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• Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown is working on a constitutional amendment to negate a Supreme Court ruling on political activity by independent groups. In the meantime, please send money.
• Rick Weiland, a Democrat running for the Senate in South Dakota, would like $9, please. Many other candidates in both parties would settle for $5.
• Welcome to the unending, inbox-clogging world of online campaign fundraising, set against a backdrop of Monday's Federal Election Commission deadline for candidates to disclose their campaign finances. The more an office-seeker reports having in the bank, the more there is available for the fall campaign. But it's not just the money that counts, it's the appearance of it.
• "In just 15 hours, I'll have to close the books on our second quarter FEC report," wrote Jenny Nadicksbernd, finance director for Sen. Mark Warner. "That report will be looked at by Karl Rove and his special interest pals to see if they should launch attacks against" the Virginia Democrat, she added.
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• BAGHDAD (AP) -- Iraq's new parliament convened for the first time Tuesday amid intense pressure to quickly choose a new prime minster who can confront a militant blitz that threatens to tear country apart and a spike in violence that made June the deadliest month of the year.
• The country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, urged lawmakers last week to agree on a prime minister, president and parliament speaker before Tuesday's meeting in hopes of averting months of wrangling that could further destabilize the country. But the prospects of a quick compromise appear distant, and embattled incumbent Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki -- whose bloc won the most seats in April elections -- has shown little willingness to step aside.
• More than 250 of the legislature's 328 members were in attendance for Tuesday's session at parliament, which is located in the heavily guarded Green Zone in central Baghdad. The proceedings opened with the playing of Iraq's national anthem, and lawmakers then took the oath of office.
• But the recent offensive spearheaded by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, an al-Qaida breakaway group that has overrun much of northern and western Iraq, loomed over the lawmakers' meeting.
• "There are many issues that need to be discussed today, but I believe that the

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