From the WSJ:

In bailing out AIG, the Federal Reserve appeared to be motivated in part by worries that Wall Street’s financial crisis could begin to spill over into seemingly safe investments held by small investors, such as money-market funds that invest in AIG debt.

Indeed, on Tuesday the $62 billion Primary Fund from the Reserve, a New York money-market firm, said it “broke the buck” — that is, its net asset value fell below the $1-a-share level that funds like this must maintain. Breaking the buck is an extremely rare occurrence. The fund was pinched by investments in bonds issued by now collapsing Lehman Brothers.

Money-market funds are supposed to be among the safest investments available. No fund in the $3.6 trillion money-market industry has lost money since 1994, when Orange County, Calif., went bankrupt. A number of money-market funds own securities issued by AIG. The firm is also a big insurer of some money-market instruments.

Does Sarah Palin endorse the reelection of earmarkers extraordinaire Ted Stevens and Don Young? (For that matter, does John McCain endorse them?)

She’s still not saying. Maybe that’s a question Hannity or Couric could put to her. Oh, never mind.

Book Clubbing at TPMCafe with Paul Tough’s Whatever It Takes.

Amy Wilkins: “Our society’s collective excuse for not providing [poor children] with the academic supports they need is the pervasive and pernicious belief, even among people of extraordinarily good will, that these students can’t learn because of circumstances outside of school.”

Yesterday’s very bad day for Carly Fiorina didn’t go unnoticed within the McCain campaign, as CNN reports:

A top McCain official contacted by CNN said, on condition on anonymity, “No big deal, but not how you get on the surrogate all-star team. Very Biden-like.”

“This campaign source said Fiorina would be discouraged from additional media interviews.

Another top campaign adviser was far less diplomatic.

“Carly will now disappear,” this source said. “Senator McCain was furious.” Asked to define “disappear,” this source said, adding that she would be off TV for a while – but remain at the Republican National Committee and keep her role as head of the party’s joint fundraising committee with the McCain campaign.

Fiorina was booked for several TV interviews over the next few days, including one on CNN. Those interviews have been canceled.

If I were leaking to the press like that about Fiorina, I’d be worried about getting bugged.

Late Update: Atrios makes a good point: “Now that the government is running the biggest insurance company in the world, shouldn’t we elect a president who is qualified to run a large company?”

Chris Cillizza fluffs Drudge — again — sending TPM Election Central over the edge.

Late Update: More on Cillizza’s Drudge-worship from Steve Benen over on his new blog at The Washington Monthly. —gs

TPM Reader JL:

Hi, I’m a big fan of TPM, have never commented before but I’ve got a financial background and have grown really frustrated about the way the Democrats — the Obama campaign in particular — have not driven home their fundamental differences on how they view the role and operation of the financial markets, and how, at this point, implementation of one point of view over another is becoming the difference between the U.S. sliding downward into 2nd-world economic status or the dollar and U.S. financial markets maintaining their leading role around the world.

One metaphor the Democrats don’t use, that I think of over and over when I hear Obama speak about the need for regulation: the markets operate like team sports — like say, a football game. Team sports don’t operate well without referees, and that’s exactly what’s happened under the Republicans.

They can blame Clinton all they want — the fact is, the Republicans under leadership of such brain trusts as Phil Gramm have methodically removed the referees from the games, and look what’s happened. One of the primary reasons investors shy away from putting money into third world countries is an ABSENCE OF REGULATION.

Why doesn’t Obama encapsulate his ideas in this way? Democrats believe in free markets, but free markets need rules and referees, just like a football game does, otherwise chaos and destruction.

Late Update: Is Sen Jon Tester (D-MT) a TPM reader? Here he is this afternoon on MSNBC, using the football analogy:

(Thanks to TPM Reader RE for the catch.)

TPM Reader TR sees the forest for the trees in Trooper-Gate:

Let’s assume for a minute that Palin, McCain and all of their collective cronies are right about the trooper-gate investigation being 100% a partisan witch hunt, notwithstanding the original vote. So freakin’ what? In the US, congress and state legislatures are tasked with investigating actions of the executive offices. The executives can then present evidence to defend themselves, and their evidence can include displays of outright partisanship if they find it. They cannot legally, however, just ignore the legislative bodies. They are legally required to cooperate. This is theoretically what makes us different from countries like North Korea, Musharraf’s Pakistan, Zimbabwe, etc.

On a second point, how is McCain’s campaign legally able to insert itself into an issue that is solely about Alaska? The investigation has nothing to do with anything outside of Alaska and it predates Palin’s VP candidacy, so it seems to me like some kind of obstruction or interference from a legal point of view.

Remember, the game here is to delay, delay, delay until after the election.

Fox News’s Greta Van Susteren conducted the first interview of Todd Palin since his wife Sarah was named the Republican vice presidential nominee. She grilled Todd on everything from the story behind the name “First Dude” to how he feels about the name “First Dude.”

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

Ruth Marcus tries as hard as she can to balance it out but is finally forced to conclude that McCain is a liar and a disgrace.

TPM Election Central has the first peek at a new mailer being sent out as part of a swing-state blitz by the union-backed independent group Working America.