"While on the subject, I want to point you all to Josh Marshall's excellent post describing the central tenent of the smear campaign as "maybe, maybe, maybe"

Tenet. :-)

Well, I think Kerry should have been even more general, by speaking only in terms of broad principles like accountability, transparency, etc. I wish he hadn't named Rice specifically.

His next tactic, in order to handle the upcoming charges of partisanship, is to publish a list of prominent Republicans who think Condi should testify, which include Frist, Thompson, and Lehman.

By the way, today on NPR Clarke said, basically, "Bring it on" about the transcripts.

Don't the Bushies realize how bad they look right now? I mean, unless you are a fucking moron, there's no excuse for Rice not to testify under oath. The fact that she won't...gee, looks like she's hiding something.
And isn't it funny how so many incompetent, out of the loop people were hired for Bush's staff?

praktike- yes , i agree kerry should have been even more general, but i think he is handling the situation well overall. This week, he touted his policies, job growth and lowering the corporate tax. good strategy. Let this administration implode on its own(which is happening). Bush's main strength protecting the homeland(why it is a strength i dont know) has weakened in recent polls. The post earlier about how clarkes " the gov and i failed" statment shows class is dead on.it shows class and responsiblity, something this administration wishes it had. sending men and women to die for you, while you look for wmds in the oval office shows no class or responsilbity. sending men and women to die for you, and then prancing around in a flight suit doesnt show class or responsilbity. blaming everything on clinton(iraq, economy, 9/11) doesnt show class or responsilbility. Clarke has the exact opposite character of bush and his cronies. probably why he left, a good move. I hope this bush administration does show a shred of class and responsilbility, at least for the sake of the ppl they've sent to fight for them. Hope they can do that for the next 10 months or so. Bush should end his presidency on a good note at least.

OK, who broke Pandagon?

DANGER: Comment may be confusingly irrelevant in a short amount of time. If so, ignore.

"That's a good first tact"

tack.

I agree with everything else.

Be sure to take note of the fact that at the NY Times—the paper that two weeks ago just couldn't get enough of telling us how the Bushies were going to eat John Kerry for lunch—has relegated the report of these remarks to (basically) just before the obits. Times rules: When Bush surrogates attacak Kerry, it's front-page news. When Kerry (in person!) attacks Bush—cue the crickets.

Reading A1, the NY Times front page project

Great post, but as noted above, the idiomatic term you wanted was "tack," not "tact." It's a borrowing from nautical terminology -- "tack" is the term for getting a sailing ship to take a direction that is not in line with the wind. It's used euphemistically for taking a particular direction in one's plans or thoughts.