10.29.2005

Editorial Cartoon Asks 'WHY?'

Mike Luckovich marked the tragic milestone of 2,000 American servicemen and women killed in Iraq by hand-writing the name of each one in his Wednesday editorial cartoon. Together, their names spell out the question: WHY?"

I was trying to think of a way to make the point that this whole war is such a waste," said Luckovich, of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Creators Syndicate. "But I also wanted to honor the troops I believe our government wrongly sent to Iraq."

Luckovich told E&P that he spent 12 or 13 hours this past weekend writing in most of the names -- roughly in the order of when the soldiers died. The Journal-Constitution's publisher and various editors were also involved in the effort -- checking that all 2,000 names were there, looking for spelling errors, doing a test printing to see if the names would be readable in the paper, and, when it looked like the names might not be readable, giving permission for the cartoon to be published much larger than Luckovich's drawings usually appear in the Journal-Constitution.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001390467

10.28.2005

Quote of the Day:

"They were scared of Oprah, which is O.K.," he said. "We should all have a healthy fear of Oprah."

http://select.nytimes.com/preview/2005/10/30/arts/1130230223187.html?8tpf&emc=tpf

From the new 'Boondocks' cartoon series - can't wait - Nov 6th Cartoon Network

More from the article:

Regarding the rapper Kanye West's recent remark that Mr. Bush doesn't care about black people: "If you're black and you don't know that by now, you're in trouble. I think it's time that poor whites start realizing that George Bush doesn't care about them either and he will let them die too."

"You can actually look at Jayson Blair and say, 'Wow, you set black people back,' " Mr. McGruder said, shaking his head. "A lot of people are accused of that, but he actually did it."

Cheney In The Office....

Click in headline for link...

Call your Congress Member for a positive reason....

Capitol May Host Vigil for Rosa Parks
If Congress Approves, She Would Be First Woman Honored in Rotunda


Rosa Parks, the African American seamstress who refused to give up her bus seat to a white man in Montgomery, Ala., 50 years ago and lent a spark to the beginnings of the modern civil rights movement, is expected to make history again as the first woman ever to lie in honor in the Capitol Rotunda.

The Senate approved a resolution last night to allow the honor, and the House is to consider it today. U.S. Capitol Police and the staff in the office of the Architect of the Capitol already had begun working on logistics for the event, which the resolution said would take place Sunday and Monday.

It would be the first time a woman has been so honored and one of the few occasions for a citizen who did not hold an elected office. Americans have quietly shuffled past the coffins of presidents Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, among others. They have mourned the unknown soldiers of both World Wars, Korea and Vietnam. In 1998, a Rotunda vigil was held for U.S. Capitol Police Officer Jacob Chestnut and Detective Mike Gibson, who were shot to death in an ambush inside the Capitol. Chestnut was the first African American to be honored; Parks would be the second.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/27/AR2005102702272.html

From American Progress - They get it right:

Now that we now know Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald believes that crimes were committed in an effort to cover up the White House’s involvement in the outing of an undercover CIA officer, it is time to get out the broom at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and clean house.

At its core, this case is about the Adminstration’s manipulation of intelligence to sell the war in Iraq. Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s continuing investigation may reveal more about the White House’s effort to cover up its missteps in the lead up to the war.

We should not have to wait for Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s findings for the President to take responsibility for what went on in the White House. The President has an opportunity to save his presidency by demanding the resignation of anyone involved in the leak.

In addition to Libby, we know senior Presidential aides; Deputy White House Chieg of Staff Karl Rove, National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, and Press Secretary Scott McClellan were either complicit in the leak and the cover up or grossly negligent in their duties. They should also resign.

http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=699965&ct=1550047

10.27.2005

Altercation still gets better reader mail than I do..

Name: Melinda Bates
Hometown: Washington, D.C.
Dear Dr. Alterman,The current rightwing spin on perjury reminds me of the brilliant Chris Rock, opining during the early stages of the Lewinsky troubles: "OK, so the President lied about sex. F**k - MOST people lie about sex. F**k - SOME of us lie DURING sex! It's not as if he lied about... where the BOMBS are!" This was in 1998.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9803645/#051027

Good Old Trent Lott...

"There are a lot more people - men, women and minorities - that are more qualified in my opinion by their experience than she is," he said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9598551/

...because minorities are neither men nor women?

Fox News Thru Hisory

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze1ldyn/id2.html

10.26.2005

The real problem with gas prices...

Yesterday, British energy giant BP PLC reported $6.5 billion in third-quarter profit, up from $4.9 billion in the same period last year. And tomorrow, analysts expect Exxon Mobil Corp. to show that it earned nearly $9 billion over the past three months -- the largest corporate quarterly profit ever

In the third quarter of 2004, for instance, Exxon Mobil earned $6.2 billion. When the company reports its third-quarter results tomorrow, David Dropsey, an analyst with Thomson First Call research, expects profit of about $8.8 billion.

Chevron made $3.2 billion in last year's third quarter; Dropsey predicts the company will hit about $4.3 billion for this year's third quarter. ConocoPhillips Co. is expecting a $3.5 billion quarterly profit when it reports today, Dropsey said, up from $2 billion last year.

Yesterday, House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) called it "fine" that energy companies are reaping record profit. "However, there have been allegations of price gouging in the wake of the hurricanes. This is unacceptable, and any company who does it will be prosecuted," he said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9819463/

Name for me one other business where, when your cost of goods and production supposedly increases, your profits skyrocket?

It is a sham, friends.

Taken out of context, this is a great quote:

Bush/Cheney - Legalize Torture:

Amid all the natural and political disasters it faces, the White House is certainly tireless in its effort to legalize torture. This week, Vice President Dick Cheney proposed a novel solution for the moral and legal problems raised by the use of American soldiers to abuse prisoners and the practice of turning captives over to governments willing to act as proxies in doing the torturing. Mr. Cheney wants to make it legal for the Central Intelligence Agency to do this wet work.

Mr. Cheney's proposal was even more ludicrous. It would give the president the power to allow government agencies outside the Defense Department (the administration has in mind the C.I.A.) to mistreat and torture prisoners as long as that behavior was part of "counterterrorism operations conducted abroad" and they were not American citizens. That would neatly legalize the illegal prisons the C.I.A. is said to be operating around the world and obviate the need for the torture outsourcing known as extraordinary rendition.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/26/opinion/26wed2.html?th&emc=th

Republican Reverse Robin Hood Strikes Again: Steal from the poor to give to the wealthy!

Impoverished Americans are being set up as targets this week in Congress's desperate attempt to find budget cuts after four straight years of tax cuts for the affluent. House Republicans propose harmful cuts in Medicaid access and benefits, while forcing another 10 hours of work from welfare families and giving states free rein to pile more draconian reductions onto the most vulnerable citizens.

This gross political posturing does not even translate into true savings. While imperiously proclaiming cuts of $50 billion over five years, Congressional leaders are determined to fiddle more harmfully with the revenue half of the budget and to pass an additional $70 billion in upper-bracket tax cuts.

The proposals would have the federal government - supposedly the protector of the neediest - give the states broad leeway to restrict current benefits; to require co-payments by the poor for medicine and for care by doctors and emergency rooms; and to cut preventive care for children, who represent half of the Medicaid roll. The food stamp program would probably also be hit with a $1 billion cut, and even welfare payments to elderly people who are sick would be crimped by using federal bookkeeping tricks.

One particularly boneheaded proposal would severely cut the funds for child support enforcement by $4 billion. This program currently returns $4 in benefits from natural parents for every dollar invested.

The proposals are so appalling that moderate Republicans are even said to be considering a show of life on the floor. In contrast, Senate Republicans are shaping cuts that would spare the poor's Medicaid and other safety nets, while finding savings in Medicare overpayments.

The Senate approach is obviously preferable, but it is also rooted in the G.O.P.'s pre-election fiction that overspending is the basic problem. The tax cuts should be scuttled and the poor protected.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/26/opinion/26wed3.html?th&emc=th

Oshkosh Thoughts on 2000 American Iraq War Deaths

The Northwestern does a great job with this story:

“It sickens me that we are still fighting with other people and how many more lives does it need to be?” said Mary Bosveld. “Do we need to give all of our children away until we learn that there are other ways to solve conflicts?”

Bosveld’s daughter, Army Private First Class Rachel Bosveld, was the first woman from Wisconsin to die in Operation Iraqi Freedom. She attended Oshkosh West High School. Bosveld said Iraqi families have lost loved ones, too, and she doesn’t want that forgotten.

Ralph Beck, a veteran of the Vietnam War with the U.S. Marine Corps, said he was saddened.

“I think that every military loss is a tragedy,” said Beck of Oshkosh. “However, I think the biggest mistake that we could make now would be to abandon our commitment to the Iraqi people. When we left Vietnam the citizens of that country suffered greatly.”

Pete Wallace, father of Sgt. Andrew Wallace, a Wisconsin Army National Guard member from Oshkosh and killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq, said his heart goes out to all the families who have lost loved ones in the war.“

I certainly don’t want to see anyone else go through that pain, sorrow and suffering,” Wallace said, “but I’m afraid there will be more deaths in the future.”

Oshkosh resident Rick Wing Sr., who served with the U.S. Army in the Vietnam War, said the war in Iraq had gone on longer than he thought it would.

“I just pray to God that it’s worth it,” Wing said, referring to the 2,000 U.S. military personnel, who have perished in the war.

Wing said the war in Iraq had been high in terms of cost and the number of lives it has taken.

“I thought they would have a game plan when the fighting ended, but now we’re in a quagmire just like Vietnam,” he said.

http://www.wisinfo.com/northwestern/news/local/stories/local_23132185.shtml

Poll: Bush Would Lose If Election Today - Dems Better on Issues

A majority would vote for a Democrat over President Bush if an election were held this year, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll released Tuesday.

In the latest poll, 55 percent of the respondents said that they would vote for the Democratic candidate if Bush were again running for the presidency this year.

Thirty-nine percent of those interviewed said they would vote for Bush in the hypothetical election.

On separate issues, a majority of those questioned felt the Democrats could do a better job than Republicans at handling health care (59 percent to 30 percent), Social Security (56 percent to 33 percent), gasoline prices (51 percent to 31 percent) and the economy (50 percent to 38 percent).

Forty-six percent also believed Democrats could do better at handling Iraq, while 40 percent said the GOP would do better.

In 2003, 53 percent said Republicans would better handle Iraq and only 29 percent believed the Democrats would do better.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/10/25/poll.bush/index.html

Just a question, not criticism...

Esslinger had concerns about a resort financing option that could have Oshkosh temporarily owning its marina or conference space. Lease money would generate revenue to payoff city tax-incremental finance borrowing.

Esslinger and even a handful of project supporters were less comfortable with the city in such a role.

“We’re not in that business, and we shouldn’t be in that business,” Esslinger said.

http://www.wisinfo.com/northwestern/news/local/stories/local_23129057.shtml

Isn't that exactly what we do with the current convention center? It is owned by the city and leased to the hotel, isn't it?

So, aren't we in this business already?

A Quick Shout-out to a Great Place to Work:

The chamber presented small, medium and large Manufacturer of the Year Awards respectively to C3 Corp., Surface Mount Technology Corp. and J.J. Keller & Associates. It gave its Athena Award to Sharon Hulce, president and chief executive officer of Employment Resource Group.

“We’re blessed and humbled,” said Bob Keller, president and chief executive officer of J.J. Keller & Associates. “We’re accepting it on behalf of all of our 1,000 employees.” He came to the podium with his brother, Jim, chief operating officer and acknowledged his father, founder John J. Keller, in the audience.

http://www.wisinfo.com/postcrescent/news/archive/local_23046304.shtml

Blue States are Better Than Red States, Part 496

Illinios sweeps Texas in the World Series....

That is as much sport commentary as I will get into.

10.25.2005

Rieckman Nails Underheim & Roessler

He writes:

In Utopia our elected representatives would listen to all points of views, not just the ones they agree with. Unfortunately we live in Oshkosh.

That was never more clear than Monday when Sen. Carol Roessler and Rep. Gregg Underheim failed to attend a community hearing in their home town on a bill supporters call the "Compassionate Care for Rape Victims".

The bill would mandate that hospitals provide information on Emergency Contraceptives to rape victims to prevent pregnancies. Underheim in the assembly and Roessler in the senate are chairmen of the health committees. Both have adopted the "don't bother me with the facts, my mind is made up" approach to listening to members of the their community. Neither one will hold hearings on the bill, first introduced in 2002, much less release the bills for a vote. The only reason to not send the bill to a vote is to protect their Republican colleagues who don't want to have to explain how they voted to the folks back home.

Regarding the hearing Monday both dismissed it as politically motivated.

Roessler's response was a veiled threat: "This to me seems much more political posturing than it does anything else. It's a curious way to win friends and influence people."

Underheim's response was not as deft as he resorted to a lame and tired stereotype: "It's sort of the left wing of the Democrat party that showed up in Oshkosh."

Either way, their absence from the meeting was an affront to Oshkosh residents people who happen to have a different point of view on an issue.

After this month's performance before the common council, you would think Roessler and Underheim would be more sensitive to the people they represent. But then again, this ain't Utopia and it ain't Madison.

http://everydayeditor.blogspot.com/2005/10/who-elected-them.html

Go get 'em!

Is Cheney Lying or Just Incompetent?

"I don't know who sent Joe Wilson. He never submitted a report that I ever saw when he came back," Cheney said at the time. "... I don't know Mr. Wilson. I probably shouldn't judge him. I have no idea who hired him."

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=544&e=1&u=/ap/20051025/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cia_leak_investigation

Now, in 1990, Cheney was Sec of Defense preparing for Gulf War 1 - and Wilson was the head diplomat to Iraq in Baghdad.

Cheney plotted and executed a war with a country without ever speaking with or being briefed by the head diplomat to that country, the las American to see or talk to Saddam?

No wonder they like war so much...

Cheney's All Wrapped Up in the Leak

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 - I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, first learned about the C.I.A. officer at the heart of the leak investigation in a conversation with Mr. Cheney weeks before her identity became public in 2003, lawyers involved in the case said Monday.

Notes of the previously undisclosed conversation between Mr. Libby and Mr. Cheney on June 12, 2003, appear to differ from Mr. Libby's testimony to a federal grand jury that he initially learned about the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson, from journalists, the lawyers said.
The notes, taken by Mr. Libby during the conversation, for the first time place Mr. Cheney in the middle of an effort by the White House to learn about Ms. Wilson's husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, who was questioning the administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's nuclear program to justify the war.


Lawyers involved in the case, who described the notes to The New York Times, said they showed that Mr. Cheney knew that Ms. Wilson worked at the C.I.A. more than a month before her identity was made public and her undercover status was disclosed in a syndicated column by Robert D. Novak on July 14, 2003.

It would not be illegal for either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby, both of whom are presumably cleared to know the government's deepest secrets, to discuss a C.I.A. officer or her link to a critic of the administration. But any effort by Mr. Libby to steer investigators away from his conversation with Mr. Cheney could be considered by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel in the case, to be an illegal effort to impede the inquiry.

Click in headline for link...

From MSNBC 'First Read' - Some Good Points

First glanceThe New York Times reports this morning that, per notes now in special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's hands, Lewis "Scooter" Libby learned of Valerie Plame's identity from Vice President Cheney rather than from journalists, as Libby had previously testified. The Times thus becomes the first to report direct involvement by Cheney in the White House effort to learn more about Joe Wilson -- though the story notes that it's unclear whether either Cheney or Libby knew at the time they discussed Plame that her status was classified. "But any effort by Mr. Libby to steer investigators away from his conversation with Mr. Cheney could be considered by [Fitzgerald] to be an illegal effort to impede the inquiry."

President Bush may or may not take questions today after his Rose Garden statement at 2:55 pm with the head of the Kurdistan regional government (note that Bush has another event, a photo op, scheduled for just 15 minutes later). White House spokesperson Scott McClellan suggested yesterday that Bush's 11:35 am address to a joint armed forces officers’ wives’ luncheon will include some recognition of the looming 2,000 KIA milestone for US troops in Iraq. Tonight, Bush headlines another $1 million fundraiser for the Republican National Committee.
(Is that not the definition of disconnect???)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9749969/

10.24.2005

Frist is Caught in the Lie:

In January 2003, after winning election as majority leader, Frist was asked on CNBC whether his HCA holdings made it difficult for him to push for changes in Medicare, a federal health program for seniors that added to the hospital company's revenue.

"I think really for our viewers it should be understood that I put this into a blind trust," Frist replied. "So as far as I know, I own no HCA stock." He added that the trust was "totally blind. I have no control."

Two weeks before that interview, M. Kirk Scobey Jr., a Frist trustee, informed the senator in writing that one of his trusts had received HCA stock valued at between $15,000 and $50,000.

Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, said she was surprised that Frist had ever claimed before this summer's liquidation that he might have owned no HCA stock. "Did he say that? What was he thinking of?" she asked. "How did he know to tell the trustee to sell it [his HCA stake] if he didn't know that he had it in the first place?"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/23/AR2005102301201_pf.html

Republican Family Values

Embattled Sherwood Raises $26,000

The Hotline's called it "the quietest scandal ever." It's Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Don Sherwood 's legal battle over a $5.5 million assault and battery lawsuit filed by his former mistress, who claims he repeatedly beat her during their five-year relationship.

Sherwood, 64, married and hailing from a rural district around Wilkes-Barre, has admitted the affair with the now 29-year-old woman but denies assaulting her.

Perhaps as a result of this matter, Sherwood's poll ratings have dropped from 60 to 54 percent. But recent reports that a Green Party activist may enter the race next year should doom any Democratic chances of picking up the seat.

Even so, the House GOP leadership must be concerned enough about the little adultery/domestic violence distraction that it's going to the aid of its pal. A review by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington finds that Sherwood's October monthly financial report, filed recently with the Federal Election Commission, indicates his campaign committee received $5,000 contributions from the Keep Our Majority PAC (Speaker J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois), Rely on Your Beliefs Fund (Majority Leader Roy Blunt of Missouri), the Freedom Project ( John A. Boehner of Ohio) and TOMPAC ( Thomas M. Reynolds of New York).

Sherwood's campaign also received $2,500 from the PRYCE Project PAC ( Deborah Pryce of Ohio) and the Prosperity Helps Inspire Liberty PAC ( Phil English of Pennsylvania); and $1,000 from the Help America's Leaders PAC ( Harold Rogers of Kentucky).

That's $26,000 from GOP leadership PACs. Sherwood probably won't need it for his campaign, but CREW executive director Melanie Sloan notes the money can be spent on legal expenses as well as campaign expenses. Anything to support family values.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/23/AR2005102300948.html

Abromoff & Reed - A match made in Washington loot...

Here is an excertp, but all the meails published here really need to be read:

From Abramoff to Reed, January 18, 2002 2:28 p.m.:
I have an urgent matter for him. The Choctaws [the Mississippi Choctaws were an Abramoff client] -- who have given literally hundreds of thousands to our candidates and groups - are getting screwed at DoJ [The Department of Justice] on a jail funding . . . We really need some serious swat from Karl [Rove]. I have asked Susan [Ralston] to get me in to see him on this, but if you could mention it, perhaps I could get him the materials and save the need to meet? Thanks Ralph.

Reed to Ambramoff, January 20, 2002 10:57 p.m.:
ok


In addition to broaching the matter with the White House, Abramoff also lobbied Republicans and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate, who wrote letters to Attorney General John Ashcroft supporting the jail's funding. Later in 2002, the Department of Justice released the money to the Mississippi Choctaws—another victory for Abramoff and Reed.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1121969,00.html

Just as a reminder..

“It’s pretty interesting that all the generals see it the same way, and all the others who have never fired a shot, and are hot to go to war, see it another. … We are about to do something that will ignite a fuse in this region. [We] will rue the day we ever started.”

—Major General Anthony Zinni, (ret.) former chief of US Central Command, October 2002

Miers Recieved "unprecedented" Legal Fees From Bush Campaign Funds

George W. Bush's rising political fortunes provided a windfall for Harriet Miers' law firm.

Campaign records show Bush's Texas gubernatorial campaigns paid Miers a total of $163,000 in legal fees, most of it for work done during the future president's 1998 re-election bid.

Some senators are planning to explore Miers' legal work for Bush during her confirmation process to be the newest Supreme Court justice, but the White House says it won't release any memos detailing that work.

"I'm baffled," said Randall B. Wood, a partner in the Austin firm of Ray, Wood and Bonilla, and former director of Common Cause of Texas. "I've never seen that kind of money spent on a campaign lawyer. It's unprecedented."

Dana Perrino, a White House spokeswoman, said the legal fees to Miers' firm were for routine campaign work, but declined to be more specific. Presidential aides declined to say whether Miers ever worked on researching Bush's past, such as his military record.

Former Texas Land Commissioner Garry Mauro, a Democrat who was defeated handily by Bush in the 1998 campaign, said both the amount and the timing of the payments are curious. In late September, when Miers' firm received the first of two $70,000 payments, Mauro said he trailed Bush in the polls by 35 points.

"If they're spending that kind of money," said Mauro, now an Austin attorney who estimates he spent less than $20,000 on legal fees during the campaign, "they're spending it to protect themselves from something."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051021/ap_on_go_su_co/miers_campaign_windfall

In Case Anyone Else Loves Mythbusters as Much as I Do...

Researchers all but zap ancient death ray myth
Attempt to recreate Greek solar weapon creates smoke, but little else


It wasn’t exactly the ancient siege of Syracuse, but rather a curious quest for scientific validation.
According to sparse historical writings, the Greek mathematician Archimedes torched a fleet of invading Roman ships by reflecting the sun’s powerful rays with a mirrored device made of glass or bronze.
More than 2,000 years later, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Arizona set out to recreate Archimedes’ fabled death ray Saturday in an experiment sponsored by the Discovery Channel program “MythBusters.”

Their attempts to set fire to an 80-year-old fishing boat using their own versions of the device, however, failed to either prove or dispel the myth of the solar death ray.
The MIT team’s first attempt with their contraption made of 300 square feet of bronze and glass failed to ignite a fire from 150 feet away. It produced smoldering on the boat’s wooden surface but no open flame. A second attempt from about 75 feet away lit only a small fire that burned itself out.
Mike Bushroe of the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory tried a mirrored system shaped like flower petals, but it failed to produce either smoke or flames.

“If this weapon had worked, it would have been the equivalent of a nuclear weapon in the ancient world,” Rees said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9787596/

Today in History - Bush is trying to erase edition...

1940
The 40-hour work week went into effect under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.


On Oct. 24, 1945, the United Nations officially came into existence as its charter took effect.

http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/20051024.html

Republicans: Lying is Politics

Karl Rove, the senior White House adviser, and I. Lewis Libby Jr., who is Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, have been advised that they are in serious legal jeopardy. Other officials could also face charges in connection with the disclosure of the identity of an undercover C.I.A. officer in 2003.

On Sunday, Republicans appeared to be preparing to blunt the impact of any charges. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas , speaking on the NBC news program "Meet the Press," compared the leak investigation with the case of Martha Stewart and her stock sale, "where they couldn't find a crime and they indict on something that she said about something that wasn't a crime."

Ms. Hutchison said she hoped "that if there is going to be an indictment that says something happened, that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn't indict on the crime and so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation was not a waste of time and taxpayer dollars."

But allies of the White House have quietly been circulating talking points in recent days among Republicans sympathetic to the administration, seeking to help them make the case that bringing charges like perjury mean the prosecutor does not have a strong case, one Republican with close ties to the White House said Sunday. Other people sympathetic to Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby have said that indicting them would amount to criminalizing politics and that Mr. Fitzgerald did not understand how Washington works.

Gossip: DeLay had a facelift

Is DeLay delaying ravages of age?
Did Tom DeLay have a face lift?
Nip-and-tuck aficionados have been buzzing about the strangely stretched visage in the mug shot of the former Majority Leader, who is facing charges of conspiracy and money laundering.
The folks at AwfulPlasticSurgery.com have studied the recent pic and an earlier one, and concluded that DeLay has had a nose job. “One nostril is almost nonexistent, while the other looks normal,” it notes, adding, “Sometimes, when a rhinoplasty surgery goes wrong, there can be problems with nostrils healing properly.”
Additionally, bloggers have dug up info that when DeLay was elected majority leader, he had his teeth capped and that he once had his eyelids lifted, supposedly to help his vision.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9546085/

Lawrence Wilkerson, a retired Army colonel who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, addressed the administration's arrogance..

...and ineptitude in a talk last week that was astonishingly candid by Washington standards.

"The case that I saw for four-plus years was a case that I have never seen in my studies of aberrations, bastardizations, perturbations, changes to the national security decision-making process. What I saw was a cabal between the vice president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made."

When the time came to implement the decisions, said Mr. Wilkerson, they were "presented in such a disjointed, incredible way that the bureaucracy often didn't know what it was doing as it moved to carry them out."

Where was the president? According to Mr. Wilkerson, "You've got this collegiality there between the secretary of defense and the vice president, and you've got a president who is not versed in international relations and not too much interested in them either."

http://select.nytimes.com/2005/10/24/opinion/23herbert.html?th&emc=th

10.23.2005

Miers Takes Advantage of Govt in Land Sale...

Miers family received 'excessive' sum in land

Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers collected more than 10 times the market value for a small slice of family-owned land in a large Superfund pollution cleanup site in Dallas where the state wanted to build a highway off-ramp.

The windfall came after a judge who received thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from Miers' law firm appointed a close professional associate of Miers and an outspoken property-rights activist to the three-person panel that determined how much the state should pay.

The resulting six-figure payout to the Miers family in 2000 was despite the state’s objections to the "excessive” amount and to the process used to set the price. The panel recommended paying nearly $5 a square foot for land that was valued at less than 30 cents a square foot.

Mediation efforts in 2003 reduced the award from $106,915 to $80,915, but Miers, who controls the family’s interest in the land, hasn’t reimbursed the state for the $26,000 difference, even after Bush appointed her to the Supreme Court.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/12973371.htm
"You allowed your fighters to be laid down facing west and burned. You are too scared to retrieve the bodies. This just proves you are the lady boys we always believed you to be."
An unidentified U.S. soldier, in a videotape by an Australian photojournalist that appears to show troops burning the bodies of two dead Taliban fighters and taunting villagers with their smoking corpses; the Army is investigating

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9785753/site/newsweek/