(2004-03-25) -- Self-proclaimed atheist Michael Newdow yesterday pleaded with the U.S. Supreme Court to remove the phrase 'under God' from the Pledge of Allegiance and acknowledged the court's Chief Justice as his "personal higher power."

"In the name of William H. Rehnquist almighty," said Mr. Newdow, "I call upon this court to protect the rights of those who have no recourse to a higher power than this. And, by Rehnquist, I will continue this fight until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream."

At the end of his legal arguments, Mr. Newdow prostrated himself on the floor of the courtroom and said "blessed be the glorious name of Rehnquist, may he reign forever."

Later he told reporters on the steps of the court building, "My personal relationship with Rehnquist brings me unspeakable joy, hope for the future and peace in my heart. It's a comfort to know that he's thinking about me at this very moment."

(2004-03-23) -- U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld today told the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States that he has a plan to prevent past acts of terror.

"As I have listened to people speculate on what might have been done to prevent 9/11," said Mr. Rumsfeld, "I realized that we've been doing all the post-mortem analysis after the fact."

Mr. Rumsfeld proposed that the CIA, FBI and the Pentagon immediately begin "studying the facts about the next major terror attack, which will never happen because we will prevent it in hindsight."

"All we have to do is figure out who attacked us, where and when," he said. "It's a simple matter of stepping out of the time-space continuum to ward off future incidents after they have already happened."

(2004-03-23) -- Questions about the reliability of U.S. intelligence services grew today as documents revealed that the FBI tracked Democrat presidential candidate John Forbes Kerry as early as 1971, but did nothing to stop him.

"This looks like another tragic intelligence failure," said an unnamed aide to the Senate Intelligence Committee. "FBI agents knew Kerry was in the country and they even attended his anti-war speeches, but apparently their reports never reached the highest levels of the agency. He was literally within our grasp and we let him slip through."

The aide blamed the failure on the Nixon administration, which he said was too distracted by the war in Vietnam to devote full attention to homeland security.

"If John Kerry is elected president of the United States," he said, "Republicans will have no one to blame but themselves."

(2004-03-22) -- A new book by Richard Clarke, the former counter-terrorism coordinator for the Bush administration, charges that the president was so obsessed with Saddam Hussein that he delayed invading Iraq for 19 months after the 9/11 terror attacks "just so he could let his hatred of Saddam simmer in his mind."

Mr. Clarke told CBS reporter Leslie Stahl that, from the beginning, the Bush administration didn't take the al Qaeda threat seriously and was focused on attacking Iraq.

"The 9/11 attacks by al Qaeda were such an utter surprise to [National Security Advisor] Rice and [Defense Secretary] Rumsfeld, that it took them almost a month to retaliate against the Taliban," said Mr. Clarke. "By contrast, Rumsfeld started planning to hit Saddam from the moment he took office in January 2001. Sure enough, only 26 months after that he unleashed a lightning strike on Iraq. He would have launched the attack sooner if Bush hadn't been so obsessed with Saddam that he couldn't see straight."

The former official said even the war against the Taliban was part of the president's obsession with Saddam Hussein.

"Bush foolishly believed that there was a link between al Qaeda and Iraq," Mr. Clarke said. "So, in order to bring down Saddam Hussein, he first attacked the Taliban in Afghanistan in October 2001, because they harbored al Qaeda. Bush thought that if the Taliban fell, Saddam would soon follow. It's clear that Rumsfeld and Rice have thought about nothing but Iraq for more than three years now."

(2004-03-20) -- The presumptive Democrat presidential nominee, Sen. John Forbes Kerry, today called for a ban on snowboarding. The demand comes less than a week after a Secret Service agent caused the Senator to tumble on a slope in Idaho.

"Snowboarding is an inherently dangerous activity," said Mr. Kerry. "Although I'm one of the best snowboarders alive, and I don't fall down, there is no way to protect the average 19-year-old from being taken out by a [expletive deleted] Secret Service agent. The board manufacturers claim the sport is safe. But how do you ask a man to be the last man to break his leg for a lie?"

In a symbolic gesture, Mr. Kerry plans to throw his snowboard, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, over the White House fence later this week. TV news crews will be permitted to videotape his second snowboard toss attempt.

(2004-03-21) -- Religious philosopher Usama bin Laden today announced that although he had been among the unnamed foreign leaders who support John Forbes Kerry's election as U.S. president, he has withdrawn his support.

"At first, I was an anyone-but-Bush man," said Mr. bin Laden on an audiotape aired by al Jazeera TV. "But the more I hear about Kerry's strategy of nuanced engagement, the more I like Bush. At least I know where I stand with the Great Satan from Texas."

Mr. bin Laden said he was concerned that his emissaries would be "tied up for years in fruitless talks with the Kerry administration."

"Next thing you know, al Qaeda will be chairing the U.N. Human Rights Commission," he said. "We don't have time for that kind of nonsense."

The Kerry campaign released the following brief statement: "There are no longer any foreign leaders who support Senator Kerry's candidacy."

(2004-03-18) -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia today claimed that his colleague, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, should recuse herself from a case involving Vice President Dick Cheney because she refused to hunt ducks with Mr. Cheney in January.

The statement comes in response to the Sierra Club's contention that Mr. Scalia should recuse himself, since he accompanied Mr. Cheney on the duck hunt.

"Justice Ginsburg's failure to hunt ducks with the Vice President gives rise to questions of bias against him," said Mr. Scalia. "If she were truly objective, she would have hunted with Mr. Cheney and picked off a few ducks for which he was aiming, thereby demonstrating neither blinding affection nor prejudicial antipathy. I like the Vice President but, given the chance, I would shoot his duck...as I have amply demonstrated."

(2004-03-16) -- In the wake of claims by Democrat presidential candidate John Forbes Kerry that foreign leaders hope he wins the White House, President George Bush today said "unnamed foreign leaders told me they want me to clean Kerry's clock, you know, to fix his wagon."

"They can't go out and say this publicly," Mr. Bush said, "but boy they look at you and say, 'You've got to pummel this wishy-washy appeaser. You've got to spank him with the buckle end of the belt'. Of course, I can't tell you who said that, but them foreigners want me to put a hurt on him."

Mr. Bush, like Mr. Kerry, spends hours every day chatting with foreign leaders to find out what kind of American foreign policy will be most popular with them. And while Mr. Kerry speaks fluent French thanks to childhood summers spent at a family estate in Brittany, Mr. Bush speaks Spanish and Pig Latin, which he calls "the new Esperanto...the global language of diplomacy."

"You wouldn't believe some of the things my foreign buddies have told me about Enator-say Erry-kay," said Mr. Bush. "It's all on the Q.T., of course."

(2004-03-16) -- Spain's newly-elected socialist prime minister today declared the start of a "new era of protection from terror" as he cut the ribbon at the grand opening of the al Qaeda embassy in downtown Madrid.

The building, formerly known as the U.S. Embassy, will house the offices and "manufacturing facilities" of the global religious social services organization headed by renowned philosopher Usama bin Laden.

"Spain's involvement in the war on terror caused the recent train station bombings," said Prime Minister-elect José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. "Now that the Spanish people have elected a socialist government, and embraced al Qaeda's diplomats, we have nothing to fear. Al Qaeda has promised to protect us from extremists like those at the U.S. White House and Pentagon."

Mr. Zapatero said he was "pleasantly surprised at al Qaeda's reasonable pricing for high-quality protection."

(2004-03-15) -- Countless dozens of protestors marched on CNN's Atlanta headquarters today to speak out against the Cable News Network's "barrage of negative coverage" about the U.S. role in the liberation of Iraq.

The event followed a CNN story about an anti-war march in Washington D.C., which the network claimed drew a crowd estimated by police to number "in the low triple-digits."

No independent crowd-size estimate was available for the Atlanta protest, but organizers said several cases of bottled water were consumed and at least one participant claimed he was inadvertently jostled by a fellow protestor.

"This is arguably as massive as the anti-war march in D.C.," one organizer shouted over the din of several clusters of chatting protestors. "We figured if we could get a crowd this large, then CNN would have to cover the march even though we're protesting their coverage. You just can't ignore the roar of the vox populi."