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By Suzanne Pepper
$44.95
By Jabari Asim
$5.89
$18
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Not to pile on, but there’s something about Dick Cheney’s gruff personality that invites awkward and amusing moments. If you don’t want to be compared to the emperor from “Star Wars,” it’s probably best not to act like such a menacing puppet master.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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The White House has continued to criticize House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for visiting Syria, while ignoring an earlier trip by a Republican congressional delegation. The speaker’s office maintains that it is worth meeting with “every country that has an interest in avoiding a chaotic Iraq.”
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AP Photo / Brennan Linsley
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By Robert Scheer — The Supreme Court may not be interested in applying American values to Guantanamo Bay, but at least one soldier has taken a principled stand against the prison’s tortured justice system.
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Left: CNN.com / Right: wikipedia.org
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Over the president’s objections, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi plans to visit the president of Syria next weekend. Pelosi’s spokesman said the meeting was inspired by the Iraq Study Group, which recommended engaging regional players—a recommendation the Bush administration has so far ignored.
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The president has threatened to veto a war spending bill that includes a timetable for the withdrawal of troops, but that didn’t stop the Senate on Thursday from passing one. The next step is for the House and Senate to work out the differences between their competing withdrawal plans, and then it’s off to the White House.
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By Joe Conason — The Washington press elite has warned the Democrats not to pursue the U.S. attorney scandal, but lawmakers should listen to the polls, not the “cable sages” who have so frequently been wrong.
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According to prepared remarks obtained in advance of his testimony, Alberto Gonzales’ former chief of staff believes the eight U.S. attorneys were fired for political reasons: “A U.S. attorney who is unsuccessful from a political perspective ... is unsuccessful.” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy warned that even Gonzales’ resignation would not derail his investigation into the firings.
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washtimes.com
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The Senate narrowly defeated a Republican amendment Tuesday that would have removed a withdrawal plan from the emergency war spending bill. As the legislation stands, the U.S. will have to begin a troop withdrawal within four months after the law is enacted and complete the pullout by March 31, 2008.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The president and his allies seem eager for a constitutional showdown, but with the people on their side, the Democrats and the Congress are poised for victory. Updated to reflect Tuesday’s Senate vote
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By Marie Cocco — Now that Republicans in Congress have expressed their overwhelming support for the status quo in Iraq, the war has gone from Bush’s pet disaster to the albatross around his party’s neck.
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Iraqi-American rapper TIMZ responds to the war with this video, titled simply “Iraq.” The first verse is meant to be from the perspective of an Iraqi, the second from an American. Both have the intensity that has made the genre such an effective avenue for political and social commentary.
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The Justice Department’s liaison to the White House announced she would take the Fifth Amendment to avoid self-incrimination rather than testify in the U.S. attorney scandal. Meanwhile, Alberto Gonzales said he was “really pained” by diminishing support from lawmakers.
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nytimes.com
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Three prominent Republican senators expressed their lack of confidence in Alberto Gonzales on Sunday. GOP support has dropped off since Justice Department documents released on Friday caught the attorney general misrepresenting when he first knew about a plan to fire eight U.S. attorneys.
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Last week the Iraq war entered its fifth year. We mark the occasion by revisiting striking moments from March 19, 2003, onward. It would be impossible for one slide show to capture every iconic frame or ghastly scene. Still, these images remind us that little has changed in the years since George Bush stood before a banner reading “Mission Accomplished.”
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kucinich.us
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Not everyone was celebrating the passage of the Iraq spending bill on Friday. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, told Truthdig it’s “a disaster for the American people.” The presidential candidate went on to explain his dissatisfaction with his party: “It’s the same kind of thinking that led us into Iraq— that we didn’t have any alternatives.”
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The looming showdown over subpoenas and presidential privilege is as insincere as it is distracting. How quickly politicians forget their rock-hard principles when applying them to another administration. The politicization of the justice system is a real scandal—one that demands an open inquiry.
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When the phrase “speaking on ground rules of anonymity” appears in The New York Times, we tend to get nervous, but a set of anonymous reports just caught our eye. According to those reports, our new defense secretary, right out of the gate (forgive the pun), argued for closing Guantanamo because its reputation had hurt the war effort. Robert M. Gates also reportedly argued that the detainees there should be brought to the U.S.
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The Senate told Bush to shove his “take it or leave it” offer and ordered subpoenas for key figures in the U.S. attorney scandal. Sen. Pat Leahy had this to say about the president’s above-the-law attitude: “A system of justice does not serve at the pleasure of any person in this country.”
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By Joe Conason — Every dismal anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq has come to resemble the last, at least for anyone still listening to George W. Bush. So redundant were the president’s remarks that they scarcely registered on the front pages.
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Conan O’Brien casts his picks for the Hollywood version of Plame-U.S. Attorneys-Iraq-gate. With news that Warner Bros. plans to make the Valerie Plame Wilson story, this comedy routine feels somewhat prescient, although we seriously doubt Jabba the Hutt would agree to play Karl Rove.
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The president gave Congress an ultimatum Tuesday regarding testimony in the U.S. attorney scandal: His aides will talk in private and off the record or not at all. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy balked at the proposal, setting up a possible constitutional showdown over executive privilege. Bush continued to dismiss the scandal, even as the Senate voted to require confirmation of U.S. attorneys.
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By Marie Cocco — Attorney General Alberto Gonzales suddenly finds himself in hot water over the U.S. attorneys scandal, but the truth is, the Senate should never have confirmed him in the first place.
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washingtonpost.com
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Henry Waxman’s House committee put the irons to Philip A. Cooney on Monday. The former oil lobbyist who became chief of staff of the White House Council on Environmental Quality made hundreds of edits to government reports in order to downplay the link between fossil fuels and global warming.
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Wow. CNN’s Jack Cafferty really doesn’t like Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. After calling him the definition of a “weasel,” Cafferty asked America whether the AG should resign. Surprisingly (or not), CNN didn’t get one e-mail saying Gonzales should stay.
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ABC News
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Sen. Pat Leahy, D-Vt., made it clear on Sunday’s “This Week” that he is determined to get to the bottom of the U.S. attorneys scandal and, as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, will use subpoenas to do it: “I want testimony under oath. I am sick and tired of getting half-truths on this.” Leahy said he wanted to hear from Karl Rove, Harriet Miers and other administration officials linked to the firings.
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By Andy Borowitz — The satirist envisions a Cabinet-level agency to better handle the abundance of misinformation pumped out by the administration.
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nzherald.co.nz
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During a conference call Friday with all 93 U.S. attorneys, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales apologized for the way his office carried out its apparently partisan firings. The move was seen by critics as an attempt at damage control amid calls for his resignation.
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The White House has suggested that the idea to fire U.S. attorneys originated with former counsel Harriet Miers, but newly released e-mails show that Alberto Gonzales discussed the matter with political guru Karl Rove even before he was confirmed as attorney general. Related: Check out the Brad Blog’s excellent coverage of the voter-fraud angle of the scandal.
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The storied journalist speaks to Truthdig about his new book, “Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall and Catastrophic Legacy,” which offers fresh insight into the real force behind the Iraq debacle.
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By Joe Conason — This isn’t the first Bush White House to exert political pressure on U.S. attorneys. Back in 1992, a principled Arkansas Republican sacrificed his own career to defy partisan thuggery.
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On Tuesday, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced there was “direct evidence” that Alberto Gonzales was politically motivated to order the firing of U.S. attorneys. The attorney general admitted that “mistakes were made here,” but said he had no plans to resign.
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By Andy Borowitz — The satirist pokes fun at the Libby verdict and the president’s rush to distance himself from a liar.
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The president has announced plans to send an additional 4,400 troops to Iraq, on top of the 21,500 combat troops he’s already authorized. Bush has requested $3.2 billion to pay for the increase, putting the ball in the Democrats’ court.
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beachblogger.net
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I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby was found guilty on four of the five counts of perjury and obstruction for which he was standing trial. Media Matters anticipates the misinformation talking points likely to circulate in the mainstream media.
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Mea culpas, heated exchanges and reform pledges marked the first day of congressional hearings about the treatment of American veterans in military facilities like the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Meanwhile, Washington Post journalists Anne Hull and Dana Priest are following up on their Reed report with similar stories from vets across the country.
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By Joe Conason — While Americans grow increasingly frustrated with the Democrats for failing to end the Iraq fiasco (after a whopping two months), the vice president, one of the war’s chief architects, spent the week doing away with the last shred of a possibility that he either knows what he’s talking about or is telling the truth.
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By Marie Cocco — Opponents of a new law that would make it easier to form unions, including the president and some Republicans in Congress, have found a clever if shameless method of concealing their loyalty to corporate greed.
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This isn’t the most engrossing clip we’ve ever put up, but if you can sit through a few minutes of the Miami Heat rubbing elbows with Bush, there’s a moment at the end that speaks volumes about our president.
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The long-dormant White House press corps has shown signs of life in recent months, including Monday’s briefing when reporters refused to allow press secretary Tony Snow to dodge and divert their questions about the Army hospital scandal.
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Too Soon to Tell: The Case for Hope, Continued
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