Norah O'Donnell and Geoff Tracy welcomed Riley Norah Tracy into the world Riley Norah Tracy yesterday at 11:39a.m. Riley weighed 8 pounds and measured 21 inches long. Twins Henry and Grace were excited to meet their new sister.

From NASA-fan Howard Mortman:

Washington Post: Ex-Hostage Reunited With Children in Bogota

Washington Examiner: Blog - Yeas & Nays

N.Y. Times: The '60s Begin to Fade as Liberal Professors Retire

L.A. Times: Ball girl's incredible catch is an Internet hit

USA Today: $99 New York hotel rooms debut - Hotel Hotsheet

Politico: Caroline Kennedy: The reluctant operative

ABC News: 'How Could You'? Brinkley Relives Her Nightmare

CBS News: Waxman: White House Knew Of Iraqi Oil Deal

Fox News: Focus on Uncle Intensifies After Body of 12-Year-Old Missing Vermont Girl Found

CNN: Old-fashioned fake-out results in freedom for hostages

Wall Street Journal: Opinion: Can Barack Buy the Presidency?

MSNBC: Ex-captive meets her kids for 1st time in 6 years

Congressional Quarterly: Dem Newcomer Faces Long - but Better - Odds Against Virginia Rep. Goode

NPR: Scientists Make Herpes Breakthrough

Roll Call: RNC Launching $3 Million Ad Buy in Four States

Bloomberg: U.S. Loses 62,000 Jobs, Jobless Rate Holds at 5.5%

WashingtonPost.com Executive Editor Jim Brady sent out the following memo yesterday, which was obtained by FishbowlDC:

Subject: Live Discussion Update All, Just wanted to give you a heads up on some impending changes with live discussions. As you all know, live discussions are one of washingtonpost.com's franchises. We do more live discussions, with a wider variety of guests, than any other web site l know of, and our live discussion fans are among the most loyal readers of our site. It's something that's extremely important to us, and something we have to keep working to make better. To do that, we need to free up the time of its staff. So, to that end, we're going to soon trim back our schedule of weekly live discussions. There are a host of new things we need to work on, such as video live discussions, better web distribution of our discussions content and a more modern tool to handle the discussions. I've asked for and reviewed a list of traffic to each of our discussions for the past year, and after meeting with the Live Online staff, have made some preliminary decisions on cuts. I need to do a little more due diligence, but expect to let everyone know in the next two weeks what we've decided to cut. In some cases, we may offer alternative ways for hosts to reach their readers, such as discussion groups (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/community/groups/front.html?nid=ro ll_messboards). Or we may suggest a more ad-hoc approach in subject areas that tend to see spikes based on news. And nothing prevents us from doing one-offs when news warrants it. Anyway, just wanted to send this out so no one was caught by total surprise if they're contacted in the coming weeks about the status of their discussion. Thanks, Jim

Our thoughts are with Media Consortium's Brian Beutler this morning:

Brian Beutler, a well-known progressive blogger, was shot and seriously injured during a mugging last night in Washington, D.C. One bullet damaged Beutler's spleen, and he had it removed during surgery this morning at the Washington Hospital Center. He's expected to make a "pre-trauma" recovery, which is to say, a completely full recovery.

Good Morning Washington.

Got a blind item, interesting link, funny note, comment, birthday, anniversary or anything of the sort for Morning Reading List? Drop us a line or let us know in the tips box below.

Good morning Washington.

We've got your morning mix of media Muesli after the jump...

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Click on the papers below to see full images.

*Note: Today's edition of The Express is currently unavailable.

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This week's installment raises the question -- why aren't seal levels discussed more?

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Washington Post: Obama Got Discount on Home Loan

Washington Examiner: Blog - Yeas & Nays

N.Y. Times: The Minimalist: 101 20-Minute Dishes for Inspired Picnics

L.A. Times: Warriors make offer to Elton Brand

USA Today: High gas prices threaten to shut down rural towns

Politico: Cindy's fortune: An asset and a liability

ABC News: Canada Ready to Deport U.S. Deserters

CBS News: Stolen Beauty

Fox News: U.S. Navy Commander Warns Iran: Don't Try Closing Gulf Oil Passageway

CNN: Life of a military boy: 'My heart kind of dropped'

Wall Street Journal: Starbucks to Shut More Stores, Cut Jobs

MSNBC: Could you pass the latest citizenship test?

Congressional Quarterly: Gen. Clark Comes From Behind to Win CQ Politics VP Madness

NPR: Harlem School Aces Math Test

Roll Call: DCCC, Murphy Say Rove Advising Freedom's Watch

Bloomberg: Bin Laden May Die of Kidney Disease in 6 Months, Time Reports

Could it be? The most recent edition of the Post's Date Lab was a success. This gives Date Lab consecutive successful dates for the first time since March.

This brings the overall ratio to 37 successful dates out of a total of 98, or just under 38 percent.

From Hotline's "Friday Feature:

Betsy Rothstein, Capital Living Editor of The Hill, has been bothering press secs. for the past nine years. Before joining The Hill in '98, Rothstein was the press sec. for Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL). She worked as a reporter and features editor for Spanish weekly newspapers in Boston and Denver, and covered business and politics for the Boca Raton News in Boca Raton, FL. But today Rothstein's our Friday Feature: What's your most embarrassing on-the-job moment? (Or as embarrassing as you'd like to reveal?) I once went up to Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.) to ask him a question and stupidly said, "Oh, you're Mary Bono's boyfriend." To which he replied, "I'm not Connie Mack. I'm way too ugly for that." I wanted to die. A distant one: Former Rep. Jim Traficant (D-Ohio), who is now incarcerated, used to shout at me from one end of the Speaker's Lobby to the other when I was talking with a lawmaker. He'd yell, "DON'T TALK TO HER!" And then he'd come up and goose the lawmaker. (Thankfully he didn't goose me.)

Howard Kurtz added a whopping 41 Facebook friends this week to bring his total to 1,862.

He also had four status updates, which included:

Howard is wondering how Ralph Nader became big news.

Howard is hoping for no news today.

Howard is summnig up the career of his longtime boss Len Downie.

Howard is marveling at the Mars photos.

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We're less than two months away until FishbowlDC's 4th annual "Hottest Media Types" competition gets underway. Which means you still have time to knock off a quick Atkins diet to get in tip-top shape, people.

Relive all the old glory of contests past here.