Stories you shouldn’t miss:
1. The pending shutdown of the federal government is not about budget cuts, it’s about abortion and climate change, the LA Times reports. In negotiations with President Obama and Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, House Republicans are demanding new restrictions on abortions nationwide and they’re attempting to defund efforts by the US Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions. Democrats note that the Republican demands, which are holding up a deal that would avoid a shutdown, have nothing to do with the nation’s growing budget deficit.