Digby: Of Course They Would

I wrote about this over the week-end but it's worth mentioning again. This take on it is from James Fallows at The Atlantic:

Five and a half years ago, Thomas Wales was murdered in Seattle. He was shot, through the window of his home, as he sat working at his computer late at night.

[...]

The killing took place on October 11, 2001. If the ruins of the World Trade Center had not still been smoking at the time, and if the nation’s attention had not been completely (and naturally) riveted by that event, Tom Wales’s death would likely have become major national news. He was 49 years old, and he had spent the previous 18 years as a federal prosecutor in Seattle, mainly working on white-collar crime cases. He was gregarious, modest, humorous, charming, vigorous, very active in community efforts, widely liked and admired. A significant detail is that one of the civic causes for which Tom Wales worked was gun safety and at the time of his death was head of Washington Cease-Fire.

Digby: Rule 'O Law

Glenn Greenwald notes that the neoconservatives reflexively defend their crooks, no matter what they have done:

But what has become increasingly apparent of late is that the rejection of the rule of law finds expression not only on a political level -- as a license for political leaders to break the law to advance the neoconservative political agenda -- but it also serves as personal immunity for individual neoconservatives who are charged with breaking the law or committing serious ethical violations.

When it comes to instances where neoconservatives stand accused of criminality and other wrongdoing, the same neoconservative movement which shrilly advocates the virtually complete abolition of limits on federal power to detain and punish people -- a movement which mocks every notion of due process or restraints on federal power as terrorist-loving subversion -- suddenly reverses course and begins reflexively defending the accused, complaining that they are the victims of wrongful prosecutions and overzealous government power.

Digby: Bully In Chief

Here's a wonderful lesson for the children from our president:

The informal Bush enjoyed the formality so much that he even took time out to torment an underdressed photographer. After his walk with the queen after lunch, Bush got the photographer, Newsweek's Charles Ommanney, to agree that it was "a special day" at the White House.

Digby: Too Busy Laughing

Hullabaloo is proud to present another episode of "Imagine If This Were A Democrat" this week starring Condoleeza Rice:

Chevron, the second-largest American oil company, is preparing to acknowledge that it should have known kickbacks were being paid to Saddam Hussein on oil it bought from Iraq as part of a defunct United Nations program, according to investigators.

The admission is part of a settlement being negotiated with United States prosecutors and includes fines totaling $25 million to $30 million, according to the investigators, who declined to be identified because the settlement was not yet public.

Digby: Vain In Our Highmindedness

It's funny that Atrios highlights this perfect quote by Charlie Peters just as I was writing a post on this very subject as another follow-up to Jonathan Chait's piece on the netroots.

I'm very fond of Mike [Kinsley]. He's genuinely brilliant, but I think there has always been a tension between Mike and me, in that I sense he is embarrassed by passion. Mike's detachment has notably decreased since his marriage and the onset of Parkinson's, both of which had a pronounced humanizing effect, but his more sardonic imitators have become a major problem in journalism -- very bright people who seem too concerned with being bright.

Digby: Better Things To Do

I have been listening to various people today discuss the George Tenet book in light of Bob Woodward's review of Tenet's book in today's WaPo:

In his remarkable, important and often unintentionally damning memoir, George Tenet, the former CIA chief, describes a meeting with Condoleezza Rice, then national security adviser, two months before the 9/11 terrorist attacks. In much more vivid and emotional detail than previously reported, Tenet writes that he had received intelligence that day, July 10, 2001, about the threat from al-Qaeda that "literally made my hair stand on end."

Digby: Landmines

I have long been concerned about the effects on society at large when a government openly endorses torture. It would appear that we will get a first hand look as some of the troops who fought in the Iraq war come home for good. It's hard to believe that they will easily shed these views and may even find themselves hardening them in order to defend their actions abroad.

Digby: Weird Willard

"There is no work more important to America's future than the work that is done within the four walls of the American home," Romney said. He also criticized people who choose not to get married because they enjoy the single life.

"It seems that Europe leads Americans in this way of thinking," Romney told the crowd of more than 5,000. "In France, for instance, I'm told that marriage is now frequently contracted in seven-year terms where either party may move on when their term is up. How shallow and how different from the Europe of the past."

Digby: Cui Bono?

I can't help but be reminded of something very creepy when I read this strange story about the US Attorney from Washington being recommended for firing because he was insisting on action from Washington to find the murderer of an assistant US Attorney --- who happened to be a gun control advocate.

Daily Kos: How Bush Breached the 'Wall of Separation'

by Len Hart

Fri May 11, 2007 at 02:05:40 AM PDT

When the US House passed the "Defense of the Ten Commandments" amendment to the juvenile justice bill, zealots of the Religious Right chanted the mantra: the USA is a Christian Nation! A press conference was attended by Gary Bauer and Rep. Robert Aderholt(R, Alabama), the sponsor of the amendment. Aderhold said:

The Ten Commandments represent the very cornerstone of the values this nation was built upon, and the basis of our legal system here in America".

Nonsense!

David Niewert: Lou Dobbs: Making up racist sh*

The eliminationist meme connecting immigrants to disease leapt forward about five quanta this week thanks to CNN's Lou Dobbs.

The Southern Poverty Law Center reports that Dobbs is spreading the tale that immigrants are bringing leprosy to America, and concocting numbers out of whole cloth in the process:

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) today urged CNN to acknowledge that anchor Lou Dobbs has been spreading false information about the prevalence of leprosy and its supposed links to undocumented immigrants.

"We're not talking about a newscaster who simply made a mistake — we're talking about someone with a national platform who cites wildly inaccurate data to demean an entire group of people and who, when confronted with the truth, simply repeats the lie," said SPLC President Richard Cohen. "It's outrageous, and CNN should do something about it immediately."

Billions in oil missing in Iraq, US study finds

RAW STORY
Published: Friday May 11, 2007

"Between 100,000 and 300,000 barrels a day of Iraq's declared oil production over the past four years is unaccounted for and could have been siphoned off through corruption or smuggling, according to a draft American government report," the NEW YORK TIMES is set to report on Saturday page ones, according to a copy of the story advanced to RAW STORY.

Bipartisan bill bans warrantless wiretapping of US citizens

05/11/2007 @ 4:27 pm

Filed by Michael Roston

Members of Congress from both parties succeeded on Friday in passing legislation that restricts the wiretapping of US citizens by the National Security Agency without warrants.

"When Congress said the Administration must get court approval for domestic surveillance, we meant it. Today, Congress reaffirmed that basic protection," said Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), who co-sponsored legislation included in the intelligence authorization bill that Congress passed.

Bush stalling while Americans die

By Joseph L. Galloway
McClatchy Newspapers

When 11 Republican members of Congress trooped over to the White House this week to speak frankly to President Bush about the Iraq War, it may not have popped the bubble around The Decider but it did pry a few bricks out of the wall that has kept unpleasant truths at a distance.

It seems that the representatives let their leader know that there will be a public reckoning of both American military progress and Iraqi political progress at the end of this summer.

Warming triggers `alarming' retreat of Himalayan glaciers

By Tim Johnson, McClatchy Newspapers

The glaciers of the Himalayas store more ice than anywhere on Earth except for the polar regions and Alaska, and the steady flow of water from their melting icepacks fills seven of the mightiest rivers of Asia.

Now, due to global warming and related changes in the monsoons and trade winds, the glaciers are retreating at a startling rate, and scientists say the ancient icepacks could nearly disappear within one or two generations.

Gloomy Greenspan warns of recession for US economy

· Weak housing market puts brake on retail spending
· New Fed chairman may be forced to cut interest rates

Larry Elliott and Ashley Seager
Saturday May 12, 2007
The Guardian

Further gloom gathered over the US economy yesterday as retail sales lurched lower while former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan issued a fresh warning that the world's largest economy could be heading for recession.

New figures showed retail sales in the US unexpectedly tumbled last month, hit by a double whammy of higher petrol prices and a crumbling housing market.

Senators who weakened drug bill got millions from industry

By Ken Dilanian, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — Senators who raised millions of dollars in campaign donations from pharmaceutical interests secured industry-friendly changes to a landmark drug-safety bill, according to public records and interviews.

The bill, which passed 93-1, grants the Food and Drug Administration broad new authority to monitor the safety of drugs after they are approved. It addressed some shortcomings that allowed the painkiller Vioxx to stay on the market for years after initial signs that it could cause heart attacks.

Colleagues Cite Partisan Focus by Justice Official

By ERIC LIPTON

Published: May 12, 2007

WASHINGTON, May 11 — Two years ago, Robin C. Ashton, a seasoned criminal prosecutor at the Department of Justice, learned from her boss that a promised promotion was no longer hers.

“You have a Monica problem,” Ms. Ashton was told, according to several Justice Department officials. Referring to Monica M. Goodling, a 31-year-old, relatively inexperienced lawyer who had only recently arrived in the office, the boss added, “She believes you’re a Democrat and doesn’t feel you can be trusted.”

Life in the 'triangle of death'

Guardian photographer Sean Smith, embedded with US soldiers near Baghdad and on his fifth trip to Iraq, describes the huge gap between government rhetoric and reality on the ground

Interview by Stephen Moss
Friday May 11, 2007
The Guardian

The Americans didn't attempt to patrol the so-called "triangle of death" around the town of Yusifiyah, about 25 miles south-west of Baghdad, until last year. Before that it was a no-go area, ruled by tribal chiefs. Even now, when you move through the area, it reminds you of John Boorman's film Deliverance; you never know what will be around the next corner.

I'm embedded with the 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division, who have a base in Yusifiyah and are setting up smaller bases in the surrounding countryside. Yusifiyah is predominantly Shia; the areas around it, populated by farmers, are largely Sunni. Both groups are hostile to the Americans: used to autonomy, they recognise this as an occupation.

New charges against former CIA official

By ALLISON HOFFMAN, Associated Press Writer
Sat May 12, 1:41 AM ET

New charges have been filed alleging that a former top CIA official pushed a proposed $100 million government contract for his best friend in return for lavish vacations, private jet flights and a lucrative job offer.

The indictment, returned Thursday, replaces charges brought in February against Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, who resigned from the spy agency a year ago, and Poway-based defense contractor Brent Wilkes. The charges grew from the bribery scandal that landed former U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham in prison.

The pair now face 30 wide-ranging counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering.

Why The Virtual Liberal Silence On Murdoch's Bid For Wall Street Journal?

May 07, 2007 -- 11:37 AM EST

Suppose a billionaire megalomaniac and avowed GOP partisan with a known history of turning news organs into propaganda outlets for his chosen political party was on the verge of taking over one of the most influential and respected newspapers in the world.

The liberal blogosphere and left-leaning opinion leaders would raise a huge stink and launch an aggressive, all-out campaign to try to stop it from happening, right? Well, no.

Administration Withheld E-Mails About Rove

By Murray Waas, National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, May 10, 2007

The Bush administration has withheld a series of e-mails from Congress showing that senior White House and Justice Department officials worked together to conceal the role of Karl Rove in installing Timothy Griffin, a protégé of Rove's, as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas.

The withheld records show that D. Kyle Sampson, who was then-chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, consulted with White House officials in drafting two letters to Congress that appear to have misrepresented the circumstances of Griffin's appointment as U.S. attorney and of Rove's role in supporting Griffin.

The Good American

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070510_the_good_american/

Posted on May 10, 2007

By Scott Ritter

Editor’s Note: Scott Ritter was a Marine Corps intelligence officer from 1984 to 1991 and a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. He is the author of numerous books, and his latest is “Waging Peace: The Art of War for the Antiwar Movement” (Nation Books, April 2007).

I joined the American Legion a few years back. As a veteran of the Persian Gulf War in 1991, I was eligible to do so for some time but always hesitated, perhaps out of a sense of trying to deny that my days as an active-duty combatant were long past. Every year, on Memorial Day, my fellow firefighters and I would gather in the basement of the local American Legion hall before we paraded before the town we protect. I would look around at the uniforms and faded patches and ribbons worn by the veterans who joined us in the hall and realize that they, too, were deserving of a great deal more support than simply being wheeled out once a year to participate in a parade. So I sent in my application and was accepted.

One of the fringe benefits of membership in the American Legion is a subscription to its monthly journal, The American Legion, billed as “the magazine for a strong America.” It quickly became apparent that The American Legion magazine was a sounding board for many holding quite militaristic and jingoistic opinions based on their rather limited personal experiences, many dating back to World War II. The war in Iraq, together with the overarching “global war on terror,” seems to be viewed by many in the American Legion as an extension of their own past service, and much effort is made to connect World War II and the Iraq conflict as part and parcel of the same ongoing American “liberation” of the world’s oppressed.

The Next Enron Scandal

Isaiah J. Poole and Rick Perlstein

May 11, 2007

Isaiah J. Poole is executive editor of TomPaine.com. Rick Perlstein is senior fellow at the Institute for America's Future.

The Enron scandal is rearing its ugly head again, and the Securities and Exchange Commission has to decide with whom it will stand: Will it be with small investors who depend on the honest advice of financial advisors or with bankers who, thanks to a recent federal court decision, have a license to facilitate fraud?

That stunning Fifth Circuit ruling is before the Supreme Court, which has to decide whether it will review the case. How the SEC weighs in could influence the justices, who will have their own choice to make between a conservative ideology that brooks virtually no boundaries for rampant corporate greed and the values of basic farness, honesty and justice.

Democrats send cease and desist to conservative website, XM over alleged Dean remarks

05/11/2007 @ 11:46 am

Filed by John Byrne

The Democratic National Committee filed two letters of cease and desist Thursday with a conservative website and XM Radio regarding comments allegedly made by DNC Chairman Howard Dean.

The website FreeRepublic.com, citing an XM radio show, said that "Dean called Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius early, around 5 am, one morning after the tornado had destroyed the town of Greensburg, Kansas and discussed with her what to say about the tornado and how to blame the war in Iraq and the Bush administration on a slow response to the aftermath."

White House sought investigations of voter fraud allegations before elections

By Margaret Talev and Marisa Taylor
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Only weeks before last year's pivotal midterm elections, the White House urged the Justice Department to pursue voter-fraud allegations against Democrats in three battleground states, a high-ranking Justice official has told congressional investigators.

In two instances in October 2006, President Bush's political adviser, Karl Rove, or his deputies passed the allegations on to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' then-chief of staff, Kyle Sampson.

VA medical system isn't as big a success as officials have asserted

By Chris Adams
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - The Department of Veterans Affairs has habitually exaggerated the record of its medical system, inflating its achievements in ways that make it appear more successful than it is, a McClatchy Newspapers study shows.

Confirmed -- Deforestation plays critical climate change role

New research confirms that avoiding deforestation can play a key role in reducing future greenhouse gas concentrations. Dr Pep Canadell, from the Global Carbon Project and CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, says today in the journal Science that tropical deforestation releases 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon each year into the atmosphere.

Study sheds light on Earth's CO2 cycles

A research team, including Kent State Professor of Geology Dr. Joseph Ortiz, tracing the origin of the large carbon dioxide increase in Earth’s atmosphere at the end of the last ice age has detected two ancient “burps” that originated from the deepest parts of the southern ocean around Antarctica.

The new study showed carbon that had built up in the ocean over millennia was released in two big pulses at about 18,000 years ago and 13,000 years ago, says Dr. Thomas Marchitto of the University of Colorado at Boulder, who jointly led the study with colleague Dr. Scott Lehman. While scientists had long known as much as 600 billion metric tons of carbon were released into the atmosphere after the last ice age, the new study is the first to clearly track CO2 from the deep ocean to upper ocean and atmosphere and should help scientists better understand natural CO2 cycles and possible impacts of human-caused climate change.

Sirotablog: TIMELINE: The Secret Bush-Democratic Trade Deal & What It Means

Thursday, May 10th was a whirlwind day on the political frontlines in the War on the Middle Class, as a handful of senior congressional Democrats and the White House - cheered on by K Street lobbyists - joined forces today to announce a "deal" on a package of trade agreements that could impact millions of American workers and potentially calls into question the entire election mandate of 2006 (I say potentially because the full details are still being concealed by both Democrats and the White House). You'll notice the irony of the deal with just a glance at the front of the New York Times business section (screen captured above) - the deal was agreed to (though its details have still not been made public) on the very same day the U.S. government reported another widening of America's job-destroying trade deficit.

Pentagon restricting testimony in Congress

Blocks staff of lower rank

By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff | May 10, 2007

WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon has placed unprecedented restrictions on who can testify before Congress, reserving the right to bar lower-ranking officers, enlisted soldiers, and career bureaucrats from appearing before oversight committees or having their remarks transcribed, according to Defense Department documents.

Robert L. Wilkie , a former Bush administration national security official who left the White House to become assistant secretary of defense for legislative affairs last year, has outlined a half-dozen guidelines that prohibit most officers below the rank of colonel from appearing in hearings, restricting testimony to high-ranking officers and civilians appointed by President Bush.

FBI agent steps into Coulter voting case

By Jose Lambiet

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Friday, May 11, 2007

Conservative pundit Ann Coulter has been cleared of allegations that she falsified her Palm Beach County voter's registration and voted illegally — this, after a high-level FBI agent made unsolicited phone calls to the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office to vouch for Coulter.

The caller wasn't just any G-man. According to PBSO documents, he was Supervisory Special Agent Jim Fitzgerald, of the FBI Academy's Behavioral Analysis Unit in Quantico, Va. — the closest reality gets to the serial-killer catchers on CBS' Criminal Minds.

Iraqi Lawmakers Back Bill on U.S. Withdrawal

By Joshua Partlow

Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, May 11, 2007; Page A12

BAGHDAD, May 10 -- A majority of members of Iraq's parliament have signed a draft bill that would require a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. soldiers from Iraq and freeze current troop levels. The development was a sign of a growing division between Iraq's legislators and prime minister that mirrors the widening gulf between the Bush administration and its critics in Congress.

The draft bill proposes a timeline for a gradual departure, much like what some U.S. Democratic lawmakers have demanded, and would require the Iraqi government to secure parliament's approval before any further extensions of the U.N. mandate for foreign troops in Iraq, which expires at the end of 2007.

Iraq: A Small War Guaranteed to Damage a Superpower

By Patrick Cockburn, Tomdispatch.com
Posted on May 11, 2007, Printed on May 11, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/51730/

Iraq may have been a pushover in the invasion, but the price of occupation for America could exact a heavy toll on its empire.

At 3 am on January 11, 2007 a fleet of American helicopters made a sudden swoop on the long-established Iranian liaison office in the city of Arbil in northern Iraq. Their mission was to capture two senior Iranian security officials, Mohammed Jafari, the deputy head of the Iranian National Security Council, and General Minojahar Frouzanda, the head of intelligence of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. What made the American raid so extraordinary is that both men were in Iraq at the official invitation of the Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, who held talks with them at his lakeside headquarters at Dokan in eastern Kurdistan. The Iranians had then asked to see Massoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, in the Kurdish capital Arbil. There was nothing covert about the meeting which was featured on Kurdish television.

NASA study suggests extreme summer warming in the future

A new study by NASA scientists suggests that greenhouse-gas warming may raise average summer temperatures in the eastern United States nearly 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the 2080s.

Radical engine redesign would reduce pollution, oil consumption

Researchers have created the first computational model to track engine performance from one combustion cycle to the next for a new type of engine that could dramatically reduce oil consumption and the emission of global-warming pollutants.

Tension Mounts as Antiwar Movement Challenges Dems' Commitment to Stop the War

By Matt Taibbi, RollingStone.com
Posted on May 10, 2007, Printed on May 10, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/51687/

There is a growing number of people out there who believe the Reid-Pelosi Iraq war supplemental is a gigantic crock of shit, and who think the Democratic Party leadership should now officially be labeled conspirators in the war effort. I've even seen it suggested that Reid and Pelosi should now be sent official "certificates of war ownership," to formally put them in a club with Bush, Cheney, Richard Perle and the rest of the actual war authors.

The growing tension between the real antiwar movement and the Democratic Party was reflected in a long article over the weekend in the New York Times. "Antiwar Groups Use New Clout to Influence Democrats." The piece that described how an umbrella group of antiwar activists called Americans Against the Escalation in Iraq was ready to drop the public relations hammer on the Dems, should they cave too easily in their negotiations with the president.

Bush Alums Reap Their Rewards

Robert Scheer —

It’s no wonder that an administration that celebrated and rewarded liars and opportunists would produce the likes of Paul Wolfowitz, who followed up the Iraq disaster with a scandal at the World Bank, and George Tenet, who held his tongue until the price was right. But how do they sleep at night?

Opposition may delay or repeal Real ID program

By Margaret Talev

McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - A nationalized system for driver's licenses that was to take effect next year already had been postponed because of a backlash from Congress and several states, and the Senate began hearings Tuesday to consider repealing it altogether.

The Real ID Act was pitched as a homeland-security enhancement, added to a spending bill and passed by the Republican-led Congress in 2005.

To board commercial airlines or enter federal buildings, Americans would need to obtain new identification cards with beefed-up requirements to prove their legal status and verify their Social Security numbers, addresses and other information. States were to be ready by this time next year.

US accused over release of convicted terrorist

Mark Tran and agencies
Wednesday May 9, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

Cuba and Venezuela today accused the US of double standards after a judge threw out immigration charges against a former CIA operative and convicted terrorist.

In a surprise move, Kathleen Cardone, a US district judge in El Paso, Texas, dismissed the charges against Luis Posada Carriles on the grounds that the US government case was based on statements obtained from the 79-year-old under false pretences.

NYT Editorial: Stamping Out Diverse Voices

Published: May 8, 2007

Postal rate increases are an unwelcome fact of life for every magazine publisher. But it seems the steep new increases for periodicals, scheduled to begin on July 15, will inflict undue hardship on small independent magazines that do much to inform the national discourse on politics and culture. They will be required to pay a much higher percentage increase than some of the largest magazines.

A skimpily funded coalition of small journals of opinions and ideas — running the ideological gamut from The National Review on the right to The Nation on the left — is struggling to get Washington to focus on the issue. The group’s request that the rate increase be reversed, or at least done in stages to mitigate its crippling impact, warrants the immediate attention of the House and Senate committees that oversee postal operations.

Cheney And the Saudis

By David Ignatius

Wednesday, May 9, 2007; Page A17

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice may make the headlines with her high-profile diplomatic missions to the Middle East. But for a glimpse at the hidden power plays, follow Vice President Cheney's trip this week to Saudi Arabia.

Saudi King Abdullah has emerged over the past nine months as the Bush administration's most important and strong-willed Arab ally. He launched an aggressive campaign last fall to contain Iranian influence in the Arab world and, in the process, buttress American interests in the region despite U.S. setbacks in Iraq. It's Cheney, whose blunt, unsmiling demeanor matches Saudi notions of American gravitas, who manages the Abdullah account.

U.S. soldier filmed scene after Iraq killing

Tue May 8, 2007 6:57PM EDT

ROME (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier on trial in absentia in Italy for killing an Italian intelligence agent in Iraq two years ago filmed the scene moments after he opened fire, an Italian television channel said on Tuesday.

Mario Lozano's lawyer said the U.S. soldier, who denies any wrongdoing in firing at agent Nicola Calipari's car, gave the video to TG5 channel, apparently after recording an interview with him in the United States. Italian prosecutors investigating the case immediately seized the tape, judicial sources said.

Pelosi threat to sue Bush over Iraq bill

By Jonathan E. Kaplan and Elana Schor
May 09, 2007

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is threatening to take President Bush to court if he issues a signing statement as a way of sidestepping a carefully crafted compromise Iraq war spending bill.

Pelosi recently told a group of liberal bloggers, “We can take the president to court” if he issues a signing statement, according to Kid Oakland, a blogger who covered Pelosi’s remarks for the liberal website dailykos.com.

Homeland Security: A Costly Mess

By Cindy Williams, MIT Center for International Studies
Posted on May 9, 2007, Printed on May 9, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/51571/

In January 2003, the Bush administration drew 22 disparate agencies and some 170,000 employees into a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Proponents of the reorganization hoped a single department under a single cabinet secretary would foster unity of effort across a substantial portion of the federal activities related to domestic security.

A key tool would be the department's budget. With all the agencies beholden to him for their money, the secretary could promote and reward much-needed integration across the department. He could wield the budget tool to expand high priority activities, eliminate or defer the less important or redundant ones, and reallocate the workforce to fill gaps in high-risk areas.

Majority of Iraqi Lawmakers Now Reject Occupation

By Raed Jarrar and Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on May 9, 2007, Printed on May 9, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/51624/

On Tuesday, without note in the U.S. media, more than half of the members of Iraq's parliament rejected the continuing occupation of their country. 144 lawmakers signed onto a legislative petition calling on the United States to set a timetable for withdrawal, according to Nassar Al-Rubaie, a spokesman for the Al Sadr movement, the nationalist Shia group that sponsored the petition.

It's a hugely significant development. Lawmakers demanding an end to the occupation now have the upper hand in the Iraqi legislature for the first time; previous attempts at a similar resolution fell just short of the 138 votes needed to pass (there are 275 members of the Iraqi parliament, but many have fled the country's civil conflict, and at times it's been difficult to arrive at a quorum).

Conservative Assault On America's Families

Beth Shulman

May 08, 2007

Beth Shulman is a lawyer and consultant focusing on work-related issues. She is the author of The Betrayal of Work: How Low-Wage Jobs Fail 30 Million Americans. Shulman delivered these remarks at the Failure of Conservatism Conference http://commonsense.ourfuture.org/failure_conservatism_conference on May 3 in Washington, sonored by the Campaign for America's Future and The American Prospect.

Conservatism historically has seen government as a problem to overcome, an albatross. President Reagan stated it succinctly when he said, “we need to get government off our backs.” Conservatives usually justify this negative view of government in the name of freedom. They conflate freedom with unregulated markets, anti-unionism, low taxes and a rabid individualism. Without so-called government interference, people would be free to make their own choices. But what has this restricted view of government and the notion of freedom it embraces meant for America’s families today? In one word—disaster.

The “you are on your own” notion of government and freedom has meant that American families must live with stagnant wages at a time of high profits and productivity without a way to get ahead no matter how hard they try. It has meant health insecurity for workers and their families as fewer and fewer jobs provide health care coverage. It has meant that workers face their older years without the means they counted on to retire, as corporations have slashed traditional pension plans. And it has meant that half of Americans don’t have the fundamental right to take a day off from work when they are sick without losing a job or a paycheck.

Daily Kos: Worst. President. Ever.

by mcjoan

Mon May 07, 2007 at 11:53:24 AM PDT

From his catastrophic war of choice to fiddling while New Orleans drowned, from installing partisan and unqualified lackeys in every possible government position to allowing the poisoning of our food, the Bush administration has failed. Top to bottom.

The Democratic Policy Committee has released a new fact sheet on the Bush administration and the economy for middle class Americans. One of the findings? He's worse than Herbert Hoover:

Worst job creation record since Hoover Administration. A growing economy should be good news for those seeking jobs. But over the course of President Bush's term in office, his Administration has the worst overall job creation record since Herbert Hoover more than 70 years ago.

The Lethal Media Silence on Kent State’s Smoking Guns

by Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman

The 1970 killings by National Guardsmen of four students during a peaceful anti-war demonstration at Kent State University have now been shown to be cold-blooded, premeditated official murder. But the definitive proof of this monumental historic reality is not, apparently, worthy of significant analysis or comment in today’s mainstream media.

After 37 years of official denial and cover-up, tape-recorded evidence, that has existed for decades and has been in the possession of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), has finally been made public.

Justice Dept. Allows Immunity Deal for Former Gonzales Aide's Testimony

By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, May 8, 2007; A04

The Justice Department cleared the way yesterday for a limited immunity deal between House investigators and Monica M. Goodling, a former top Justice aide who has refused to answer questions about her role in last year's firing of eight U.S. attorneys.

The move means that Goodling is likely to testify in front of the House Judiciary Committee on a broad range of questions about the firings that she helped coordinate, including the extent of involvement by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and the White House, officials said.

Hard to Deny: Iraq Is All About the Oil

By Michael Schwartz, Tomdispatch.com. Posted May 8, 2007.

How the U.S. is working to secure Iraq's oil -- one of the most important sources of petrochemical energy on the planet -- and how the Iraqis are resisting.

The following is a story by Michael Schwartz with an introduction by Tom Engelhardt.

In the run-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2002-2003, oil was seldom mentioned. Yes, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz did describe the country as afloat "on a sea of oil" (which might fund any American war and reconstruction program there); and, yes, on rare occasions, the President did speak reverentially of preserving "the patrimony of the people of Iraq" -- by which he meant not cuneiform tablets or ancient statues in the National Museum in Baghdad, but the country's vast oil reserves, known and suspected. And yes, oil did make it prominently onto the signs of war protestors at home and abroad.

[...]

***

The struggle over Iraqi oil has been going on for a long, long time. One could date it back to 1980 when President Jimmy Carter -- before his Habitat for Humanity days -- declared that Persian Gulf oil was "vital" to American national interests. So vital was it, he announced, that the U.S. would use "any means necessary, including military force" to sustain access to it. Soon afterwards, he announced the creation of a Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force, a new military command structure that would eventually develop into United States Central Command (Centcom) and give future presidents the ability to intervene relatively quickly and massively in the region.

Report: Saudis, US sponsoring covert action against Iran

Michael Roston
Published: Monday May 7, 2007

The governments of Saudi Arabia and the United States are working with other states in the Middle East region to sponsor covert action against Iran, according to a report in this month's edition of The Atlantic. The report also suggests that covert attacks may occur against Iran's oil sector.

David Samuels, in a lengthy article on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's diplomatic initiatives in the Middle East, reports that the US is promoting a campaign against Iran that includes covert action.

Premature births may be linked to seasonal levels of pesticides and nitrates in surface water

The growing premature birth rate in the United States appears to be strongly associated with increased use of pesticides and nitrates, according to work conducted by Paul Winchester, M.D., of Indiana University School of Medicine. Preterm birth rates peaked when pesticides and nitrates measurements in surface water were highest -- April-July -- and were lowest when nitrates and pesticides were lowest -- August-September.
Indiana University School of Medicine

The U.S. Attorney, the G.O.P. Congressman and the Timely Job Offer

By ADAM COHEN

Published: May 4, 2007

There is yet another United States attorney whose abrupt departure from office is raising questions: Debra Wong Yang of Los Angeles. Ms. Yang was not fired, as eight other prosecutors were, but she resigned under circumstances that raise serious questions, starting with whether she was pushed out to disrupt her investigation of one of the most powerful Republicans in Congress.

If the United States attorney scandal has made one thing clear, it is that the riskiest job in the Bush administration is being a prosecutor investigating a Republican member of Congress. Carol Lam, the United States attorney in San Diego, was fired after she put Randy Cunningham, known as Duke, in prison. Paul Charlton, in Arizona, was dismissed while he was investigating Rick Renzi. Dan Bogden, in Nevada, was fired while he was reportedly investigating Jim Gibbons, a congressman who was elected governor last year.

Whistle-Blower on Student Aid Is Vindicated

By SAM DILLON

Published: May 7, 2007

WASHINGTON — When Jon Oberg, a Department of Education researcher, warned in 2003 that student lending companies were improperly collecting hundreds of millions in federal subsidies and suggested how to correct the problem, his supervisor told him to work on something else.

The department “does not have an intramural program of research on postsecondary education finance,” the supervisor, Grover Whitehurst, a political appointee, wrote in a November 2003 e-mail message to Mr. Oberg, a civil servant who was soon to retire. “In the 18 months you have remaining, I will expect your time and talents to be directed primarily to our business of conceptualizing, competing and monitoring research grants.”

A Test Everyone Will Fail

By Gerald W. Bracey

Thursday, May 3, 2007; Page A25

The world of education is a world of tests these days. But why should tests be only for students? Here's one for policymakers, politicians and adults in general. Bet you don't pass.

The National Assessment Governing Board defined the "proficient" rating on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the nation's report card, as the level that "all students should reach." (The other levels are "basic" and "advanced"; the proficient and advanced levels are often reported together as "proficient or better.")

US pump shock -- gasoline passes three dollars per gallon

Gasoline prices in the United States have topped three dollars a gallon, the highest level in nearly a year, a leading automobile association said Friday.

The Automobile Association of America said the average price at the pump was 3.012 dollars Friday.

Frank Rich: Is Condi Hiding the Smoking Gun?

If, as J.F.K. had it, victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan, the defeat in Iraq is the most pitiful orphan imaginable. Its parents have not only tossed it to the wolves but are also trying to pin its mutant DNA on any patsy they can find.

George Tenet is just the latest to join this blame game, which began more than three years ago when his fellow Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Tommy Franks told Bob Woodward that Douglas Feith, the Pentagon’s intelligence bozo, was the “stupidest guy on the face of the earth” (that’s the expurgated version). Last fall, Kenneth Adelman, the neocon cheerleader who foresaw a “cakewalk” in Iraq, told Vanity Fair that Mr. Tenet, General Franks and Paul Bremer were “three of the most incompetent people who’ve ever served in such key spots.” Richard Perle chimed in that the “huge mistakes” were “not made by neoconservatives” and instead took a shot at President Bush. Ahmad Chalabi, the neocons’ former darling, told Dexter Filkins of The Times “the real culprit in all this is Wolfowitz.”