Abramoff talks to Vanity Fair

Oh, this is a luscious interview. Think Progress has some excerpts and a link to the pdf of the article. All those GOPers who said they didn't know Jack, they're all lying. And he doesn't appreciate it.

AP has the story too -- and they lead with the Bush angle:

Convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff says President Bush knew him well enough to joke with him about weightlifting. "What are you benching, buff guy?" Abramoff said Bush asked him. The president has said he doesn't know Abramoff.

Abramoff said he finds it hard to believe Bush doesn't remember the 10 or so photos he and members of his family had snapped with the president and first lady.

"He (Bush) has one of the best memories of any politician I have ever met," Abramoff wrote in an e-mail, according to Vanity Fair's April issue being released this week. "Perhaps he has forgotten everything. Who knows?"

Read the rest of this post...

US upset with Iran's war of words

So exactly what did they expect when Cheney made public threats yesterday? These people have botched US foreign policy enough without exacerbating the delicate situation with Iran. I realize that Cheney has a control problem but how did he possibly think that yesterdays remarks would help and when did the US finish sorting out Iraq enough that he thought it would be a brilliant idea to kick off trouble with Iran? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

What's your take on today's news? Read the rest of this post...

Katherine Harris says she is NOT dropping out of the Senate race

Phew. There have been rampant rumors that Harris was going to drop out of the Senate race. She says no way...she's staying. That's great. I hope she stays in this race til she loses in November:

U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris said she doesn't plan to drop out of the Senate race, a statement she made as rumors swirled Wednesday that she would end the campaign because of ties to a company involved in bribery scandal.

"I am out there. We are running hard. We think we have great momentum," Harris said in a telephone interview. She is the only major Republican in the race to unseat Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson.

Speculation was heavy in Washington and Florida that her association with a defense contractor, MZM Inc., that prosecutors say illegally funneled thousands of dollars to her 2004 House campaign would force her out of the race. Harris has said she didn't knowingly do anything wrong.

Of course, we'll see how long her commitment to the race lasts. But, for now, we've still got Katherine Harris to kick around. Read the rest of this post...

Make no mistake, Cheney is still running the White House

If you have any doubt, read Froomkin's column today:

Faced with the frightening prospect of public hearings and active Congressional oversight into President Bush's contested domestic spying program, the White House sent out its big dog -- Vice President Cheney -- to bring straying moderate Republicans to heel.

Indeed, no matter what you have may have heard lately, the fact is that Cheney is still the Bush Administration's most ferocious warrior. Never mind the rumpus about his initial refusal to tell anyone -- even Bush -- that he shot someone while hunting in Texas. Disregard those reports of tensions between the vice president's office and, well, pretty much everyone else at the White House.

Cheney took point in the White House effort to quash a full-blown investigation into the program. And the guy still gets the job done.

Read the rest of this post...

Frist blocking vote to stop Bush's port deal

CNN is reporting that White House puppet/GOP Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist blocked a vote this afternoon on an amendment offered by Senator Chuck Schumer that would stop the deal Bush cut with the UAE to run American port security.

AP has a description of the Schumer amendment...and it sure sounds like Chuck is determined to get a vote:

With the issue bubbling toward an election-year boil, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., sought to force a Senate vote on a proposal that would prevent the company from owning or operating U.S. ports. Schumer's provision would bar any American port activities by companies owned by countries that recognized Afghanistan's Taliban rulers, as Dubai did, before the Taliban was overthrown by U.S. forces in 2001.

Read the rest of this post...

Growing talk about whether Colorado far-right Republican Marilyn Musgrave violated military rules by having uniformed servicemembers at partisan event

From the Coloradoan

In his Feb. 9 column, conservative columnist Robert Novak wrote that county Republican leaders were arranging local speeches by active duty military personnel about their experiences in Iraq.

Jones said he believed Republicans were, indeed, doing so to appeal to the patriotic side of Americans. He said Musgrave should, instead, vote for bonuses and medical benefits for military members.

"I think there's a proactive movement to literally take photos of themselves with soldiers," Jones said.

"What I find disgusting about all of this is (Republicans) are trying to get re-elected because they know they're in trouble, and they're running behind our soldiers to do it."

Read the rest of this post...

Get AMERICAblog by email

We launched a new feature a few weeks back, using a service called FeedBlitz. The service allows you to get one email a day that contains EVERYTHING we posted on AMERICAblog in the previous 24 hours (usually 12 to 18 posts). You can find the sign-up box for this service, it's free, in the top of the column to the left.

Now, for those of you who come to this site 10 times a day, you probably don't need this email service. But others don't love to read Web sites, or they like to visit a few times a week - then they get overwhelmed by the number of posts. Still others like to read the news on their way to work from their PDAs. If either of those sound like you, you can use this service to get a daily email that includes everything we've written in the previous day. You can then read it on your PDA, on your computer at work, at home, or even print it out and read it.

Like I said, for some of you this service won't matter, but for others, it could make reading the blog a lot easier. The sign-up box is in the upper left-hand corner. Again, it's free, and just FYI, I don't sell or rent my email lists (or give them away for free), so don't worry.

Thanks, JOHN Read the rest of this post...

Bush blasted at conservative forum

From the Wash Post:

Author of the new book "Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy," Bartlett called the administration "unconscionable," "irresponsible," "vindictive" and "inept."

It might also have had something to do with speaker No. 2, conservative blogger Andrew Sullivan. Author of the forthcoming "The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It; How to Get It Back," Sullivan called Bush "reckless" and "a socialist," and accused him of betraying "almost every principle conservatism has ever stood for."

Nor was moderator Boaz a voice of moderation. He blamed Bush for "a 48 percent increase in spending in just six years," a "federalization of public schools" and "the biggest entitlement since LBJ."

They're now writing books about how bad Bush is. I think the Republicans now realize that they need to do everything they can to distance themselves and the Republican party from Bush in order not to have him taint them in the upcoming congressional and presidential elections. That means expect plenty of Bush-bashing by the Republicans over the next 3 years.

How sweet it is. Read the rest of this post...

Noon (in the east) open thread

And if you're in San Francisco on Friday, read the post below about us trying to organize a blogger meet-up with me and you in SF during the day. Read the rest of this post...

Elizabeth Dole sends out GOP fundraising letter disguised to look like federal tax form, "requires" you to respond "or else"

Local blogger BlueNC makes an incredible find.

This is pretty low. A Republican party fundraising letter that pretends to be an official document from the IRS, and then demands that you not destroy the official document and that you respond?

This is fraud, and it's no better than the people who try to extort money from the elderly or those Nigerian spammers. They're looking for a few suckers who don't know any better, and that's exactly what Senator Dole and the Republican party are doing with this mailer. They're trying to trick people into donating money to the Republican party at tax time, or else.

I doubt this is legal, and it's most certainly sleazy as hell. Read the rest of this post...

If Moussaoui is guilty, then so is Bush

From the Wash Post:

...prosecutor Rob Spencer opened his case by telling the jury that "even though [Moussaoui] was in jail on Sept. 11, he did his part as a loyal al-Qaida soldier."

"Had he not lied to agents in 2001, the U.S. government would have stopped those deaths, or at least some of them," Spencer asserted.

So Moussaoui is guilty because he had the chance to speak before 9/11 and didn't. Well, another way to look at this is that the Bush administration is guilty because it had Moussaoui in jail in the weeks preceding September 11, and had they not failed to get him to talk, the US government would have stopped those deaths, or at least some of them.

Bush had one of the hijackers in his hands and got nothing out of him, and as a result 3,000 people died. Imagine had Bill Clinton done something like this? Of course, when the World Trade Center was attacked during Clinton's presidency, the attack was a failure and we caught all the terrorists.

Oh what a difference a real president makes. Read the rest of this post...

AMERICAblog meet up in San Francisco this Friday?

Gang, I'm going to San Francisco to take a media training (i.e., teach me how to do better during TV interviews, etc.) and will have Friday day free. I know it's a bit inconvenient because folks are working during the day, but I was wondering if it was worth trying to set up another coffee with local readers of the blog somewhere in SF during that day? I'll be staying at a hotel in town, somewhere, and anytime during the day this Friday works (just not evening). Friday is the only day that works, I'm heading back to DC on Saturday.

Any locals think this would work, or is Friday during the day too busy a work time? Let me know. Thanks, JOHN Read the rest of this post...

Creepy new furry lobster found

But does it taste good? Read the rest of this post...

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

What do you know? Read the rest of this post...

Looks like another bumper crop of opium in Afghanistan

Wasn't that one of the things the US was going to bring an end to there? Anyone who has spent time in a poor country knows exactly how this process works. The government has a team of inspectors who are responsible for enforcing government policies such as the eradication of poppy. The government is weak and has very little money to pay the enforcers but guess who has the cash to supplement their income? Meanwhile, the US military dishes out another hollow statement about cracking down but hell, we all know they have enough trouble holding the country not to mention having the troops to hunt down bin Laden because everyone was sent to Iraq.

Mission Accomplished?

It looks to be a bumper year. Some 320,000 acres are currently blanketed in rows of dandelion-like sprouts that eventually produce almost 90 percent of the world's heroin.

The dramatic increase in poppy cultivation since U.S. forces ousted the Taliban from power in late 2001 has caused alarm in the West, particularly Europe, the destination of most of the drugs. Only a fraction of the output is consumed inside Afghanistan.

One reason cultivation had risen is that threats to cut down last year's crop never materialized, a U.S. drug agent said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of his involvement in sensitive counternarcotics operations. This year, agents hope threats are now backed by action.

Read the rest of this post...

18 dead found in Iraq - or is this just another media-inspired tale?

Is Rummy going to tell everyone that the 18 men found with their hands tied behind their backs and strangled to death were not really people or didn't they really exist? With ridiculous comments like he had yesterday, blaming all of their troubles on the media, it is no wonder the public doesn't believe the administration any longer. In the face of civil war the American public sees it for what it is but the administration continues to talk like its 2003 and the public was believing everything they had to say. Times have changed Rummy. You made the mess and you have no idea how to fix it. Read the rest of this post...

Another race related murder in Europe?

A few weeks ago in France there was a sickening story about a Jew who was tortured for weeks and finally left to die after being set on fire. Despite weeks of screams, more than a dozen people being involved and the police investigating, nobody ever helped or reached out to authorities. Now from the UK another murder that appears to be race related. Is Europe going to wake up to hate crimes and modern-day lynchings or will they continue to ignore the problem? There is such a massive problem across Europe and so little seems to be done about it regardless of the country.

Northumbria Police had promised community leaders on Tyneside an exhaustive investigation into the murder of Lee Phipps, a photographer who had highlighted race-hate crimes.

Mr Phipps, 31, whose mother has Somalian roots, was found stabbed to death on a doorstep in South Shields, South Tyneside, on Thursday afternoon, after leaving the home he shared with her to photograph the snow-covered Cleadon Hills.

His previous actions against racists in the area have included photographing a gang which allegedly gave Nazi salutes to his mother three years ago. He was taken to hospital after they attacked him

Read the rest of this post...

Good Dem Ciro Rodriguez is ahead, so far, behind now in Texas congressional primary vote

Stay tuned.

Update at 12:13: Doesn't look good for Ciro. Read the rest of this post...