Today’s edition of quick hits:
* Not good: “Manufacturing grew in June at its slowest pace in 11 months and hiring in the sector slowed as overseas demand for U.S. products waned, an industry survey showed on Thursday.”
* On the other hand: “A backward baby step in home sales last month is little more than a momentary bobble amid what appears to be an otherwise mending U.S. housing market.”
* The Supreme Court ruled this morning that the FCC “failed to give two television networks, FOX and ABC, advance notice of standards before to punishing them for broadcasts in which outbursts of expletives and brief nudity were aired.”
* A looming deadline: “President Obama on Thursday again called on Congress to pass legislation avoiding a hefty increase in student loan interest rates that takes effect in 10 days, but Republicans said the president had refused to work with them to find a compromise.”
* Commerce Secretary John Bryson stepped down today, “following an episode in which he had a seizure and was involved in a sequence of automobile accidents.”
* The Senate passed the Farm Bill today. In a rare display of non-drama, the final vote was 64-35. * Remember when “Fox & Friends” aired its own anti-Obama attack ad in late May? It led White House Press Secretary Jay Carney to make “an angry phone call” to the network’s executive vice president for news, Michael Clemente. * Now that he’s retiring, Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.) is free to speak his mind when reflecting on what’s become of American politics: “Society has changed. The public is to blame as well. I think the people have gotten dumber. I don’t know that I would’ve said that out loud pre-my announcement that I was going to be leaving. But I think that’s true.” Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
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