A NATION OF LAWS

Big, big development: the Supreme Court issues a broad repudiation of the Bush gang’s policies on Guantanamo detainees – and with implications for other misuses of power as well

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/29/washington/29cnd-scotus.html
The Supreme Court today delivered a sweeping rebuke to the Bush administration, ruling that it exceeded its authority by creating tribunals for terror suspects that fell short of the legal protections that Congress has traditionally required in military courts. . . As a result, the court said in a 5-to-3 ruling, the tribunals violated both American military law and the military's obligations under the Geneva Conventions.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/29/AR2006062900928.html
The Supreme Court today delivered a stunning rebuke to the Bush administration over its plans to try Guantanamo detainees before military commissions, ruling that the commissions violate U.S. law and the Geneva Conventions governing the treatment of war prisoners.

Highlights: http://www.discourse.net/archives/2006/06/hamdan_highlights.html

Full text: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/29/10408/2434

Extensive analyses – all important and worth reading. The ruling may also have implications for the administration’s torture and warrantless wiretapping policies

http://www.scotusblog.com/movabletype/archives/2006/06/hamdan_summary.html
[Marty Lederman] Even more importantly for present purposes, the Court held that Common Article 3 of Geneva applies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. That is the HUGE part of today's ruling. The commissions are the least of it. This basically resolves the debate about interrogation techniques, because Common Article 3 provides that detained persons "shall in all circumstances be treated humanely," and that "[t]o this end," certain specified acts "are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever"—including "cruel treatment and torture," and "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." This standard, not limited to the restrictions of the due process clause, is much more restrictive than even the McCain Amendment. . .

This almost certainly means that the CIA's interrogation regime is unlawful, and indeed, that many techniques the Administration has been using, such as waterboarding and hypothermia (and others) violate the War Crimes Act (because violations of Common Article 3 are deemed war crimes). . .

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/significance-of-hamdan-v-rumsfeld.html
[Glenn Greenwald] The Court dealt several substantial blows to the administration's theories of executive power beyond the military commission context. And, at the very least, the Court severely weakened, if not outright precluded, the administration's legal defenses with regard to its violations of FISA. Specifically, the Court. . . rejected the administration's argument [Sec. IV] that Congress, when it enacted the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force in Afghanistan and against Al Qaeda ("AUMF"), implicitly authorized military commissions in violation of the UCMJ [Uniform Code of Military Justice] . . .

This is a clearly fatal blow to one of the two primary arguments invoked by the administration to justify its violations of FISA. The administration has argued that this same AUMF "implicitly" authorized it to eavesdrop in violation of the mandates of FISA, even though the AUMF said absolutely nothing about FISA or eavesdropping. If -- as the Supreme Court today held -- the AUMF cannot be construed to have provided implicit authorization for the administration to create military commissions in violation of the UCMJ, then it is necessarily the case that it cannot be read to have provided implicit authorization for the administration to eavesdrop in violation of FISA.

http://balkin.blogspot.com/2006/06/hamdan-as-democracy-forcing-decision.html
[Jack Balkin] What the Court has done is not so much countermajoritarian as democracy forcing. It has limited the President by forcing him to go back to Congress to ask for more authority than he already has, and if Congress gives it to him, then the Court will not stand in his way. It is possible, of course, that with a Congress controlled by the Republicans, the President might get everything he wants. However this might be quite unpopular given the negative publicity currently swirling around our detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay. By forcing the President to ask for authorization, the Court does two things. First, it insists that both branches be on board with what the President wants to do. Second, it requires the President to ask for authority when passions have cooled somewhat, as opposed to right after 9/11, when Congress would likely have given him almost anything (except authorization for his NSA surveillance program, but let's not go there!). Third, by requiring the President to go to Congress for authorization, it gives Congress an opportunity and an excuse for oversight, something which it has heretofore been rather loathe to do on its own motion. . .

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/29/gitmo-wiretapping/

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/29/hamdan/index.html

http://www.scotusblog.com/movabletype/archives/2006/06/after_hamdan_re_1.html

A fun read: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/look-out-david-addingtons-head-just.html
Look Out, David Addington's Head Just Exploded . .

The dissenting opinions, from the predictable sources

http://crookedtimber.org/2006/06/29/geneva-and-guantanamo/

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/29/212559/565
[In the Hamdan decision,] Justice Thomas refers to Justice Stevens' "unfamiliarity with the realities of warfare"; but Stevens served in the U.S. Navy from 1942 to 1945, during World War II. Thomas's official bio, by contrast, contains no experience of military service.

Watch the word choice: the Bush gang is setting up to trivialize or ignore this ruling. They don’t accept the fundamental authority of the Supreme Court and Constitution, but simply see this as a “disagreement” between two branches of government

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6434
Q This administration has said that under the Constitution, at a time of war, the President has had very far-reaching power to protect the American people, and the Court seems to disagree and says the President overreached in that power.

MR. SNOW: You know, it's -- overreached is the headline, it's not the way it's been written by the Court. I mean, I've got the opinion here, and I'd defy anybody to come up with a very quick and simple analysis of the varied holdings in here. You've got people agreeing and disagreeing in part. So I think what the Court is saying is that it wants to make sure that there's congressional authorization, and it also is concerned about comporting with the Geneva Conventions and also the Uniform Code of Military Justice. And those are matters that will be taken under advisement.

Q And those are things that this White House has basically said it did not have to do, that executive has the authority to pursue this war without dealing with those other institutions.

MR. SNOW: The Court disagreed with that. . . I think it would say that the administration -- the Supreme Court has disagreed with the approach we've taken. You may -- I don't know how you'd say "overreached." Apply whatever adjective or whatever verb you want, the Supreme Court has said that it disagrees with the way in which the commissions were convened, and has laid down some guidelines for proceeding. . .

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115161969654876273
[Digby] Certainly some of the legal questions about presidential wartime powers seem to have been answered. But from a political standpoint, I'm with Atrios about the practical effect of this ruling:

[Atrios] My quick take is that it's certainly an important symbolic victory, but this administration's contempt for the law, the constitution, and the balance/separation of powers that our system rests on isn't going to be very affected by what 5 people in black robes say. They've ignored Congress and they'll ignore the Court too. . .

This decision will ultimately feed into conservative boogeyman number 438: judicial activism. Look for Justice Sunday IV: Vengeance is Mine Sayeth Delay. And expect many more calls to spike John Paul Stevens' pudding with arsenic. This is the beauty of the conservo-machine. When your primary political tools are both intimidation and victimization, you can spin anything to your advantage.

Here's Trent Lott doing a triple axel:

LOTT: I think some people are probably laughing at us. This is ridiculous and outrageous. Now in legal speak, let me say, I have not read the entire opinion, nor the dissents. But preliminarily my opinion is they probably didn’t even have jurisdiction. They shouldn’t have ruled the way they did. This is not a bunch of pussycats we’re talking about here. These are people that have made it clear in many instances that they would kill Americans if they got out. This is Osama bin Laden’s driver. And this is one other example of why the American people have lost faith in so much of our federal judiciary. This is a very bad decision in my opinion.

http://www.slate.com/id/2144838/fr/rss/
[Eric Umansky] The White House suggested it will go to Congress to get the tribunals approved in one way or the other way. Of course, the other option is just to go slow and not push for any tribunals since the detainees can still be held indefinitely without them. UPI also quotes some anonymous administration officials talking tough and saying they just might get Congress to strip al-Qaida suspects of those pesky Geneva protections. . .

“The culture of treason”

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606300002
[Ann Coulter] And the way newspapers are behaving. I mean, the culture of treason right now, it just -- it has become so pervasive that you just expect Democrats to side with Al Qaeda.

More: http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/coffeehouse/2006/jun/29/general_rove_and_the_battle_of_gitmo

Don’t expect any help from the cable news stations in informing people about what this decision means

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/cnn-come-on-please-report-real-story.html

Fortunately, we still have newspapers

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/29/AR2006062902300.html
For five years, President Bush waged war as he saw fit. If intelligence officers needed to eavesdrop on overseas telephone calls without warrants, he authorized it. If the military wanted to hold terrorism suspects without trial, he let it. . . . Now the Supreme Court has struck at the core of his presidency and dismissed the notion that the president alone can determine how to defend the country. . .

The cost of the Afghan, Iraq Wars will soon top a half trillion dollars

http://www.paktribune.com/news/index.php?id=148346

http://www.iraqfoundation.org/news/2003/ajan/2_whitehouse.html
[December 2002] In a telephone interview today, the official, Mitchell E. Daniels Jr., director of the Office of Management and Budget, also said there was likely to be a deficit in the fiscal 2004 budget, though he declined to specify how large it would be. The administration is scheduled to present its budget to Congress on Feb. 3. . . . Mr. Daniels would not provide specific costs for either a long or a short military campaign against Saddam Hussein. But he said that the administration was budgeting for both, and that earlier estimates of $100 billion to $200 billion in Iraq war costs by Lawrence B. Lindsey, Mr. Bush's former chief economic adviser, were too high. . .

U.S actions since 9-11 have strengthened, not weakened, Al Qaeda

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13600653/site/newsweek
[Michael Hirsh] . . . But there was substantial evidence showing that, up to 9/11, Al Qaeda could barely hold its act together, that it was a failing group, hounded from every country it tried to roost in (except for the equally lunatic Taliban-run Afghanistan). That it didn't represent the mainstream view even in the jihadi community, much less the rest of the Muslim world. This is the reality of the group that the Bush administration has said would engage us in a "long war" not unlike the cold war—the group that has led to the transformation of U.S. foreign policy and America's image in the world. . .

The ultimate tragedy of the Iraq war was not only that it diverted the U.S. from the knockout blow against Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan—the deaths of bin Laden and Zawahiri would likely have persuaded most jihadis it was wiser to focus on the near enemy—but that Iraq also altered the outcome of Al Qaeda's internal debate, tipping it in bin Laden's favor. "Iraq ended that debate because it fused the near and the far enemy," as Arquilla puts it succinctly. America ventured into the lands of jihad and willingly offered itself as a target in place of the local regimes. And as a new cause that revived the flagging Al Qaeda movement. It is, no doubt, bin Laden's greatest victory.

Bin Laden was right to help elect Bush: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009102.php

Condi Rice, one-time university Provost, seems to have taken to this propaganda thing pretty easily

http://www.slate.com/id/2144782/fr/rss/

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3100

Bush finally finds someone willing to replace John Snow as Treasury Secretary – now here’s the job Henry Paulson has ahead of him

http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2006/06/hank_paulson_is.html

Fascinating account of the Net Neutrality vote, in committee, with the Senators surrounded by lobbyists actively intervening in the deliberation and vote, in real time. This tells you all that is wrong with this issue, and how important it is

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/29/13346/5943

Good news: http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/specialguests/2006/jun/29/when_a_net_neutrality_tie_is_a_win

Bob Ney (R-OH): the beginning of the end

http://www.dccc.org/stakeholder/archives/004950.html

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008884

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008887

The House of Representatives finds time in its busy schedule to overturn a previous vote requiring gunlocks on all handguns – because, let’s face it, it just makes too much damn sense

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060629/pl_nm/congress_guns_dc

More mischief: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060629/ap_on_go_co/offshore_drilling_8
The House voted Thursday to end a quarter-century offshore drilling ban and allow energy companies to tap natural gas and oil beneath waters from New England to Alaska. . .

The death of the Fourth Estate: Fox “News” anchor calls for an Office of Censorship

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606290009
BRIAN KILMEADE: . . . See, I'm more into the ends justifying the means. . . Winning is everything. . . That's the reality. You're in love with the law, but I'm in love with survival. . .

Not bad enough? How about the regular “commentator” on MSNBC who said. . .

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_177.html#003015
[Melanie Morgan] "If [Bill Keller, Executive Editor of the New York Times] were to be tried and convicted of treason, yes, I would have no problem with him being sent to the gas chamber."

More proof that disclosing the SWIFT program did little or no damage

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009100.php

Bonus item: The Daily Show “is destroying democracy as we know it”

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_714.html

[NB: Not the hateful and divisive Rush Limbaugh, not Ann Coulter, not David Horowitz -- no, a late-night comedy show. . . ]

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:38 AM

 
DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL

Lying bastards. So while lashing out at the press for publishing details about their surveillance of bank records, suggesting that publishing such news “helps the terrorists,” and encouraging their proxies to accuse some reporters of “treason,” a few new facts come out. . .

#1 If tracking financial records was such a crucial secret, why had the administration been saying openly for months that they were doing it?

http://makeashorterlink.com/?C3525285D
[Boston Globe] News reports disclosing the Bush administration's use of a special bank surveillance program to track terrorist financing spurred outrage in the White House and on Capitol Hill, but some specialists pointed out yesterday that the government itself has publicly discussed its stepped-up efforts to monitor terrorist finances since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

On Monday, President Bush said it was “disgraceful" that The New York Times and other media outlets reported last week that the US government was quietly monitoring international financial transactions handled by an industry-owned cooperative in Belgium called the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Communication, or SWIFT . . . But a search of public records -- government documents posted on the Internet, congressional testimony, guidelines for bank examiners, and even an executive order President Bush signed in September 2001 -- describe how US authorities have openly sought new tools to track terrorist financing since 2001. That includes getting access to information about terrorist-linked wire transfers and other transactions, including those that travel through SWIFT.

“There have been public references to SWIFT before," said Roger Cressey, a senior White House counterterrorism official until 2003. “The White House is overreaching when they say [The New York Times committed] a crime against the war on terror. It has been in the public domain before." . . .

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/most-fact-free-accusation-yet-treason.html
[Glenn Greenwald] Yet again, The Boston Globe demonstrates what real journalism is supposed to do -- subject claims by the Government and its loyalists (in this case, claims that the Times disclosed information that will help the terrorists commit terrorist attacks) to skeptical scrutiny, and then report facts which have been concealed that undermine the Government's claim. That's the definition of the core journalistic purpose.

This is not a complicated matter. Nobody who is making these accusations can identify a single specific act that Terrorists would have engaged in before that they will now avoid. That, by itself, does not merely undermine, but destroys, the claim that the Times harmed national security. Any "journalist" who allows those accusations to be made without pointing out that fact are, to put it mildly, acting quite irresponsibly.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/06/28/BL2006062801268.html
[Dan Froomkin] When asked to back up the White House accusation that a recent New York Times story put American lives at risk by disclosing vital secrets to terrorists, the best press secretary Tony Snow could do yesterday was this: "I am absolutely sure they didn't know about SWIFT."

SWIFT, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, is the international banking cooperative that quietly allowed the Treasury Department and the CIA to examine hundreds of thousands of private banking records from around the world.

But the existence of SWIFT itself has not exactly been a secret. Certainly not to anyone who had an Internet connection. . . SWIFT has a Web site, at swift.com. . .

It's a very informative Web site. For instance, this page describes how "SWIFT has a history of cooperating in good faith with authorities such as central banks, treasury departments, law enforcement agencies and appropriate international organisations, such as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), in their efforts to combat abuse of the financial system for illegal activities." . . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/bush-administration-previously-told.html
[John Aravosis] This is what we call explosive stuff. Reporters are coming forward to document just how much the Bush administration already told journalists about their supposedly super secret spying they do on financial records in order to catch terrorists. We now know that the Bush administration already told reporters FAR MORE about this program than anything the New York Times reported last week. Yet Bush and his surrogates are accusing the NYT of treason. . .

More: http://www.defensetech.org/archives/002546.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004476.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009091.php

[NB: did the SWIFT program violate European laws? (shhh! don’t tell them!)
http://crookedtimber.org/2006/06/28/swift-and-europe/]

#2 Did the stories tell the terrorists anything they didn’t already know – or are they upset because it told the American people something they didn’t already know?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/hasnt-anybody-else-noticed.html
[John Aravosis] Hasn't anybody else noticed that had George Bush not skirted the law with his various domestic spying programs, had George Bush actually gotten the appropriate court approval and warrants necessary in order to conduct such unprecedented spying on Americans, none of these recent "revelations" would have been as newsworthy?

What made last week's New York Times story so newsworthy was the fact that, yet again, the Bush administration was caught spying on Americans without following the normal court procedures expected in a democracy. Procedures that separate America from common dictators.

That's news. And news of George Bush's own making.

#3 Why trash the NY Times (a “liberal” paper) for running the story, but not the Wall Street Journal (a reliably conservative paper) for running the same story – or are the WSJ reporters going to be charged with treason too?

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_167.html#002977
[Greg Sargent] I just got off the phone with a spokesperson for the Treasury Department, and she's refusing to explain why Treasury officials didn't demand that the Wall Street Journal hold off on publishing the story about the U.S.'s secret financial surveillance program, the way they demanded it of the New York Times and the L.A. Times.

This is interesting, because Tony Snow said today that the Treasury Department's press office could explain this. But now they're clamming up. . .

More traitors at the National Review? http://billmon.org/archives/002493.html

The New York Times hits back hard

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/28/opinion/28Wed1.html
Over the last year, The New York Times has twice published reports about secret antiterrorism programs being run by the Bush administration. Both times, critics have claimed that the paper was being unpatriotic or even aiding the terrorists. Some have even suggested that it should be indicted under the Espionage Act. There have been a handful of times in American history when the government has indeed tried to prosecute journalists for publishing things it preferred to keep quiet. None of them turned out well . . .

The United States will soon be marking the fifth anniversary of the war on terror. The country is in this for the long haul, and the fight has to be coupled with a commitment to individual liberties that define America's side in the battle. A half-century ago, the country endured a long period of amorphous, global vigilance against an enemy who was suspected of boring from within, and history suggests that under those conditions, it is easy to err on the side of security and secrecy. The free press has a central place in the Constitution because it can provide information the public needs to make things right again. Even if it runs the risk of being labeled unpatriotic in the process.

Where do they get these people?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009090.php
Michelle Boardman, a deputy assistant attorney general, had this to say to Congress yesterday [on Bush’s signing statements]: "It is often not at all the situation that the president doesn't intend to enact the bill.". . . [read on]

Tony Snow continues to learn that it’s hard to b.s. reporters at the WH press briefing when they know more about the issues than he does

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6423
MR. SNOW: Meanwhile, the U.S. military says that, in fact, it will meet its training goal for Iraqi security forces by the end of the year.

Q Tony, I was at the briefing at the Pentagon yesterday by General Dempsey, and it was actually a very sobering briefing. . . [read on!]

Iraq update (you can’t write jokes better than this)

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3095
The Los Angeles Times nailed it with their headline on Saturday . . .

Divisive Plan to Unify Iraq

[read on!]

Read this, then multiply 2500 times

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/29/world/middleeast/29soldier.html

[NB: Ooops, I forgot – that’s “just a number”]

Republicans knew that Bush's military was recommending a troop withdrawal at the same time they were attacking the Dems for proposing one

http://jabbs.blogspot.com/2006/06/mcconnell-admits-gop-knew-about-caseys.html

More on the GOP’s “American Values Agenda”

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7797.html
[Steve Benen] Congressional Republicans gave up, quite literally, on passing a substantive policy agenda several weeks ago, choosing instead to focus on divisive bills, which they didn't expect to pass, in the hopes of rallying the base in advance of the midterm elections. . .

Bill Frist (R-TN), nitwit

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Video_Frist_blames_CNN_for_Republican_0628.html
Senator Bill Frist (R-TN) appeared on CNN's American Morning to explain why the Senate is spending time on issues like flag burning while polls indicate that the American people are more concerned about Iraq and the economy.

CNN host Miles O'Brien asked Frist why recent polls show that show 54% of Americans will vote for Democrats in the upcoming elections while only 38% planned to vote for Republicans. Frist explained that the people's concerns were being addressed by the Republican Senate but told O'Brein those were the sort of issues "you may not cover and others may not cover."

O'Brien defended CNN, "We are covering but I think there is -- a lot of what you say there -- Americans are not hearing that particular message. As the majority leader, isn't that part of your job?"

Frist replied, "Well, you know, it's part of my job and your job and your whole coming into this was, again, saying [from] Harry Reid that we are spending all of our time on marriage -- which is important.”. . .

Shorter version: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008867.php
Senate GOP polls sagging because CNN not living up to role as GOP mouthpiece. . .

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7802.html
[Steve Benen] At times, I almost feel sorry for Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. . .

Amendment on Net Neutrality stalls in Senate committee. This is serious – nothing less than the fate of an open Internet is at stake

http://www.freepress.net/press/release.php?id=157

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/28/172211/165

This is also a very smart fight for the Democrats to pick

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/06/27/congress.wage/index.html
A week after the GOP-led Senate rejected an increase to the minimum wage, Senate Democrats on Tuesday vowed to block pay raises for members of Congress until the minimum wage is increased. . .

"They can play all the games the want," [Harry] Reid said derisively of the Republicans who control the chamber. "They can deal with gay marriage, estate tax, flag burning, all these issues and avoid issues like the prices of gasoline, sending your kid to college. But we're going to do everything to stop the congressional pay raise." . .

All politics IS local: the Supreme Court affirms the right of state legislatures to redistrict every time party control switches (what a mess this will turn out to be). Okay, Democratically controlled state houses – get busy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/28/AR2006062800660.html

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/28/111835/521

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7799.html

(So-called) “Justice” Dept backs new Jim Crow voting rules in Georgia – next step, the courts

http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/politics/story/3319590p-12227684c.html

Another Bush official indicted in the Abramoff scandal – and not the last

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/001021.php

“A culture of corruption”

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004481.html
[Norman Ornstein] In all my years of watching Congress, I have never seen anything quite like what we have now. . .

Bob Ney (R-OH), going down. . .

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008868

DeLay’s (R-TX) desperate attempt to get off the ballot in his Texas district isn’t looking very good

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/28/13276/5570

DeLay, still pulling strings behind the scenes in the House of Representatives

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/28/231937/624

Well, good, thank you

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060628/pl_nm/arms_usa_gays_dc_1
The Pentagon no longer deems homosexuality a mental disorder, officials said on Wednesday . . .

Bonus item: I told you, he’s a dangerous man

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009095.php
[Jeb Bush] "In Texas, they call guys like George 'a hard case.' It wasn't easy being his brother, either. He truly enjoys getting people to knuckle under." . . . [read on!]

More from Suskind: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/applying-one-percent-doctrine-in.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:34 AM

 
A DANGEROUS MAN

Bush, because he hasn’t seized enough new and unprecedented power to the Executive branch, wants even more

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/27/AR2006062700701.html
President Bush called on Congress today to give him a line-item veto as a means to enforce fiscal discipline in spending bills . . .

http://www.tpmcafe.com/?q=blog/yglesias/2006/jun/27/silly_season
[Matt Yglesias] Truly, pleading for line-item veto power is the last refuge of conservative scoundrels. Bush hasn't bothered to veto anything at all so he hardly seems in need of additional veto powers. On top of that, it's simply a myth -- a giant one -- that "pork" projects are an important cause of "big government." Overwhelmingly, money is getting spent on big popular programs like Social Security and the Navy.

On one front, at least, some push-back

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/27/AR2006062700145.html
The White House on Tuesday defended President Bush's frequent use of special statements that claim authority to limit the effects of bills he signs, saying the statements help him uphold the Constitution and defend national security.

Senators weren't so sure.

"It's a challenge to the plain language of the Constitution," said Arlen Specter, a Republican whose Senate Judiciary Committee opened hearings on the issue. "There is a sense that the president has taken signing statements far beyond the customary purview." . . .

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015181.html
The Senate Judiciary Committee this morning began examining President Bush's use of signing statements. . . [read on]

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7791.html

http://www.niemanwatchdog.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=ask_this.view&askthisid=00211
[Dan Froomkin] President Bush’s unprecedented use of “signing statements” to quietly assert his right to ignore legislation passed by Congress – including its ban on torture – first came to light in January due to some aggressive reporting by Boston Globe reporter Charlie Savage. . . In April, Savage reported his astonishing discovery that Bush has claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws in all since he took office. . .

The Bush gang is determined to bully the press into holding back on stories that disclose the truth about their full-court assault against privacy and civil liberties (all just to keep us safe, of course). The latest salvo ratchets the hyperbole up to an absurd level: the press is now accused of “treason”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/06/27/BL2006062700760.html
[Dan Froomkin] In accusing the press -- and specifically, the New York Times -- of putting American lives at risk, President Bush and his allies have escalated their ongoing battle with the media to nuclear proportions. . .

As far as I can tell, all these disclosures do is alert the American public to the fact that all this stuff is going on without the requisite oversight, checks and balances. . . . How does it possibly matter to a terrorist whether the government got a court order or not? Or whether Congress was able to exercise any oversight? The White House won't say. In fact, it can't say.

By contrast, it does matter to us. . .

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7788.html
[Steve Benen] Just how apoplectic is the right? Well, first consider what talk show host Melanie Morgan said on MSNBC's Hardball last night.

Chris Matthews: Let me ask you Melanie, do you really mean "treason"? You mean put them in jail for life? I don't know what treason carries as a sanction, but I assume the penalties are incredible severe, 20 years perhaps.

Melanie Morgan: Yes.

Matthews: You are saying to put Bill Keller and his associates in prison for 20 years?

Morgan: Absolutely. I am absolutely advocating that.

Yes, MSNBC hosted a discussion on whether NYT journalists were literally guilty of treason, as if this were a normal, reasonable question. . . I noticed one popular conservative blogger, however, who was willing to go a little further.

“Just a few quick comments about what the New York Times, The L.A. Times, and the Wall Street Journal have done in divulging government secrets used to defend Americans against our terrorist enemy during a time of war.

The Rosenbergs where executed for a lot less. . . Wouldn't executing Risen, Lichtblau, and Keller for treason (along with the person or persons responsible for leaking the government secrets) bring with it the ancillary benefit of encouraging other journalists and editors to find more socially beneficial ways to win a Pulitzer Prize. . . [T]he SOBs deserve to be shot at sunrise - without a trial."

More: http://mediamatters.org/items/200606270010

A LOT of traitors: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009089.php
[Kevin Drum] The New York Times story that exposed the Treasury Department's terrorist finance tracking program says it relied on "nearly 20" former and current government officials. The LA Times story on the same subject relied on "more than a dozen" sources.

Isn't that an awful lot of traitors in our midst? Why were so many people willing to talk about this? Was it because (a) revealing the program's existence didn't really endanger anything, or (b) they were concerned about its legality? Or both?

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/bush-lynch-mob-against-nations-free.html
[Glenn Greenwald] Any doubts about whether the Bush administration intends to imprison unfriendly journalists (defined as "journalists who fail to obey the Bush administration's orders about what to publish") were completely dispelled this weekend. As I have noted many times before, one of the most significant dangers our country faces is the all-out war now being waged on our nation's media -- and thereby on the First Amendment's guarantee of a free press -- by the Bush administration and its supporters, who are furious that the media continues to expose controversial government policies and thereby subject them to democratic debate. After the unlimited outpouring of venomous attacks on the Times this weekend, I believe these attacks on our free press have become the country's most pressing political issue. . . [read on!]

And, disturbingly, many IN the press are happy to encourage this line of thinking

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_684.html
[Matt Yglesias] I never, ever, ever watch prime time cable news because it makes me want to kill extremely large numbers of people. Tragically, I walked through the door yesterday and my roommate already had Hardball on. There were two people debating the issue of . . . whether or not The New York Times should be brought up on charges of treason. Seriously. Treason. For publishing an article in a newspaper. Treason. And there was Chris Matthews happily presiding over the whole thing as if this was a serious conversation that people should be having. This all taking place on a network that, allegedly, does journalism.

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115142063819441932
[Atrios] Torturing people, jailing journalists for treason, the president being allowed to disobey the law at whim . . . The mainstream media has made all of these things a part of the normal conversation. They've allowed "two sides" to all of these things to be debated on equal footing. Left wing bloggers on the internets complain about the media and they get ignored and accused of "blogofascism." Conservatives call for the New York Times to be blown up and their reporters and editors jailed and they get treated seriously on MSNBC's flagship political talk show. . . . There's a problem here. You've been playing this game for years, letting these people control the terms of the debate. This is where it has brought you. Congratulations.

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115141616653443199

A dangerous man

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008858
[Josh Marshall] So on exporting democracy ...

1. President encourages supporters to accuse newspaper reporters of treason: check.

2. President mandates systematic use of torture: check.

3. President routinely asserts right to ignore laws passed by Congress: check.

What am I missing?

Actually, I think it's more one of those trick questions. Like, we're not exporting 'democracy' but our democracy. So, as we send it to them, we lose ours.

The Republicans in Congress, of course, CAN’T RESIST exploiting the issue (thanks to Josh Marshall for the link)

http://www.thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/062806/nytimes.html
House Republican leaders are expected to introduce a resolution today condemning The New York Times for publishing a story last week that exposed government monitoring of banking records. . .

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060627/pl_nm/security_leaks_dc_1
The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee [Pat Roberts, R-KS] on Tuesday blasted U.S. media for exposing details of highly secretive intelligence programs and asked the Bush administration for a formal damage assessment. . .

Cynical, despicable “flag-burning” amendment goes down in a narrow vote – despite widespread public clamoring that THIS is the issue most needing Congress’s attention right now (uh-huh)

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/27/washington/27cnd-flag.html

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7783.html
[Orrin Hatch, R-UT] "They say that flag burning is a rare occurrence; it is not that rare," he told the chamber. . . . "Now, I have to tell you," he vouched, "the American people are aggrieved."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/26/AR2006062601321.html

Trumpet it far and wide, loud and clear: if Bush’s rubber-stamp congress is re-elected in the fall, they will go after Social Security AGAIN

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008854

More: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_689.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/bush-and-paulson-want-to-meddle-with.html

And. . . do people really want more of THIS?

http://makeashorterlink.com/?A25C3165D
[AP] The "American Values Agenda" also includes a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage — which already has failed in the Senate — a prohibition on human cloning and possibly votes on several popular tax cuts. . .

More busywork for the mindless: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008860
[Josh Marshall] Sen. James Inhofe's Senate Environment and Public Works Committee put out this press release slamming an AP article that reported there is a scientific consensus that the claims Al Gore makes in his movie [“An Inconvenient Truth”] are correct. . .

I guess someone sent Maliki the horse’s head, because his new and revised reconciliation plan says nothing (despite advance leaks to the contrary) about either troop withdrawal or amnesty for U.S troop killers

http://billmon.org/archives/002483.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/27/world/middleeast/27cnd-iraq.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2144656
[Eric Umansky] The papers point out inside that Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki told reporters that the "amnesty" he's proposed will only apply to those who "did not kill anyone." Maliki's comments came after much criticism in the U.S. about the proposal to pardon those who've killed U.S. troops. A NYT editorial notices that the latest formulation "would seem to leave few, if any, real insurgents eligible for any amnesty."

More evidence (as if any more is needed) that the Bush gang was TOLD their Iraqi misadventure wasn’t going to go as smoothly as they were leading us all to believe – but did they listen?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/26/AR2006062601306.html

A new twist on the Bin Laden tape, released just before the 2004 election, that helped elect Bush

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/october-surprise-revisited.html
[Anonymous Liberal] Five days before the 2004 presidential election, Osama bin Laden released a video to Al Jazeera; it was his first on camera appearance in nearly three years. It was obvious at the time who benefited politically from this "October surprise." The tape helped George W. Bush and hurt his challenger, John Kerry. Given the timing and subject matter of the tape, it was clear that Bin Laden was attempting to influence the U.S. election, and, almost surely, knew that the tape would benefit President Bush.

One of the (so far) overlooked revelations in Ron Suskind's new book, The One Percent Doctrine, is the fact that the CIA reached this same conclusion about the bin Laden tape almost immediately. . . Of course the fact that the Bush administration itself had concluded that the purpose of the tape was to tilt the election in favor of the President did not stop the Bush/Cheney campaign from sending its surrogates out to make the exact opposite claim . . .

Ha ha. Looks like Tom DeLay played things a little too cute for his own good, stayed in the GOP congressional primary so he could continue to raise money for his “campaign” (which he actually planned to use for his legal defense), then quit – and now he’s stuck with his name on the ballot

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6404

More: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4004711.html

Looks like DeLay’s dubious redistricting plan will also be getting a skeptical review

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4001349.html
In arguments before the court earlier this year, challengers characterized the new map as a partisan power grab that violated the Constitution and the federal Voting Rights Act. . .

More: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/cats/tom_delay/

Once again, all I can do is point you in the direction of Billmon’s sharp analysis: what the attacks on Kos and other left of center bloggers are really all about. . . . [read it all]

http://billmon.org/archives/002482.html
Seriously, though, I suspect the real objective here is to try to scare away the Democratic pols who have been cozying up to Kos and the liberal blogosphere. The sight of all those powerbrokers -- Harry Reid, etc. -- lining up to kiss Kos's ring in Vegas must have really set the klaxons wailing at DLC HQ. . . . The Lieberman Dems don't hate and fear Kos and the Daily Kos "community" because they are too far to the left. They hate them because they represent an emerging power center within the Democratic Party that they don't control -- what's more, one that is now much closer to the public mainstream on the central issue of our time (the Iraq War) than they are. . .

More on Rush’s new drug problem: Viagra, the little blue pill, OxyContin, the little blue pill. . . ?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/when-is-viagra-not-viagra.html

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6408

This really may violate his plea deal: http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/06/27/not-such-a-rush/

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015187.html

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2006/06/27/m1a_limbaugh_0627.html

Katherine Harris (R-FL), is. . .just. . . ridiculous!

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6405

Bonus item: Bush, the dry drunk (no, I’m not kidding, and no I don’t think this is an exaggeration) – thanks to Holden for the link

http://makeashorterlink.com/?A56B6265D
[Patrick Moore] In 1999, responding to questions about his use of drugs and alcohol, George Bush told the Washington Post, "Well, I don't think I had an addiction. . . Having observed the president's behavior in office, I wonder if he might be wrong. Perhaps not only the president, but also his administration, suffers from alcoholism. After all, arrogance and the inability to take responsibility for one's actions, classic alcoholic traits, have become trademarks of the Bush presidency.

George Bush's problems are not only personal. By necessity, they have become the problems of our entire country. And our country is like the family of an alcoholic, devastated by the drinker's actions but powerless to stop them.

Many will consider it a cheap insult to call the president an alcoholic. But recovering alcoholics, with steady doses of humility and rigorous honesty, can become extraordinary human beings. It is no insult to be an alcoholic. However, an alcoholic who simply controls his drinking, without taking the time to examine the many defects of character that fueled his destructive behavior, only grows more dangerous. There is a term for this unhappy creature - dry drunk.

In 2002, Alan Bisbort wrote a piece about Bush for American Politics entitled "Dry Drunk" in which he mused:

"Bush's past battles with the bottle are worth pondering at a time like this, one of the most dangerous in the nation's history... fumble-tongued, incapable of stringing more than two coherent sentences together, snippily irritable with anyone who dares disagree with him or even ask a question, poutily turning his back on the democratically elected president of one of our most important allies because of something one of his underlings said about him...listlessly in need of constant vacations and rest, dangerously obsessed with only one thing (Iraq), to the exclusion of all other things..."

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:33 AM

 
WAKING UP FROM THE DREAM

Ah, for those simple days when the Bush gang convinced themselves that they could dash into Iraq, throw around a little “shock and awe,” be greeted by the grateful citizens with flowers and kisses, arrest Hussein and remove him from power, install a friendly puppet regime under Chalabi, and be back home in time for dinner. So much for Plan A. Now they’re into Plan J, and desperate for a way to get out of it. They’re trapped into fighting a ruthless and growing insurgency; struggling with all the worst aspects of “nation-building” (which they vowed never to do), in a “nation” riven by irresolvable ethnic and religious interests that they still do not understand; locked into ongoing negotiations with an increasingly independent “democratically elected government” which is not quite convinced that U.S. interests are compatible with their own in the long term; finding that within the wider Middle and Near East they have exacerbated the very forces of anti-western mistrust and hatred that engendered the 9-11 attacks which supposedly justified this enterprise in the first place; and making very little headway against the terrorist threat that was the justification for it all. Oh yeah, and no oil profits – in fact, a steady outflow of war expenditures at a time of already-massive deficits.

Meanwhile, back at home, the awareness that we were duped into the war through, at best, exaggerations and wishful thinking or, at worst, cynical lies, has firmly taken root. Too many people have relatives or friends over there, and they’re hearing first-hand from the soldiers how frustrating and sisyphean the mission has become. They have heard all the stories about foolish post-war “planning” (if that word can be used), ranging from underestimating the likelihood of an insurgent opposition, to dismantling the Iraqi army, to failures to plan effectively for the protection of U.S. personnel. They watch enlistment figures continue to lag, despite lowered standards and raising the maximum enlistment age; and they watch tours of duty getting doubled and tripled; and they understand what all that means. They have LOST FAITH that the Bush gang will ever level with them about the purpose and duration of this mission, and even though they don’t want to see the Iraqi government fall, they are sick of the endless commitment that seems to be involved with propping it up. And they are hearing clearer and clearer signs from the Iraqis that they don’t want us there any more either.

Increasingly, the Bush plan looks to have only two remaining purposes: get through this fall’s election with vague promises of troop withdrawals and hope that the American people don’t decide to treat the vote as a referendum on the conduct of the war; and then muddle through to the end of Bush’s term, taking out as many troops as possible, perhaps, without unleashing the kind of civil war that will bring down the carefully-maintained appearance of a workable coalition government, and leaving the underlying commitment to the next President to deal with.

Finally, the insurgents know something that no one over here wants to talk about openly: the Iraqi government, as currently constituted, will NEVER be able to subdue them – and NO government committed to the purposes that the U.S. desires (including the establishment of permanent bases and privileged access to oil contracts) will ever be able to maintain legitimacy there.

So, what do the American people want?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2006-06-26-iraq-poll_x.htm?csp=1
A majority of Americans say Congress should pass a resolution that outlines a plan for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq . . . . In the poll, 57% say Congress should pass a resolution that outlines a plan for withdrawing U.S. troops. . .

Or, as the Post prefers to describe it: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/26/AR2006062600250.html
Nation Is Divided on Drawdown Of Troops

[NB: Gee, and when Bush got 50.73% of the vote in 2004, that was a “mandate” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._presidential_election,_2004]

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115133630800970405
[Atrios] Bush wants to stay in Iraq forever. We don't know what the presumed benefits of that are because they won't tell us why, and nobody will ask. We have some sense of how costly the ongoing occupation is, and how costly it will be in the future.

We can't have a sensible public debate about this issue until the public understands what the issue is. Our pundit class is blissfully unaware of why we're in Iraq. No one has yet been able to answer the question.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/polls-continue-to-worsen-on-iraq.html
[John Aravosis] No matter what stunts Bush pulls, things will get worse, and the American public will know it.

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7780.html
[Steve Benen] In the broader context, it's worth taking a moment to consider the landscape that Tony Snow can't quite bring himself to describe. Congressional Dems want a timed withdrawal; Gen. Casey wants something similar, and perhaps most importantly, Iraq's new Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, has called for a withdrawal timetable for coalition forces from Iraq. As Newsweek reported over the weekend, "Mahmoud Othman, a National Assembly member who is close to President Talabani, said that no one disagrees with the concept of a broad, conditions-based timetable."

Does that include Bush? Well, that depends on the limitations of the president's options.

Greg Sargent described a fascinating political dilemma for the White House yesterday.

[F]or Bush, a timetable isn't really an option politically — both because Dems have been calling for it and because the GOP has scorned Dems for doing just that and has now dug itself in too deep with a "stay the course" position. More to the point, a timetable would force the Bush administration into a real discussion of what it's really trying to accomplish in Iraq, something it's been scandalously loath to talk about in specific terms at all.

The real tragedy here, though, is this: Not only is decreasing the troop level politically impossible for Bush, but increasing it is politically untenable, too — no one would stand for it. So the only remaining option happens to be the one that's the absolute worst option for the soldiers in Iraq: Keeping things exactly as they are.

A slightly different take: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_672.html
[Michael Tomasky] They invaded Iraq. They didn’t expect a problem. They got a problem. Now they want out. But they want out provided two conditions are met in the process: 1. They can do it in such a way to make the Democrats look weak; 2. They can time it so as to maximize electoral benefit from announcement of withdrawal.

. . . You’ve surely learned by now that there is no substance with these people. There is only politics. We will start to get out of Iraq, bit by bit, this September and October. By the end of 2007, a plan will be announced to ensure we’re substantially out (i.e., a 75 percent draw down or some such) by October 2008. You can set your watch by it.

Yardsticks of civic stability will be manipulated, just as intelligence was manipulated three and four years ago, to “prove” that Iraq is becoming a stable society at whatever moment the administration wants to trot out those statistics. The substance, and the consequences, will be something for the next administration to deal with. . .

Has the Bush gang managed to get Maliki to back away (in public anyway) from his request that the U.S. offer a plan for troop withdrawals?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/26/world/middleeast/26iraq.html

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002483.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/iraqi-prime-minister-maliki-backtracks.html

Atrios coins a new demarcation of time in Iraq, a “Friedman” (equal to six months) – as in: every new development results in a new pronouncement that “the next six months will be critical”

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115132600407104831

“As they stand up, we will stand down. As we stand down, they will run away”

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3087

(Karzai in Afghanistan is fed up with dealing with us, too)

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3084

Here’s a very good question (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://jabbs.blogspot.com/2006/06/did-cheney-know-of-caseys-redeployment.html
Did Cheney Know Of Casey's Redeployment Plan When He Said Democrats' Redeployment Plan Was "Worst Possible Thing?"

Here’s an attempt to get at the answer – and watch the verbal gymnastics

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/26/snow/index.html
Question: Tony, you had Democrats over the weekend -- Sen. Kerry, Sen. Boxer -- saying that even the framework of a plan would kind of fly in the face of Republican [claims that] the Democrats want to cut and run. Do you have any response to that? I mean, the president, himself, has implied it, Rove has said it outright.

Snow: There's still a pretty significant difference between what Sen. Kerry or even Sen. Levin had proposed and what Gen. Casey is talking about, simply because one is driven by a calendar and the other is driven by events on the ground. So there is a significant difference.

Question: But doesn't Gen. Casey -- like, part one of his plan has a significant number of troops, two combat brigades, coming out in September. Doesn't that give the enemy --

Snow: Well, actually, he has one, and it -- you know, again, this is not, I believe the way, at least it was reported, is you've got two brigades by the end of the year, September being short of the end of the year. But I may be misreading it. In any event, you've got to keep in mind that this is not a statement of policy. Again, Gen. Casey keeps in mind a number of scenarios. You're talking about scenarios here ... And so I would caution very strongly against everybody thinking, well, they're going to pull two brigades out. Maybe they will, maybe they won't. That really does depend upon a whole series of things that we cannot, at this juncture, predict. But Gen. Casey -- again, I would characterize this more in terms of scenario building, and we'll see how it proceeds.

[Tim Grieve] A few minutes later, a reporter asked Snow if any of Casey's "scenarios" might involve a significant increase in U.S. troop levels. "You know," Snow said, "here's the thing about military plans: You don't disclose them. So rather than trying to talk about various scenarios for typical reasons, Gen. Casey will have a number of scenarios in mind for differing situations on the ground. As I said, as conditions on the ground change, he will adjust those plans. But I'm certainly not going to announce in advance anything that he may have in mind for the president, or that he may be recommending -- just don't do that in a time of war."

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7780.html

Tony Snow is making so many misstatements in his daily briefings that the WH now has to annotate (correct) the transcript

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6391

Go Helen!

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6391
Q Why didn't the President seek congressional authorization for the program?

MR. SNOW: He didn't need to.

Q Why?

MR. SNOW: Because, why would he need it? Under what statute would he need congressional authorization?

Q On what legal -- what is your legal basis for --

MR. SNOW: The legal basis -- no, the legal basis here is that you've got an executive order, and furthermore, if you want to get into the legal vagaries, I will send you over to the Treasury Department attorneys who have been working this. . .

Q Why doesn't it --

MR. SNOW: It is legal, Helen.

Q What is the law that allows you to go into the private --

MR. SNOW: I'll tell you what, we will attach -- we'll get our lawyers to attach all this and it will just --

Q No, no, just give me the law --

MR. SNOW: I am going to give you the law.

Go ahead.

Q You don't even know --

MR. SNOW: You're absolutely right, I do not know the specific statute . . .

Q That's not --

MR. SNOW: Helen, will you stop heckling and let me conduct a press conference.

The Bush gang has a simple position: we decide what national security requires, and we don’t want anyone else to know about it

http://makeashorterlink.com/?F2291255D
[AP] President Bush said Monday it was "disgraceful" that the news media had disclosed a secret CIA-Treasury program to track millions of financial records in search of terrorist suspects. . . "The fact that a newspaper disclosed it makes it harder to win this war on terror," Bush said, leaning forward and jabbing his finger during a brief question-and-answer session with reporters. . .

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/26/snow-nyt/
[Tony Snow] [T]he New York Times and other news organizations ought to think long and hard about whether a public’s right to know in some cases might override somebody’s right to live. . .

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/26/bank/index.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2144574
NYT editor Bill Keller offered his response yesterday. Today the LAT's chief, Dean Baquet, chimes in: The government did not "give us any strong evidence that the information would thwart true terrorism inquiries."

Remember this, write it down, and make sure your grandchildren understand why the government didn’t do anything about global warming when there was still time to reverse the catastrophe

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/print?id=2119971
"I have said consistently," answered Bush, "that global warming is a serious problem. There's a debate over whether it's manmade or naturally caused..."

The President -- as far as the extensive and repeated researches of this and many other professional journalists, as well as all scientists credible on this subject, can find -- is wrong on one crucial and no doubt explosive issue. When he said -- as he also did a few weeks ago -- that "There's a debate over whether it's manmade or naturally caused" ... well, there really is no such debate.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/06/03/tech/main510920.shtml
[June 2002] "I read the report put out by the bureaucracy," Mr. Bush said dismissively when asked about the EPA report . . . The report was the first by the Bush administration to mostly blame human activity for global warming.

Everything you need to understand about the Bush gang, how they seized and maintained power, and how their approach has screwed up the country

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7778.html
[LAT] Perhaps more than any other administration, the White House of George W. Bush has mastered the art of mixing politics and policy and keeping track of how federal government decisions can affect even obscure local elections. Rove, with a broad portfolio and extraordinary influence, introduced a new political doctrine, effectively putting the federal bureaucracy and the bully pulpit of the White House in the service of GOP political ends. . .

[Kevin Drum] Pundits keep trying to figure out just what it is that makes Bush so different from other presidents, but most of them start by trying to figure out what he values…. The fact is, all presidents rely for their decisions on a complex stew of ideology, interest group pandering, and political calculation. So what is it that makes Bush so different? Just this: until Bush they also all cared about serious policy analysis. . .

[Steve Benen] None of this should come as a surprise to anyone, of course, but it's yet another affirmation of what John DiIulio said after his stint as a policy advisor to the president: "There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus. What you've got is everything — and I mean everything — being run by the political arm” . . . There is no precedent for such an operation. The history books will no doubt be filled with Bush's errors and tragedies, but ultimately, his most profound legacy will be eight years of mixing policy and politics to the point in which there is no meaningful difference.

Is the hard-right backlash against John McCain starting? How does he become the Republican nominee with people like Grover Norquist saying this about him?

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/001003.php
"When McCain claims this was something other than an annual contribution, he is lying," Norquist said. . . “He is delusional"

Or is Norquist about to become irrelevant?

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000997.php

In for a penny, in for a pound: Rick Santorum (R-PA) follows up his risible lies about WMD with this

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7774.html

Arlen Specter (R-PA) is making angry noises again. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/senator-specter-pretends-to-be-real.html

Ernie Fletcher (R-KY) – a piece of work

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/26/131312/665
[Kos] He's corrupt (indictments all over his administration), he's blocking state employees from seeing liberal blogs (while conservative blogs get through fine), and now, we find out about his big commute:

Under a blue Kentucky sky, birds sing from the boughs of the oaks and magnolias on the Capitol lawn. People walk their dogs. Joggers pass by. . . . Gov. Ernie Fletcher finishes a day at the office, but instead of walking through the idyllic scene across the street to the Governor's Mansion, he gets into a Lincoln Town Car to be chauffeured to his door.

500 feet. That's the distance.

Nope, not joking: Rush Limbaugh gets busted at the Palm Beach International Airport for illegal drugs

http://cbs4.com/topstories/local_story_177194808.html

So, here’s the full story: He had a prescription for Viagra that did not have his name on it; that’s a misdemeanor. He claimed it was a legitimate prescription, issued under his doctor’s name, not his own, “for privacy reasons” (oops – well, so much for that!). Two things are not known: why did he need Viagra during his trip to the Dominican Republic, and does this violate the terms of his plea bargain for previous drug offenses?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115137478484542650

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115137580780784454

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015177.html

Or is there more? http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/i-feel-like-theres-something-missing.html

Why the left blogosphere has trouble with The New Republic

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/the_blogospheres_case_against.html

Bonus item: Have people caught on to the joke? Fox “News” ratings plummet

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/27/05929/8582

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 4:58 AM

 
IT’S DIFFERENT WHEN WE DO IT

Billmon was right: Orwell had nothing on this

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/25/AR2006062500764.html
Senate Democrats reacted angrily yesterday to a report that the U.S. commander in Iraq had privately presented a plan for significant troop reductions in the same week they came under attack by Republicans for trying to set a timetable for withdrawal. . .

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/25/122334/604

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_158.html#002933

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_25.php#008840

. . . and the media, of course, plays dumb

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115126392912820032
[Atrios] It was bad for Democrats when they couldn't get Republicans to agree with them and now it's bad for Democrats now that Republicans do agree with them. . .

More: http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_156.html#002931

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_157.html#002932

http://billmon.org/archives/002480.html

Still, Republicans are skittish about backing the administration on withdrawal, especially if it is linked to amnesty for the insurgents who have been killing our troops

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/wash-post-democrats-angry-that-bush.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/republican-presidential-candidates.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/iraqi-amnesty-plan-causing-increasing.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/gop-senator-mcconnell-flip-flops-on.html

Dubai Ports redux? http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/25/21637/1122

Hey, are the Democrats eating their Wheaties?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_atrios_archive.html#115125886883439187
[CNN] DICK CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The worst possible thing we could do is what the Democrats are suggesting, and no matter how you carve it, you can call it anything you want, but basically, it is packing it in, going home, persuading and convincing and validating the theory that the Americans don't have the stomach for this fight.

BLITZER: All right. You want to respond to the vice president, Senator Biden?

BIDEN: No, I don't want to respond to him. He's at 20 percent in the polls. No one listens to him. He has no credibility. It's ridiculous.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3083

I still think the Iraq War is a WINNING issue for the Democrats. Why? Because things aren’t getting better over there – and they’re not going to

http://billmon.org/archives/002481.html

More phony war news, coordinated with RNC operatives

http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20060625/1066005.asp?PFVer=Story
"Baghdad is absolutely beautiful. . . I mean shockingly majestic. This is a city for years we have been told is unsalvageable and I was amazed to see this level of cleanliness."

Yep, people are just cramming in line to get to fight in Bush’s Great Patriotic War (then why have they had to raise the enlistment age to 42?)

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1886067.php

Good thing we’re treating returning Iraq and Afghanistan veterans better than we did Vietnam veterans

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/world/story.html
Thousands of U.S. veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan are facing a new nightmare - the risk of homelessness. The U.S. government estimates several hundred vets who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan are homeless on any given night across the country, although the exact number is unknown.

The reasons that contribute to the new wave of homelessness are many: some are unable to cope with life after daily encounters with insurgent attacks and roadside bombs; some can't navigate government red tape; others simply don't have enough money to afford a house or apartment. . .

Here’s another issue the Democrats shouldn’t let go: corruption and the need for lobbying reform

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/25/AR2006062500789.html
When Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) announced his resignation as majority leader in January -- soon after lobbyist Jack Abramoff pleaded guilty to corruption charges -- House Republicans panicked. Dozens of GOP lawmakers, fearing a political backlash, flooded the office of House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) with urgent pleas for lobbying reform. . .

But that was then. Six months later, the legislation has slowed to a crawl. Along the way, proposals such as Hastert's that would sharply limit commonplace behavior on Capitol Hill have been cast aside. Committee chairmen once predicted the bill would be finished in March, but the Senate did not pass its ethics bill until March 29 and the House passed its version May 3. The House has yet to name negotiators to draft the final package.

Legislators and public-interest group advocates say the most likely result this year is a minimalist package that would allow members to say they have responded to the Abramoff situation and other scandals but would do little to crimp their ability to accept lobbyist favors. . .

The latest Establishment attacks on progressive bloggers

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7769.html

Digby complies, vows to retire

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115125964266094876
It is with great regret that I must resign from the vast left wing blogospheric conspiracy today. The time has come to choose one's allegiances, and mine must lie with my liege lords, the journalistic and political leadership who have brought us where we are today. I can no longer be associated with the barbaric, illiterate jacknapes who presume to call their betters' judgment into question.

You see, I've come to realize that this business of "punditry" and "politics" is not something anyone can just "do." It is what one is born to, what one is meant to do, what one is. Some people are simply designed to have superior opinions. And those people are well known by others who have superior opinions. It is outside the natural order of things for unwashed, unknown rabble like me to set forth my ideas in the same public arena . . .

Bonus item: Murray Waas, hero of Plame reporting, has a secret. . . [read on!]

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015172.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 4:35 AM

 
A MAN OF HIS WORD

The Iraqi government is asking us to withdraw our troops. Hmmm. . . . what was it Bush promised?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/28/politics/28prexy.html
[Bush, January 2005] President Bush said in an interview on Thursday that he would withdraw American forces from Iraq if the new government that is elected on Sunday asked him to do so. . . [A]sked if, as a matter of principle, the United States would pull out of Iraq at the request of a new government, he said: "Absolutely. This is a sovereign government. They're on their feet."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13521628/site/newsweek/
A timetable for withdrawal of occupation troops from Iraq. Amnesty for all insurgents who attacked U.S. and Iraqi military targets. Release of all security detainees from U.S. and Iraqi prisons. Compensation for victims of coalition military operations. . . Those sound like the demands of some of the insurgents themselves, and in fact they are. But they're also key clauses of a national reconciliation plan drafted by new Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who will unveil it Sunday.

What was it Bremer, Powell, Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld promised?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4978361/
[May 2004] “If the provisional government asks us to leave we will leave,” Bremer said, referring to an Iraqi administration due to take power June 30.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/iraq/20040514-2018-iraq-uswithdrawal.html
[May 2004] U.S.-led coalition forces would leave Iraq if a new interim government should ask them to, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday. . .

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june04/wolfowitz_05-28.html
[May 2004] MARGARET WARNER: . . . let me also show you what Colin Powell had to say, the secretary of State, a couple of weeks ago. He said, were this interim government to say us to we really think we can handle this on our own, it would be better if you were to leave, we would leave. If the transitional government asks us to leave, asks the U.S. to leave --

PAUL WOLFOWITZ: That's the right answer to the hypothetical question. . .

http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/36/10039
Bush and Rumsfeld have said that if the Iraqi government asks them to leave, they'll leave. . .

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3080

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008835

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009076.php

Isn’t this infuriating? When Democrats talk about withdrawing troops from Iraq, it’s “cutting and running.” When the Bush gang decides to do it, it’s because of “conditions on the ground.” (The condition that matters most to them, of course, is getting SOME kind of token withdrawal before the fall elections)

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/06/22/cheney.access/
[Cheney, June 22] What the Democrats are suggesting, basically, about a withdrawal -- you can call it redeployment, whatever you want to call it. Basically, it in effect validates the terrorists' strategy. . . If we were to do that it would be devastating from the standpoint of the global war on terror. . . . It is absolutely the worst possible thing we could do at this point. It would be to validate and encourage the terrorists by doing exactly what they want us to do. . . You're not going to complete the mission if we follow the Democrats' advice. . .

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/23/232812/946
[June 23] So Senate and the House Republicans seem pretty united that a time table for withdrawal of our men and women from Bush's Iraqi quagmire would be a bad idea. Why, it would be a sell out, bordering on treasonous assistance to the terrorists and an insult to the casualties of Bush's war. Bully for them, and as the traditional media reports in breathless glowing detail, that's a sign of strength. . .

The U.S. House has voted in favor of not setting a timetable for troops to be removed from Iraq. . .

And the DoD has signed right on the dotted line:

Rumsfeld: Iraq Timetable wouldn't 'do any good':--As for a timetable for troop withdrawal, Rumsfeld said that timetables are often wrong. "Once you start doing that, then you are stuck with a number and a date, and it just doesn't do any good," he said. . .

So what do we learn today?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/world/middleeast/25military.html
[June 25] The top American commander in Iraq has drafted a plan that projects sharp reductions in the United States military presence there by the end of 2007, with the first cuts coming this September . . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/top-us-general-in-iraq-says-its-time.html
[John Aravosis] They've got to be kidding. The same week the Republicans and the White House viciously and personally attack Democrats for wanting to establish a timetable to start withdrawing US troops from Iraq, the top US general in Iraq has now created a detailed timetable for partially withdrawing US troops from Iraq, and George Bush himself has seemingly signed off on it. . .

http://www.slate.com/id/2144463
[Andrew Rice] Several caveats, however: 1) The story says Casey presented only a "concept" as opposed to a "formal plan"; 2) Most units in Iraq aren't combat brigades; 3) It's all dependent on things going well during the next year, which the Pentagon is referring to as a "period of stabilization”. . . .

Billmon’s a pretty smart guy

http://billmon.org/archives/002479.html
[Billmon] If this Newsweek story is correct, then we're probably approaching one of those truly Orwellian moments when the trained parrots all start screeching a completely different set of propaganda talking points -- diametrically opposed to the ones they were screeching just a few minutes before. . .

A timetable for withdrawal of occupation troops from Iraq [is one of the] key clauses of a national reconciliation plan drafted by new Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who will unveil it Sunday. The provisions will spark sharp debate in Iraq — but the fiercest opposition is likely to come from Washington, which has opposed any talk of timetables, or of amnesty for insurgents who have attacked American soldiers.

Far from opposing it, I think Washington is probably where the plan originated. Maliki, after all, was the American choice for the prime ministership -- the guy that Ambassador Khalilzad and his band of behind-the-scenes string pullers went to the mat for during the long, drawn-out negotiations in Baghdad earlier this year. It's pretty far fetched to think he would pull a peace plan like a rabbit out of a hat and then present it to his U.S. benefactors as a fait accompli.

And, right on cue, we have the New York Times weighing in with a well-timed leak promising major U.S. troop reduction, beginning two months before the November elections. Now isn't that a coincidence? . . .

The next step, of course, will be for the same people who three days ago were demanding the execution of John Kerry and John Murtha for even daring to suggest a withdrawal timetable to immediately begin calling for a withdrawal timetable -- that is, when they're not hailing the Cheney administration for having won a smashing victory in Iraq. In fact it's already started.

I really should have seen this coming. . .

Déjà vu?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3081

Just in case there’s any doubt that these decisions are being made under fundamentally political calculations. . . .

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008837
[Josh Marshall] No leaving Iraq until 2009, the president says. But then the administration leaks word that the pull-out is in 2007. No plan -- just whatever sounds best at the moment.

Against a phased withdrawal before they were for it.

They can't keep their story straight. . .

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008836

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115100176090444950

Anyway, the insurgents are already saying they aren’t interested in making any deals (Why should they? THEY’RE WINNING. The U.S. has to start pulling out troops sooner or later, and when we do the Iraqi government will never be able to contain them. What comes next is anyone’s guess, but it will NEVER be a stable democracy. All the Bush claims to the contrary are sugar-spun candy for domestic consumption)

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2242602,00.html

Bush was right: invading Iraq WILL lead to a realignment of the Middle East

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/world/middleeast/25syria.html
Wary of U.S., Syria and Iran Strengthen Ties

. . . Those changes illustrate what may well be a worrying phenomenon for Washington as it seeks to contain Iran and isolate Syria: the two governments, and their people, are tightening relations on several fronts as power in the region shifts away from the once dominant Sunni to Shiites, led by Iran. . .

Good question: why aren’t the Democrats making a bigger issue of Bush’s plan for permanent bases in Iraq? (And can any Iraqi government survive that agrees to them?)

http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/yglesias/2006/jun/24/democrats_and_iraq

More: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009074.php

One of the lynchpins of pre-war lies: the source known as “Curveball”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/24/AR2006062401081.html
In late January 2003, as Secretary of State Colin Powell prepared to argue the Bush administration's case against Iraq at the United Nations, veteran CIA officer Tyler Drumheller sat down with a classified draft of Powell's speech to look for errors. He found a whopper: a claim about mobile biological labs built by Iraq for germ warfare. . . . Drumheller instantly recognized the source, an Iraqi defector suspected of being mentally unstable and a liar. The CIA officer took his pen, he recounted in an interview, and crossed out the whole paragraph.

A few days later, the lines were back in the speech. . .

Those goofs in Miami

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7768.html
By any reasonable measure, the Bush administration's track record on exposing dangerous terrorist plots isn't terribly impressive. . .

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2006/06/miamis_dangerous_terrorist_cell.html
The Justice Department has a terrible track record of exaggeration when it comes to claiming that they've uncovered terrorist cells in the US. . .

Grover Norquist: nailed

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000988.php
[Paul Kiel] It's now clear to anyone who's paid attention that Norquist used his non-profit, Americans for Tax Reform, as a money-washing business and lobbying firm. . .

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/24/AR2006062401080.html

Can’t anyone connect the dots here?

http://makeashorterlink.com/?B2395435D
[AP] Wanted: Face time with President Bush or top adviser Karl Rove. Suggested donation: $100,000. The middleman: lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Blunt e-mails that connect money and access in Washington show that prominent Republican activist Grover Norquist facilitated some administration contacts for Abramoff's clients while the lobbyist simultaneously solicited those clients for large donations to Norquist's tax-exempt group. . .

The new CW is that the rampant corruption and abuses of power by the Republicans, even though they have been thoroughly documented (and with even more to come), won’t be the deciding factor in the fall elections

More: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2006/06/the_friday_line_2.html

Well, if that’s not a reason to dump them, how about this, then?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/23/AR2006062301719.html
The Republican-controlled Congress seems to be struggling lately to carry out its most basic mission: passing legislation. . .

More: http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/24/143741/960

Running scared on immigration . . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/washington/25bush.html

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/24/AR2006062400469.html

Global warming: “Worse than we thought”

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009077.php

I know it’s not this simple, and the numbers can change, but doesn’t Mark Kleiman have a point here?

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/campaign_2008_/2006/06/on_not_having_to_run_the_table.php
According to a Harris Interactive poll. . .

48% say they would "definitely not vote for" Al Gore;
47% say they would "definitely not vote for" Hillary Clinton;
47% say they would "definitely not vote for" John Kerry. . .

That suggests to me that. . . the Democrats shouldn't nominate Gore, Clinton, or Kerry.

I must admit, this is kinda fun: Markos Moulitsas (Kos, of Daily Kos) has been embroiled in a big fight with the (once liberal) New Republic – and, my, have these boys been pissy with each other

http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2006/06/cage_match_pass.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009073.php

Bonus item: The Boss, on CNN. Don’t miss it!

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/23/video-springsteen-hits-coulter-defends-right-to-take-a-stand-on-political-issues/

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:25 AM

 
LOSING

The Bush gang says the Democrats are traitors to suggest setting a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, but guess what? The Iraqi government is about to ask us to do just that. Now what?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7374-2239088,00.html
THE Iraqi Government will announce a sweeping peace plan as early as Sunday in a last-ditch effort to end the Sunni insurgency that has taken the country to the brink of civil war.

The 28-point package for national reconciliation will offer Iraqi resistance groups inclusion in the political process and an amnesty for their prisoners if they renounce violence and lay down their arms, The Times can reveal.

The Government will promise a finite, UN-approved timeline for the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Iraq; a halt to US operations against insurgent strongholds; an end to human rights violations, including those by coalition troops; and compensation for victims of attacks by terrorists or Iraqi and coalition forces. . .

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015155.html
The amnesty would apply to all but those who killed Iraqi civilians. Meaning, it would apply to those who killed U.S. soldiers -- unless they were members of al-Qaeda or similar "extreme group" considered not to be a legitimate resistance group or otherwise "beyond the pale." What does the Bush Administration think of this? They are divided. . .

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/23/232812/946

Nice summary of where we stand

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/23/91319/9991
[Bill from Portland Maine] 1. The Republican "hawks" love to boast of how quickly and efficiently the Iraqi security forces are getting trained and deployed to defeat the terrorists inside their country. They promise that "as the Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down."

2. The Republicans also love to boast that invading Iraq made America safer because we're "fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here."

3. Yesterday, Dick Cheney blew #1 and #2 all to hell with this jaw-dropping admission that we can never, ever pull our troops out:

"If we pull out, [the terrorists in Iraq] will follow us. It doesn't matter where we go. ... And it will continue---whether we complete the job or not in Iraq---only it'll get worse. Iraq will become a safe haven for terrorists."

The only conclusion that can be drawn from the vice president---the architect of this occupation---is, we're screwed. . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html
[Dan Froomkin] Vice President Cheney yesterday offered an unusually revealing glimpse of his worldview -- one in which a withdrawal from Iraq may have less to do with Iraq, and more to do with the message it would send to the world about the limits of American power.

In Cheney's view, withdrawal from Iraq would first and foremost make the United States look weak. . . Cheney really loathes weakness. . .

“State of emergency” http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7765.html

Great point: people say Bush doesn’t have a plan for Iraq, but that’s not exactly right. He does have a plan, but just doesn’t want to say what it is: permanent bases

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_665.html
[Matt Yglesias] Bush has a plan for Iraq all right, and it's trouble with a capital "T" and that rhymes with "P," which stands for "permanent bases". That's the reason he won't even make a vague promise to bring the troops home by Christmas (or whatever). That also explains the curious phenomenon by which the administration keeps hinting at troop withdrawals but insisting that the withdrawals must never have an endpoint. The plan is to withdraw troops -- most of them -- and leave the rest there . . . forever.

Oh, by the way, we’re losing the Afghan government too

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/23/13611/8430

Rove 101: when you have a political weakness, portray it as a strength

http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/apps/nl/newsletter2.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=917053

An open letter to the Democrats

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008830.php
[Josh Marshall] You're really doing a poor job in the public debate over Iraq. . .

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115110491610966608

Headline madness, part one: the Republicans, led by nothing-to-lose Rick Santorum, dump a load of manure about “finding the WMD’s” in Iraq. NO ONE believes this is true, not even Bush’s own Defense Dept. Right-wing talk radio and Fox, predictably, trumpet this nonsense as “proof” that Bush was right all along. And how does one of the few major outlets to even address this ridiculous lie portray it?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/22/AR2006062201839.html
Democrats Criticize Claim on Iraqi Arms

More: http://mediamatters.org/items/200606230008

http://santorumexposed.com/serendipity/archives/175-Weapons-of-Minor-Discomfort.html

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/23/212013/509

Headline madness, part two: the great Miami terrorist haul. But a few problems. One, they aren’t Muslim and have no connection to Al Qaeda – they’re HOMEGROWN. Two, they had made no significant progress toward even beginning to implement their pipedreams

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/sears23.html
Sears Tower terror plot foiled

. . . . Managers of the Sears Tower, the nation's tallest building, said in a statement they speak regularly with the FBI and local law enforcement about terror threats and that Thursday "was no exception." . . . "Law enforcement continues to tell us that they have never found evidence of a credible terrorism threat against Sears Tower that has gone beyond criminal discussions," the statement said. . .

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/23/us/22cnd-indict.html

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008833
[Josh Marshall] It seems the new terrorist cell rolled up near Miami was in such preliminary stages of launching their jihad that they hadn't yet set aside time to become Muslims. . . .

http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/cair-miami-cult-not-muslims-i-just-saw.html

And then there’s this: http://daoureportgrit.blogspot.com/2006/06/sears-tower-terror-plot-demolishes.html
[Peter Daou] The notion that "we're fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here" has been nullified by the news that "a federal indictment against seven men revealed Friday details of what the government said was a plan to "kill all the devils we can" by blowing up Chicago's Sears Tower." . . . Apparently, they are here. Whether or not we're fighting them there.

Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed, about to get their turn in the harsh Abramoff spotlight

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000988.php

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/06/23/politics/main1746140.shtml

Bob Ney (R-OH): situation hopeless

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/22/AR2006062201711.html

The governor of Kentucky is still selectively banning progressive, but not conservative, political blogs

http://www.bluegrassreport.org/bluegrass_politics/2006/06/youre_kidding_r.html

The Bush gang is going to keep hammering the press whenever they publish a story the Bush gang doesn’t want let out – and the press MUST keep on doing it

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/24/washington/24swift.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/cheneys-offended.html
[Cheney] "What I find most disturbing about these stories is that some of the news media take it upon themselves to disclose vital national security programs, thereby making it more difficult for us to prevent future attacks against the American people," Cheney said. "That offends me."

[Joe] Is he kidding?

Cheney and his Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, disclosed vital national security information to the news media for political reasons. They made it more difficult to prevent attacks against the American people. They put partisan politics first -- before national security. . .

More: http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002726989

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/23/state_secrets/

Bonus item: Ah-nuld will not send more California National Guard troops to help Bush’s ill-conceived border protection plan

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-guard24jun24_wr,0,5500493.story

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:10 AM

 
MAKE THEM PAY

Remember those heady days, not so long ago, when everyone was hinting that Bush would start drawing down troop numbers significantly? That’s not what he’s saying now. . .

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008824.php
[Josh Marshall] The president says he wants to stay in Iraq for at least three more years. Virtually every Republican agrees. Three more years. . . They don't have a plan. . .

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_18_atrios_archive.html#115101079707623956
[Atrios] Bush is on the record is stating that there is no chance that the war will be over before he leaves office. . .

[NB: When some other poor schmuck will have to make the tough call to bring troops home, and be savaged for it]

Cheney’s lies

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/22/214110/353
[Georgia10] The most infuriating aspect of the administration's "stay the course until we drive off the cliff" strategy in Iraq is this oft-repeated lie: that sacrificing some 2,500 lives and spending billions of dollars in a country that splitting apart at its seams is necessary to secure our safety here at home. The Vice-President repeated this lie again today . . . This is, of course, the most cowardly of lies, meant to lull the American people into a sense of security, as if tethering ourselves permanently in Iraq will somehow keep terrorists quarantined in the Middle East.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115102325862918632
[Gene Lyons] Murtha didn’t say so, but there’s no chance of an Iraqi democracy friendly to the U.S. That’s a delusion. . . [read on!]

What do the American people want?

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/22/19377/0928

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_18_atrios_archive.html#115098144817952746
[Atrios] Republicans really believe that by promising to stay in Iraq forever they'll win elections. I do think the politics of Iraq are a bit tricky, even though the press completely ignores polls showing that the Democratic positions are in fact popular, but it's up to Democrats to make the public understand that this is in fact what the Republicans are gloating about.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/while-you-were-politicking.html
[Joe] The White House has completely failed in Iraq. They can't run a war, but they can run political campaigns. So, the Bush administration is blatantly treating the Iraq war as just another political operation. It's all about politics for them . . . CNN's Dana Bash just said the GOP is "downright giddy" about the current debate. They're all loving it. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009066.php
[Kevin Drum] Scratch a Republican and I'll bet a lot of them. . . know in their hearts that this administration can't win the war in Iraq, but they can't stand the thought of withdrawing because it seems too much like surrender. So they're stuck supporting a war they know is a losing effort.

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/22/114513/237

http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/specialguests/2006/jun/22/gop_on_iraq_more_of_the_same

Mr. Bush, why are the majority of those detainees being imprisoned at Guantanamo?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_18_atrios_archive.html#115101878443186765
[Bush] "there are some that need to be tried in US courts. . .”

First your phone and Internet records, now your financial records – they won’t stop until we stop them

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/22/washington/22cnd-intel.html

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015148.html

Is the Bush gang considering a pre-emptive strike against North Korea? Hard to get a straight answer on this one

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/22/north_korea/index.html?source=war_room.rss

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7752.html

Rick Santorum, clown

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/santorums-discovery.html

Where did he get this WMD information? http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/are-us-intelligence-agencies-trying-to.html

Pat Roberts (R-KS), having forestalled the crucial part of his Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the abuse of prewar intelligence on Iraq, is now prepared to follow the only remaining course of action: shut down that part of the investigation entirely

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_140.html#002890
[Greg Sargent] It's hard to describe just how ridiculous and transparently corrupt this is. . .

More: http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_141.html#002891

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009063.php

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004451.html

Apparently, Bob Ney (R-OH) doesn’t know that lying to investigators is a crime whether you are under oath or not (just ask Scooter Libby)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008827

Speaking of Libby, I am now 100% convinced that Bush will pardon Libby before his case comes to trial. Having exonerated Rove (in their own minds), is there any chance they will let him go under oath and document his full involvement in the plan to out Plame and punish Wilson? Will they ever let the extent of Cheney’s role and knowledge be revealed? I actually believe that this is why Fitzgerald hasn’t pushed marginal cases for perjury or obstruction – because if he can get Rove and Cheney's testimony on record, the main effects (in terms of losing their jobs) will be the same. Or they will have to perjure themselves. I don’t see how Bush ever lets that happen

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115094229623899446

The coming Abramoff “bloodbath”

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008823

Democratic prospects to retake the Senate?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008819

Is Ann Coulter losing it?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/ann-coulter-loses-it-during-radio.html

Bonus item: Oh my, a nasty little dust-up in the progressive blogosphere. I have to let you know about this one. . .

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/22/townhouse/index.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:28 AM

 
REALITY CHECK

Looks like Ron Suskind’s new book is going to be a gold mine of devastating revelations about the Bush gang – if anyone is paying attention, that is

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/21/162612/616
[Salon] We've known for years now that George W. Bush received a presidential daily briefing on Aug. 6, 2001, in which he was warned: "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." We've known for almost as long that Bush went fishing afterward.

What we didn't know is what happened in between the briefing and the fishing, and now Suskind is here to tell us. Bush listened to the briefing, Suskind says, then told the CIA briefer: "All right. You've covered your ass, now."

Wow, more: http://yglesias.tpmcafe.com/blog/yglesias/2006/jun/20/things_i_learned_today

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2006/06/the_fountainhead_of_torture.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/06/19/BL2006061900578.html

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7738.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004443.html

Their priorities: Republicans can’t find a reason to increase the minimum wage, which has been flat for a decade, but they can find time to raise their own salaries and cut the inheritance tax further

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002474.html

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/06/08/news/cong.php

Here’s one thing they AREN’T going to be dealing with any time soon – immigration

http://makeashorterlink.com/?F2761205D
[AP] In a defeat for President Bush, Republican congressional leaders said Tuesday that broad immigration legislation is all but doomed for the year. . .

Something else the Republicans don’t want to pass: the renewal of the Voting Rights Act

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/house-gop-stops-voting-on-extending.html

More trouble for Denny Hastert (R-IL)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/21/AR2006062102210.html

The Bush gang BUYS phone records (without a warrant)

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/bush-administration-using-creepy.html

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/20/132736/160

Will Congress look into NSA domestic spying? That would be a definite “maybe”

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/serious-rumblings-and-awakenings-in.html

More people with a “mental disorder” – this time working for Rumsfeld’s own Defense Dept

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001499.php

Woo boy: Dusty Foggo, former #3 CIA official and (allegedly) a frequent beneficiary of the Cunningham/Wilkes “hospitality suites,” is “singing like a bird”

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004441.html

Rick Santorum: proof that any idiot can become a Senator

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/21/santorum-wmd/
“Congressman Hoekstra and I are here today to say that we have found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq . . .”

More: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/santorums-discovery.html

Defense Dept: Nope! http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/21/dod-disavows-santorum/



It’s true: they just make stuff up, assuming that the press won’t call them on it – and usually they’re right. Here’s Tony Snow’s latest howler

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008800

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008804

Who are all those damn gutless pacifists who support John Murtha’s call for troop withdrawal from the quagmire in Iraq?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/real-troops-support-murtha.html
[Joe] The traditional media has given great coverage to the attacks on Murtha from the GOP - led by Karl Rove. Yet, the traditional media - like most people in D.C. -- know that Murtha has impeccable sources within the military. He is channeling the voice of the military leaders about the real situation in Iraq. . . . When AP talked to real soldiers from Murtha's district, not DC-based GOP operatives, they found that soldiers were on Murtha's side. . .

David Safavian convicted, and the press gets amnesia about who he worked for

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

Ernie Fletcher, the utterly corrupt (and stupid) governor of Kentucky, blocks a blog that is critical of his record, then blocks all the blogs that criticize him for blocking it!

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008803

Ann Coulter’s obsession. . .

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_18_atrios_archive.html#115092155506883740

Bonus item: I hope that new constitutional amendment on defacing the flag will put an end to outrages like this

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/did-george-bush-deface-american-flags.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:27 AM

 
PARDON ME?

Here’s why Bush is likely to pardon Libby, sooner rather than later: he absolutely can’t afford the testimony that would come out in az trial, and he can’t afford to let his people – especially Rove and even perhaps Cheney, testify there under oath

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008789.php

Why the media will accept it meekly without question: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_18_atrios_archive.html#115077579613685097

How Cheney became the driving force of U.S. foreign policy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

And, on the subject of Cheney: what a COMPLETE LIAR he is!

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/19/cheney-defends-last-throes-2/

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7727.html

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/06/19/D8IBFKU05.html
"I don't think anybody anticipated the level of violence that we've encountered”. . .

Yep, Bush must be feeling pretty cozy in his position right now – he’s back in hyper-macho, smug frat-boy mode

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115076709383035704

The press: we LIKE being used http://mediamatters.org/items/200606190003

Rumsfeld’s Pentagon classifies homosexuality as a “mental disorder”

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060619/D8IBIJS00.html

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/pentagon-document-still-classifies.html

[NB: Someone should ask Cheney if he thinks his daugher has a "mental disorder"]

Gotta give ‘em credit: Truthout stands 100% (well, 99%) behind their original story – an indictment WAS issued for Rove

http://forum.truthout.org/blog/story/2006/6/19/185947/499
[Marc Ash] Our sources continue to maintain that a grand jury has in fact returned an indictment. Our sources said that parts of the indictment were read to Karl Rove and his attorney on Friday, May 12, 2006. Last week, we pointed to a sealed federal indictment, case number "06 cr 128," which is still sealed and we are still pointing to it. During lengthy conversations with our sources over the past month, they reiterated that the substance of our report on May 13, 2006, was correct. . .

That leaves the most important question: If our sources maintain that a grand jury has returned an indictment - and we have pointed to a criminal case number that we are told corresponds to it - then how is it possible that Patrick Fitzgerald is reported to have said that 'he does not anticipate seeking charges against Rove at this time?' . . .

What appears to have happened is that - and this is where Truthout blundered - in our haste to report the indictment we never considered the possibility that Patrick Fitzgerald would not make an announcement. We simply assumed - and we should not have done so - that he would tell the press. He did not. Fitzgerald appears to have used the indictment, and more importantly, the fear that it would go public, to extract information about the Plame outing case from Rove. . .

The electronic communication from Fitzgerald to Luskin, coming immediately on the heels of our Monday morning, June 12 article "Sealed vs. Sealed" that became the basis for the mainstream media's de facto exoneration of Karl Rove was, our sources told us, negotiated quickly over the phone later that afternoon. Luskin contacted Fitzgerald, reportedly providing concessions that Fitzgerald considered to be of high value, and Fitzgerald reportedly reciprocated with the political cover Rove wanted in the form of a letter that was faxed to Luskin's office.

Our sources provided us with additional detail, saying that Fitzgerald is apparently examining closely Dick Cheney's role in the Valerie Plame matter, and apparently sought information and evidence from Karl Rove that would provide documentation of Cheney's involvement. Rove apparently was reluctant to cooperate and Fitzgerald, it appears, was pressuring him to do so, our sources told us. . .

More: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000941.php

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009043.php

What a disaster at CIA Porter Goss was. Now they’re trying to fix the things he screwed up

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/18/AR2006061800779.html

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004426.html

Err. . . .ahem: Dubai still controls those U.S. ports, and Congress has apparently decided to look the other way

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/cnn-dubai-still-controls-22-us-ports.html

Abusing the Constitutional amendment process for purely political purposes: why are we talking about a Flag Burning amendment to the Constitution when no one has been seen burning an American flag in the U.S. for thirty years!?

http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/apps/nl/newsletter2.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=917053

“The Dumbest Law Ever” http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/dumbest-law-ever.html

I’ve said it before: eventually Tony Snow is going to put his foot in it in a way he won’t be able to explain away. He has neither the experience nor the disposition to be a good press secretary

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6332

Bonus item: early (VERY early) handicapping on the Democratic race for the 2008 nomination – it’s down to three already

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/19/14253/6791

Or not: http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/19/14145/8824

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:42 AM

 
WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON

What’s really going on in Iraq: in the heady aftermath of Bush’s showboating trip, an astonishing memo from Ambassador Khalilzad tells what things are really like there

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/16/AR2006061601768.html
“An Arab newspaper editor told us he is preparing an extensive survey of ethnic cleansing, which he said is taking place in almost every Iraqi province, as political parties and their militias are seemingly engaged in tit-for-tat reprisals all over Iraq.". . . [go read it all]

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115065281623062500
[Digby] In a very straighforward descriptive style, Khalilzad writes that Iraqis must hide the fact that they work for the US or face ostracism or worse. Women are being treated only slightly better than if they were living under the Taliban in 1999 --- and they are being asked to wear clothing that Khalilzad admits was not even required by the most repressive Iranian Ayatollahs. They are losing their driving privileges and are considered suspicious if they use a cell phone. . . People are being gouged for electricity, to which they barely have access anyway (in 115 degree heat!) They face kidnappings and violence every day of their lives. Sectarian divisions are showing up in all their social interactions, even among families. They must adopt separate customs, dress and manner of speaking to travel freely through various neighborhoods in Baghdad or risk violence. They cannot trust the security forces, who seem to be getting more hostile to the population, especially those who work for the US. Their anxiety is palpable as they feel their lives are hurling out of control. . .

The country has obviously already spiraled into a state of civil war. It's not surprising that it's taken on this character of secret informants, ethnic cleansing, paranoia and neighborhood militias because the whole society was shaped by an authoritarian police state. But civil war it is, and from the sound of this cable, it's happening on a far more fundamental level than we knew. The whole society is breaking down from inside out. . . [Khalilzad] pretty much says that he doesn't know if he can trust his own employees much longer because they are being driven a little bit crazy by fear and paranoia. . .

More: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002690071

http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/yglesias/2006/jun/19/confidentional_memo_from_us_embassy_baghdad
[Matt Yglesias] You'd think this cable might get some more press. For that matter, you'd think some American newspaper editors might want to look into this whole widespread ethnic cleansing question.

Want more? Here are Iraqi military experts, talking about their troops and the war effort

http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/iraqi-military-experts-discuss-iraqi.html

What’s really going on in Guantanamo, from two of the reporters kicked out of there

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015109.html

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-op-williams18jun18,0,3393296.story

What’s really going on in Afghanistan: the Bush gang can’t even keep its lies straight

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/19/14324/6768

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/17/AR2006061700784.html

Whoa – don’t mess with Jack Murtha

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/18/washington/18cnd-cong.html
Representative John P. Murtha, the Pennsylvania Democrat and Vietnam War veteran pushing for a quick withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, today mocked Karl Rove, the president's senior adviser, for championing the war while "sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside." . . . Mr. Murtha, in an appearance on the NBC News program "Meet the Press," was responding to a speech Mr. Rove delivered in New Hampshire last week attacking Democrats for what he called "that party's old pattern of cutting and running."

When Mr. Murtha was asked today for his reaction to Mr. Rove's remarks, he said: "He's making a political speech. He's sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside saying, 'Stay the course.' That's not a plan. . . We’ve got to change direction. You can’t sit there in the air-conditioned office and tell troops carrying 70 pounds on their backs, inside these armored vessels hit with IEDs every day, seeing their friends blown up, their buddies blown up — and he says stay the course? Easy to say that from Washington, DC.”

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/18/murtha-rove/

Meanwhile, the Republicans are more interested in voting on symbolic and politically driven resolutions than a real plan for peace

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/18/opinion/18sun1.html
[NYT] Rather than engage in a serious debate about America's future course in Iraq, President Bush and the Republican Congress have again opted for sound bites and partisanship. Yet all the choreographed posturing and a one-week flurry of good news cannot blot out the larger picture of dubious trends and dismal prospects. . .

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/18/22547/4206

Tony Snow follows up his response to 2500 dead US troops in Iraq as just “a number” with this gem . . .

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/18/snow-focus-kidnapped/
[Snow] The thing is the way the war is being covered — and we’ve seen it right now, we have two U.S. servicemen, and god bless them, we hope they’re okay. We’re focusing on them and we forget that since Zarqawi was killed, hundreds of bad guys have been rounded up, there has been a lot of intelligence. . . There is a lot going on there. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/white-house-spokesman-tony-snow-says.html
[John Aravosis] [I]f you're a current or former US service member, or the family or friend of a US service member, once again take note. It's the Democrats and the liberals and the traditional media that are concerned about the well-being of US soldiers in Iraq. Whether it's body armor, kidnappings, having sufficient manpower, having a plan for success, it's the folks on the left and the traditional media who are always the one actually concerned about our troops. And it's the Republicans who don't give a damn. . .

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061401928.html

More Republican complaints that talking about how badly the war is going is unpatriotic

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/18/175134/046

Denny Hastert’s (R-IL, Speaker of the House) turn on the grill?

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0606180254jun18,1,4341439.story

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_18.php#008777

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/hastert-shows-america-how-to-make.html

You can’t talk about the problem of immigration without talking about the companies that hire these workers at sub-market wages

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/18/AR2006061800613.html
The Bush administration, which is vowing to crack down on U.S. companies that hire illegal workers, virtually abandoned such employer sanctions before it began pushing to overhaul U.S. immigration laws last year, government statistics show. . .

And did you know that “illegal immigrants,” those lousy parasites, PAY U.S. TAXES (even though they’re not eligible for many public services)?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/19/business/19illegals.html

More: http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20060501.shtml

More and more talk about a pardon for Libby

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-uspard0618,0,467087.story

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004425.html

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3060

Karl Rove says Democrats are only using the Internet to spread hate and anger

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/17/223457/969
"I do also think that the Internet has proven to be a more powerful tool on our side than it has been for the other side," Rove told VictoryNH.com, a non-partisan Website founded by a former Ambassador who has raised and contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to strictly Republican candidates. "It has proven to be a tool on our side to sort of unite Conservatives and have a healthy intra-movement dialogue," Rove explained. "But it's essentially been something that has helped us gain in influence and broaden our appeal.". .

"Among Democrats, my sense is that the blog world has tended to strengthen the far Left of the Democratic Party at the expense of liberal, but somewhat less liberal, members of their party," Rove said. . . Instead of "focusing on good ideas," Rove opined that the "Internet for the Left of the Democratic Party" only "mobilize hate and anger."

Back when Democrats didn’t feel the need to apologize for being Democrats -- a brilliant FDR speech from 1932. Don’t miss it

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/18/15236/3491

Can a Senator (from either party) become President?

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/18/122411/867

Bonus item: Mission Impossible IV?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009035.php

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115062692617071008

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:35 AM

 
OFF THE LEASH

The Pentagon on torture: “oops!”

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3058
[WP] A secretive military Special Operations group in Iraq used several unauthorized interrogation tactics on detainees in early 2004 after it erroneously received an outdated policy from commanders in Baghdad . . . . [read on]

More human rights abuses in Gitmo

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015106.html
[Jeralyn Merritt] As if it's not bad enough that at least one of the Guantanamo detainees who committed suicide last week didn't know he had been cleared for release, now we find out some of them didn't even know they had lawyers. . .

The Department of Homeland Security breeds lobbying scumbuckets

http://www.slate.com/id/2143965
[Joshua Kucera] The top story in the New York Times is the exodus of top Department of Homeland Security officials to the private sector and the loopholes that allow them to lobby the government soon after their departure. . . . While the revolving door from government to industry is old news in Washington, the Homeland Security exodus appears to be unique in its scale: More than two-thirds of the department's most senior executives have moved on to the far bigger paychecks of lobbying and consulting firms, the NYT reports.

The law forbids government officials from lobbying their former department or agency for a year after their departure. Homeland Security officials have shrunk that timeline by a variety of methods, many not unique to that department. But the piece identifies one key rule change, "created in late 2004 at the request of senior department officials, when the first big wave of departures began." The department was divided into seven components for purposes of the lobbying laws, so now a former official can lobby DHS officials right away, as long as the lobbyees are from one of the six components the official did not work for before.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/18/washington/18lobby.html

Bush’s magical gift for human insight

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/17/AR2006061700662.html
President Bush flew to Baghdad last week to size up Iraq's new leader. "I have come not only to thank you," he told American troops gathered in the Green Zone on Tuesday, "but to look Prime Minister Maliki in the eyes -- to determine whether or not he is as dedicated to a free Iraq as you are."

The presidential determination? "I believe he is," Bush said.

The snap assessment recalled Bush's famous assertion that he had sensed Vladimir Putin's soul and showed how Bush often appears more comfortable with his gut-level assessment of foreign leaders than the one he gets from briefing papers prepared by his intelligence agencies. . .

Oh, yeah, that major White House shake-up sure has brought in new voices and perspectives

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/17/16412/5716

A pardon for Libby?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015107.html

The kind of people they are

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/17/125224/071
[Matt Stoller] Jack Burkman is a Republican lobbyist who thinks that gay marriage is 'five times more important than the war on terror and the war in Iraq combined'. He lobbies for the Family Research Council, the far right Christianist hate group, and Caring to Love Ministries, an anti-abortion group in Louisiana. . . I guess it's not a surprise then that Burkman has been soliciting girls in a gay pride parade for prostitution. . .

WP profile on Jason Leopold leaves his credibility in shreds – and I’m sorry for ever giving his “scoops” space here

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/16/AR2006061601754.html

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/washington-post-destroys-jason-leopold.html

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015104.html

Jamison Foser’s opus on media accountability

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606160008

Sunday talk show line-ups

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/17/AR2006061700650.html
FOX NEWS SUNDAY: White House press secretary Tony Snow, New Democrat Network President Simon Rosenberg and Center for American Progress President John D. Podesta.

THIS WEEK (ABC): Preempted by World Cup coverage.

FACE THE NATION (CBS): Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.); and Snow.

MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), Shell Oil Co. President John Hofmeister, ConocoPhillips Co. Chairman James J. Mulva and Chevron Corp. Chairman David J. O' Reilly.

LATE EDITION (CNN): Sens. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.); Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, former secretary of state Lawrence S. Eagleburger, former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski and Snow.

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:56 AM

 
ISN’T IT IRONIC?

Oh, man, count the ironies here

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/northern_california/14837174.htm
Pentagon investigators threatened the death penalty and used other coercive techniques to obtain statements from some of the seven Marines and a Navy corpsman jailed for the shooting death of an Iraqi civilian, two defense lawyers say. . .

Jodka was questioned for up to eight hours at a time . . .

"They used some really heavy-handed tactics to extract the information”. . .

[NB: What, no electrodes? No snarling dogs? . . . ]

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/16/washington/16cnd-formica.html

Is “military intelligence,” as they say, an oxymoron? Read this, and judge for yourselves

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004416.html

More ironies: hard-line GOPers, who won’t hear of amnesty for illegal immigrants, are falling all over themselves to justify amnesty for insurgents who have been killing US troops

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115047916206408186

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/make-no-mistake-iraqi-government-does.html

[NB: And we ask, once again, what would happen if the Democrats had proposed such a thing?]

Tony says 2500 US troops dead in Iraq is just “a number.”

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/harry-reid-blasts-white-house-over.html

[NB: And we ask, again once again, what would happen if a Democrat said this?]

Lying for political advantage: when the media won’t point it out, what’s the cost?

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_124.html#002820

The Democrats get their hands on a briefing book for Congressional Republicans, prepared by the PENTAGON, to give them guidelines on how to play the Iraq issue (and it might be illegal)

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7707.html

Beyond cynical

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/17/washington/17cong.html

How Donald Rumsfeld is ruining the nation’s military

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6313

Total Information Awareness: despite the fact that Congress pulled funding for it, you never really thought the Bush gang would give it up, did you?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_11.php#008767
[Justin Rood] The ill-conceived datamining effort is back, and worse than ever -- they've stripped privacy protections and abuse safeguards from the system . . .

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004413.html

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000924.php

What does the announcement that Rove won’t be indicted mean for Truthout, which published a report that he already was?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015098.html

How did Rove get away with it?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3057

What questions about Rove should the media be pressing now?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/06/13/BL2006061300764.html

What will happen when all of Bush’s recess appointments need to come back for formal approval?

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6320

The 2004 election theft: does anyone care any more? (thanks to Susan Madrak for the links)

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_mark_cri_060616_some_might_call_it_t.htm

More: http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_greg_pal_060616_african_american_vot.htm

Credit where credit is due. I like Hillary’s Privacy Bill of Rights

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/hillary-calls-for-privacy-bill-of.html

Bonus item: Groundhog Day? Please wake me

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7709.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 4:48 AM

 
ENOUGH!

OK, I’m ticked off about the Rove situation and extra-grumpy tonight. I am SICK AND TIRED of. . .

. . . of the media acting like hired help to the WH public relations machine

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6301
After the release of a picture depicting White House counselor Dan Bartlett and press secretary Tony Snow wearing helmets and flak jackets while riding in a helicopter in Iraq, CNN chief national correspondent John King reported that President Bush also wore protective gear during the helicopter ride, but that members of the media "did not get to photograph" Bush . . .


. . . of the callous dismissal of US troop casualties by the people who put them in harm’s way

http://makeashorterlink.com/?L2051594D
[AP] American deaths since the invasion of Iraq have reached 2,500, marking a grim milestone. . . "It's a number," White House press secretary Tony Snow told reporters at the White House. . .

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7698.html

. . . of the pretense that we are in Iraq at the request of the government there

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060615/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_troop_withdrawal_1
Iraq's vice president has asked President Bush for a timeline for the withdrawal of foreign forces from Iraq, the Iraqi president's office said. . . Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, a Sunni, made the request during his meeting with Bush on Tuesday, when the U.S. president made a surprise visit to Iraq.

"I supported him in this," President Jalal Talabani said in a statement released Wednesday. . .

Bush made it clear during his visit that the U.S. military presence — now at about 132,000 troops — would continue. . .

. . . of Republicans, oh-so-tough on the war, who are prepared to throw every principle overboard if it will get the troops out and save their hides in the fall election

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115040777237169630
[DSCC] This afternoon on the Senate floor, several Senate Republicans are DEFENDING the proposal to give amnesty to terrorists who have killed or wounded American troops. . .

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115040866727974101

. . . of Arlen Specter’s double-talk and cowardice

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/specter-falsely-denied-proposing_15.html

. . . of the Bush-appointed judiciary, which endorses police-state activities

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015092.html
The police have little incentive to obey the constitutional requirement to knock and announce their presence before busting down doors to serve search warrants, thanks to a 5-4 Supreme Court decision issued today. Justice Alito provided the tie-breaking vote. . .

. . . of Donald Rumsfeld’s assault on human rights

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015087.html
So much for freedom of the press. Journalists have been forced to leave Guantanamo in the wake of the suicides. . .

. . . of the Bush gang’s obsession with secrecy and keeping information from the public

http://susiemadrak.com/2006/06/16/07/06/under-the-rug/
[LAT] Senate Democrats on Thursday accused the Bush administration of withholding key details about toxic waste sites that present risks of exposure to nearby residents. . .

. . . of the inability of the press to ask, and get answers, for the simplest of questions about Rove’s firing offenses

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015083.html
Did Karl Rove lie to investigators in the fall of 2003? . . .[read on]

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/15/rovespin/index.html

. . . of Tony Snow’s Me Big Dummy style of dodging questions

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/15/snow/index.html
Question: Tony [Snow], the investigation of Karl Rove is now over. Why is it, then, inappropriate for the president or the White House, three years later, to finally give us some sort of explanation or assessment, judgment, of Karl Rove's actions when it had nothing to do with the Libby trial?

Snow: Because, as you know, there is -- well, they may have. There is talk that he may be called --

Question: Scott McClellan has nothing to do with the Libby trial ...

Snow: Well, that's fine. I will continue my statement first. I can't give you any texture or background on the Scott/Karl stuff, because I wasn't here. But the president made it pretty clear that a lot of this stuff -- and as you know, Peter, once you get up on the stand, and Karl may be called to the stand -- they can ask about anything. And so it is our view that we're simply not going to get involved in making comments on something that may be brought to trial, when Scooter Libby is still under indictment and is going to go to trial with the special prosecutor. The other thing is that Karl, apparently, the prosecutor found nothing untoward in what Karl has done, there is no indictment. But we're just not going to go into it. You could go at it 58 different angles, I'm still not going to give you an answer.

Question: Let me ask a general question then. In 2000, the president said it wasn't enough to simply not be indicted in the White House, that he had a higher ethical standard. Is that, in fact, still the ethical standard --

Snow: Yes.

Question: -- or, in fact, should we interpret from his comments yesterday that as long as you're not indicted, everything is fine?

Snow: Apparently, you've indicted Karl.

Question: No, I'm asking a question.

Snow: And yes, the answer is, the ethical standard still applies.

Question: And what is the ethical standard?

Snow: You tell me. I mean, the president said the higher ethical standard -- you were reciting a thing. You know what the president says is: You serve honorably, you serve well, you obey the law.

Question: And the reality is --

Question: Did Karl Rove serve honorably and serve --

Snow: Like I said, don't try to get me to bite on it because I'm not going to do it ...

Question: ... Is the vice president's office worried about what that may -- how intrusive [the Libby trial] could be, in terms of the inner operations of his office?

Snow: I don't have any idea. You'll have to deal with his office on that ...

Question: Tony, yesterday the president said that he's made the comments he's going to make about the Karl Rove matter, and now he's going to move forward. A year ago, he told us at least twice that he would be more than happy to comment further once the situation, the investigation was completed. Does this mean that despite telling us that he would comment further that now he isn't going to? Or does it mean that he will comment further and be happy to at a later date?

Snow: Well, I'm going to let his comments yesterday suffice. I'm not going to get beyond what he said yesterday, and we'll see what happens. That would be a why-don't-I-figure-it-out -- what the president said yesterday is he's not going to comment because the Libby trial is upcoming. I don't know if he has any plans --

Question: Has he made the comments he's going to make?

Snow: Victoria, I don't know if he has any plans. I just don't know. I can't give you an answer.

Question: Will that include appeals? How far can we stretch this?

Snow: I don't know, Peter. But I'll tell you what. It's obviously really important to you guys. I'll try to find out ...

Question: I have one other one on Karl Rove working in the White House, and the "honorable standard" question, which is that he's not being indicted, apparently. But three years ago -- I say "apparently" because I don't think anyone has seen the letter yet -- but three years ago he was asked about whether he has spoken to any reporter about whether Valerie Plame was --

Snow: OK, I'm not going to -- I can't get back into that question, because, frankly, I'm totally incompetent on it, and I'm not going to get in the middle of the Karl Rove thing. That all predates me.

Question: I can't even finish the question?

Snow: You can finish the question. I'll give you the same answer.

Question: ... Scott McClellan was asked whether in fact he had spoken to any reporter about whether Valerie Plame worked for the CIA. And the reply was that he had assured Scott McClellen that he wasn't involved in any of this.

Snow: Right. As I said, thank you for getting me in the middle of an old fight that I have no part in and I'm not -- I'm just not going to play on it. But thank --

Question: It seems clear, however that he spoke with Matt Cooper, Judith Miller and Robert Novak, so it would seem that the two answers don't match.

Snow: OK, thank you.

. . . of the Fox News/Bush Gang Mutual Stroking Society

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/15/cheney/index.html
Hannity: Well, I got to admit, these are good times for the administration. You got -- Zarqawi is dead, revenues are up significantly, the deficit has been cut significantly, the president's trip. And I'm also told there's some breaking news that a high-value insurgent has again been captured in Iraq just now.

Cheney: Well, you're ahead of me on that one. I knew about all the other stuff, Sean, but I hadn't heard that one yet.

Hannity: See, that's why I'm here, to bring you good news.

Cheney: That's right. (Laughter.) I got to tune in every day to find out what's really going on in the world.

Hannity: Three hours a day, Mr. Vice President, is all we ask. . . .

. . . of the media’s refusal to draw a clear contrast between the Democrats, who act to oust their own crooks, and Republicans, who bend over backwards to excuse theirs

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008760.php
Tonight, the House Democrats voted to strip Rep. Bill Jefferson of his seat on the House Ways & Means Committee. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi pushed very hard for this. And it's created a lot of controversy and tension within the Democratic caucus. . .

More: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060616/ap_on_go_co/democrats_jefferson_8

. . . of Ann Coulter, period

http://www.qando.net/Details.aspx?Entry=4060
John Hawkins: How about dashing off a quick sentence or even just a word or two about the following individuals... [John Murtha]

Ann Coulter: The reason soldiers invented "fragging."

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115042874917163279

Bonus item: in the Fall 2006 elections, the issue is Bush

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115040559807807714

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:48 AM

 
YOUR ROVING REPORTER

Man, I’m away from the Internet for a day and all hell breaks loose. OK, what does the Rove news mean?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/14/washington/14leak.html
Mr. Fitzgerald announced in a letter to Mr. Luskin on Monday that he would not indict Mr. Rove, who had testified on five occasions to a federal grand jury about his involvement in the disclosure of an intelligence officer's identity.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/13/AR2006061300267.html
Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald told Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, in a short letter delivered Monday afternoon that he "does not anticipate seeking charges" against Rove in the case, Luskin said. . .

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/06/13/some-things-to-contemplate/
[Christy Hardin Smith] What exactly does the phrase "doesn’t anticipate bringing charges" mean? . . . [read on]

Rove’s lawyer (not Fitzgerald) says he’s off the hook

http://www.crisispapers.org/essays6w/rove-skate.htm
[Bernard Weiner] Rove's lawyer won't release the text of Fitzgerald's letter that reportedly gives his client a walk. It's possible there are hints in the actual text indicating why Rove is free to go: on condition that he cooperate with the ongoing investigation, that sort of thing. . .

Is it significant that Fitzgerald hasn’t made any announcements?

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/06/13/dodging-cipa-graymail-bulletsand-other-legal-notes/
[Christy Hardin Smith] I’ve said this before, and I will say it again: unless and until I hear it from Patrick Fitzgerald, the investigation continues to be ongoing. Which means that there are still potential developments down the road, should the evidence (like handwritten marching orders on the Wilson op-ed in Dick Cheney’s handwriting) lead there. . . [read on]

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/13/rove3/index.html

Does this mean Rove cut a deal?

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/13/corallo/index.html
[Tim Grieve] Rove spokesman Mark Corallo says no. In an e-mail message, Corallo tells us: "There is no deal. Period."

In a follow-up interview, we asked Corallo if he could provide us a copy of the letter -- and he says there was a letter -- that Luskin says he received from Fitzgerald. He declined to do so, saying it has been the Rove team's long-standing policy not to release written communication from the special prosecutor. He insisted, however, that the letter says nothing at all about Rove's continuing cooperation with Fitzgerald's investigation. "There is nothing, there are no conditions, there were no discussions of any conditions or deals or anything of the sort," Corallo said. . .

Plame and Wilson may still sue him

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/valerie-plame-and-joe-wilson-may-sue.html

So, then, why exactly can’t the White House answer ALL the questions now about Rove’s role in outing Plame’s identity – which Bush set as the standard for getting fired?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008732.php
[Josh Marshall] The question going back three years ago now is whether Karl Rove knowingly participated in leaking the identity of a covert CIA operative for the purpose of discrediting a political opponent who was revealing information about the White House's use of intelligence in the lead-up to the Iraq War.

That was the issue. From the beginning, Rove, through Scott McClellan, denied that he did any of that. There weren't even any clever circumlocutions. He just lied. From admissions from Rove, filings in the Libby case, and uncontradicted reportage, we know as clearly as we ever can that Rove did do each of those things.

So he did do what he was suspected of and he did lie about it. . .

Rove and OJ: http://boilingmad.blogspot.com/2006/06/rovebush-pull-oj-today.html
Just as O.J. was cleared because of a jury decision, Rove was cleared for lack of a special counsel to investigate the Bush crimes. Also like O.J., Bush has promised to find the real leaker. . .

Bush says?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402160.html
President Bush yesterday reaffirmed his trust in White House strategist Karl Rove, and GOP allies said the longtime presidential adviser has no reason to apologize for his role in the disclosure of a CIA officer's identity three years ago.

"Along with others in the White House, I took a sigh of relief" when the news broke this week that Rove would not be charged in the CIA leak investigation, Bush told reporters in a Rose Garden news conference. "I trust Karl Rove." A senior White House official said Bush and his staff are eager to "put this behind us" as quickly as possible.

But while Rove appears out of legal jeopardy, partisans are already pressing a question that is likely to hound him and Bush for some time: Should Rove be held to account outside the legal system for his part in unmasking CIA officer Valerie Plame and initially telling the nation he was not involved?

The three-year investigation of the Plame leak did not result in criminal charges against Rove, but it did raise questions about his early denials. In 2003, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said he consulted Rove and was assured that the senior aide played no role in the leaking of Plame's name to the media. The White House left the clear impression that Rove knew nothing of the leak and certainly did not participate in it.

The subsequent federal investigation determined that Rove talked with at least two reporters about Plame before her identity was disclosed by columnist Robert D. Novak in July 2003, and that he relayed word of those conversations to other White House officials. . .

[NB: See, it’s just the “partisans” who are concerned that Bush stick to his own words, just the “partisans” who wants answers about what Rove’s role actually was. What a sorry excuse for an independent press]

More partisans: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/karl-rove-dreyfus-or-val_b_22894.html

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606130002

So now Rove is back on the case, crafting the message for 2006. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: cowardly Democrats will get you and your children killed

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/13/15236/5608
Rove, one of Washington's most powerful and polarizing figures who is under investigation in the leak of a CIA covert operative's name, chided Democrats for floating the idea of troop reductions in Iraq.

He specifically targeted Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and Pennsylvania Rep. John Murtha.

"Like too many Democrats it strikes me they are ready to give the green light to go to war, but when it gets tough, they fall back of that party's old platform of cutting and running. They may be with you for the first few bullets but they won't be there for the last tough battles," he said. . . [read on]

The internal GOP memo: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/14/boehner-memo/

Other ways Rove is spending his time

http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/coffeehouse/2006/jun/13/mr_rove_is_ready_for_his_close_up
[Mark Schmitt] Now I’m sure plenty of people here will be appropriately outraged by the fact that an official paid by taxpayers is out there raising money for a felon’s legal fees. . .

Yet despite Bush’s showboat trip to Iraq, this much-needed Rove news, and other good breaks, Bush’s popularity surge amounts to . . . 1%

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/media-cant-believe-it-bush-isnt-moving.html
[Joe] The media can't believe it, Bush isn't moving in the polls. . .

Ann Coulter, plagiarist

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/For_new_book_Coulter_cribs_adult_0613.html

http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2006/06/why-ann-coulters-plagiarism-matters.html

Bonus item: Bush chides blind reporter for wearing sunglasses

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/14/bush-reporter-shades/

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 2:50 PM

 
MEGHAN-IZED

Happy talk? If you want to know why we have such a screwed-up situation in Iraq, just read this

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/12/washington/12osullivan.html
At the end of each day, President Bush gets a three-to-four-page memo from the National Security Council staff about developments over the previous 24 hours in Iraq. The document, said to be written in the crisp, compelling style that the president prefers, can cover a range of issues — the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, new nominees for cabinet posts or the progress, or lack of it, in ending the three-year insurgency.

The person responsible for the memo is someone who is largely unknown outside the administration, but who colleagues say is instrumental in shaping Mr. Bush's views: Meghan L. O'Sullivan, the 36-year-old deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan, and the most senior official working on those nations full time at the White House. . .

Ms. O'Sullivan, who was crisp and wary in a recent interview in her office in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, would say little more about her conversations with Mr. Bush. But people who have seen her brief the president say she has been succinct, unpretentious, full of facts and cheerful — exactly what Mr. Bush likes. . .

In Baghdad, American Embassy officials sometimes use the phrase, "Let's not Meghan-ize the problem," meaning, let's not try to impose order on the chaos of Iraq with one of her five-point presentations. . .

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_569.html
[Matt Yglesias] Elisabeth Bumiller's profile of White House Iraq aide Meghan O'Sullivan is another reminder that, though it's impolite and possibly politically counterproductive to say so, the man in charge of this country seems to be a bit dimwitted. His Iraq briefing memos are only three pages long and "written in the crisp, compelling style that the president prefers." O'Sullivan is praised for her ability to "distill a complex mass of developments into something more penetrable" and for being "succinct, unpretentious, full of facts and cheerful — exactly what Mr. Bush likes."

The other thing is that even though the whole article's about Iraq, this isn't her exclusive focus. Instead, her job is "deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan." Is there any reason to combine those two jobs? They're different wars happening in different countries. Surely each is important enough to have a separate mid-level staffer as coordinator. The only rationale for collapsing the two jobs would seem to be maintaining the fiction that invading Iraq was, like toppling the Taliban, a straightforward response to 9-11.

Scapegoat? http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3045

Early indications coming out of Bush’s big two-day Iraq retreat are less than inspiring

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/12/AR2006061200271.html
Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, "will be making those assessments, as he told us today via the teleconference," Bush said. "He says he will make these proper assessments and come back to us and make recommendations to us. Whatever we do will be based upon the conditions on the ground. And whatever we do will be toward a strategy of victory”. . . “I thought your assessment of the situation in Iraq was very realistic," Bush told the officials in Baghdad when reporters were briefly allowed into the room. "I think your recommendations to us on how to win in Iraq, to have an Iraq that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself are -- your recommendations are valid."

But some things never change: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/13/washington/13prexy.html
It came as Republicans began a new effort to use last week's events to turn the war to their political advantage after months of anxiety, and to sharpen attacks against Democrats. On Monday night, the president's top political strategist, Karl Rove, told supporters in New Hampshire that if the Democrats had their way, Iraq would fall to terrorists and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi would not have been killed. . . "When it gets tough, and when it gets difficult, they fall back on that party's old pattern of cutting and running," Mr. Rove said at a state Republican Party gathering in Manchester.

Tom Friedman, enabler

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_577.html
[Ben Adler] The Tom Friedman column mocked ‘round the world (in which he boldly declared for the umpteenth time that "the next six months are crucial in Iraq") just gets funnier as Friedman goes on the defensive. . .

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115013580415816716

Serious people across the political spectrum are sounding pretty pessimistic about our prospects in Iraq

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7666.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009001.php

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/12/apology/index.html

Permanent bases in Iraq? The Bush gang’s doubletalk

http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/apps/nl/newsletter2.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=917053
"It is not only our plan but our policy that we do not intend to have any permanent bases in Iraq," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt -- the Central Command deputy commander for planning and strategy in Iraq -- promised in January. The following month, Undersecretary of State Karen Hughes was asked if the U.S. planned to keep permanent military bases in Iraq. "No," Hughes responded, "we want to bring our people home as soon as possible." But the New York Times reported yesterday that officials have begun to "look at the costs of maintaining a force of roughly 50,000 troops there for years to come, roughly the size of the American presence maintained in the Philippines and Korea for decades after those conflicts." This is not the first signal the administration has sent on a permanent military presence in Iraq. When asked if "U.S. forces could be in Iraq five or even 10 years down the road," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would not deny the possibility. Newsweek reported on the administration's efforts to build up military installations in Iraq with $1.1 billion in military construction. And despite unanimous agreements against permanent base funding in both the House and Senate Iraq spending bills, conservatives quietly killed the provision last week. Researchers have "found a link between support for attacks and the belief among Iraqis that the United States intends to keep a permanent military presence in the country."

Copious documentation of their lies, c/o Billmon

http://billmon.org/archives/002465.html
The United States is planning a long-term military relationship with the emerging government of Iraq, one that would grant the Pentagon access to military bases and project American influence into the heart of the unsettled region, senior Bush administration officials say.
New York Times
Pentagon Expects Long-Term Access
To Four Key Bases in Iraq
April 20, 2003

The impression that's left around the world is that we plan to occupy the country, we plan to use their bases over the long period of time, and it's flat false.
Donald Rumsfeld
Press Conference
April 21, 2003

From the ashes of abandoned Iraqi army bases, U.S. military engineers are overseeing the building of an enhanced system of American bases designed to last for years.
Chicago Tribune
14 `enduring bases' set in Iraq
March 23, 2004

"Is this a swap for the Saudi bases? I don't know . . . When we talk about enduring bases here, we're talking about the present operation, not in terms of America's global strategic base. But this makes sense. It makes a lot of logical sense."
Brig. Gen. Robert Pollman,
chief engineer for base construction in Iraq
Chicago Tribune interview
March 23, 2004

This proposal will allow the Army to provide temporary facilities, and in some very limited cases, permanent facilities . . . These facilities include barracks, administrative space, vehicle maintenance facilities, aviation facilities, mobilization-demobilization barracks, and community support facilities.
U.S. Army
Supplemental Appropriation Request
February 14, 2005

U.S. military commanders have prepared plans to consolidate American troops in Iraq into four large air bases . . . The officers said a master plan for the positioning of U.S. forces in the Middle East, maintained by U.S. Central Command, did not envision keeping U.S. forces in Iraq permanently.
Washington Post
Commanders Plan Eventual Consolidation
Of U.S. Bases in Iraq
May 22, 2005

Initially referred to as "enduring bases" in 2004, these four bases were redesignated as "Contingency Operating Bases" in February 2005.
GlobalSecurity.org
Iraq Facilities
Date unknown

Any attempt to find out whether the US is, or is not, constructing permanent military bases meets with frustration. The few who have attempted to get a direct answer to this question are met with evasion and purposeful confusion over what is or is not "permanent".
Former Sen. Gary Hart
Financial Times op-ed
January 4, 2006

We want Iraq to stand on its own feet, we have no goal of establishing permanent bases here.
Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. ambassador to Iraq
Interview with Iraq television
March 11, 2006

The policy on long term presence in Iraq hasn't been formulated. And I don't imagine that it will emerge until a government of national unity emerges.
Centcom Commander Gen. John Abizaid
House appropriations subcommittee hearing
March 14, 2006

The House . . . gave anti-war Democrat Rep. Barbara Lee of Oakland a rare victory by accepting her proposal to bar permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq. Lee's amendment, which would bar the use of any funds in the new spending bill to establish permanent bases, passed on a voice vote, with no one speaking in opposition.
San Francisco Chronicle
House OKs bill to pay for Iraq war
March 17, 2006

Yesterday, the Senate unanimously passed an amendment to the Iraq supplemental spending bill . . . that would require the Bush administration not to use any appropriated funds for the construction of permanent bases in Iraq.
Think Progress
Congress Has Spoken:
No Permanent Military Bases In Iraq
May 4, 2006

I've told the American people I'd like to get our troops out as soon as possible.
George W. Bush
Press Conference
June 9, 2006

Congressional Republicans killed a provision in an Iraq war funding bill that would have put the United States on record against the permanent basing of U.S. military facilities in that country . . . Senate aides said Republican staffers removed the provisions from the bills before House and Senate negotiators convened this week in a late-night work session to write a compromise spending bill.
Reuters
Iraq war bill deletes US military base prohibition
June 10, 2006

Mr. Bush on Friday made clear that the American commitment to the country will be long-term. Officials say the administration has begun to look at the costs of maintaining a force of roughly 50,000 troops there for years to come, roughly the size of the American presence maintained in the Philippines and Korea for decades after those conflicts.
New York Times
U.S. Seeking New Strategy
For Buttressing Iraq's Government
June 11, 2006

To achieve lasting peace in Iraq, America will have to make concessions, including an explicit commitment not to seek permanent military bases in Iraq. Perhaps no issue in the coming years will more clearly expose the real purpose of the Bush administration's postwar mission in Iraq: to build democracy or to obtain a new, regional military platform in the heart of the Arab world.
Larry Diamond
The seeds of insurgency
June 30, 2005

John Bolton, un-approved UN representative, finishes his first year on the job. How’s he doing?

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_575.html
[Mark Leon Goldberg] As John Bolton approaches the one-year mark of his recess appointment, it is clear that his tenure has been defined by the waning of American influence at the United Nations. His preference for zero-sum games in a forum that has advanced beyond those kinds of negotiating tactics has backfired, and has done so to the detriment of American interests at the United Nations. . .

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/11/AR2006061100765.html

Must-read. Where would we be if the press DIDN’T publish government secrets?

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/publishing-secrets.html

Brilliant! Bush gang argues in court that their domestic spying is legal, but they can’t explain WHY it is legal, because that would betray national security

http://crookedtimber.org/2006/06/12/we-could-tell-you-why-its-legal-but-then-wed-have-to-kill-you/

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015071.html

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/orwellian-doublespeak.html

Damn them. Damn them all to hell

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015058.html
One of the three detainees who committed suicide at Guantanamo had been scheduled for release and not yet told. . .

Violent crime rate rises under Bush (and this isn’t even counting Abu Ghraib and Gitmo)

http://makeashorterlink.com/?U1C43104D

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/crime_control_/2006/06/bad_news_on_the_crime_front.php
[Mark Kleiman] This seems like a lousy time to be reducing Federal aid to local law enforcement . . .

Awww. . . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/when-bush-goes-from-35-to-33-its-not.html
Zarqawi's killing hasn't helped President Bush with the public, either. His overall job approval rating remains just 33 percent — down slightly from 35 percent last month . . .

How stupid is Rick Santorum (R-PA), to think that people wouldn’t catch this?

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7663.html
English-language visitors to www.ricksantorum.com encountered a home page filled with concern about the "amnesty-ridden proposal" the U.S. Senate adopted to deal with illegal immigration.

But a section of the site for Spanish readers made no mention of amnesty in its discourse on immigration. Nor did it refer to "rewarding criminal behavior" of illegal immigrants, as the English version did.

Jim Hoefler, a professor of political science at Dickinson College, noted: "The English version is kind of the Rick Santorum we know - no amnesty, law and order, tough guy. The Spanish version is a lot softer - we need to find a balance, that sort of approach."

More: http://politicalwire.com/archives/2006/06/12/santorums_mixed_messages.html

The Lieberman Problem

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/06/12/the-lieberman-problem/

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115014208414964195

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/13/21853/4271

Uh-huh, riiiight: House crooks now claim to have gotten “clearance” from the increasingly-misnamed “Ethics” committee

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_11.php#008720

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_11.php#008723

Truthout tries to explain its “Rove indicted” story by suggesting that his indictment was issued, but sealed

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/12/rove/index.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/009002.php

More: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061206Z.shtml

But after further review. . . http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/12/rove2/index.html

This is hilarious

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2006/06/12/libby_to_plead_bad_memory.html
Scooter Libby's defense team is "considering calling a memory expert to testify at his trial early next year" to help prove that the "any erroneous statements made to Federal Bureau of Investigation agents or the grand jury were the result of a faulty memory, and not intentional lies," Washington Wire reports.

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015064.html

Digby on YearlyKos and the future(s) of progressive blogging

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/06/12/take-a-bow/

Hype? http://www.slate.com/id/2143502/fr/rss/

Rewriting history. Fox News (after all this!) says it’s going to investigate and clear up the question of WMDs and a possible Saddam/Al Qaeda link once and for all. Does anyone doubt what their conclusions will be?

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7665.html

[NB: Aided, no doubt, by selective leaks and hints from the Bush foreign policy team]

I know, I know it’s too soon to predict the decline of Ann Coulter’s influence, but. . . .

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#115017687147737423

Bonus item: Why does the (so-called) “Christian” Right refuse to denounce this violent video game?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115012175734145002

http://billmon.org/archives/002466.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 4:34 AM

 
CHEERLEADERS

Is it just me, or does this sound like a catastrophe in the making?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/world/middleeast/11summit.html
President Bush's two-day strategy session starting Monday at Camp David is intended to revive highly tangible efforts to shore up Iraq's new government, from getting the electricity back on in Baghdad to purging the security forces of revenge-seeking militias, White House officials said.

Three years of efforts to accomplish those goals have largely failed. Billions of dollars have been spent on both electricity and security, yet residents of Baghdad get only five to eight hours of power a day, and the American ambassador acknowledged on Friday that the city is "more insecure now than it was a few months ago."

One of the senior officials involved in the strategy session characterized it as a "last, best chance to get this right," an implicit acknowledgment that previous American-led efforts had gone astray.

He said the decision to hold a joint cabinet meeting on Tuesday, between Mr. Bush's top advisers and the newly appointed cabinet of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq via a video link from Baghdad, was intended to set an agenda for the new government that could begin to win the loyalty of disaffected Iraqis. It is also an effort to hand off leadership to Mr. Maliki's government and, in an analogy used by several American officials, to begin to let go of the bicycle seat and find out if the Iraqi government can stay upright with less American support.

For Mr. Bush, the session comes at a critical moment in Baghdad and in Washington. His efforts to prop up two interim prime ministers with similar pledges of support largely failed. . .

Congress has made clear that its willingness to pay for more Iraqi reconstruction is just about exhausted. Both American and Iraqi officials now acknowledge that they will have to seek billions in investment and aid from Persian Gulf nations that have been unwilling to contribute many dollars or any soldiers.

Mr. Bush on Friday made clear that the American commitment to the country will be long-term. Officials say the administration has begun to look at the costs of maintaining a force of roughly 50,000 troops there for years to come. . .

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3042
[Swopa] Did it occur to any of the geniuses planning the summit that a choreographed TV appearance with Dubya and his (*cough*) brain trust might not be the best way to demonstrate the new Iraqi government's self-reliance? Of course, once you remember that the main goal of any public action by the Shrubster is to influence polls in the U.S. rather than to create actual results, it all makes sense. . . Even so, the cognitive dissonance among the Bushites doesn't stop there. . .

Iraq’s future?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/world/asia/11afghan.html
A large springtime offensive by Taliban fighters has turned into the strongest show of force by the insurgents since American forces chased the Taliban from power in late 2001, and Afghan and foreign officials and local villagers blame a lack of United States-led coalition forces on the ground for the resurgence.

American forces are handing over operations in southern Afghanistan to a NATO force of mainly Canadian, British and Dutch troops, and militants have taken advantage of the transition to swarm into rural areas. . .

A very good WP piece on government secrecy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/09/AR2006060901976_pf.html
Secrecy and security are not the same. . . [read on]

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004385.html

Donut holes: the absolute mess Bush has made of the Medicare system

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008995.php

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/health_care_/2006/06/the_plot.php

A couple of recent events have cast a sharp bright light on how the Republicans see politics. I’ve blogged these before, but it’s worth studying them

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/06/10/fallen_star_blames_self_gop_tactics/
[Allen Raymond] “A lot of people look at politics and see it as the guy who wins is the guy who unifies the most people," he said. ``I would disagree. I would say the candidate who wins is the candidate who polarizes the right bloc of voters. You always want to polarize somebody.". . .

“Republicans have treated campaigns and politics as a business, and now are treating public policy as a business, looking for the types of returns that you get in business, passing legislation that has huge ramifications for business," he said. ``It is very much being monetized, and the federal government is being monetized under Republican majorities." . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/08/AR2006060801376.html
[Tom DeLay] In preparing for today, I found that it is customary in speeches such as these to reminisce about the good old days of political harmony and across-the-aisle camaraderie, and to lament the bitter, divisive partisan rancor that supposedly now weakens our democracy. . . Well, I can't do that because partisanship, Mr. Speaker, properly understood, is not a symptom of democracy's weakness but of its health and its strength, especially from the perspective of a political conservative. . . Indeed, the common lament over the recent rise in political partisanship is often nothing more than a veiled complaint instead about the recent rise of political conservatism. . .

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7655.html
My friend Shaun called the speech "a study in arrogance, petulance and the very worst side of the partisanship whose virtues he proclaims. . .

More reasons we won’t miss Tom DeLay: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008999.php

Arlen Specter’s (R-PA) act is wearing thin. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/specter-claims-again-hes-going-to-get.html
"If we don't get some results, I'm prepared to go back to demand hearings and issue subpoenas if necessary," Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said Sunday . . .

President Newt?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114996150088970305

Plame-ania

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/scooter-libby-has-hearing-tomorrow.html

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015064.html

More examples of how the media misrepresents “liberalism”

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/wash-post-on-yearlykos.html
[WP, on YearlyKos] Conference participants appeared anxious to dispel their image as doctrinaire liberals, though the most animated panels involved liberal attacks on Bush and the Republicans over the Iraq war, criticism of the administration's role in the unmasking of CIA operative Valerie Plame, and charges that the mainstream media have failed to stand up to the president.

[John Aravosis] Note the logical fallacy here. Conference participants say they're aren't "doctrinaire liberals" BUT look at what they REALLY believe:

1. They don't like Bush.

2. They're upset about the Iraq war.

3. They bash Republicans.

4. They don't like the fact that the White House jeopardized national security by outing a CIA agent.

5. They believe that the mainstream media isn't doing its job.

Which of those five points above is "liberal," let alone "doctrinaire"?

http://yglesias.tpmcafe.com/node/30252
[Matt Yglesias] Nancy Pelosi, we learn in The New York Times, is "an unapologetic liberal." A couple of weeks ago I would have passed this remark over without noticing much. I like liberals, I like Nancy Pelosi, and I don't think any of us have anything to apologize for. Recently, though, I've been reading Geoffrey Nunberg's Talking Right where he makes a point about this.

The phrase "unapologetic liberal" is a very common one in the press when describing, well, liberals. You almost never hear, by contrast, about an "unapologetic conservative." Instead, you might call someone an "outspoken conservative" or a "conservative stalwart" or what have you.

Calling the Pelosis and Ted Kennedys and Dick Durbins of the world "unapologetic" has two problems. On the one hand, it suggests that maybe Pelosi should be apologetic about her liberalism. That, at a minimum, apologizing is something liberals should think about in a way conservatives shouldn't. Second, it re-enforces the idea that more centrist Democrats are not, in fact, moderates but rather apologetic liberals with secret far-left hidden agendas.

The kind of people they are, part 1

http://crookedtimber.org/2006/06/11/ministry-of-tact/
[BBC] A top US official has described the suicides of three detainees at the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as a “good PR move to draw attention”.

[Chris Bertram] And who is this “top official”? She is Colleen Graffy, “Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy.” I wonder what she says when she’s being undiplomatic.

The kind of people they are, part 2

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_11_atrios_archive.html#115004196397965657

Cheerleaders

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/journalists-as-groupies.html
[Glenn Greenwald] One of the few redeeming features of Chris Matthews is that he lacks the normal faculties of self-restraint which most journalists possess. As a result, he frequently says things which most of them would know better than to admit, but which nonetheless reveal how so many of them think. . .

MATTHEWS: Well said. Thank you very much. James Jeffrey, assistant to Condoleezza Rice. We‘re huge fans—bring her back with you next time.

For a variety of reasons, I watch cable news shows very rarely, so perhaps I'm finding a relatively common event to be remarkable. But the idea that a "journalist" would openly declare himself to be a "huge fan" of particular administration officials is unbelievable by any measure. How can Chris Matthews possibly report in any meaningful way on the actions of people of whom he is a "huge fan"? That's just obvious. That this sort of sentiment can be openly expressed on a major news network and not even be noticed is a very potent indication of the state of journalism today.

Journalists, of course, are supposed to be the opposite of "fans" of political leaders. They are intended to be watchdogs over them, skeptical of their statements, and eager to expose their ineptitude and corruption. The principal reason the Bush administration has been able to get away with their extremist and law-breaking actions is because journalists became "huge fans" of the President and his top aides in the wake of 9/11 and most have never given up their adolescent adoration. Matthews' comment is an excellent reminder of the true sentiments of most national journalists. . .

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092699/quotes
[Broadcast News] I know you care about him. . . so please don't take it wrong when I tell you that I believe that Tom, while a very nice guy, is the Devil. . . What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he's around? Nobody is going to be taken in if he has a long, red, pointy tail. No. I'm semi-serious here. He will look attractive and he will be nice and helpful and he will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation and he will never do an evil thing... he will just bit by little bit lower standards where they are important. . .

Does Arlen Specter’s surveillance bill include amnesty for illegal domestic spying or not? Why can’t we get a straight answer?

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/completely-unreliable-washington-post.html

Where did today’s journalists learn their craft?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008996.php
[Kevin Drum] When did it become standard practice to write stories about legislation without even taking a single sentence to provide the vote count and the party breakdown? . . .

Bonus item: George Bush, liar

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060626/alterman

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:58 AM

 
LESSONS LEARNED AND NOT LEARNED

Bush to huddle with his team to develop (another) “new” strategy and plan for Iraq. Zarqawi or no, it won’t help

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/reid-to-bush-dont-just-talk-do.html

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/06/10/national/w113858D48.DTL
White House officials played down expectations of troop-cutback formulas or other dramatic announcements from the meetings. . .

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/10/bush-zarqawi-violence/

New questions about Zarqawi’s death

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060610/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_al_zarqawi
[AP] U.S. officials have altered their account of the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, saying he was alive and partly conscious after bombs destroyed his hideout, and an Iraqi man raised fresh questions about the events surrounding the end of Iraq's most-wanted militant. . . The man, who lived near the scene of the bombing, told AP Television News on Friday that he saw U.S. soldiers beating an injured man resembling al-Zarqawi until blood flowed from the victim's nose. . .

[NB: There’s no way of assessing the credibility of this claim – though it’s coming from the AP, not some fringe source. Could US troops have demonstrated such an appalling lack of discipline? Unfortunately, it’s not hard to imagine. . . ]

Further questions: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/world/middleeast/11scene.html

http://makeashorterlink.com/?X15851E3D

More: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/why-i-do-not-celebrate-al-zarqawis.html
[Hume’s Ghost] Why I do not celebrate al-Zarqawi's death . . [read on!]

What next? (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=507&language_id=1
Indeed, although al-Zarqawi was successful in inspiring foreigners to join the insurgency in Iraq, as a popular leader of Iraqis he was a failure. One danger that his death leaves open for the United States and the Iraqi government is the possibility that al-Zarqawi's successor will be more competent. If al-Qaeda in Iraq is successful in winning more Sunni hearts and minds in Iraq, it could prove to be a larger threat to the new Iraqi government than under al-Zarqawi's helm. As a result of the time spent between al-Masri and al-Zawahiri, analysts think that if al-Masri takes control of the organization, he may direct al-Qaeda in Iraq on a course that more closely resembles bin Laden's strategy. Additionally, al-Iraqi, the other possible replacement for al-Zarqawi, is thought to be of Iraqi origin (al-Zarqawi was Jordanian), which means he would probably be better able to rally the support of Iraqis.

Three suicides at Guantanamo -- and what is our response?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/us/11gitmo.html
Three detainees being held at the United States military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, committed suicide early on Saturday. . . Military officials said that the three hanged themselves in their cells with nooses made of sheets and clothing and died before they could be revived by medical personnel. . .

"They are smart, they are creative, they are committed," Admiral Harris said. "They have no regard for life, neither ours nor their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us."

More, if you can stand it: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015058.html

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gitmo11jun11,0,2161893.story
Meanwhile, recurring allegations of interrogation abuses and the trial system have spurred global condemnation. The United Nations Committee Against Torture called on the Bush administration last month to shut down the prison, and the European Parliament this year urged that the prison be closed and detainees be given trials without delay.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has called for shutting down the prison, and top officials in Britain, Germany and elsewhere have expressed concern to U.S. counterparts and called for drastic changes. . .

The Bush gang loves to play the bully, and compromise and conciliation have no place in their vocabulary. But with poll numbers dropping and an increasingly resentful and resistant Congress (even in his own party), Bush decides it’s time to play nice – or at least to pretend to

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/washington/11bush.html
It was also a new way of doing things for a president who Republicans in Congress say has for years treated them like pesky younger siblings, ignoring their ideas and calling on them only to promote his legislation on Capitol Hill.

Now, with Mr. Bush's poll numbers sinking and his agenda faltering, the White House needs Republicans in Congress more than ever. Without necessarily taking the advice he is seeking from Capitol Hill, Mr. Bush is adding a more personal touch to his presidency in an effort to put himself in the good graces of lawmakers. . .

Who sent Michael Brown the email reporting Bush’s “better you than me” wisecrack?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114995978222403739

Aptly named

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008701
[Josh Marshall] Jeffrey Shockey is the deputy staff director of the House Appropriations Committee. That's the committee that decides how the money gets spent. Literally. It's hugely powerful. And the Committee Chairman is Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA) who's at the center of the ever-expanding Cunningham investigation.

Now, Shockey went to work for Lewis in 1994. Then in 1999 he left to work for the lobbying firm of Copeland Lowery. . .

That was between 1999 and 2004 while Lewis was a member of the Appropriations committee and then Chairman of the Appropriations Defense Subcommittee. . . . But in January 2005, Lewis ascended to the Chairmanship of the full Committee. And it was then that Shockey was overcome with a earning [sic!] to return to public service and signed on as deputy staff director for Lewis at the Appropriations Committee.

Now, already it was known that when Shockey left Copeland Lowery he got a lump-sum payment of $600,000. . . But it came out yesterday that that was just the first payment out of a total of $1.96 million Copeland Lowery paid Shockey over the course of 2005 when he was helping to run the committee that is earmark central. . .

Now, you don't have to be too stringent to see that there's a problem here. Shockey's working at Copeland Lowery as an earmark-finder. Then he goes to work as the deputy staff director of the earmark committee, basically an earmark-giver. And he's still being paid by Copeland Lowery, which is of course in the earmark business.

Republican power broker sees the error of his ways, sheds light on the GOP world view

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/06/10/fallen_star_blames_self_gop_tactics/
Raymond has been in prison. And for that, he blames himself, but also says he was part of a Republican political culture that emphasizes hardball tactics and polarizing voters. . .

"A lot of people look at politics and see it as the guy who wins is the guy who unifies the most people," he said. "I would disagree. I would say the candidate who wins is the candidate who polarizes the right bloc of voters. You always want to polarize somebody.". . .

“Republicans have treated campaigns and politics as a business, and now are treating public policy as a business, looking for the types of returns that you get in business, passing legislation that has huge ramifications for business," he said. "It is very much being monetized, and the federal government is being monetized under Republican majorities."

Republicans should be asked again and again and again if they endorse, or repudiate, Ann Coulter’s hateful and outrageous slurs

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/10/matalin-coulter/

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/v-echo/story/424807p-358231c.html

Until they get a reasonable handle on the corruptibility of e-voting machines, every closely contested election is going to be thrown into suspicion (thanks to Susan Madrak for the link)

http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002930.htm
Given what we know about Diebold voting machines (both optical-scan and touch-screen), several folks have written to ask: "Are you sure they actually allowed poll workers to take these machines home with them" prior to the Busby/Bilbray U.S. House special election in CA-50th?

Yes. I'm sure. And yes, I confirmed it with someone in the media office at the San Diego County Registrar of Voting. . . ask how they intend to prove that the results of the Busby/Bilbray special election are accurate now that the chain of custody for the electronic voting machines -- which have been shown to be exceedingly prone to easy, passwordless tampering -- has been corrupted by sending them home for days and weeks at a time with volunteer poll workers.

Right-wing appeals court supports Bush gang’s expansive view of surveillance

http://makeashorterlink.com/?H12322E3D

The “Net Neutrality” bill, just passed the House and on its way to the Senate. Why it matters

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008697.php

The YearlyKos blogger conference continues to get a lot of buzz, and the traditional media are taking notice. People are starting to realize that a new dynamic is emerging between political parties, online communities, and the discursive hubs of blogs and social networking sites. Are blogs becoming to the Democrats what talk radio is to the Republicans?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/blog-conference-makes-ny-times-twice_10.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/internet-fundraising-giving-dems-big.html
[Joe] According to the Washington Post -- and Ken Mehlman -- Democrats are competitive with the Republicans in fundraising this year because of the internet. . . It's a whole new world.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/10/135537/230
[Peter Daou] The blogosphere is a new power base, a stand-alone entity with its own ethos. The real question for the progressive netroots and the establishment media alike is whether or not the online community will prevail upon the media to stop caving in to rightwing pressure. It's a war between two distinct centers of political power and the media's strategy appears to be a hodge podge of misunderstanding, misstating, and marginalizing the blogs.

Theocracy watch

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7652.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:53 AM

 
SHAMELESS

Those damn Iraqis keep thinking they’re in charge now

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/09/washington/09cnd-prexy.html
President Bush sought today to dampen any expectation that the new Iraqi government will soon be able to provide security for itself and the Iraqi people and thus allow American troops to come home. . . the president pointedly did not endorse a recent statement by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that Iraqi forces will be able to control their country within 18 months.

http://www.tpmcafe.com/node/30660
[Matt Yglesias] Iraq's Prime Minister semi-endorses an 18 month timetable for withdrawal and Bush, rather than embrace the opportunity to extricate ourselves, smacks him down. Did someone say "permanent bases"?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/09/world/middleeast/09troops.html
Senior administration and military officials now acknowledge that there is little chance the United States can reach the milestone of reducing American troop levels in Iraq to 100,000 by December, a goal that earlier in the year had seemed within reach. . .

Did torture play a role in Zarqawi’s capture?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015050.html

Ho-lee crap

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6247
[E-mail to Michael Brown] "I did hear of one reference to you, at the Cabinet meeting yesterday. I wasn't there, but I heard someone commented that the press was sure beating up on Mike Brown, to which the president replied, 'I'd rather they beat up on him than me or Chertoff.' Congratulations on doing a great job of diverting hostile fire away from the leader."

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/gwb_the_beloved_leader_/2006/06/a_cowardly_way.php
What's truly "cowardly”. . . [read on]

Arlen Specter – what’s his game?

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/new-low-senate-seeks-to-pardon.html
[Glenn Greenwald] Observing and commenting on the behavior of Arlen Specter is one of the most unpleasant obligations a person can have, but for anyone following the NSA eavesdropping scandal specifically, and the Bush administration's abuses of executive power generally, it is a necessary evil. The principal reason that the Bush administration has been able to impose its radical theories of lawbreaking on the country is because Congress, with an unseemly eagerness, has permitted itself to be humiliated over and over by an administration which does not hide its contempt for the notion that Congress has any role to play in limiting and checking the executive branch. And few people have more vividly illustrated that institutional debasement than Arlen Specter, who, along with Pat Roberts, has done more than anyone else to ensure that Congress completely relinquishes its constitutional powers to the President. . .

A bill proposed yesterday by Arlen Specter to resolve the NSA scandal -- literally his fifth or sixth proposed bill on this subject in the last few months -- would drag the Congress to a new low of debasement. According to The Washington Post, Specter has introduced a bill "that would give President Bush the option of seeking a warrant from a special court for an electronic surveillance program such as the one being conducted by the National Security Agency." This proposal is the very opposite of everything Specter has saying for the last several months . . .

A law which makes it "an option" -- rather than a requirement -- for the Government to obtain a warrant before eavesdropping is about as meaningless of a law as can be imagined.

But that complete change of heart by Specter is not even nearly the most corrupt part of his proposed bill. For pure corruption and constitutional abdication, nothing could match this:

Another part of the Specter bill would grant blanket amnesty to anyone who authorized warrantless surveillance under presidential authority, a provision that seems to ensure that no one would be held criminally liable if the current program is found illegal under present law.

The idea that the President's allies in Congress would enact legislation which expressly shields government officials, including the President, from criminal liability for past lawbreaking is so reprehensible that it is difficult to describe. To my knowledge, none of the other proposed bills -- including those from the most loyal Bush followers in the Senate -- contained this protective provision. And without knowing anywhere near as much as I would need to know in order to form a definitive opinion, the legality of this provision seems questionable at best. It's really the equivalent of a pardon, a power which the Constitutional preserves for the President. Can Congress act as a court and simply exonerate citizens from criminal conduct?

Analysis: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114987020964234273
[Digby] I have two thoughts about this. The first is that this completely takes the wind out the wingnuts' sails about amnesty for undocumented workers. . . . Amnesty for Bush and Cheney but not for some poor Mexican who's only crime was working in this country for years to make a better life??? It would be a gift.

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015046.html

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7645.html

This is what happens when you put a political hack in charge of a government agency: their instincts keep confusing spin with substance

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/08/vets.data/index.html
Thieves may have erased personal data on millions of veterans that was on a laptop they stole, the secretary of veterans affairs said Thursday. . .

The laptop was stolen in May from the home of a Veterans Affairs employee who, in violation of agency regulations, took it to a private residence. . . It contained Social Security numbers, names and addresses for more than 26 million veterans as well as possibly millions of current service members and reservists.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/08/AR2006060801560.html
Police believe that thieves who stole a laptop and external hard drive from a Department of Veterans Affairs employee were interested in selling the equipment, not harvesting the sensitive personal information it contained, VA Secretary Jim Nicholson said yesterday. . .

[NB: The possibility that the thieves weren’t looking for the sensitive data, didn’t know what they had, might have erased it all, etc., doesn’t mean a thing to what is alarming about this case, or what it says about the unbelievably lax security practices of the agency under Nicholson. The fact that he might have dodged a bullet doesn’t change anything]

Today’s must-read: don’t miss it!

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114987502793575962
[The Poorman] Far away, in the magical country of Epistomolia, there live two peoples. One people, called the Seers, believed that Truth is, that to know Truth requires Knowledge, and Knowledge is gained from observation, and from the application of reason. The Truth is the Truth is pretty much the Truth, the Seers believed, and the only trick was knowing how to see it. These people are, in many ways, much like you and me.

The other people, the Makers, believed that a tribe can create knowledge through the incantation of belief, and, either by overwhelming with volume or harmonizing with the incantations of other tribes, truth becomes. . .

Tom DeLay, liar and self-promoter to the end

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/delay-proud-of-himself-k-street.html
[NYT] "I did a good job," said Mr. DeLay, the linchpin of the House Republican majority for the last decade and the mastermind of a formidable political operation that melded legislating, fund-raising, conservatism and business advocacy as never before. "I helped build the largest political coalition in the last 50 years. The K Street project and the K Street strategy I am very proud of."

[Joe] He also helped build one of the largest political corruption scandals in the history of the country.

Good riddance: http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/9/15038/81251

http://rozius.blogspot.com/2006/06/paul-krugman-delay-principle.html

Despite his precipitous move to Virginia, DeLay’s name may still have to stay on the ballot in Texas

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/9/1147/96597

Ken Blackwell, Ohio Sect’y of State, engineered massive voter disenfranchisement in the 2004 election, helping to hand the election to Bush. The fact that he is black and many of the voters affected were black adds a note of deep irony. But then, there’s also the fact that he intends to do just the same thing in 2006. And this time, HE’S a candidate (for governor)

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7640.html

Jerry Lewis (R-CA): screwed

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008695

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/09/AR2006060901576.html

ANOTHER senior staffer quits on Katherine Harris (R-FL)

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_politics/2006/06/harris_chief_of.html

Big blogger conference!

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015052.html

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/09/yearly/index.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004376.html

TheirSpace. The NSA is trolling blogs, social network sites

http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/mg19025556.200-pentagon-sets-its-sights-on-social-networking-websites.html

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114989254320214519

The state of journalism

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_562.html
If you're going to run an article under the headline "Democrats call Zarqawi killing a stunt," wouldn't it be good to include in the piece a quote from some Democrat actually calling the Zarqawi killing a stunt?

How the media enables Ann Coulter

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114987359920531752

Bonus item: Weird? Or strange? You decide

http://www.attytood.com/archives/003504.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:33 AM

 
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU ASK FOR

Zarqawi’s killed, and it’s a dangerous moment for the Bush gang. They can’t crow, because it probably will mean nothing in diminishing the insurgency. They can’t claim victory, because they’ve already DONE that. And they can’t say this is the beginning of the end, because the last thing they can do is to raise expectations (again), with so many troops still stuck over there. So even while they achieve an important objective, they can claim little joy from it

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/world/middleeast/08cnd-assess.html
But the Al Qaeda organization that Mr. Zarqawi leaves behind in Iraq is a far-flung and decentralized collection of semi-autonomous terrorist groups, each operating more or less independently. To date, at least 60 different groups have carried out attacks against Iraqi and American targets under Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia's name. Experts say these groups can probably continue to carry out attacks, if perhaps not with the same audacity as Mr. Zarqawi.

Dozens of other insurgent groups in Iraq have little or no relationship to Al Qaeda, including some of the largest, like Ansar Al-Sunnah and the Islamic Army of Iraq. Indeed, some of them are Al Qaeda'a deadly rivals. They, too, will probably carry on.

What is more, Mr. Zarqawi, a Jordanian, had apparently begun to hand over the leadership of his organization to Iraqis, possibly in anticipation of his own death. . .

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/08/zarqawi_effect/index.html
[Tim Grieve] For one thing, Zarqawi's group, Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, wasn't an especially tightly knit organization -- the name covered at least 60 separate terrorism teams that still have the capacity to fight on without Mr. Z in charge. As Hoffman put it, "He has already set in motion powerful forces that won't necessarily stop just because he is dead."

More important is the point the Brookings Institution's Ivo Daalder raises in TPM Cafe: Zarqawi and his group aren't the most important cause of violence in Iraq. "What we have in Iraq today -- and have had for many, many months -- is not a traditional insurgency or even wanton terrorism, but a large-scale sectarian conflict," Daalder points out. "Much of the killing in Iraq today isn't the result of Zarqawi's men, but of Sunni and Shite militias engaged in a big fight for control of neighborhoods, towns, cities, and the resources they control. . .

http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/zarqawi-killed-in-baquba-prime.html
[Juan Cole] There is no evidence of operational links between his Salafi Jihadis in Iraq and the real al-Qaeda; it was just a sort of branding that suited everyone, including the US. Official US spokesmen have all along over-estimated his importance. Leaders are significant and not always easily replaced. But Zarqawi has in my view has been less important than local Iraqi leaders and groups. I don't expect the guerrilla war to subside any time soon. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/world/middleeast/07cnd-reaction.html
President Bush said today that the killing of the Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was a blow to Al Qaeda in Iraq. . . But while emphasizing the importance of the death. . . Mr. Bush appeared to be careful to avoid any suggestion that Mr. Zarqawi's killing marked a final victory over the insurgency or an end to the American mission there.

"Zarqawi is dead," Mr. Bush said in early morning remarks at the White House. "But the difficult and necessary mission in Iraq continues. We can expect the terrorists and insurgents to carry on without him."

He added: "We can expect the sectarian violence to continue. . .”

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3034
[Reuters] "Zarqawi is dead, but the difficult and necessary mission in Iraq continues," a somber-looking Bush said in a measured statement in the White House Rose Garden. . . A senior White House official said: "Don't expect any announcement that there's going to be a reduction in troop levels. It's not going to happen now."

More on what Zarqawi’s death does (and doesn’t) change

http://www.tpmcafe.com/node/30574
[A]s Jason Zengerle suggests the whole Zarqawi phenomenon is largely fake; the product of a bizarre collaboration between a Bush administration eager to identify an enemy in Iraq and a terrorist eager to overstate his own importance. . .

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/zarqawi.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2143388/fr/rss/

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001457.php

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_550.html

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_551.html

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008683

A few tantalizing inconsistencies in the narrative, just for the conspiracy buffs

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015038.html

http://www.ericumansky.com/2006/06/got_tinfoil_hat.html

On rhizomes and insurgencies: a parable

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/terrorism_and_its_control_/2006/06/a_parable_on_the_death_of_alzarqawi.php

Then there’s this. . .

http://www.ericumansky.com/2006/06/zarqawi.html
TNR's Spencer Ackerman tries to go counter-intuitive and argues that Zarqawi's killing could actually make things worse in Iraq. . .

More: http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w060605&s=ackerman060806

The media coverage: proportional and reasoned, as always

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/06/06/con06232.html

Oh, and by the way. . .

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7625.html
[Steve Benen] One relevant angle to this story, however, that has not been emphasized (or even mentioned) by most news outlets today is that Zarqawi could have been taken out years ago, but Bush decided not to strike. . . In fact, this happened more than once. . .

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/08/zarqawi/index.html
[Tim Grieve] The Bush administration didn't need to go to war to take out Zarqawi. . . In fact, there's evidence that the war actually helped keep Zarqawi alive longer -- and certainly presented him with more easily accessible targets -- than would have been the case if the United States had not invaded Iraq. As NBC News reported back in 2004, U.S. military planners drew up plans to take out Zarqawi three times in 2002 and 2003, but the Bush administration killed the plans each time. Why? Because, military officials told NBC, the Bush administration feared that destroying Zarqawi's terrorist camp in Iraq "could undercut its case for war against Saddam."

What the Bush regime has brought us

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/defining-america-down.html
[Anonymous Liberal] Many years from now, when historians look back on this period in our history, I fear that they will describe it as the moment when the idea of America lost its resonance in the world, when America became just another country.

I've traveled enough to know that America has long occupied a unique place in the collective consciousness of people across the globe. The idea of America has long encompassed a number of adjectives: some complimentary, some derogatory, but all distinctive and uniquely American. America is viewed as a nation of unparalleled decadence, of conspicuous and unapologetic consumption. But it is also viewed as the land of opportunity, a place where innovation and industriousness are rewarded like nowhere else. People around the world have long complained of American arrogance and self-importance, but on some level, they understand why Americans are proud of their country. They grudgingly admit that America has, for most of its history, been a powerful force for good in the world. . .

And it's exactly that reputation that the Bush administration has carelessly pissed away over the last four years. . .

More: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/defining-america-away.html
[Hume’s Ghost] In A.L.'s "Defining America Down" post he noted that for the last four/five years the administration has been defining America's principles down. I think it's worse than that. . .

Get ready: the Republicans gear up. . . to accuse the Democrats of stealing elections!

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114980441119509022

The next big GOP scandal, Jerry Lewis (R-CA), starts ticking. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/culture-of-corruption-continues-within.html
[NBC] Lisa Myers interviewed the former CEO of a software business who had some rather interesting relationships with Lewis. . .

Lisa Myers: You were allowed to write language for an appropriations bill yourself?

Casey: Yes, I did. That was Congressman Lewis' suggestion.

Casey says Lewis repeatedly urged him to hire a lobbyist, former U.S. Rep. Bill Lowery, Lewis' close friend, and when that didn't happen, pressed for another favor.

Casey: Congressman Lewis asked me to set up stock options for Bill Lowery in our company.

Casey says Lewis suggested he issue the stock options in Canada. . . in someone else's name.

Myers: Did you view it as an effort to hide what was really going on?

Casey: It was intended to conceal his participation, yes.

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008678.php

Boom! http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-lewis8jun08,0,2545979,full.story

Frist’s “divide America” agenda now 0 for 2

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008977.php

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7632.html

Fascinating Murray Waas account of the first days of the Plame investigation – when Ashcroft didn’t think he had to recuse himself, and when Rove didn’t think he had to tell the truth

http://news.nationaljournal.com/articles/0608nj1.htm

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015040.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004365.html
[Waas] During the initial stages of the Plame investigation, the RNC was at the forefront of the Bush administration's effort to stymie demands for the appointment of a special prosecutor and to continue the campaign to discredit Wilson. To some career investigators, the RNC appeared to be acting as a proxy for the White House in attempting to thwart the naming of a special prosecutor.

David Israelite, who was a deputy chief of staff to Ashcroft, had been the RNC's political director. Barbara Comstock, who was Ashcroft's director of public affairs, had been in charge of the RNC's opposition research department. Corallo, who succeeded Comstock at Justice under Ashcroft, had also worked for the RNC. Currently, Comstock is serving as a spokeswoman for Libby and his legal team as he prepares for trial early next year.

In the fall of 2003, senior Justice officials concerned about the investigation faced unique hurdles in seeking Ashcroft's recusal, current and former federal law enforcement officials said in interviews.

[Laura Rozen] It is pretty interesting that Mark Corallo, former Ashcroft spokesman, is now spokesman for Rove; and that former Ashcroft/DOJ director of public affairs Barbara Comstock, is now spokesman for Libby; in other words, the two top PR officials for Ashcroft when he was AG are now the spokespeople for the two chief subjects of investigation.

And even more: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3036

Daddy Dearest: while Blumenthal isn’t always reliable, I have no trouble believing this. Someone someday will write the whole twisted psychohistory of Bush outdoing his dad on Iraq, on defeating the man who was going to assassinate his father, on undoing the CIA his father had helped to resuscitate from its cowboy days of the early 70’s, on winning the second term his father couldn’t, on dissing the man (Clinton) who had defeated his father, then watching his father cozy up to Clinton “like a son”. . . .

http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2006/06/08/haditha/
[Sidney Blumenthal] Former President George H.W. Bush waged a secret campaign over several months early this year to remove Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The elder Bush went so far as to recruit Rumsfeld's potential replacement, personally asking a retired four-star general if he would accept the position, a reliable source close to the general told me. But the former president's effort failed, apparently rebuffed by the current president. When seven retired generals who had been commanders in Iraq demanded Rumsfeld's resignation in April, the younger Bush leapt to his defense. "I'm the decider and I decide what's best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain," he said. His endorsement of Rumsfeld was a rebuke not only to the generals but also to his father. . .

Dead-enders

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7631.html
[Steve Benen] Last night, Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) faced off in a debate against Joseph Sestak (D), a former deputy chief of naval operations and the first director of Deep Blue, the Navy's anti-terrorism group. Naturally, the war in Iraq was a major topic, and the two debated the principal reason used to launch the invasion.

While Sestak said Iraq was "not a clear nor a present danger" because no weapons of mass destruction have been found, Weldon said he knows of four sites in Basra and Nasiriyah that have yet to be searched for biological or chemical weapons.

"I think the jury is still out on WMD," said Weldon.

It's been three years, Charles Duelfer said Iraq did not possess, or have concrete plans to develop, nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, but Weldon wants his constituents to hold out hope that he was right all along.

Did I mention that Weldon is the vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee?

More: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/last-throes-of-pro-war-right.html

Goodbye Tom: don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/8/203923/3552
[DeLay] In preparing for today, I found that it is customary in speeches such as these to reminisce about the good old days of political harmony and across-the-aisle camaraderie, and to lament the bitter, divisive partisan rancor that supposedly now weakens our democracy.

Well, I can't do that because partisanship, Mr. Speaker, properly understood, is not a symptom of democracy's weakness but of its health and its strength, especially from the perspective of a political conservative. . . Indeed, the common lament over the recent rise in political partisanship is often nothing more than a veiled complaint instead about the recent rise of political conservatism. . .

Ann Coulter: have people finally seen her for the repulsive shrew she is?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606080008

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7635.html

Rush doesn’t even try to pretend to pay attention to facts

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606080004
Rush Limbaugh downplayed President Bush's low approval ratings by falsely claiming that former President Bill Clinton "was down in the 20s at one point" and suggesting that Clinton had "parallel poll results" to Bush during the equivalent point in his second term. In fact, Clinton's approval rating never dropped below 36 percent . . .

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 3:11 AM

 
NON-PERSONS

Some are born irrelevant, some achieve irrelevance, and others have irrelevance thrust upon them. . .

Tom DeLay (R-TX), whose corruption and extremism are at the heart of the GOP’s current woes, thinks his advice is still worth something

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/delay-on-gop-panic-depression-and-woe.html
[USAT] The former No. 2 House leader criticized his Republican colleagues for "panic, depression and woe-is-me-ism," and predicted they will lose control in November "if they continue the attitude they have right now." . . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/07/AR2006060701436.html
Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay urged colleagues Wednesday to "stand on principle" and ignore the media in a farewell speech to fellow House Republicans at their weekly private meeting. . .

More: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-06-06-delay-interview_x.htm

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/delay-gives-his-farewell-address.html

[NB: Yep, this is the advice I want them to hear – don’t question the mistakes you’ve made, don’t change course, don’t compromise. . . thanks, Tom]

More on the Abramoff connection: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008677

Arlen Specter (R-PA) keeps getting angry with the Bush gang’s contempt for Congress and the laws. . . and keeps letting himself get rolled by them

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015036.html
[TChris] Yesterday, the Justice Department sent Matthew Friedrich to stonewall the Judiciary Committee's interest in Alberto Gonzales' assertion that journalists can be prosecuted for divulging classified information. Specter put up a fuss when Friedrich dodged his questions. . . Today Specter sent Vice President Cheney a testy letter complaining that Cheney went behind his back to sabotage the Judiciary Committee's investigation of reports that telephone companies have handed over customer calling records to the NSA. . .

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601303.html

http://chronicle.com/free/2006/06/2006060702n.htm

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Senator_slams_Cheney_for_lobbying_Congress_0607.html

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-06-06-senate-phone-companies_x.htm
A last-minute deal Tuesday with Vice President Cheney averted a possible confrontation between the Senate Judiciary Committee and U.S. telephone companies about the National Security Agency's database of customer calling records.

The deal was announced by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the committee chairman, and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah. They said Cheney, who plays a key role supervising NSA counterterrorism efforts, promised that the Bush administration would consider legislation proposed by Specter that would place a domestic surveillance program under scrutiny of a special federal court.

In return, Specter agreed to postpone indefinitely asking executives from the nation's telecommunication companies to testify about another program in which the NSA collects records of domestic calls. . .

[NB: How long do you think they will “consider” it?]

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7616.html

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/06/06/national/w152043D54.DTL
"Why don't we just recess for the rest of the year?" the committee's top Democrat, Sen. Pat Leahy of Vermont, asked sarcastically. "Vice President Cheney will just tell the nation what laws we'll have." . . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/06/06/BL2006060600667.html
[Dan Froomkin] When all is said and done, the biggest story of the Bush presidency will likely be its dramatic expansion of executive power -- engineered by Vice President Cheney, unchecked by a supine Congress, and underreported by the traditional media. . .

Orrin Hatch (R-UT) doesn’t think there’s anything “bigoted” about bashing gays – and resents the accusation that there is

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/orrin-hatch-shocked-by-truth.html

Gay marriage bill doesn’t only fail in the Senate, it fails embarrassingly – and some Republicans are getting nervous

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/7/113536/5483
[Kos] The vote for cloture failed 49-48. Not only did they fail to even bring this thing up for a vote, far short of the 60 votes they needed, but the haters couldn't even muster up a bare majority. . . They're losing ground. . .

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7624.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2143208

What was Khalilzad going to say?

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Senators_write_Bush_after_classified_Iraq_0607.html
President Bush has cancelled a classified briefing on the situation in Iraq, according to a letter from four Democratic senators obtained by RAW STORY. . . US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad had been set to brief Senators today. Democratic aides tell RAW STORY that the meeting, set to address "all members," was cancelled abruptly yesterday. Requests for a briefing by another administration official went unanswered. . .

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004348.html

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3030

A “global spider’s web”

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6213
More than 20 states, mostly in Europe, colluded in a "global spider's web" of secret CIA prisons and transfers of terrorism suspects, a European rights watchdog said in a report released on Wednesday.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/world/europe/08rendition.html

That much-trumpeted “terrorist arrest” in Toronto may mean less than it has been portrayed to be (thanks to Warren C. for the link)

http://www.straightgoods.ca/ViewFeature6.cfm?REF=370

The forged document that started the string of lies that led to justifying the Iraq war – just where DID it come from originally? Who forged it?

http://www.vanityfair.com/features/general/articles/060606fege02

Has any recent administration done more to harm the interests of enlisted personnel?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/07/washington/07cnd-identity.html
Democrats accused the Bush administration of incompetence today, after it became known that the recent theft of computer data from the Department of Veterans Affairs included private data about far more active-duty military people than was originally thought.

"At some point, this administration has got to stop saying we'll hire or appoint political cronies, but we'll actually appoint somebody who knows how to make the government work," said Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont. . .

A Veterans Affairs spokesman, Matt Burns, said today that . . . the secretary of veterans' affairs, R. James Nicholson, would conduct "and up-and-down review" to ensure that such a lapse does not happen again.

A laptop computer and an external hard drive containing the data were stolen in a burglary at the home of a department data analyst in the Maryland suburbs on May 3. Some department officials learned of the theft almost immediately, but Mr. Nicholson was not notified until May 16.

Ann Coulter, a commentator with moral credibility to burn, decides to make her latest target the widows of 9-11 victims. Is it possible, even for her, to go too far?

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/06/07/coulter.911.widows.ap/index.html

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/07/coulter/index.html

http://susiemadrak.com/2006/06/07/18/43/anorexic-harridan/
[Chris Rock] “You’re just a nasty bitch.”

Bonus item: Where are they now?

http://thinkprogress.org/the-architects-where-are-they-now/

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:09 AM

 
“A NEST OF DUMMIES”

I think this is a telling parallel: gay marriage is going to become the GOP’s latest “Terri Schiavo” fiasco. What happens when they try to seize upon on issue on which they have zero credibility, simply for political reasons that even their supporters recognize as cynical and opportunistic?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/it-was-big-mistake-for-republicans-to.html
[John Aravosis] And kudos to Senator Reid and the Democrats for refusing to take the bait on this one. The Republicans tried to sucker punch the Dems into a three-day debate on gay marriage. So, Harry Reid is giving them a three day debate on why they're afraid to talk about Iraq, gas prices, and the war on terror. Brilliant.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/5/231135/8210
[Slate] combined with the fact a two-thirds majority is required for passage has bloggers--and not just those on the left--seeing a transparent attempt to boost the GOP's chances in the midterm elections this fall. "Bush is trying to appease angry conservatives and Christians by pushing this amendment," writes Christian ex-liberal La Shawn Barber. "It's an empty and meaningless gesture because the thing will never be ratified."

At InstaPundit, libertarian law prof Glenn Reynolds revels in the dissent. "Message to Karl Rove: When you're being double-teamed by LaShawn Barber and Dave Weigel, you're probably working from the wrong playbook," Reynolds writes, asking why proven poll concerns like immigration and earmarks aren't being highlighted. "[W]hy not try addressing those issues sensibly, instead of trying to run on symbolism?"

Gay blogger and conservative contrarian Andrew Sullivan wonders whether Rove is losing his magic touch: "The whole point of the marriage amendment b.s. in the Senate this week is appeasing the Christianist base of the GOP. At least that's the theory. It has its costs. By spear-heading the FMA again, Bush has alienated a vast swathe of socially inclusive suburbanites, the veep's daughter, every gay person and many of their families, libertarians, constitutional conservatives and principled federalists. But he's won over the fire-breathers, right? It turns out: Not even them any more."

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/6/122347/2867
[GOP strategist Ed Rollins] The secret to this game is you always want to be thinking politically, but you don't want to look political. This looks like desperation politics. . .

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/5/172126/5377
[An aide for Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL)] “The Senator is not interested in protecting marriage but in protecting the definition of marriage”

What do Americans care about? Read the poll, look for gay marriage (or flag burning)

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/6/2387/36691

This is about one and only one thing

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/06/washington/06bush.html
"It is true what this vote will do will be to help the voters identify who is and is not supportive of the family," Dr. James C. Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, said in an interview on Monday. "And I think those that are not are going to have to answer for it."

Dr. Dobson's group is already running advertisements against senators who do not plan to support the amendment, including one against Senator Ken Salazar, Democrat of Colorado, that says, "Why doesn't Senator Salazar believe every child needs a mother and a father?"

Republican Party officials in several states have released statements attacking Democrats who are not expected to vote for the amendment. And another conservative group, the Family Research Council, is planning to ask lawmakers to take "a marriage protection pledge" and then tell voters who signs it and who does not.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/5/154125/4562
Not a single religious right leader was visible on camera during George Bush's entire address this afternoon. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008958.php
[Tony Snow] During that interview, however, Dobson pointedly asked Snow about tough allegations being raised in some conservative circles that the president had announced his support for MPA only for political reasons. . . "This is an issue on which George W. Bush has been very clear over the years -- and he's spoken repeatedly about it," Snow told Dobson.

[Steve Benen] That's about half-true. Searching through White House transcripts, I found that in 2004, Bush mentioned his support for a constitutional amendment "defining and protecting marriage as a union of a man and a woman" in public speeches over 100 times. In 2005? Zero. In 2006, before this past weekend's radio address? Zero.

In other words, Bush has spoken about the amendment "repeatedly" -- but only when he needed to use his base to get a second term.

E. J. Dionne wrote today that the GOP "thinks its base of social conservatives is a nest of dummies who have no memories and respond like bulls whenever red flags are waved in their faces." Sounds about right.

More: http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-na-outlook4jun04,1,6281414.column

James Inhofe (R-OK) says something he is sure to regret

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/great-moments-in-republican-bigotry.html
During today's same-sex marriage amendment debate, Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) used a prop of a blown-up photo of his family (some 20 people or so). Gesturing towards the photo, he said:

“As you see here, and I think this is maybe the most important prop we'll have during the entire debate, my wife and I have been married 47 years. We have 20 kids and grandkids. I'm really proud to say that in the recorded history of our family, we've never had a divorce or any kind of a homosexual relationship.”

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/06/inhofe-gay-marriage/

George Will and Rick Santorum, obsessing over anal intercourse

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/george-will-talks-about-human-rectum.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/rick-santorum-its-all-about-sodomy.html

And now the questions to GOP hypocrites begin: What have YOU done to defend marriage lately?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/is-your-member-of-congress-defending.html

http://www.pensitoreview.com/2006/06/05/the-real-threat-to-marriage-top-10-gop-adulterers/

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/best-phone-call-ever.html

More counterattacks

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/jon-stewart-destroyed-bill-bennett.html

http://online.logcabin.org/news_views/reading-room-back-up/an-open-letter-to-president.html

Kos: how to truly protect marriage

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/5/142836/9823

And for their tone-deaf political encore, Republicans announce their priority for NEXT year, if they retain their majority: go after Social Security again

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/6/14247/97998

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008660

The politicization of homeland security spending

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008663
[UPI] When the Senate took $1.9 billion out of the war supplemental to fund border security last month, $1.6 billion came out of funds to replace equipment destroyed or worn out from four years of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The money was diverted at the behest of the White House in a last-minute bid to address growing political unrest about illegal immigration. The Office of Management and Budget championed the change without input from the Army or the Marine Corps whose budgets were sliced, a Pentagon budget official told United Press International last week.

Crazy like a FOX. How’s this logic for you?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606050001
On Fox News' Your World, host Neil Cavuto complained that "the media is all over" the alleged Haditha killings but that there has been "virtually no coverage of the daily savage attacks by insurgents on Iraqi civilians and our troops." Onscreen text during the segment read: "Blatant Bias?" But Cavuto has previously alleged that "all you see in the media out of Iraq are the insurgent activity, our soldiers getting killed or hurt." In fact, he recently asked if "beheadings and roadside bombs, suicide attacks" in Iraq are "being blown out of proportion by the media." Onscreen text during this segment read: "Media Bias?"

Say it

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601396.html
[David Ignatius] The American project in Iraq is unraveling. . . [read on]

Brain damage

http://www.slate.com/id/2143172
[Eric Umansky] USA Today leads with a military survey suggesting a whole lot of GIs in Iraq have had undiagnosed concussions from bomb blasts. Twenty percent of the frontline troops surveyed showed evidence of them. Multiple concussions can cause permanent damage. But USAT seems to bury the lead: While a military center that specializes in brain injuries has pushed screening procedures for such injures, "the Pentagon has declined to mandate" them. "I think they're afraid," said the head of the center. "The sheer numbers are overwhelming. It's like opening a can of worms."

Tony Snow responds to Condi Rice’s denial that Iraqi PM Maliki was “misquoted” when complaining about US mistreatment of Iraqi civilians.

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6201
"I speculated about whether Condoleezza Rice or anybody here had spoken with Prime Minister Maliki, and the answer is, no, the people on the ground, Ambassador Khalilzad and General Casey, have spoken with him."

[NB: I think that’s the WH Press Secretary saying, in so many words, that the Secretary of State doesn’t know what the hell she is talking about]

I tell you, folks, I seriously don’t think Tony’s long for this job

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7600.html
Snow: Whether [the Federal Marriage Amendment] passes or not, as you know, Terry, there have been a number of cases where civil rights matters have risen on a number of occasions, and they've been brought up for repeated consideration by the United States Senate and other legislative bodies…

Q: You mentioned civil rights. Are you comparing this to various civil rights measures which have come to the Congress over the years?

Snow:: Not — well, these — it –

Q Is this a civil right?

Snow:: Marriage? It actually — what we're really talking about here is an attempt to try to maintain the traditional meaning of an institution that has maintained one meeting for — meaning for a period of centuries. And furthermore –

Q And you would equate that with civil rights?

Snow:: No, I'm just saying that I think — well, I don't know. How do you define civil rights?

Q It's not up to me. Up to you.

Snow:: Okay. Well, no, it's your question. So I — if I –

Q (Chuckles.)

Snow:: I need to get a more precise definition.

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6205
[Holden] After his stumbling inability to define civil rights yesterday you would think the press would know not to ask Pony Blow to define his terms.

Q Explain "assimilation." What are you talking about there, Tony?

MR. SNOW: Well, to tell you the truth, Steve, I'll tell you later in the day, because I've got to look at the briefing notes on it. I know it's a Catholic center and I just -- I don't want to --

Later Pony found his notes.

Q What does the President mean by "assimilation"?

MR. SNOW: Assimilation means understanding the laws and cultural pathways of the United States, gaining a mastery of the English language. Those are some of the basics. I mean, one of the things that has been stressed is becoming fluent in English -- that also is something that obviously a lot of Americans support and has always been a key determinate in how successful somebody is going to be in the long run.

Pony Blow has rapidly become an object of ridicule for the press corps.

Q Can you say how likely you think it is that you can reach some kind of agreement before the election, on immigration?

MR. SNOW: No, because I don't know. (Laughter.)

Q You know how likely you think it is. (Laughter.)

MR. SNOW: No. "Likely" means to assign a probability, which gets you into "more likely," "less likely," "is it 60 percent likely" -- I really don't know.

Swopa begins a comprehensive review of Karl Rove’s role in the Plame affair

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3027

The WSJ endorses perjury

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015028.html

Oh, these Abramoff trials are going to be interesting. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008954.php
[TPM] Safavian conceded to Justice prosecutor Peter Zeidenberg that he most likely didn't believe he had the qualifications to be chief of staff at the Government Services Administration, the position he held when he had the dealings with Jack Abramoff he is accused of covering up.

"Did you think you were qualified for the job?" Zeidenberg asked.

"Probably not, actually," Safavian said.

Tom DeLay’s wife gets dragged into his scandals

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601320.html

Taking a page out of George Bush’s book, the Associated Press reacts to John Solomon’s widely discredited reporting by giving him an award

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008656

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/new-rule-at-ap-get-story-wrong-get.html
[AP] "It was the most talked-about, blogged-about political story of the week -- twice."

[John Aravosis] Yes, it was talked about because it was wrong and biased.

More: http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_80.html#002669

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008658

The people who DIDN’T win: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_06_04.php#008662

Bonus item: Quote of the Day, goes to Jon Stewart

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7610.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:24 AM

 
THE HORROR

Haditha fronts the news magazines

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/06/04/time.cover/index.html
[Time] The killings of 24 Iraqis one morning last November may mark a terrible turning point in America's already shaky presence in Iraq. . . Like the Abu Ghraib prison scandal before it, what happened at Haditha threatens to become one of the war's signature debacles, an alleged atrocity committed by a small group of service members that comes to symbolize the enterprise's larger costs. . .

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1790499,00.html
The marine unit involved in the killing of Iraqi civilians in Haditha last November had suffered a "total breakdown" in discipline and had drug and alcohol problems, according to the wife of one of the battalion's staff sergeants. . . The allegations in Newsweek magazine contribute to an ever more disturbing portrait of embattled marines under high stress, some on their third tour of duty after ferocious door-to-door fighting in the Sunni insurgent strongholds of Falluja and Haditha. . .

"We are in trouble in Iraq," Barry McCaffrey, a retired army general who played a leading role in the Iraq war, told Time magazine. "Our forces can't sustain this pace, and I'm afraid the American people are walking away from this war."

The Newsweek account described a gung-ho battalion that had staged a chariot race, complete with captured horses, togas and heavy metal music, before the battle for Falluja in late 2004. The marines were given loose rules of engagement in the vicious urban warfare that followed. . . "If you see someone with a cellphone," said one of the commanders was quoted as saying, half-jokingly, "put a bullet in their fucking head".

At one point in the battle, a marine from the 3rd battalion was caught on camera shooting a wounded, unarmed man as he lay on the ground. However, the marine involved was later exonerated.

The third battalion lost 17 men in 10 days in Falluja and by the time the troops arrived in Haditha, in autumn last year, it was clear morale had plummeted. A Daily Telegraph reporter who visited its headquarters early this year at Haditha Dam, on the outskirts of the town, described it as a "feral place" where discipline was "approaching breakdown". . .

And in Ishaqi. . .

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002613009
The U.S military said Saturday it had found no wrongdoing in the March 15 raid on a home in Ishaqi that left nine Iraqi civilians dead. But, as with the apparent massacre in Haditha, will a military "coverup" in this case come undone?

The Iraqi police charge that American forces executed the civilians, including a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old baby. The BBC has been airing video of the dead civilians, mainly children, who appeared to be shot, possibly at close range. Photographs taken just after the raid for Agence France-Presse, and reports at the time by Reuters and Knight Ridder, also appear to largely back up the charge of an atrocity. . .

[NB: Wait, don’t tell me – the infant had a cell phone, right?]

http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=824382006
AMERICA'S alliance with the new Iraqi government was plunged into major crisis last night as the country's prime minister and its people reacted with fury to the US military clearing its forces of killing civilians during operations against insurgents.

Iraqi leaders vowed to press on with their own probe into one of the most notorious American raids against extremist fighters, in the town of Ishaqi, rejecting the US military's exoneration of its forces. . .

Was Maliki “misquoted” when he complained bitterly about US attacks on Iraqi civilians? Tony Snow says, “uh, yeah, I think so, but it’s all very complicated so I can’t really explain.” Condi Rice says, NO. Now what will Tony say?

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/04/rice-drops-misquoted-claim/

Iraq misses another deadline for forming a government

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/04/world/worldspecial/05iraqcnd.html
Iraqi political leaders failed to reach agreement on the two most important cabinet posts today, further delaying the formation of a new government and underscoring just how divided Iraq’s political establishment has become. . .

More: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5047098.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,1790426,00.html

http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/at-least-80-dead-with-students.html

Wait! Good news! An island of relative calm in Iraq!

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/complete/la-fg-southestan4jun04,1,2875902.story
Hashemia Mohsen Hossein's first death threat came in October. . . Yet Hossein says she is grateful to the Shiite militias and political parties that dominate this region of southern Iraq. Her reason: security.

"If you give me a choice and say, 'Go live in Baghdad, with all its explosions,' I would pick here," she said.

Talk of security may seem odd in a city where the mounting number of killings and kidnappings prompted Iraq's new prime minister, Nouri Maliki, to declare a state of emergency Wednesday. . . . But the bloodshed and intimidation in the region, which have been widely attributed to rivalries between Shiite groups, have remained distant from the lives of most members of the Shiite majority. Instead, they have been directed primarily against minority Sunni Arabs and those who are politically active, particularly members of secular political groups.

In its combination of security and repression, Iraq's south — the Shiite heartland — provides a glimpse of what could be the country's future.

Checkpoint by checkpoint, street by street and institution by institution across Iraq's southern provinces, the Shiite Muslim parties that ascended to power in last year's elections have begun imposing their will, clamping down on the modest democratic gains that followed the U.S.-led invasion.

They long ago banned liquor sales and public amusements deemed un-Islamic. Their activities now include busting up labor organizations, menacing secular political rivals and critics, intimidating journalists and academics and drenching the public sphere with Islamic imagery and slogans.

Their activities and tactics closely resemble those used by their fellow Islamic activists across the border in Iran, where many of Iraq's Shiite political leaders sought refuge during Saddam Hussein's rule.

The approach has succeeded in establishing a semblance of order in much of the south, something the weak central government has been largely unable to accomplish elsewhere. . .

Our outlaw nation

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.geneva05jun05,0,7799053.story
The Pentagon has decided to omit from new detainee policies a key tenet of the Geneva Conventions that explicitly bans "humiliating and degrading treatment," according to knowledgeable military officials, a step that would mark a further shift away from strict adherence to international human rights standards.

The decision culminates a lengthy debate within the Defense Department but will not become final until the Pentagon makes new guidelines public, a step that has been delayed. However, the State Department opposes the military's decision to exclude Geneva Conventions protections and has been pushing for the Pentagon and White House to reconsider, the defense officials acknowledged. . .

Meanwhile, back at home. . . .

Hey George, when Newsweek’s CW is ridiculing you, you’ve lost the Zeitgeist

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/deciders-distraction-strategy.html
“Iraq's a bigger mess than ever, Iran's digging in its heals on nukes. What's "the decider" focusing on? The same-sex marriage issue.”

Ouch. This doesn’t help either

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/who-are-bigger-chumps-religious-right.html
[Newsweek] A White House official, who declined to be identified discussing strategy, says Bush has not made calls [asking members of Congress to support]... the amendment because "nobody has asked us.". . . Though Bush himself has publicly embraced the amendment, he never seemed to care enough to press the matter. One of his old friends told NEWSWEEK that same-sex marriage barely registers on the president's moral radar. "I think it was purely political. I don't think he gives a s--t about it. He never talks about this stuff," said the friend, who requested anonymity to discuss his private conversations with Bush.

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/newsweek-bush-doesnt-give-shit-about.html

State Secrets

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015015.html
[TChris] Accountability avoidance is habitual in the Bush administration. It therefore comes as no surprise to learn that the Justice Department has grown increasingly reliant on the "state secrets" defense to evade judicial review of alleged governmental misconduct. . . [read on]

As for YOUR secrets. . .

http://www.slate.com/id/2142992/
[Daniel Politi] The Washington Post leads with word that three years after federal protections on private medical information were instituted, the Bush administration has not imposed any civil fines and has prosecuted only two criminal cases. . . Although there have been 19,420 complaints so far, mostly about the unnecessary revelation of private medical details, the administration has chosen to go with the philosophy of "voluntary compliance," giving violators a chance to fix wrongdoings. Not surprisingly, hospitals, insurance companies, and doctors are happy with the arrangement . . .

Who do these lawyers think they are? Defenders of the Constitution or something?

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/06/04/bar_group_will_review_bushs_legal_challenges/
The board of governors of the American Bar Association voted unanimously yesterday to investigate whether President Bush has exceeded his constitutional authority in reserving the right to ignore more than 750 laws that have been enacted since he took office. . . Meeting in New Orleans, the board of governors for the world's largest association of legal professionals approved the creation of an all-star legal panel with a number of members from both political parties. . .

Canada nabs some (non-Al Qaeda) bombers and suddenly this vindicates all the law-breaking of the Bush gang? I don’t think so

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/greater-mysteries.html

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/remedial-nsa-eavesdropping-course.html

As every sane person knows, the only way to significantly reduce abortions is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. So WHY are we still having this debate?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008942.php

Theocracy watch

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_06_04_atrios_archive.html#114947960306861030
SAN ANTONIO – Lt. Col. Brian Birdwell offered a greeting to delegates to the Republican convention. "It's great to be back in the holy land”. . .

At Saturday morning's prayer meeting, party leader Tina Benkiser assured them that God was watching over the two-day confab. . . "He is the chairman of this party," she said against a backdrop of flags and a GOP seal with its red, white and blue logo.

The party platform, adopted Saturday, declares "America is a Christian nation" and affirms that "God is undeniable in our history and is vital to our freedom."

Molly Ivins on Enron (thanks to Susan Madrak for the link)

http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/36931/

Will this backfire? (It all depends on the press coverage, doesn't it?)

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2006/06/05/senate_republicans_plan_divisive_votes.html
Senate leaders this week "are planning votes on emotional issues dear to social conservatives, many of whom are upset with President Bush and GOP lawmakers about immigration and other matters,” reports the Houston Chronicle. . . "Neither the same-sex marriage nor the flag-burning proposals are expected to win the two-thirds votes in both chambers of Congress needed to get the issues to the state legislatures. Nevertheless, the Republicans hope that their efforts will motivate a key constituency that needs to turn out in force at the polls in the November elections if the party is to retain control of Congress."

Do you remember the headline when the Republicans took over Congress? “Prospective Committee Chairs All Conservative”?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/ap-spinning-for-gop.html

The latest on John Solomon’s hatchet job on Harry Reid (D-NV)

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7589.html

Bonus item: I’m sure Bill Kristol is joking . . . ah, he IS joking, isn’t he?

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/06/04.html#a8572

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:39 AM

 
FAKES

Iraq doesn’t accept the US investigation of the Ishaqi massacre, which cleared troops of any wrongdoing

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/5044244.stm

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/06/03/iraq.inquiries/

More on the phony baloney Bush Co. claim that Iraqi PM Maliki was “misquoted” when he complained that US attacks on Iraqi civilians are a “daily” event

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7585.html
[Steve Benen] OK, sometimes reporters get things wrong, especially when there's a possible language barrier. Tell us, Tony Snow, what did al-Maliki say?

"[T]hat is a little too complicated for me to try to read out," Snow explained, adding, "[I]t really does get pretty convoluted. I don't want to get myself too much into it."

Yeah, that ought to clear things up nicely.

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/the_wayward_press_/2006/06/the_dog_that_did_not_bark_in_the_night.php
[Mark Kleiman] And then the dog did not bark in the night. So far, no press report about the White House statement contains any reference to a reporter's having asked the Prime Minister's office, or any other agency of the Iraqi government, for its version of the story. . . There's no way to know, right now, what al-Maliki actually said. But isn't it strange, if the Prime Minister had been misquoted on such a sensitive point, that his office didn't put out a correction directly, rather than at third hand?

Salam Pax (just read it)

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004322.html

No one has asked this question: for US troops who have been hanging on in Iraq with the expectation that this was the year when withdrawals would finally begin, how will they react to hear that there are no plans to do that – that in fact MORE troops are being sent in, and the current commitment has no end in sight?

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0603-04.htm

The Defense Dept lies (again)

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe-cordesman3jun03,1,7829096.story
[Anthony Cordesman, flaming peacenik] But the quarterly report to Congress issued May 30 by the Department of Defense, "Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq," like the weekly reports the State Department issues on Iraq, is profoundly flawed. It does more than simply spin the situation to provide false assurances to lawmakers and the public. It makes basic analytical and statistical mistakes, fails to define key terms, provides undefined and unverifiable survey information and deals with key issues by omission. It deserves an overall grade of F. . . [read on!]

ANTHONY H. CORDESMAN is a defense and intelligence expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. He is the author of "The Iraq War: Strategy, Tactics and Military Lessons."

John Aravosis declares war: if Republicans (and a few craven Democrats) are going to bash gays gratuitously in supposed “defense of marriage,” then their own anti-marriage actions (adultery, etc) will have to bear scrutiny

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/adulterer.html

Ooooh. Don’t piss off Jack Cafferty

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114934729495327973
[CNN] Guess what Monday is? Monday is the day President Bush will speak about an issue near and dear to his heart and the hearts of many conservatives. It's also the day before the Senate votes on the very same thing. Is it the war? Deficits? Health insurance? Immigration? Iran? North Korea?

Not even close. No, the president is going to talk about amending the Constitution in order to ban gay marriage. This is something that absolutely, positively has no chance of happening, nada, zippo, none. But that doesn't matter. Mr. Bush will take time to make a speech. The Senate will take time to talk and vote on it, because it's something that matters to the Republican base.

This is pure politics. If has nothing to do with whether or not you believe in gay marriage. It's blatant posturing by Republicans, who are increasingly desperate as the midterm elections approach. There's not a lot else to get people interested in voting on them, based on their record of the last five years.

But if you can appeal to the hatred, bigotry, or discrimination in some people, you might move them to the polls to vote against that big, bad gay married couple that one day might in down the street.

Bush starts his pandering circuit on gay marriage with some dubious constitutional reasoning of his own

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/3/11228/42572
[Bush] In our free society, people have the right to choose how they live their lives. And in a free society, decisions about such a fundamental social institution as marriage should be made by the people -- not by the courts. . .

[Georgia10] The President couldn't have made his position any clearer. Courts should not be overturning the will of the people when it comes who should and should not be allowed to marry. Now, which enterprising White House reporter will ask whether the President thinks that Loving v. Virginia should be overturned?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court declared Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute, the "Racial Integrity Act of 1924", unconstitutional, thereby ending all race-based legal restriction on marriage in the United States.

[NB: Notice the precise wording of Bush’s statement. He seems to be signaling that homosexuality is a legitimate private decision, as long as it doesn’t infringe on public institutions, like marriage. Is this his idea of a reasonable compromise?]

Pouring gasoline and throwing a match

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7586.html
[Steve Benen] Just to follow up on an item from yesterday, I suggested that the religious right would not be terribly impressed with the president speaking out in support of the so-called Federal Marriage Amendment at the last minute. Given the reactions yesterday from some leading activists, I think I understated the case. . . . To be sure, most conservatives love it, but some far-right heavy-hitters are balking — because it's not harsh enough.

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/misstep-in-bushs-quest-for-historical.html
[James Dobson] “As you all very well know, marriage is under vicious attack now, I think from the forces of hell itself."

Courts hit the Bush gang with two unfavorable judgments on domestic spying

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/3/10147/54371
[Georgia10] On May 30th, a federal judge ordered that John Ashcroft and Robert Mueller must reveal whether they were aware of any secret government monitoring of communications between the plaintiffs and their lawyers. . .

[Oh-oh]

If Gold's decision was the first crack, then a decision issued by Judge Anna Diggs Taylor the next day can only be described as shattering that wall (well, for now at least). . . Judge Taylor is presiding over the case of ACLU v. NSA. The suit was filed on behalf of attorneys, journalists, scholars, and others who have a "well-founded belief that their communications are being intercepted by the NSA.". . .

U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor apparently doesn't like the government's games. Instead of ruling immediately on the state secrets privilege (and possibly killing the case), she has ordered a hearing on the plaintiff's motion first. . . Only after she hears both sides argue the legality of the program will she proceed to the state secrets privilege. Translation? For the first time, a court will hold a hearing on the legality of the program. . . On the record, in a court of the law, the government will have to explain why the program--which operates outside of the FISA law--is lawful and constitutional.

The battle never ends: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/04/washington/04secrets.html

The Supreme Court wars to come

http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/06/02/scotus.ahead/index.html

The media likes a good narrative, as long as the facts don’t get in the way. Digby has more. . .

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114937518656008343

This is the kind of ordinary human insight that just cuts through all the spin and b.s. George Bush: the man who can never be wrong (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.findingavoice.com/mt/archives/000285.html
[Ann Davidow] I think I’ve finally figured out why President Bush bollixed up the “fool me once…” quote. It wasn’t just his usual garbling of the English language; it was because the second part of “fool me once shame on you” is “fool me twice shame on me”, and it is simply beyond this man’s capability to accept blame for anything, making it impossible for “shame on me” to escape his lips.

NEVER wrong: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7587.html

I guess revenge IS a dish best served cold. . .

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114935928995994979
[NPR] GROSS: You got to see George W. Bush close-up when he was your opponent for the presidency. What surprises you most about how the Bush presidency has turned out?

Vice Pres. GORE: I guess what surprises me most is his incuriosity. That's a real mystery to me because he's clearly a smart man. He has a different kind of intelligence, as everybody does. There's so many varieties of intelligence. He's clearly a smart man, but it is a puzzle that he would ask no questions about important matters. When his first secretary of the Treasury came in for their first meeting and spoke for an hour about economic policies of the new administration, he asked not a single question. When he received the briefing in August of 2001 that Osama bin Laden was planning a major attack soon, you know, on the United States, he did not ask a single question. When he was briefed several days before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the weather service people were saying it may mark a return to medieval conditions, he asked not a single question. And that same incuriosity seems to be a factor when he just accepts hook, line and sinker the ExxonMobil view that global warming is not a problem, in no way related to the massive volumes of pollution we're putting into the Earth's atmosphere every hour of every day.

When they tell him that the scientific community is wrong and that they're just lying because they're greedy for more research dollars, he doesn't apparently look under the rug. He doesn't ask questions. And in the American system, the president of the United States is the only person who is charged with representing all of the people in every state in every district and looking after the welfare of the people as a whole. And if the special interest has one view, at least you should ask questions about how the public interest is affected, and I really do not know why he is so incurious.

If the religious right succeeds in making the emergency contraceptive “Plan B” a crime, then only criminals will have Plan B (thanks to Mark Kleiman for the link)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/02/AR2006060201405_pf.html

Closing the circle: Ann Coulter, in order to defend her illegal voting in Florida, hires a lawyer who was central to disenfranchising thousands of Florida voters in 2000. I guess when you’re rich, blond (fake), and conservative, it’s different (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/search/content/local_news/epaper/2006/06/02/m2a_jose_col_0602.html
Conservative pundit and best-selling political writer Ann Coulter has hired a white-glove, White House-connected law firm to fight allegations she voted illegally in February's Town of Palm Beach election. . . And the attorney from the Miami-based Kenny Nachwalter firm is no stranger to Palm Beach voting. Marcos Jimenez — who was, along with the more famous Olson, one of the lead attorneys who fought for George W. Bush's side in the 2000 presidential election snafu here — was assigned to Coulter. . .

More on Karl Zinsmeister (new Bush appointee): he may have lied on his resume too

http://www.prospect.org/horsesmouth/2006/06/post_65.html#002637

In the interests of balance, a detailed critique of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr’s article on the 2004 election

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/03/kennedy/

More: http://www.thepoorman.net/2006/06/02/here-we-go-again/

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114935027329276958

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7588.html

Sunday talk show line-ups

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114929089522946871
• Meet the Press hosts Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) and Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission Chair Dr. Hans Blix.
• Face the Nation hosts Sec/State Condoleezza Rice and Time's Mike Duffy.
• This Week hosts VP Gore. Ex-Labor Sec. Robert Reich and Time's Jay Carney join the roundtable. Author John Updike is the Voices segment.
• Fox News Sunday hosts Rice, and Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Jack Reed (D-RI).
• Late Edition hosts Rice and Sens. George Allen (R-VA) and Carl Levin (D-MI).

Bonus item: Fake (and very, very funny) Katherine Harris campaign video (thanks to Michael Froomkin for the link)

http://harrisvideo.cf.huffingtonpost.com/

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:17 AM

 
GAINING TRACTION

Military investigating SEVERAL alleged massacres (and no, Bill O’Reilly, I’m not happy to hear it)

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/06/02/iraqi.probes/index.html

More: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7576.html

What did Bush know, and when did he know it? (thanks to Buzzflash for the first link)

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-wobush024765646jun02,0,848787,print.story
The White House said yesterday it took nearly a month for President George W. Bush to learn the military was investigating whether Marines gunned down civilians in Haditha - an incident Iraq's leader called "a horrible crime" as he launched his own probe.

That explanation appeared at odds with a White House statement earlier this week that Bush was told of the inquiry "soon after" it was launched in February. Bush never discussed Haditha in public until he was asked about it by reporters Wednesday. . .

http://www.samefacts.com/archives/public_management_/2006/06/missing_the_point_about_atrocities.php
[Michael O’Hare] The president is "troubled" about the Haditha story, and reassures us, lapsing into his usual passive-voice departure from scenes he doesn't enjoy, that "if laws were broken, there will be punishment.". . . But that's not what this story is about, or it shouldn't be. The three elephants in this room are (i) none of this was on the scope at the White House until at least two months after the event, (ii) when it was, none of it was shared with the public until a couple of weeks ago, and by John Murtha, (iii) a whole chain of command up to the president obviously believed that the person above him did not want stuff like this passed along. . .

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/03/world/middleeast/03haditha.html
Marine commanders in Iraq learned within two days of the killings in Haditha last November that Iraqi civilians had died from gunfire, not a roadside bomb as initially reported, but the officers involved saw no reason to investigate further, according to a senior Marine officer. . .

A senior Marine general familiar with the investigation, which is being led by Maj. Gen. Eldon A. Bargewell of the Army, said in an interview that it had not yet established how high up the chain of command culpability for the killings extended. But he said there were strong suspicions that some officers knew that the Marine squad's version of events had enough holes and discrepancies that it should have been looked into more deeply. . . "It's impossible to believe they didn't know," the Marine general said, referring to midlevel and senior officers. "You'd have to know this thing stunk.". . .

Infuriating. Rumsfeld tries to explain away military abuses (by suggesting that it’s the Iraqis’ fault)

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6176
[NYT] Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki charged on Thursday that American forces had regularly attacked Iraqi civilians and said that the Iraqi government would take this conduct into account in determining how long American troops should remain in Iraq

Mr. Rumsfeld declined to respond directly to Mr. Maliki's assertions, saying that he had not read them. He also declined to discuss the specifics of the Haditha deaths, saying that he did not want to interfere in the ongoing investigations. . .

The major obstacle to progress in Iraq, he suggested, was not the United States, but rather the slow efforts by Mr. Maliki's government to appoint Defense and Interior Ministers, two ministries that are central to securing Iraq. . . "My assessment of the situation is that the government that has been elected under the new constitution needs to appoint a defense minister and a minister of interior and get about the task of governing the country," Mr. Rumsfeld said.

Tony Snow: Maliki “misquoted” (uh-huh)

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6177

This Mr. Dum-Dum approach is wearing thin: http://makeashorterlink.com/?C36C2243D
"That is a little too complicated for me to try to read out," Snow said at a briefing where he was pressed to explain how al-Maliki's remarks were supposed to have been distorted. "It becomes a little convoluted and so I don't want to make a real clear characterization because it's a little hazy to me," Snow said.

Interesting: watch the Democrats (re)position themselves on the Iraq War

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_517.html#002630

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7580.html

We can’t get a straight answer on WHY Homeland Security funds to NY and DC were cut

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/feds-now-lying-about-why-they-cut-nyc.html
[John Aravosis] Right. The Bush administration cut NY's (Hillary Clinton) and DC's (no vote in Congress) homeland security "stop the next 9/11" monies because the application wasn't emailed, it was faxed instead. . .

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008622
[Josh Marshall] If I'm understanding this correctly, both New York City and Washington, DC had their federal homeland security grant funding cut this year in large part because their grant applications were either incorrectly filed or poorly prepared. Doesn't that seem like quite a coincidence? Especially since there appears to be affirmative evidence that the claim of improper filing about New York City is false.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/6/2/9514/81859
[ABC] New York has no national monuments or icons, according to the Department of Homeland Security form obtained by ABC News. That was a key factor used to determine that New York City should have its anti-terror funds slashed by 40 percent . . [huh?!?]

Now this: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_515.html
[DHS’s] inspector general, furious at his inability to compel changes, just wrote a book called Open Target about how deeply dysfunctional the DHS is, and how totally unprepared they've left the country. . .

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/cliffs-corner_02.html

Bush’s anti-gay marriage pandering speech on Monday: how many gay WH staffers will attend?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/will-mary-and-heather-be-in-rose.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/speaking-of-marriage-protection-monday.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008936.php
[Steve Benen] I know the White House is anxious to impress the frustrated GOP base, but I'm not sure if the Bush gang has thought this one through. . . Putting aside the merit of the amendment (or lack thereof), there's little strategic upside to the president's new-found interest in the anti-gay amendment.

If you're Bush, and your agenda isn't exactly sweeping through the Hill, why intentionally tie yourself to a measure that's going to fail? The amendment isn't going to pass; it won't even be close. But instead of a predictable, pro-forma defeat for the far-right on the Senate floor, the president will connect himself to a sinking ship on purpose. The post-vote spin will now be, "Bush suffers another defeat on the Hill; lawmakers reject president's demands on amendment."

Maybe the religious right will give Bush credit for trying? It's unlikely. Dobson, Falwell, Robertson & Co. have asked the White House to take this amendment seriously for months. For the president to speak out, literally at the 11th hour, will probably be seen as too-little, too-late.

There's also the consistency question. In January 2005, Bush said, in no uncertain terms, that he would not aggressively lobby the Senate to pass the constitutional amendment during his second term. By flip-flopping now, the president only reminds everyone what a weak position he's in -- and how much he needs to suck up to angry religious right activists before midterms.

What an asshole: http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Santorum_calls_Federal_Marriage_Amendment_an_0601.html
On May 24, Republican Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania appeared on the nationally syndicated radio show, "Janet Parshall's America," to discuss the Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), a bill that would amend the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage. . . While Parshall and Santorum acknowledged the FMA's bleak prospect of passing a full Senate vote, Parshall cast the bill as an attempt to "speak back to the culture." Santorum agreed, declaring that the debate over the FMA would be "an opportunity for us to get beyond, you know, 'We should treat people nicely.'". . .

Bush’s economy goes cold

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6172

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/02/jobs/index.html
Republicans grumble that they're not getting enough credit for an improving economy, and Karl Rove has been aiming to fix that. His job just got a little harder. . .

More and more GOP candidates are getting nervous about being associated with Bush and his policies

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2006/06/02/in_maryland_steele_skips_bush_visit.html
[Cox] "When President Bush showed up at a Baltimore-Washington International Airport hotel Wednesday night for a fundraiser for the Maryland GOP he found that the party’s top-of-the-ticket candidate already had boarded a plane and left town." . . . U.S. Senate candidate Michael Steele (R) "joined the list of Republicans who had to be somewhere else when Bush came to town to raise money for the GOP."

Here’s why: http://susiemadrak.com/2006/06/03/08/01/the-popular-crowd/
The war in Iraq has become so unpopular that it could cost Republicans control of Congress, statehouses and governor races around the country, national pollster John Zogby said Friday. . . He said 70% of voters believe the U.S. is headed in the wrong direction, adding, “I have never seen a number like that since I’ve been polling.” . . .

Hilarious? Pathetic? Infuriating? You decide

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008937.php
[Kevin Drum] Did you ever think you'd see the day when the Washington Post would consider it front page news — front page news! — that the White House is showing a "willingness to listen to opinions that are at odds with its stated positions"? That's quite an accomplishment. . .

Libby: screwed

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008629
[Paul Kiel] Bad news for Scooter Libby: his trial will not be about Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, the war in Iraq, etc. It will be about whether he lied or not.

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015001.html

When will we hear about Rove?

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7578.html
“When you least expect it”

CREW: doing the investigative work Congress won’t

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/crew-wins-can-depose-number-3-guy-at.html

Thank goodness for the courts

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114926264957408779
[AP] A federal judge will go ahead with hearings in a legal challenge to a warrantless domestic surveillance program run by the National Security Agency. . . U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor also criticized the Justice Department for failing to respond to the legal challenge. . .

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015000.html

The next big GOP scandal: Jerry Lewis (R-CA)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008630

Who is Letitia White? http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/03/washington/03white.html
The "Queen of earmarks"

The growing threat of NSA surveillance over the Internet, and not just phone logs

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008932.php

The debate over John Solomon’s hatchet job on Harry Reid (D-NV) continues, as the AP tries to defend his journalism, and the blogosphere defends the facts

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000791.php
[Paul Kiel] We went after Solomon's piece for a simple reason. At a time when Congressional corruption is arguably worse than it has ever been, leading to a spreading net of criminal investigations, Solomon used the most powerful organ in the land to attack Harry Reid for what is at very most a minor ethical transgression. Solomon did not allege a quid pro quo. He did not even allege that Reid violated ethics rules. What he argued was that Reid should have avoided accepting the seats in order to "avoid the appearance he was being influenced by gifts.". . . [read on!]

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008625
[Josh Marshall] I hear that folks at the Associated Press are starting ask some uncomfortable questions about John Solomon's reporting on Harry Reid and his weirdly non-factual defense of it. This may not be over. . .

The kind of people they are

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/another-gop-marriage-protector.html
Republican Jim Galley, who is running for Congress as a “pro-traditional family” candidate, was married to two women at the same time, defaulted on his child support payments and has been accused of abuse by one of his ex-wives. . .

The kind of people they are: hyper-macho edition

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/2/172629/7688
[Matt Stoller] So I'm reading this New York Times article on the new Treasury Secretary nominee and his chief of staff, and ladida, it's a standard piece, and all of a sudden thwack this paragraph jumps out.

[NYT] In some ways, the two are a bit of an odd couple. Mr. Paulson is very much of an alpha male: he will challenge colleagues to wrestling matches and once halted a game of paddle tennis to vomit before resuming play and winning the match.

Ann Coulter, charged with illegal voting, brings in the Big Guns

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114928510249478614
Conservative pundit and best-selling political writer Ann Coulter has hired a white-glove, White House-connected law firm to fight allegations she voted illegally in February's Town of Palm Beach election. . .

More: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/015002.html

A sensible comment on abortion

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_518.html
[Matt Yglesias] But to the best of my knowledge, though abortion rules have varied widely no society has actually considered the deliberate destruction of an early-stage embryo as on a par with deliberate murder of a human being, nor the accidental death of such an embryo (which is very common) as on a par with the accidental death of a human being. . .

After all this, what can you say about a major news organization that STILL DOESN’T UNDERSTAND THAT THERE WERE NO WMD’S IN IRAQ?

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/06/02/cnniraq/index.html

The theft of the 2004 elections (for anyone who’s paying attention): first Ohio, then the nation. . .

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/06/06/con06219.html

Bonus item: She’s her father’s daughter, ain’t she? You get a chance to sit in the American delegation at the UN, and what do you do? Hang out listening to your iPod. . .

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6174

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:28 AM

 
MISSING IN ACTION

The Commander-in-Chief is M.I.A. This is appalling: how does the man in charge not know (unless he has made it clear that he doesn’t WANT to know)?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/014991.html
[TChris] When did the president learn that Marines may have murdered civilians in Haditha?

The White House said Thursday that it took nearly a month for President Bush to learn that the military was investigating reports that Marines murdered unarmed civilians in Iraq.

How did the president learn about the deaths in Haditha?

On Tuesday, White House spokesman Tony Snow said President Bush learned of the killings only after a reporter from Time magazine asked questions.

What is the U.S. doing in response to the deaths?

The top U.S. general in Iraq on Thursday ordered American commanders to conduct ethical training on battlefield conduct following reports that Marines massacred unarmed civilians in the town of Haditha.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9287434/
It's a standing joke among the president's top aides: who gets to deliver the bad news? Warm and hearty in public, Bush can be cold and snappish in private, and aides sometimes cringe before the displeasure of the president of the United States . . .

What DID they know, and when did they know it?

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6161

The cover-up

http://www.adelphia.net/news/read.php?ps=1018&id=12842622&_LT=HOME_LARSDCCLM_UNEWS
[AP] A U.S. military investigation into actions taken following a deadly incident in western Iraq will conclude that some officers gave false testimony to their superiors. . .

Iraq says, thank you very much, WE’LL investigate what happened to our people (boy, you would think they were a sovereign nation or something)

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/01/world/middleeast/01cnd-iraq.html
The demand represented a unusual declaration for a new government that remains desperately dependent on American forces to keep some form of order in the country as a resilient insurgency and widespread sectarian violence have pushed it to the brink of civil war.

The move also came as the new Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, lashed out at the American military in the harshest terms anyone in his office has so far used to condemn what he characterized as habitual atrocities against Iraqi civilians.

The American-led forces "do not respect the Iraqi people; they crush them by vehicles and kill them by suspicion," Mr. Maliki said. "This is extremely unacceptable." . . .

Another massacre in Iraq?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008931.php
The BBC has a videotape that seems to confirm another American massacre of civilians in Iraq, this time in the town of Ishaqi, about 60 miles north of Baghdad. Knight Ridder first reported on this back in March . . .

More: http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/ishaqi-massacre-emerges-in-wake-of.html

The usual right-wing apologists try to minimize the Haditha horror

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606010008
[John Gibson, FOX] "If Iraqis know their own history, they know massacres have been committed in Iraq by warring parties from millennia piled on millennia. This is the part of the world that was in on the massacre game early". . .

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606010006
[Bill O’Reilly, FOX] "Predictably, the left-wing press has run with the alleged massacre at Haditha. . . screaming about holding all of those involved accountable. . . Why do so many rejoice when bad things happen to the USA?"

Don’t miss this: http://thismodernworld.com/2930

Andrew Sullivan sums it all up

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_06/008927.php
“We were told by the president that the Iraq war was the critical battle in the war on terror, an effort of enormous stakes that we couldn't possibly lose. And then he went to war with half the troops necessary to win, with no plan for the aftermath, and refused to budge even when this became obvious to anyone with eyes and a brain.”

Speaking the unspeakable

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004309.html
[NYT] Let's face it: this laundry list of inaction on the part of the Bush administration leaves a prudent Iraqi with no practical choice but to prepare for a United States withdrawal long before the Iraqi central government and security forces are capable of running the nation. For most Iraqis — Arab or Kurd, Sunni or Shiite — this will mean looking to religious and ethnic militias, criminal gangs and Islamist insurgents for protection. This, in turn, greatly increases the chance of civil war. . . [read on!]

Tony Snow’s ridiculous “clarification” yesterday, that Cheney’s “last throes” comment only pertained to the Al Qaeda portion of the insurgency? Well, even that is not true

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6171

More on Bush’s half-hearted offer to negotiate with Iran

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6161
[Tim Grieve] But as Sanger writes, the price of admission to the talks -- the suspension of all uranium-related activities -- is so high that Iran isn't likely to pay it. "Few" of Bush's advisors expect Iran to bite, Sanger says, and "some participants in the drawn-out nuclear drama questioned whether this was an offer intended to fail, devised to show the extent of Iran's intransigence."

If that's the goal of Bush's diplomacy, it seems to be working already. Iran's foreign minister said today that his country welcomed the idea of talks with the United States, but he said that Iran "will not give up" its "natural right" to enrich uranium, and that it isn't interested in talking about the prospect of doing so. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/01/world/middleeast/01cnd-iran.html
Iran's foreign minister said today that his country was willing to talk with the United States about its nuclear program, but did not say that Tehran would agree to the condition set by President Bush — the suspension of all activity related to uranium enrichment. . . While the statement by Manoucher Mottaki to Iranian television was critical of the American proposal, which he said contained "no new or rational solution," it did not amount to a flat refusal. . .

Bush’s flip-flop: http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7568.html

Iran is winning: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3012

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004308.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2142887/fr/rss/
[Eric Umansky] The LAT has a wee bit of trouble conveying the above nuance: "RUSSIA, CHINA, JOIN DEAL ON IRAN." It's one of those perfectly accurate and perfectly wrong headlines. Sure, China and Russia agreed on the "deal"—a deal that apparently punts on the central issue: what to do if Iran balks. . . As the WP delicately puts it:

The possible sanctions in the agreement are listed as a menu, ranging from minor to major, diplomats said. It was unclear whether there was agreement on which options to choose if Iran fails to act.

Bush to New York: “Drop Dead”

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_499.html#002603

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/ny-republicans-furious-at-bush-for.html
[John Aravosis] Not only did Bush cut funding to NYC and DC by 40% - funding that is meant to stop the next September 11 - and not only is what Bush did today the exact opposite of what his Homeland Security Secretary promised would happen - and not only is this the exact kind of move that the September 11 Commission warned was a big mistake that endangers all of our lives - but it seems that Bush didn't even bother checking with the Republican member of Congress who RUNS the entire Homeland Security Committee in the US House.

Check this out, from the NY Post no less (uber right-wing Rupert Murdoch paper that ALWAYS support Bush - not anymore): "As far as I'm concerned, the Department of Homeland Security and the administration have declared war on New York," said Rep. Peter King (R-L.I.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. . . .

John Solomon’s series of articles for the Associated Press on Harry Reid (D-NV) have gone beyond careless mistakes or sloppy journalism. When you look at their blatant inaccuracies and distortions, each compounded by every new “clarification,” there is only one conclusion you can draw

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_05_28_atrios_archive.html#114918712335655206
[Atrios] There's no way the reporter is this stupid. Look, we're getting into firing offense territory here. This is deliberate mendacious deception from a wire service reporter. . .

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7560.html
[Steve Benen] I would have been more than happy to let this story go away, but the AP's John Solomon has taken his reporting to such a reckless level, it needs to be condemned far and wide. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/associated-press-again-publishes-false.html
[John Aravosis] Okay, this has gone past the point of complaining on the blog. Anyone who wants to figure out how to do a campaign to get John Solomon at AP fired, I'm game. Feel free to figure out how to target their advertisers, get local newspapers and Web sites to drop them, whatever you need. But they've crossed the line here with repeated stories that contain outright errors and fabrications intended to mislead their readers into believing accusations that are unsubstantiated and untrue. . .

Solomon’s still rewriting his pieces: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008614

More: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000797.php

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000798.php

The AP responds, and only makes things worse

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008619
[Josh Marshall] The AP sent out a detailed response to our reporting and that of Media Matters to the John Solomon piece on Harry Reid. Paul Kiel, over at TPMmuckraker, had intended to respond to it today. But he got so bogged down with the new distortions and bamboozlement in Solomon's follow-up reporting that he didn't get to it.

Now, I just noticed that Media Matters, has their response to the AP, along with the AP's original defense of its reporting, posted at their site.

So this gave me a chance to glance over some of the AP's claims about TPMmuckraker's reporting. And most of the assertions are so demonstrably false that it's hard for me even to figure what sort of meltdown is going on over there. . .

More: http://mediamatters.org/items/200606010009

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/06/okay-im-not-making-this-up-ap-has-lied.html

The L word. Why does the mainstream press have such a hard time calling Bush a liar, no matter how blatant his howlers?

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7569.html

More: http://www.slate.com/id/2142700/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

Here’s part of the answer (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2006/06/former_white_ho.html

Three GOP bad guys down, and summer is just heating up. . .

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008613

More to come: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008620

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/6/1/21714/41322

Bill Frist (R-TN) fined for violating campaign finance law

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/FEC_finds_Frist_violated_law_by_0601.html

CREW responds: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/014995.html
Melanie Sloan, CREW's executive director, said "it is gratifying to see that the FEC recognizes that Senator Frist's campaign committee broke the law. Apparently, the FEC disagreed with Sen. Frist's aide's dismissal of the complaint as 'incorrect' and 'politically driven.'"

Zinsmeister may be sued over editing (then republishing) news article

http://www.nysun.com/article/33707
An editor is considering legal action against President Bush's nominee for domestic policy adviser, Karl Zinsmeister, for changing quotations in a profile of him published in 2004 in the Syracuse New Times. . . "What is getting lost here is that he changed quotes, that is getting lost here," Molly English, editor in chief of the alternative weekly for five years, told Editor & Publisher yesterday. "I find it insulting and his excuse is awfully lame." . .

Good article (subscription only): How the Republicans are finally figuring out that cutting taxes DOESN’T shrink the size of government (but only bankrupts it)

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200606/tax-cuts

First the telephone companies, then the Internet Service Providers

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/014990.html

http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-internet2jun02,0,622125.story

Robert Kennedy Jr. lays out the case on 2004 election fraud

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/10432334/was_the_2004_election_stolen

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114918396938949850

Ahem. The question that no major polling agency wants to ask

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002611668
A new Quinnipiac Poll finds American voters selecting George W. Bush as easily the worst American president in the past 61 years, with fellow Republican Ronald Reagan picked as the best. . . Bush was named by 34% of voters, followed by Richard Nixon at 17% and Bill Clinton at 16%. . .

More: http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6164

Bonus item: ABC news piece? Or GOP attack ad?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200606010007

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:51 AM

 
SECOND THOUGHTS

The Bush gang appears to soften its stance on negotiations with Iran. Does this mean they’ve gotten the message that the public simply won’t accept any more military incursions? Or is it just a token gesture to legitimate an inevitable attack? Haven’t we been here before?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/31/world/middleeast/31cnd-iran.html
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, abandoning the Bush administration's opposition to diplomatic contacts with Iran, said today that the United States would join European negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program if Iran suspended uranium activities that are suspected to be a cover for nuclear arms development.

Ms. Rice's announcement came after a searching internal administration debate over how to revive the stalled European-led process of engaging Iran in talks to end its suspected nuclear activity voluntarily. In recent weeks, European leaders have been increasingly vocal in asserting that direct American participation was essential to a solution with Iran. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/01/world/middleeast/01iran.html
President Bush reversed course on Wednesday because it was made clear to him — by his allies, by the Russians, by the Chinese, and eventually by some of his advisers — that he no longer had a choice. . . During the past month, according to European officials and some current and former members of the Bush administration, it became obvious to Mr. Bush that he could not hope to hold together a fractious coalition of nations to enforce sanctions — or consider military strikes on Iranian nuclear sites — unless he first showed a willingness to engage Iran's leadership directly over its nuclear program and exhaust every nonmilitary option. . .

But: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/05/post_490.html
[Sam Rosenfeld] [I]t's worth heeding cautionary notes from both Kevin Drum and Ivo Daalder that Condoleezza Rice may be (whether in deliberate bad faith or not) putting too many demands for Iranian concessions on the table as preconditions for negotiation. . .

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004303.html
[NYT] Three officials who were involved in the most recent iteration of that debate said Mr. Cheney and others stepped aside — perhaps because they read Mr. Bush's body language, or perhaps because they believed Iran would scuttle the effort. . . In the end, said one former official who has kept close tabs on the debate, "it came down to convincing Cheney and others that if we are going to confront Iran, we first have to check off the box" of trying talks.

More: http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001410.php
Condoleezza Rice just really pissed off John Bolton . . .

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004298.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004300.html

http://www.slate.com/id/2142744/fr/rss/

When was the last time you saw a total for US dead in Iraq?

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6148
Stars and Stripes reports that "insurgent attacks and resulting coalition and Iraqi deaths" are now at record highs according to a Pentagon Iraq progress report released today. . .

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iraq_casualties.htm
2487 killed, 20,648 wounded

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/05/31/honor_roll/index.html

“Last throes,” huh? I guess that depends on what the definition of "last" and "throes" is. Isn't this just the kind of weasly word-parsing they condemned when Clinton did it?

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/05/31/wordplay/index.html
[Tim Grieve] Last June, Dick Cheney made a prediction about the Iraq war. "The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline," the vice president told Larry King on CNN. "I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency."

Last throes. It was rock solid. The sort of phrase you can dress up and take to the party. And the source was solid too. Cheney knows the intelligence. He speaks to the commanders. He had even predicted -- more or less -- the Iraqi reaction to the American invasion. (See "Greeted as Liberators," March 14, 2003, on "Meet the Press.") America was free to rejoice. The war was ending.

But then something strange happened. Nothing changed in Iraq. The bombs kept blowing up. The body bags kept coming home. A month later, CNN's Wolf Blitzer sat down with Cheney and asked if he still stood by his "last throes" prediction.

Ever the scholar, Cheney pulled out a dictionary. "If you look at what the dictionary says about throes, it can still be a violent period -- the throes of a revolution." It was, to say the least, a "big-time" letdown. As it turned out, "last throes" was not a phrase you could take to bed.

But the story does not end there. The White House lexicographic campaign continues to this day. This afternoon, a reporter at the White House decided to throw "last throes" at the new press secretary, Tony Snow. "It was a year ago today that Vice President Cheney said that the insurgency there was in its last throes," the reporter pointed out. "And now we have this latest Pentagon assessment saying that the insurgency is going to remain steady."

Snow, who has been learning his job on the fly, did like the vice boss. He pulled out the dictionary. This time, however, he focused on the word "insurgency." Snow explained that Cheney probably didn't mean to suggest that the Iraqi "insurgency" was in its "last throes." In fact, Cheney was talking about the al-Qaida "insurgency." To wit:

"Well, there was a time when -- and I don't want to try to back-interpret what the Vice President said, but let me just offer at least one view on it, which is, for a long time, when we talked about insurgency -- that is, 'we,' generally, Americans -- we thought of al Qaeda. And I think it's pretty safe to say that the al Qaeda and the foreign fighters remnant presence in Iraq has been dramatically reduced, such that, at least, in the opinions of people there, it is no longer the major factor when it comes to what's going on. Now you do have former members of the Saddam regime and you do have Iraqi citizens who are in entrenched opposition and are using terror and other tactics to try to derail democracy."

Note that Snow had the presence of mind to stop midsentence to define the word "we." That is why we call them public servants. They are here to serve. It's a technique I call "equivoque." I suggest you look it up.

Yes, it looks as if the days of being greeted with flowers and parades in Iraq and Afghanistan are definitely over. . .

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060531/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_women_killed_7
U.S. forces killed two Iraqi women — one of them about to give birth — when the troops shot at a car that failed to stop at an observation post in a city north of Baghdad . . . Nabiha Nisaif Jassim, 35, was being raced to the maternity hospital in Samarra by her brother when the shooting occurred Tuesday. . .

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/3011
[AP] Speeding toward U.S. military checkpoints, convoys or living next door to a suspected insurgent hideout has cost many Iraqis their lives since U.S. troops invaded in 2003. Although figures are not available, it is commonly believed by Iraqis that hundreds of people may have died this way. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/31/world/asia/31cnd-afghan.html
American soldiers involved in a car crash in the capital Monday fired into the crowd of protesters and killed four people, according to the chief of highway police in Kabul . . .

Will the Haditha investigation look into cover-ups by officers, and not just the massacre itself?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/31/AR2006053101058.html
The U.S. military investigation of how Marine commanders handled the reporting of events last November in the Iraqi town of Haditha, where troops allegedly killed 24 Iraqi civilians, will conclude that some officers gave false information to their superiors, who then failed to adequately scrutinize reports that should have caught their attention, an Army official said yesterday. . . Bargewell has pursued two lines of investigation: not only whether falsehoods were passed up the chain of command, but also whether senior Marine commanders were derelict in their duty to monitor the actions of subordinates. The inquiry is expected to conclude by the end of this week, the official added. He said there were multiple failures but declined to say whether he would characterize it as a "coverup," as alleged recently by Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), a former Marine. . .

Now the second opinions start coming in on Henry Paulson, the nominee for Treasury Secretary – and interestingly, it may be the conservatives who bring him down

http://maxspeak.org/mt/archives/002247.html

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/5/31/17549/2373

BTW, Paulson is another Bush “Pioneer” (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.americanfamilyvoices.org/amfeed/254/am-feed---may-31-new-treasury-chief-was-bush-pioneer

Josh Marshall is starting to tabulate the Pioneers who have been convicted recently

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008607

Hey Tony, this act is going to wear thin REALLY quickly

http://www.first-draft.com//modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=6156
Q Do you happen to know when or whether Donald Rumsfeld first spoke with the President about Haditha?

MR. SNOW: Hang on a second. I've got a timetable and I will try to get you a date here. Let me -- if you'll permit. Or do I?

Q And also, when the Secretary of Defense first knew.

MR. SNOW: I think, again -- I will get back to you because I do have a tick-tock on Haditha. And the characterization I've received -- obviously, there was a report, I believe on November 19th -- was that the date? There was a follow-on sort of account on the 20th or the 21st. . .

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004299.html
Q Can you give us a readout on the President's meeting this morning with the Iraq experts?

MR. SNOW: Yes. Oh, my goodness, I forgot to bring the list. But actually -- do you have the list, Fred? Yes, it was an interesting meeting. What you ended up having was -- I've got all the names but one written down here. We had Wayne Downing, Barry McCaffrey, Michael Vickers, Amir Taheri, Fouad Ajami and Raad Alkadiri. . .

[NB: As Laura Rozen asks, why was one name left off the list?]

More flaws in the John Solomon slam job on Harry Reid’s (D-NV) “boxing scandal”

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/5/31/175025/643

More: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000788.php

So what does Solomon do? Follow it up with an even more mendacious piece

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/05/aps-john-solomon-publishes-another.html

More: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_05_28.php#008612

Good news from the electoral hinterlands: Pennsylvania and Kansas

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/5/31/15153/2101

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/004294.html

Is this the destiny of Democrats in the WH – vilified while in office (or running for it) but appreciated more and more after the fact?

http://www.slate.com/id/2142698/fr/rss/

The malpractice “crisis.” Guess what? Most malpractice cases are legitimate and necessary

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_05/008913.php

The theft of the 2004 election (thanks to Susan Madrak for the link)

http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002891.htm

Looks like 527’s will be with us for a while. . .

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/31/AR2006053101999.html

Hey, we still have an FCC!

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7551.html
[Steve Benen] Last month, a report prepared by the Center for Media and Democracy found that corporations are producing fake-news segments – which amount to little more than mini-informercials masquerading as actual news — and TV stations are running them as if they were actual news reports, never disclosing the corporate role to viewers. . . The FCC is not amused. . . Of course, if the FCC would also pursue stations that broadcast fake-news segments from the Bush administration, it'd be real progress, but I suspect I ask too much. . .

More: http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/06/press-corrupted-by-fake-news-america.html

Bonus item: I like it – “Republican’ts”

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/7559.html
[Steve Benen] Back in March, I had an item about Republican use of the phrase "Democrat Party," which is the GOP way of using grammar for childish purposes. I asked readers for ideas about what name Dems could use to tease Republicans — and you guys came up with a lot of suggestions. . .

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- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:48 AM