Off Base? The Los Angeles Times reports that one option the Bush administration is considering in response to Monday's Supreme Court ruling that grants enemy combatants access to U.S. courts, is to move hundreds of Guantanamo detainees to prisons within the U.S.

Elaine Cassel argues that President Bush "won far more than he lost" in the Supreme Court rulings, which, when "taken together... are more important for what they did not do.  Their significance for the future, particularly if Bush is reelected, cannot be underestimated."

Commenting on a First Amendment Center survey that found Americans' support for First Amendment freedoms back at pre-9/11 levels, the group's director said: "Still, having about one in three Americans say they have too much freedom is a disturbing figure."

'Now the Games Really Begin' An Asia Times analysis looks at five actors -- the U.S., Iran, Turkey, Israel and the Iraqi insurgents -- whose activities "will not only play a major role in determining the stability of Iraq, but also in formulating the prospects for the legitimacy of the interim government."

Get Your War On character asks if early handover means "we'll be bringing the troops home two days ahead of schedule?"

Eric Umansky introduces a New Yorker article on who's behind the insurgency in Fallujah, and reports on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, writing that while he "remains something of a mystery... officials are growing certain of this much: that Zarqawi is his own man, with his own group, distinct from Osama Bin Laden." The article includes a link to Time's in-depth report on 'The New Jihad.'

A GAO report released Tuesday finds that in the areas of electricity, the judicial system and overall security, Iraq is worse off than before the war. The report also says the number of insurgent attacks deemed by the CPA to be "significant," rose from 411 in February to 1,169 in May. Plus: 'Reality intrudes on promises in rebuilding of Iraq.'

A Post Too Far The Telegraph reports that the U.S. commander in Iraq, Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez, ordered British troops to prepare to send in several thousand soldiers to attack Iran's Revolutionary Guard, after Iran repositioned border and observation posts about a kilometer into Iraq, in an incident last July that the British resolved through diplomatic channels.

In an interview with "Democracy Now!," a Swedish-Iraqi photojournalist who shot some of the Iraq footage in "Fahrenheit 9/11," shows and tells what he saw on raids while embedded with U.S. troops.

Variety reports that Disney held a special screening of a "patriotic documentary" called "America's Heart and Soul," for the group Move America Forward, which is trying to discourage theater owners from showing "Fahrenheit 9/11."

"Everyone expected George Bush's media shills to go after Moore," writes the Village Voice's Richard Goldstein, "but who would have thought Fox News would keep its attack dogs relatively muzzled while ABC and NBC launched remarkably unbalanced attacks."

Goldstein offers up what he calls an "exceedingly odd" editorial in the New York Post, defending Moore from a possible FEC ban on "Fahrenheit 9/11" ads, as evidence that "Rupert Murdoch is covering his ass in case John Kerry wins."

Coming out "against the 'liar' label," Nicholas Kristof writes that "Mr. Bush did stretch the truth. The run-up to Iraq was all about exaggerations, but not flat-out lies. Indeed, there's some evidence that Mr. Bush carefully avoids the most blatant lies -- witness his meticulous descriptions of the periods in which he did not use illegal drugs."

The Washington Post reports on "Checkpoint," a forthcoming novela by Nicholson Baker, in which "a man sits in a Washington hotel room with a friend and talks about assassinating President Bush." It's scheduled to be released on the eve of the Republican National Convention.

The book's title comes from a Sydney Morning Herald article read by the would-be assassin, about the killing of 10 members of a Shiite family of 17, who died when U.S. forces fired on their vehicle at a checkpoint south of Karbala. The Post's report on the incident was headlined 'A Gruesome Scene on Highway 9.'

Critical Montages says that by failing to seize a "Walter Cronkite Moment," the Green Party "essentially elected to divorce itself from Americans who wish to vote against the pro-war candidates of the Democratic and Republican Parties."

While attending a game against the Red Sox, Vice President Cheney was booed by Yankee fans when his image appeared on a video screen during the singing of "God Bless America."

June 29

'Shameless in Iraq' Citing the decision to parcel out $18.4 billion in reconstruction aid over five years, so Ambassador John Negroponte "can use it as leverage," Naomi Klein writes that even though U.S. officials are "Unwilling to let go of their own money," they've "had no qualms about dipping into funds belonging to Iraqis." More questions about the CPA and its own private Iraq.

Juan Cole says that with Negroponte controlling the money and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld running the troops, "There isn't much space left for real Iraqi sovereignty." But Fred Kaplan thinks some may have been created with the early handover. Plus: The long haul to sovereignty.

Following a 15-month occupation, Bush administration officials try to portray 48 hours as something more than just "a shock move aimed at thwarting terrorist attacks."

'Calculated Confusion' Washington Post columnist Al Kamen addresses an issue previously raised by Left I on the News, in pointing out how President Bush is at odds with the CIA and the State Department when he speaks of "terrorist attacks" on U.S. forces in Iraq.

Reuters quotes a U.S. Marine at the scene of a blast that killed three U.S. troops as saying, "I don't know why the terrorists want to kill us. We just want to help Iraqis."

In an interview with USA Today, the author of a report on 'How Modern Terrorism Uses the Internet' says, "The guy who's posting the messages for the terrorists, or doing the downloading, is like the smallest of actors in the theater. You won't find the scriptwriters."

Howard Kurtz reports that the FBI attempted to freeze out the New York Times' Eric Lichtbau, following his article last November on the bureau's scrutiny of antiwar demonstrators. Lichtbau also got a cold shoulder from Attorney General Ashcroft after writing about his tour to defend the Patriot Act.  

Was Vice President Cheney's outburst last week the leading edge of a summer storm? Plus: 'Drip, Drip, Drip.'

To protest the Pentagon's policy banning media coverage of war dead, the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq summoned news outlets to the Sacramento airport to photograph her son's flag-draped casket.

As Google is accused of rigging searches to undermine "Fahrenheit 9/11," and the tactics employed against it by the "hardcore right" are likened to those that led to the popularity of "Deep Throat," a fan of Moore's earlier work is "left wondering... Is he for peace, or is Moore just against Dubya?"

Mein Camp "The vileness of 'Kerry's Coalition of the Wild-eyed' must not be allowed to obscure its essential hilarity," writes Slate's Jacob Weisberg. "What moron came up with this idea?"

Sen. John Kerry loses ground to President Bush in a CBS /New York Times poll that finds Bush's approval rating at a new low of 42 percent. Plus: Hoping to avoid a rerun of 2000, election officials issue stern warning about ballot tampering in advance of 2004 vote.

James Fallows discusses his Atlantic Monthly article on the "dissimilar strengths and vulnerabilities" in the debating styles of Bush and Kerry, neither of whom "has 'lost' a contest in the only way that matters: a serious post-debate decline in the polls or an electoral defeat." Earlier: Linguist George Lakoff on how conservatives use language to dominate politics.

A New York Daily News columnist comes out from under his desk to lay down a truth-telling challenge to Bill O'Reilly. Plus: How both men and women avoid O'Reilly.

An AP commentary takes celebrity journalists to task for crossing a line in hawking their books: "As one bemused observer noted, it's as if the Donald Trump model of unabashed self-marketing has become the gold standard." Earlier: "You're the best! "No, YOU'RE the best!!"

As part of its repositioning as an activist magazine, High Times is publishing a guide to the Republican National Convention, which promises to a boon for at least one sector of the service industry.

June 28

Ruling that both U.S. citizens and foreign nationals seized as potential terrorists can challenge their treatment in U.S. courts, the Supreme Court said that "a state of war is not a blank check for the president when it comes to the rights of the nation's citizens."

The U.S. and Iraq pull a fast one on insurgents, transferring authority two days earlier than expected. The AP report notes that before leaving the country, Paul Bremer "signed an edict that gave U.S. and other Western civilian contractors immunity from Iraqi law while performing their jobs in Iraq. The idea outrages many Iraqis who said the law allows foreigners to act with impunity even after the occupation."

The Washington Post reported on 97 other legal orders that Bremer left behind, which "are defined by the U.S. occupation authority as 'binding instructions or directives to the Iraqi people' that will remain in force even after the transfer of political authority." Plus: Reports charge CPA with 'Failure to account' for Iraq cash.

Introducing Adam Hochschild's 'A Pseudostate is Born,' Tom Engelhardt writes that the Bush administration "has also given birth to another pseudocreation: a pseudo-opposition."

Engelhardt refers to a Los Angeles Times article that quotes "experts and some commanders" who "fear it may be too late to turn back the militant tide." The same day, the Washington Post reported that anti-U.S. Shiite and Sunni Muslim leaders had spoken out against attacks on Iraqis by foreign fighters, in what the article said "could be an important moment in the U.S. struggle to win acceptance" for the occupation and for Iraq's interim government.

In a Newsweek cover story on U.S. Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, tasked with rebuilding Iraq's security forces, the country's incoming defense minister says of the fight against insurgents: "Americans and allied forces have certain restrictions we won't have.... We will cut off their hands and behead them." The Jerusalem Post quotes Israeli sources that say the country is 'ready to help in NATO security.'

Newsweek also reports that a captured al-Qaeda commander who "was a crucial source for one of the more dramatic assertions made by President George W. Bush and his top aides: that Iraq had provided training in 'poisons and deadly gases' for Al Qaeda," has changed his story. Plus: 'Saddam's phone call to Osama.'

The U.S. military denies a report on a U.S.-funded Iraqi radio station that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been captured in Iraq, and Eric Umansky looks at how CNN unskeptically reported an earlier claim by the U.S. military that it had almost killed al-Zarqawi.

Revisiting the case of former most wanted, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, You Will Anyway flags a new report that "senior officials are telling Fox News that al Douri -- whom they describe as an avowed and 'fanatic' Islamist whose two sons have sworn 'fealty' to Usama bin Laden -- is in league with Zarqawi and Al-Qaeda elements." Plus: 'The 'Prop-Agenda' at War.'

At a Rolling Stone roundtable on 'What Next?' for Iraq, Sen. Joseph Biden said: "I was in the Oval Office the other day, and the president asked me what I would do about resignations. I said, 'Look, Mr. President, would I keep Rumsfeld? Absolutely not.' And I turned to Vice President Cheney, who was there, and I said, 'Mr. Vice President, I wouldn't keep you if it weren't constitutionally required.'"

Cheney says he "probably" used an obscenity attributed to him, after Sen. Patrick Leahy had "challenged my integrity" by making charges of cronyism between Cheney and Halliburton. Plus: The photo before the photo and 'Are they losing it?'

The Christian Science Monitor reports that "military maneuvering in and around Congo" is raising concern that "the region is slipping into a second African 'world war.'"

'Death and Denial' In a Washington Post report on refugee camps in Darfur, including one "where for six months 75,000 people have lived on less than half the food they need to survive," Sudan's foreign minister is quoted as saying, "In Darfur, there is no hunger," it is "imagined" by the media.

The U.S. government is prohibiting scientists from participating in World Health Organization meetings without the approval of Health & Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, and a new EPA ad touts home energy conservation by mocking the notion that automobile-related conservation can significantly reduce air pollution or greenhouse emissions.

As "Fahrenheit 9/11" does boffo box office, Michael Moore is calling it "a red-state movie. Republican states are embracing the movie, and it's sold out in Republican strongholds all over the country." An Editor & Publisher survey finds positive reviews in 56 of 63 daily papers.

An article in a red state newspaper asking 'Fahrenheit' too hot here?, quotes an aide to a U.S. congresswoman calling Moore a "sleazebag, far-out left-winger" and "a despicable, well-known liar."

A writer for the John Birch Society's magazine predicts that the movie "will have a huge impact because Moore – his facile leftist economics notwithstanding – has nailed his case against the Bush regime flush to the plank."

What Really Happened has some 9/11-related questions for Moore that it suggests should be raised during Monday evening's more than 2000 house parties for the movie, that are being organized by MoveOn.org.

An AP report on the 527 group, Americans Coming Together, hiring felons to conduct door-to-door voter registration drives in swing states, prompts the New York Post to ask: "Crackheads for Kerry?"

Gore More Years! Steve Gilliard says the media has treated Al Gore's speeches "as the ravings of a sore loser, which he is not.. I am tired of seeing Gore's accurate portrayal of Bush policy treated like mental illness." Plus: Gore does star turn in 'Coalition of the Wild-eyed.'

A Tallahassee Democrat article on Florida's felon purge list, includes an interview with a man on the list who was granted clemency in 1986 that gave him his right to vote. Plus: Group shines 'Spotlight on the Florida Purge.'

Greens reject Nader-Camejo ticket, in what a WSWS report calls "a definite political decision by the Green Party to make an accommodation with the Democratic Party in the current presidential race."

June 25-27

In an Asia Times interview, three former officers in Saddam's army, who are now part of the Iraqi resistance movement, claim that "The great battle is still to begin. The liberation of Baghdad is not far away." And Iraqi interim Prime Minister Allawi tells the Telegraph that he wants to move up elections: "We are working on a framework of six months. Personally, I would bring the election date sooner."

'Security a Shambles Ahead of Handover,' headlines the Guardian, with 30,000 Iraqi police officers set to be sacked by June 30 and "serious shortfalls of properly trained police and soldiers and vital equipment." Plus:  'Government to have little control over oil money.'

American lawmakers tell U.S. Army generals that Israeli-made bullets bought to plug a shortfall should be used for training only.

Jim Lobe reports on an assessment by the Institute for Policy Studies on "The Mounting Costs of the Iraq War," which says that each U.S. household will owe upwards of $3,100 by year's end and be "less secure at home and in the world."

For the first time, a majority of respondents to a USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll say that sending troops to Iraq was a mistake and that the war there has made the U.S. less safe from terrorism. More on the poll from Gallup.

In a decision that blocked the FCC's 2003 media ownership rules, a U.S. appeals court said the "Commission falls short of its obligation to justify its decisions to retain, repeal or modify its... regulations with reasoned analysis." Free Press aggregates the coverage of a 'Big blow to big media,' while the Media Channel's Danny Schechter points out that "these rules do not extend to cable. There consolidation continues - and globally."

In sending Vice President Cheney's energy task force case back to a lower court, the Supreme Court decision cited a "paramount necessity of protecting the executive branch from vexatious litigation." And saved Cheney from an "adverse public relations dance of having to assert executive privilege," according to a Justice Department attorney in the Clinton administration.

Judicial Watch called the ruling "no victory" for the White House and the Sierra Club said it was a "rejection" of the argument that the administration has a constitutional right to keep the workings of the task force secret. Plus: Sen. John Kerry's campaign lauded for working "Bush, Cheney, Nixon and Enron all together in four short declarative sentences."

Reprint This!  The Washington Post stands alone among major U.S. media outlets in not glossing over Vice President Cheney's "big time obscenity," but uses wire service coverage of Al Gore's 6,000-word speech at Georgetown University, in which he called the contention that "Hussein was in partnership with bin Laden," a "big flamboyant lie."

White House's Iraq act doesn't play in Peoria Journal Star.

Andrea & "Anonymous"  Under the Same Sun asks, "What happens if a high-level official tells a prominent member of the media elite that the widespread Muslim discontent stems mainly from our policies and what we do and not from an irrational hatred of who we are?"  Plus: William Greider on 'Embedded Patriots.'

About 'The interrogation of George W. Bush,' Justin Raimondo writes that "what fascinates is the interconnectedness of the various scandals that threaten to engulf this administration... All share a common narrative thread, the theme of some foreign or outside force manipulating the White House to achieve its own ends."

In a column headlined 'Reality is unraveling for Bush,' Sidney Blumenthal writes that Defense Secretary Rumsfeld was reportedly less upset by what he called "serial requests" from Congress for information about Abu Ghraib, than by subpoenas of defense officials in the Valerie Plame case, saying the Pentagon was nearly "at a stop" because of them.

Wonkette translates Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz's apology to journalists covering Iraq. Will he take incoming during Friday's "Ask the White House" chat?

AP attorney says of suit seeking access to records of President Bush's military service: "It seems a little curious because the president made a pretty forceful presentation that he had nothing to hide."

The victims of a convicted embezzler say Bush was off the mark in calling her a "good soul" and an "inspirational person," during a "Conversation on Compassion" in Cincinnati.  

Knight Ridder reports that the 1999 assassination of Paraguay's Vice President may have been faked, as "credible allegations" surface that he "died in the manner of U.S. Vice President Nelson Rockefeller: in bed with a lover."

The Smoking Gun posts documents alleging extreme judicial activism in Oklahoma.

June 24

Interviewed on NBC, "Imperial Hubris" author Anonymous said that "Bin Laden saw the invasion of Iraq as a Christmas gift he never thought he'd get," and he told CNN that "In many ways, the primary goal of bin Laden is neither to destroy the United States or destroy our liberties or our freedoms. It's simply to get us out of the Muslim world."

The CNN interview is preceded by a segment with Steve Coll, who wrote about Anonymous, aka "Mike," in his book "Ghost Wars."

Brendan O'Neill says that a London-based think tank is "blowing up the numbers" with its claim that there are 18,000 potential al-Qaeda terrorists on the loose.

A Reuters report on a wave of attacks in five cities across Iraq that killed about 100 people, says that some of the "black-clad gunmen" that launched strikes in Baquba, proclaimed loyalty to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, in what "appeared to be the first time members of Zarqawi's underground network had surfaced in street combat."

As the U.S. drops its effort to gain immunity for its troops from prosecution by the International Criminal Court, the Washington Post's Robin Wright reports that the Bush administration will take what she calls the "unusual step" of bestowing immunity on its own troops and personnel from prosecution by Iraqi courts after the occupation ends. Plus: John Judis on Reaganomics in Iraq.

Back to Iraq reports on a 'Looming Credibility Crisis' facing the Iraqi Interim Government, which "is looking to take its property back under a Governing Council decision made back in January... This applies to all squatters, from poor families who live in the old Air Force building to the INC, which has taken over some of Baghdad’s prime real estate outside the Green Zone."

Introducing an essay by Jonathan Schell, Tom Engelhardt writes: "Who knew that what we had was an administration of ...lexicographers, grammarians, and philologists, intent on parsing sentences, slicing meanings, arguing over the exact definitions of words, the exact point, for instance, where torture becomes torture..."

Schell calls for a new discussion, "It's subject... neither the justifications for the war in Iraq nor the President's credibility -- for both are obviously in tatters -- but the response to all this by the country. The spotlight now shifts from the liars to the lied-to. How do we -- in the news media, in the country at large -- like it?"

CNBC's Gloria Borger says she didn't challenge Vice President Cheney's untruth because "we were at a remote location so there was no opportunity to put up the quotes," adding, "There was no point in getting in an argument with the Vice President of the United States."

Editor & Publisher notes that few papers picked up on Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz's media bashing during testimony on Tuesday before the House Armed Services Committee, when he said that "Frankly, part of our problem is a lot of the press are afraid to travel very much, so they sit in Baghdad and they publish rumors." Plus: 'Attack of the Wolfman.'

As the U.S. Senate votes to repeal the FCC's rules on media ownership, and raise the maximum fines for indecency from $27,500 to $275,000, a TVTechnology commentator argues that the real indecency is "infoganda."

Before a segment in which he falsely denied having compared Al Franken to Josef Goebbels, Bill O'Reilly renewed his threat to launch a boycott against Canada unless it hands over two U.S. military deserters, Jeremeny Hinzman.net and Brandon Hughey.org. Earlier: 'Soldiers choose Canada.'

A review of "Fahrenheit 9/11" reviews doesn't mention Christopher Hitchens' 4,300 word thrashing, in which he challenges Michael Moore to a debate: "Any show. Any place. Any platform. Let's see what you're made of." Plus: "Le Monde Selon Bush" opens in France. Watch the trailer here.

The Hill reports that a draft advisory opinion by the FEC's general counsel, generated under a McCain-Feingold prohibition on corporate-funded ads that identify a federal candidate before a primary or general election, could stop the advertising of "Fahrenheit 9/11" and other political documentaries and films, as of July 30th, 30 days before the Republican Convention.

The article says the opinion was in response to a request for guidance from David Hardy, a documentary film producer with an organization called the Bill of Rights Educational Foundation, but it doesn't say if he's also an author.

Other films that could be affected by the ruling are "Uncovered," "The Corporation," "The Hunting of the President" and John Sayles' forthcoming "Silver City," which features Colorado gubernatorial candidate, "Dickie" Pillager.

A new report from a worker justice group, "Airing Dirty Laundry," focuses on industrial laundry company Cintas. In May, the Washington Post reported on how Cintas helped convince the EPA to reclassify industrial towels contaminated with chemical solvents as "laundry" rather than "hazardous waste," calling it "but one example of a policy change by the Bush administration that favors a company controlled by a Bush Pioneer or Ranger."

The New York Times reports that a debate is raging in Florida about whether President Bush went too far with new rules restricting travel to Cuba, "and whether the crackdown could in fact hurt his re-election prospects." Plus: Can Bush lasso the "Rodeo Grannies?"

June 23

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