The New York Times gets it exactly right in today’s editorial on the Padilla conviction: It is hard to disagree with the jury’s guilty verdict against Jose Padilla, the accused, but never formally charged, dirty bomber. But it would be a mistake to see it as a vindication for the Bush administration’s serial abuse of [...]
Hey, you know who that whole “being in New York on 9/11 makes Giuliani TEH AWESOME” logic appeals to? None other than noted political theorist Adam Sandler. The Bushes had Toby Keith, Rudy gets “Opera Man.” It all makes sense now. Especially having seen this: Giuliani x2 WHY must you ever be gone-y 2 more [...]
• When Gonzales said John Ashcroft was “lucid” and “did most of the talking,” what he really meant was that Ashcroft was “feeble, barely articulate, clearly stressed.” No perjury here! [WP] • Giuliani’s time at Ground Zero? Twenty-nine hours. In fairness to the mayor, that many television interviews would wear anyone out. What’s more, this [...]
This is a pretty good preview of the next big battle in Iraq–over Basrah and its adjacent oil fields in the south. There are three contending Shi’ite parties: SIIC [formerly SCIRI, the Hakim family organization including the Badr Brigade militia] has the overt backing of Washington and, ironically, having grown up in Iran for more [...]
Michael Gerson awards Karl Rove the Nobel Peace Prize in today’s Washington Post. I thought Rove’s finest Mother Theresa moment was when he allowed the McCain-has-an-interacial-baby rumor to spread during the South Carolina primary. And then there was the high patriotism of the Swift Boat veterans for Truth…oh, but those had nothing to do with [...]
FBI Director Robert Mueller’s notes (redacted text linked here) serve largely to confirm, contemporaneously, the accounts of that now-famous 2004 scene at then-AG John Ashcroft’s hospital bedside that he and former Deputy Attorney General James Comey offered in earlier congressional testimony. And they don’t shed any light on what remains the central mystery in all [...]
Andrew Sullivan is doing Sullivanesque worrying about his impending marriage. Don’t worry! Aaron’s terrific. All Kleins wish you both all the best.
Yesterday, a federal court of appeals in California heard oral argument in a case, Hepting v. AT&T, involving the Bush administration’s unauthorized domestic spying program. Here’s how two of the judges reacted to the arguments made by administration lawyers that no court can review the legality of the program because doing so would require the [...]
I almost posted this clip from the Daily Show in the Jumble, but decided to go with the funnier one. This clip — and interview with Cheney biographer Stephen Hayes — has its moments, but it takes a decidedly serious and person turn towards the end, when Stewart starts demanding that Hayes explain why the [...]
The Family Research Council, founded by James Dobson, has announced its plans for a “three-day ‘Values Voter Summit’ this fall, complete with a presidential straw poll.” People For the American Way staff dropped in on last year’s “Values Voters Summit” where they learned, among other things, that the anti-Christ is gay. Although there’s “no word [...]
