Public Says CIA Leak More Important than Iran Contra, Whitewater, and Monica

After reading John's post below on AP, I have to say that it really shocks me. I've spent the last hour or so working my way through the CBS poll. While the 35% number is interesting in and of itself, the rest of the poll had some startling (at least to me) results. Here's one that stood out:

HOW IMPORTANT TO THE NATION IS THE CIA LEAK MATTER?

CIA Leak
Great importance - 51%
Some importance - 35%
Little/no importance - 12%

Clinton-Lewinsky (1/98)
Great importance - 41%
Some importance - 21%
Little/no importance - 37%

Whitewater (3/94)
Great importance - 20%
Some importance - 29%
Little/no importance - 45%

Iran-Contra (2/87)
Great importance - 48%
Some importance - 33%
Little/no importance - 19%

Watergate (5/73; Gallup Poll)
Great importance - 53%
Some importance - 25%
Little/no importance - 22%

Go back and reread all those numbers. The CIA Leak Investigation, which the media has begrudgingly started to cover, is according to the public, already more important than Iran Contra, Whitewater, and Monica (over which the President was impeached - talk about a hijacked Senate Mr. Frist). It is just 2 points shy of being as important to the public as Watergate.

The media needs to start taking these poll numbers seriously and stop listening to the spin inside the Beltway. It is their responsibility to do the investigative reporting -- REAL investigative reporting, give-a-team-of-reporters-six-months-to-write-their-first-story investigative reporting.

It's a responsibility they must take more seriously. Investigative reporting doesn't always make you friends. Karl isn't going to give you a nickname. If that's what you need in life, go work for the White House. As Katrina showed, they don't have very high qualifications for any job. Read More......

Mad About You

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank does a great, and funny, write-up of how Mr. Reid went to Washington and ticked off the Republicans, big-time.

Some excerpts, but do read the entire piece, it's that good:

Frist was now sputtering. "This is an affront to me personally. It's an affront to our leadership. It's an affront to the United States of America!" Turning sorrowful, he vowed that "for the next year and a half, I can't trust Senator Reid."

"Mr. Leader," one stunned journalist observed, "I don't remember you being so exercised over something before."

"You've never seen me in heart surgery," the senator, a transplant specialist, replied.

Dr. Frist's patients -- not to mention the Tennessee medical licensing board -- may be surprised to learn that he had operating-room rage. But his reaction to Reid's provocation was predictable....

Democrats did not deny it was a stunt: a brazen effort to change the subject from the Supreme Court confirmation of Sam Alito, which Republicans prefer, to war deaths and Scooter Libby's indictment. "Alito had his day," a Democratic leadership aide said as the chamber dissolved into confusion. "We're going back to our story."

It was a cheap trick -- and it worked brilliantly. Reporters dropped their stories about Alito and covered the melee in the Senate. CNN titled the episode "Congress in Crisis." MSNBC displayed a live shot of a mostly empty hallway outside the Senate chamber and a clock showing elapsed time since the Senate went into closed session....

"Republicans are outraged," Sen. Christopher Bond (R-Mo.) reported. "I just ate lunch, and it's upset my stomach."....

Through the glass door to the chamber, Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) could be seen sitting in the presiding officer's chair, looking puzzled. Reid could be seen sharing a laugh with two colleagues....

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Associated Press, stick to the news, leave the bias to FOX

AP just published the weirdest (read: sloppiest) article about the filibuster debate.

Basically, AP says, quite definitively in fact - which isn't really news reporting but rather personal opinion - that a few of the "centrist" Republicans are talking about walking out of the deal they had earlier this year to avert the "nuclear option" (i.e., Republicans try to delete the filibuster from the Senate rules), and that this means Democrats are now weaker and Alito's chances of being confirmed have increased:

The 14 centrists who averted a Senate breakdown over judicial nominees last spring are showing signs of splintering on President Bush's latest nominee for the Supreme Court. That is weakening the hand of Democrats opposed to conservative judge Samuel Alito and enhancing his prospects for confirmation.

That is the biggest bunch of crap I've read in a while.

Yes, the Democrats may have the votes to filibuster Alito, should it prove necessary to do so. And then the Republicans may get the votes to remove the filibuster from the Senate rules in some Hitler-circa-1933-esque grab for total power (note to ADL: bite me) to take more and more rights away from the political opposition since Republicans can't stomach dissent in a free society.

And then what happens next? AP says the Democrats lose.

But had AP watched the news yesterday, rather than apparently going on their annual office retreat to the Oscar Meyer factory, they'd have seen a small uproar in Washington, DC in which the Senate Democrats used arcane procedural rules to shut down the Senate, much to the chagrin and embarrassment of the White House and the Republican Senate majority.

Yesterday was clearly a signal to the Republicans (but apparently not to AP) that if the Republicans go nuclear, the Democrats will go nuclear, and then we'll just see who wins that battle, taking into account the fact that the American people hate George Bush more and more with each waking hour, and they don't like the Rs in Congress much better. Oh yeah, and perhaps AP missed this morning's new poll showing the American people will support a filibuster of Alito, but do NOT support eliminating the filibuster from the Senate rules.

So tell me again why the Terri Schiavo Republicans have the upper hand?

The Republicans choosing to march us all towards Armageddon is only a bad sign for the Democrats if they blink. And as of yesterday, it was the Republicans who blinked, not the Democrats.

I don't mean to knock this particular AP writer, because we all get it wrong sometimes. But an editor shouldn't have caught that mistake - inserting unsubstantiated opinion/conjecture into a straight news story. Not appropriate. Read More......

William F. Buckley Jr.

He says outing a CIA agent is serious business.

We have noticed that Valerie Plame Wilson has lived in Washington since 1997. Where she was before that is not disclosed by research facilities at my disposal. But even if she was safe in Washington when the identity of her employer was given out, it does not mean that her outing was without consequence. We do not know what dealings she might have been engaging in which are now interrupted or even made impossible. We do not know whether the countries in which she worked before 1997 could accost her, if she were to visit any of them, confronting her with signed papers that gave untruthful reasons for her previous stay — that she was there only as tourist, or working for a fictitious U.S. company. In my case, it was 15 years after reentry into the secular world before my secret career in Mexico was blown, harming no one except perhaps some who might have been put off by my deception.

The great question here is Robert Novak. It was he who published, in his column, that Mrs. Joseph Wilson was a secret agent of the CIA. I am too close a friend to pursue the matter with Novak, and his loyalty is a postulate. What was going on? If there are mysteries in town, that surely is one of them, the role of Novak.

The importance of the law against revealing the true professional identity of an agent is advertised by the draconian punishment, under the federal code, for violating it. In the swirl of the Libby affair, one loses sight of the real offense, and it becomes almost inapprehensible what it is that Cheney/Libby/Rove got themselves into. But the sacredness of the law against betraying a clandestine soldier of the republic cannot be slighted.

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Bush now at 35% approval, lowest ever

Break open the bubbly! Read More......

Thank you

This afternoon my office has been inundated with flowers, balloons, cards and good wishes. I wanted to say thank you all. You support means the world to my staff and me.

In addition, I am happy that so many people understand how important yesterday was. Democrats have been demanding answers on the pre-war intelligence for two years. Now Republicans have finally agreed to complete the investigation that will provide the answers to these vital questions so we all can know the truth about why we went to war in Iraq.

From the bottom of my heart – thank you.

- Harry Reid Read More......

Top White House aide misses his pal, Scooter

Isn't this touching? They miss Scooter. The National Security Advisor is broken up about losing his counterpart in the Veep's office. Yes, Scooter was also Cheney's National Security Advisor. Treason clearly doesn't faze this crowd:

"Scooter Libby is a fine person. And he served the president and the vice president well," White House National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said at a news briefing.

"I will miss him as a colleague and as a friend," he added.

Yeah, Scooter's served them so well. That's why he is being arraigned tomorrow. Read More......

AP: Young Alito defended privacy, gay rights

I'll be serving crow on the Ledo Deck to all the naysers who thought this was a nothing story.

From AP:

In college, Samuel Alito led a student conference that urged legalization of sodomy and curbs on domestic intelligence, a sweeping defense of privacy rights he said were under threat by the government and the dawning computer age.

President Bush's choice for the Supreme Court, in a report written years before ubiquitous personal computers made electronic privacy the everyday concern it is now, warned of the potential for abuses by officials and companies collecting data on individuals.

Three decades before the Supreme Court decriminalized gay sex, Alito declared on behalf of his group of fellow Princeton students that "no private sexual act between consenting adults should be forbidden." Alito also called for an end to discrimination against homosexuals in hiring.

As a federal appellate judge, Alito has built a scant record on gay-rights issues and a mixed one, at best, on privacy matters generally, in the view of civil liberties advocates who are still examining his opinions.

But they saw in the 1971 report a prescient thinker taking on issues ahead of their time, including the need for computer encryption, stronger oversight of domestic intelligence and curbs on the surveillance powers of states.

"The document itself is amazing," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "It is a dramatic statement in support of the right of privacy.

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Open thread

Been a while, go to it. Read More......

New DemsTV is up - we tried something different this time

As many of the regulars here know, I host an online political talk show called DemsTV. In an effort to try something a little different, we changed the format this week in an effort to make the show a bit more substantive and get more cross-talk between the guests (again, to provoke more substance). Anyway, have a look and see what you think. Obviously, the set is nothing special - we know that. What we could use is suggestions on the structure of the show, the flow, the tone, etc. This was a first attempt, so it's gonna need work - for starters, it's way too long.

Thanks, JOHN Read More......

Bush ♥ the Koran

He put a copy of the Koran in the White House library AND apparently he's reading it. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But oh the fundies are gonna flip.

Check out this interview last month in which a Malaysian reporter interviews Undersecretary of State Karen Hughes:

KHAIDIR: Talking about books, President Bush in the Iftar in the White House – the White House finally has a Koran in the library….

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: That’s right, he’s put a Koran in the library for the first time.

KHAIDIR: Has he started reading it yet?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: I don’t know! I know a lot of us - I know my husband and I started reading the Koran in the aftermath - I think after September 11th and after some of the discussions of, you know, after hearing some of what the terrorists were saying, and then hearing other Muslims saying that what the terrorists did, did not represent the Islamic faith, that a lot of Americans became very interested in learning more about Islam. And so I know I’ve read some of the Koran, and I’m sure the President has as well since he got the copy of the Koran to place in the White House library, so.

KHAIDIR: It’s good for him, because we have been misunderstood. [...]

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Alito ♥ Sodomy, Part II

The actual copy of Alito's report on privacy is now online here. Some particularly good excerpts:

1. Alito ♥ activist judges, Alito hates the original intent of the Framers

Privacy is a value of fundamental importance.... Compared to more traditional social values -- such as liberty, equality, justice, toleration, and order -- little has been written about privacy. This is certainly understandable, for only in the present age has it become possible to destroy privacy on a mass scale.

2. Alito ♥ terrorists and the ACLU

We are convinced that in recent years government has often used improper means to gather information about individuals who posed no threat either to their government or to their fellow citizens.

Most of the problem in this area involves surveillance by the federal government of persons it believes to be subsersive. In general, this [sic] in the province of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and it is completely improper for the Central Intelligence Agency to enter the field as it has apparently done in recent years. It is also quite wrong for military intelligence to get deeply involved in domestic surveillance.

3. Alito ♥ the homos

Laws concerning Homosexuality
The Conference voted to recommend that the current sodomy laws be changed. The Conference believes that no private sexual act between consenting adults should be forbidden... Discrimination against homosexuals in hiring should be forbidden.

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Excerpt from today's Press Gaggle at the White House

From ThinkProgress - the transcript is a gold mine today:

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, that’s — what I’m saying is that, you know, if they want to talk about the threat that Saddam Hussein posed and — we’ll be glad to talk about that. Removing Saddam Hussein and his brutal regime was the right thing to do. His regime was a destabilizing force in a dangerous part of the world.

Of course, now WE'RE the distabilizing force in a dangerous part of the world, but hey, who's counting.

Q [Republican Senator] Roberts has been sitting on the intelligence policy –

MR. McCLELLAN: Helen — Helen, they’ve already — they’ve had phase one and phase two, and Senator Roberts would greatly dispute the way you’re characterizing things.

Q He’s absolutely clamped down on going further. He had promised this report, and it’s not come out.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Senator Roberts disagrees — Senator Roberts disagrees with your characterization. He stated so publicly.

Q He doesn’t disagree. He knows darn well the business is unfinished.

MR. McCLELLAN: You should look at what he said.

What's next is my favorite moment: "Torture is not justice."

Q The President often says that when we capture an al Qaeda person, we are bringing them to justice. Is that the case?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, when you talk about capturing al Qaeda terrorists, you’re not only talking about bringing them to justice, you’re talking about being able to get important intelligence that can help us prevent attacks from happening in the first place. I think some of the people that you’re probably referencing, talking about, are people like Khalid Shaykh Muhammad and Ramzi Binalshibh and Abu Zubaydah — terrorist leaders who are responsible for killing thousands of Americans and many others in the civilized world that are innocent people.

Go ahead.

Q That doesn’t answer the question.

MR. McCLELLAN: You bet it does. I’ve told the American people exactly what I’ve said and I –

Q That’s not bringing them to justice. Torture is not justice –

MR. McCLELLAN: — I think they think it answers it.

Then Scottie gets caught lying about President Clinton, trying to claim that Clinton reached the same conclusion as Bush about going to war with Saddam:

Q Isn’t your statement in error when you say that the previous administration came to the same conclusion? The previous administration did not come to the same conclusion –

MR. McCLELLAN: I said the same conclusion, that Saddam Hussein –

Q — to intervene militarily.

MR. McCLELLAN: — that Saddam Hussein’s regime was a threat.

Q But they didn’t go to war.

Q But isn’t the point of the –

MR. McCLELLAN: You want to talk about their comments? Let’s talk about their comments.

Q But the point of what they raised yesterday is the President’s decision to move militarily into Iraq. Are you saying –

MR. McCLELLAN: There’s no more clear example of this threat than Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. His regime “threatens the safety of his people, the stability of his region, and the security of all the rest of us” — President Clinton, remarks to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pentagon staff, February 17, 1998.

Q But he didn’t take us to war.

Q But isn’t the specific issue –

MR. McCLELLAN: The conclusion they came to was that Saddam Hussein’s regime is a threat and a destabilizing force in a dangerous part of the world.

Q But he didn’t take us to war.

Q But the specific issue is weapons of mass destruction.

Q But the question was whether the United States –

MR. McCLELLAN: You asked me about a statement I made, and I just backed up the statement that I made.

Q But the specific issue is weapons of mass destruction, and that is — that is the intelligence having to do with that. And the Democrats are saying that is what they’ve been deprived of, an investigation of. And so my question is, given what happened in the Senate –

Then Scottie moves the goal post yet again on when the White House is finally going to come clean with the American people about what Rove, Cheney, Bush and the lot of them knew and did with regards to the Valerie Plame CIA leak:

Q Kind of a housekeeping question. You repeatedly say that you’ve been instructed not to comment on the CIA leaks case, because there’s an ongoing investigation. Can we infer from that that when Fitzgerald announces his investigation is completed you will be in a position to comment?

MR. McCLELLAN: I said I’d be glad to talk more about it after it’s come to a conclusion.

Q Well, would that mark the conclusion?

MR. McCLELLAN: Would what?

Q The end of the Fitzgerald investigation.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, there’s an investigation and legal proceeding. And the comments I make –

Q So now you’re adding court cases.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Bob, I think any time there’s been a legal matter going on, we’ve said, that’s a legal matter.

Q No, what you said is, you can’t comment on an ongoing investigation.

MR. McCLELLAN: No, I think what I said last — and look what I said –

Q So you’ve added the words, “legal proceeding.”

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, now there is a legal proceeding.

Q So you’re adding the words, “legal proceeding,” to the formulation.

MR. McCLELLAN: That’s not — any time there is a legal proceeding such as that, we don’t discuss it. I mean, I think you can look back at –

Q Because –

MR. McCLELLAN: Because it’s a legal matter, and it’s before the courts.

Q The world is crawling with legal matters that the White House comments on all the time. What sets this apart?

MR. McCLELLAN: No, there are legal matters that occur all the time that we do not comment on, because they’re ongoing legal matters that are before the courts. Remember, numerous times we’ve referred stuff to the Justice Department because it’s an ongoing legal proceeding.

Q What is the concern of the White House, they’re not commenting?

MR. McCLELLAN: Exactly what I said. Maybe you want to go back and look at my remarks, but we don’t want to prejudice the opportunity for there to be a fair and impartial trial.

Q Okay, because your remarks earlier had suggested that you didn’t want to influence an investigation that was ongoing.

MR. McCLELLAN: We don’t want to do that, either. We want to do our part to continue to cooperate, and that’s what we will do.

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Open thread

Have at it. Read More......

Alito ♥ sodomy

Sodomy and the right to privacy. This is getting fun already.

From the Boston Globe:

As a senior at Princeton University, Samuel A. Alito Jr. chaired an undergraduate task force that recommended the decriminalization of sodomy, accused the CIA and the FBI of invading the privacy of citizens, and said discrimination against gays in hiring ''should be forbidden."....

'We sense a great threat to privacy in modern America," Alito wrote in a foreword to the report, in 1971. ''We all believe that privacy is too often sacrificed to other values; we all believe that the threat to privacy is steadily and rapidly mounting; we all believe that action must be taken on many fronts now to preserve privacy."....

The report covered what its undergraduate authors saw as increasing threats to privacy in the late 1960s, questioning whether the ''cybernetic revolution" would result in more invasions of privacy and criticizing government surveillance of ''mild dissenters on the war in Vietnam."

Alito, who would probably rule on many privacy issues arising from the Bush administration's pursuit of the war on terror, wrote in his 1971 introduction: ''We are convinced that in recent years government has often used improper means to gather information about individuals who posed no threat either to their government or to their fellow citizens."

At the end Alito wrote: ''The erosion of privacy, unlike war, economic bad times, or domestic unrest, does not jump to the citizen's attention . . . But by the time privacy is seriously compromised, it is too late to clamor for reform."

Also, I'm not saying Alito is a big liberal, so please spare me the short-sighted comments about "how you can say he's a liberal!" I'm not an idiot. But, being soft on sodomy, so to speak, is a big deal to the religious right - the very people this nomination is meant to mollify. You've got to remember that it was Lawrence v. Texas, the recent Supreme Court decision that ruled state sodomy laws unconstitutional, that got the religious right going on the whole "gay marriage" crusade. The religious right, with Scalia as their leader, freaked out over Lawrence v. Texas. First, because they want to jail gays simply for being gay. But second, because, they argued, that Lawrence would lead to gay marriage.

In the religious right's mind, a defense of sodomy is a defense of gay marriage. That's why these Alito coming out against sodomy laws is such a big deal. And let's not even get into his support for legislation outlawing job discrimination against gays - the religious right will choke over that one. Not to mention, he was in favor of all of this 30 friggin' years ago, folks. I mean, Harriet was making pro-gay signs 15 years ago. This was 30 YEARS AGO.

Oh yeah, the fun has just begun. Read More......

Bush makes jokes about his White House staff leaking and his not wanting to get to the bottom of it

Yes, threats to our national security during wartime are very funny, Mr. President. It's especially funny when secret agents, US soldiers, and American citizens' lives are put at risk because of those leaks and our commander in chief doesn't do a damn thing about it.

BUSH JOKES ABOUT HIS WHITE HOUSE TEAM LEAKING
Wed Nov 02 2005 10:58:31 ET

ROUNDTABLE INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT
WITH FOREIGN PRINT MEDIA
The Roosevelt Room
November 1, 2005

With that, we'll start. Jorge, como yo.

Q Mr. President, in Argentina, you will have a bilateral meeting with President Kirchner.

THE PRESIDENT: Si.

Q What I want to know -- sources of the government told me that they would ask you about more cooperation on support for Argentina, you know, in the IMF fund --

THE PRESIDENT: IMF.

Q Exactly.

THE PRESIDENT: Please don't tell me that the government leaks secrets about conversations to the --

Q Well, I have my sources in the government.

THE PRESIDENT: You do? Okay, well I'm not going to ask you who they are, of course. (Laughter.)

Q No, please.

THE PRESIDENT: Inside joke here, for my team. (Laughter.)

END

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Broder says Bush is "President Pushover"

I find David Broder increasingly unbearable. He really thinks he is the dean of the Washington punditry, and many others in that crowd view him that way. So, when I see a headline like "President Pushover," it catches my eye:

But after the fiasco of the Harriet Miers nomination and the other reversals of recent days and weeks, the Alito nomination inevitably looks like a defensive move, a lunge for the lifeboat by an embattled president to secure what is left of his political base. Instead of a consistent and principled approach to major decision making, Bush's efforts look like off-balance grabs for whatever policy rationales he can find. The president's opponents are emboldened by this performance, and his fellow partisans must increasingly wonder if they can afford to march to his command.

And there is this line which is becoming clearer every day:

But the message that has been sent is that this president is surprisingly easy to roll.

The Washington press corps, Dean Broder included, has refused to believe that the Bush team was as craven and ruthless as they really are. Maybe now they are beginning to see the reality. Maybe. Read More......

CNN-USA Today-Gallup: Scalito a Flop

Looks like George just dropped a turd in the punch bowl. Initial reaction to Scalito? The public is already on our side. From Gallup:

About the same number of Americans rate Alito's selection either excellent or good (43%) as rate it fair or poor (39%). Miers received a similar rating, but Roberts' rating was somewhat more positive: 51% excellent or good, 34% fair or poor.

Rob's Note - here are two specific places where we can tell the truth to change the public's mind

About half of those interviewed Tuesday night believe Alito's views are mainstream, while a quarter think his views are too extreme, and another quarter have no opinion.
...
The public is evenly divided as to whether Alito probably would or would not vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. Thirty-eight percent believe he would, and an equal percentage think he would not, with the rest offering no opinion.

Rob's Note - and here's the best part

If it becomes clear Alito would vote to reverse Roe v. Wade, Americans would not want the Senate to confirm him, by 53% to 37%.

If most Senate Democrats oppose the nomination and decide to filibuster against Alito, 50% of Americans believe they would be justified, while 40% say they would not.

If the Republicans then decide to eliminate the filibuster on judicial nominations, to ensure an "up-or-down vote" on the nomination, Americans would be evenly divided as to whether that tactic was justified -- 45% say it would be, 47% say it would not.

Good news all around. And we're just starting. With the appropriate sized TV campaign, we're going to win this one hands down. But it will take a large, sustained, TV campaign. Moveon.org's one off campaigns are great, but this one needs to be up on the air for the duration - 2 to 3 months, every day. It's going to cost millions of dollars, and it will be worth every penny. Consider it a down payment on 2006.

Here is the specific poll Q&A;:

If you were convinced that Alito would vote to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision, would you, personally, want the Senate vote to confirm him to the Supreme Court, or not?

Yes, confirm: 37%

No, not: 53%

No opinion: 10%

Suppose all or most of the Democrats in the Senate oppose Alito's nomination. Do you think they would be justified -- or not justified -- in using Senate procedures, such as the filibuster, to prevent an up-or-down vote on his nomination?

Justified: 50%

Not justified: 40%

No opinion: 10%

If that happens, the Republicans in the Senate would consider changing Senate procedures to eliminate the filibuster on judicial nominations, which would ensure an up-or-down vote on the nomination. Do you think the Republicans in the Senate would be justified -- or not justified -- in doing this?

Justified: 45%

Not justified: 47%

No opinion: 8%

We win across the entire spectrum. Why? I would argue that the public is truly looking for someone to save them from George Bush. Call it buyers remorse, call it Iraq fatigue, call it Katrina complete government failure fallout, call it fallout from the first indictment of an administration official in 130 years. Whatever it is, the public is behind the Democrats right now, looking to them for leadership.

However, the Left often screws up just about now. They look at this kind of poll, say that the public is on our side, and then just watch when the Republicans start to a) lie regularly, and b) put up millions of dollars in lying ad campaigns. After $20 million TV campaigns, people change their minds. At the end of the day, the Left is always looking around trying to figure out what happened. Please let's not do this here.

But it's a good day, we are already winning this one! Read More......

Open Thread

Let's get started... Read More......

Republicans screamed and hollered, but caved fast

For all of Bill Frist's hystrionics, he sure gave in pretty damn quickly. The GOP are a bunch of schoolyard bullies. Maybe, just maybe, the Democrats are finally learning how to fight back against the bully:

Republicans condemned the Democrats' maneuver, which marked the first time in more than 25 years that one party had insisted on a closed session without consulting the other party. But within two hours, Republicans appointed a bipartisan panel to report on the progress of a Senate intelligence committee report on prewar intelligence, which Democrats say has been delayed for nearly a year.

"Finally, after months and months and months of begging, cajoling, writing letters, we're finally going to be able to have phase two of the investigation regarding how the intelligence was used to lead us into the intractable war in Iraq," Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) told reporters, claiming a rare victory for Democrats in the GOP-controlled Congress.

For all his tough talk, First's tough facade fell fast. Read More......

CIA holding captives in Soviet-era prisons

I know we have to play hardball with some of these guys. But Jesus, using Soviet-era prisons? But hey, don't you dare compare what WE'RE doing to prisoners with what the Soviets or the Nazis did to prisoners. Sure we're using their own compounds, but it's totally different. Like Abu Ghraib - before it was Saddam's torture place, and now it's our. But the difference is we're the GOOD guys. See? Read More......

A late night open thread

Since traffic is still pretty nuts I'm gonna post another open thread (it's amazing what some good Democratic backbone can do to Web traffic). Then off to bed. Read More......

AP: Bush buddies say he's lost his way

He's fallen and he can't get up.

"In my administration, we will ask not only what is legal but what is right, not just what the lawyers allow but what the public deserves," Bush said Oct. 26, 2000.

Five years later, senior White House adviser I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was accused of covering up his involvement in the CIA leak case, an investigation that raises questions about the role played by Bush confidant Karl Rove and Vice President Dick Cheney to discredit an Iraq war critic.

The case cuts at the president's hard-earned credibility.

In June 2004, Bush said he stood by his pledge to "fire anybody" in his administration shown to have leaked Valerie Plame's name. His press secretary, after checking with Libby and Karl, assured the public that neither man had anything to do with the leak.

It turns out they both were involved, though Rove has not been charged and neither man has been charged with breaking the law against revealing the identity of an undercover agent.

The president's own supporters call that a Clintonesque distinction that violates the spirit of Bush's pledge from 2000. Some say Bush should publicly chastise Libby and Rove while insisting on a public accounting of Cheney's role.

A White House official privately put it this way: Bush has to step up somehow and be accountable.

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