those ‘blockbuster’ White House emails about the Benghazi talking points were doctored.

Two very different responses from TPM Readers on the unfolding IRS story and my post on the politics of it earlier this afternoon, each worth a read. First, from TPM Reader BF …

Yes, the politics of the IRS scandal are just awful. And yet, it would be a terrible mistake if Obama were to respond to this as a political scandal. So far he’s saying the right things, more or less. But at this point, he has to win the outrage battle. He has to demonstrate he’s more angry about this than are the GOP.

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Attorney General Holder just said he’s asked the FBI to begin an investigation into the IRS targeting scandal. We’re getting the exact language now.