Iraq - ten years after

Ten years ago the Bush administration launched the Iraq invasion. They promised us we woud be welcomed as liberators and showered with flowers and sweets. Didn't quite work out that way. And on this grim anniversary, the violence in Iraq is still ongoing:

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - More than a dozen car bombs and suicide blasts tore through Shi'ite Muslim districts in the Iraqi capital Baghdad and other areas on Tuesday, killing nearly 60 people on the 10th anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein.

Sunni Islamist insurgents linked to al Qaeda are regaining ground in Iraq, invigorated by the war next door in Syria and have stepped up attacks on Shi'ite targets in an attempt to provoke a wider sectarian confrontation.

Ten long years of horror for the Iraqi people and nothing has really changed. I almost couldn't bear to look at the historic photo galleries at Time and Reuters, especially knowing they only cover a few pages in that long sad story.

I'm also reminded that this is the 10th anniversary of when I became a blogger. My first blog post ever was about the demonstration against the Iraq War that sprung up outside my office. I left work and joined it. The archives are muddled, so I'll just reprint it. It was a fleeting moment of hope in a long and tortuous decade:

RETRO-ACTIVISM and HOMELAND INSECURITY

There was an anti-war demonstration in my town yesterday. I had a perfect view from my second floor office window. There were at least 400 people and fully half of them took over the major intersection downtown. Some of them lay down on the pavement in a *die-in* and the rest formed a circle to protect them from the oncoming law enforcement. In the end 42 police officers arrived to arrest about 30 people, including two elderly women in wheelchairs. The remaining protesters chanted from the four street corners.

"Tell me what democracy looks like" rises from one corner to the beat of the Revolutionary Drum Corps.

"This is what democracy looks like" thunders back from the other three.

The crowd was deliciously mixed. The American Friends crowd has been demonstrating on that corner every Saturday since the US imposed sanctions on Iraq so many years ago. The college kids were also to be expected but the number of high school and even middle school kids was more suprising. The crowd swelled however with those who would not usually be there. Families with young children and old activists from the 60s who have, over the years, become respected business owners downtown. The latter poured out of the adjoining establishments, along with their employees, to reinforce the numbers. I met my own boss on the corner. He gave me a NO WAR pin someone had just handed to him.

We all stood there shivering in an increasingly chill wind for another 20 minutes in this moment of spontaneous consensus. Those who had not planned to be there stood mostly silent, looking as bemused as I felt, pondering our own role if this is indeed what democracy looks like, now.

For myself, I found it heartening to see the positive energy of the crowd and the planning of the organizers. It was a non-violent action in the name of peace. There was no vandalism and the only blood was of the fake sort that the *dead* had painted on their tshirts. I was not the only one in the 60s contingent who remarked on how the scene evoked memories of our own demonstrations.

However, as my photographer friend remarked, "It's the cool thing to do right now". He's been covering a lot of the protests and notes they are growing. The question in my mind is whether that energy will translate to the ballot box. It's clear they are willing to march, but are they willing to vote? Will they take the time to get politically involved outside of what one has to admit is at least partly a fun social event? I hope so because there are a lot more wars going on right now than just Iraq.

That night, after work, I spent hours on a bar stool explaining to drunken Republicans why the invasion was such a big mistake. I didn't change any minds. I didn't stop the war. But I tried. My conscience is clear. So there's that. [photo via]

Laffer's Ponzi scheme victims are not amused

In a sane world, this would be the end of Arthur Laffer's influence as an economic pundit. He would be laughed out of town.

HOUSTON (CN) - Fifty-two investors claim fund managers associated with supply-side economist Arthur Laffer took $3.1 million to prop up a Ponzi scheme, then said nothing as their money was "wasted with no reasonable expectation of recovery."

Lead plaintiffs Ronald and Lavonne Ellisor sued David Wallace, Costa Bajjali, and their entities Wallace Bajjali Development Partners LP, Wallace Bajjali Investment Fund II LP, the Laffer Frishberg Wallace Economic Opportunity Fund LP, and Arthur Laffer in Harris County Court.

Laffer is best known for the Laffer Curve, an economic theory that says reducing taxes will increase government revenue. He was a member of President Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board during the 1980s.

Sadly, we don't live in a sane world anymore, so I suppose nothing bad will happen to him. His spokespeople say he's no longer affiliated with the defendant firm. I expect he ran "laffing" to the bank with his endorsement fees and didn't lose a penny of his own money on the scam.

[More posts daily at the Detroit News.]

Fox Judge Says Indict Bush and Cheney

You do have to wonder how long Fox News' Judge Andrew Napolitano is going to get to keep his job after giving this interview where he just trashes Bush and Cheney. Here's the best part.

Nader: What's the sanction for President Bush and Vice President Cheney?

Napolitano: There's been no sanction except what history will say about them.

Nader: What should be the sanctions?

Napolitano: They should have been indicted. They absolutely should have been indicted for torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrants. I'd like to say they should be indicted for lying but believe it or not, unless you're under oath, lying is not a crime. At least not an indictable crime. It's a moral crime.

Of course they will never be indicted in a court of law. But it's good to see them called to account in the court of public opinion, albeit far too late to do any good.

"Lost" Bush White House emails found

I'm always feeling overwhelmed by my own overflowing inboxes, but glad I don't have to read the 22 million "lost" emails that were recovered after techs discovered they had been mislabeled. I'm seeing some optimism around the internets that this could lead to some long overdue frog-marching of high level Bush era officials, but I wouldn't start holding my breath just yet.

"The e-mails themselves are not what we're getting," Sloan said.Documents related to the handling of e-mail under the Bush administration and subsequent information regarding how White House e-mails are currently archived will be released under a settlement with the Obama administration, which inherited a lawsuit the groups filed in 2007. But the National Archives must sort out which documents are covered by the Freedom of Information Act and which ones fall under the Presidential Records Act - which means they could be withheld for five to 10 years after the Bush administration left office in January, Sloan said. [...]

Monday's settlement allows for 94 days of e-mail traffic, scattered between January 2003 to April 2005, to be restored from backup tapes. Of those 94 days, 40 were picked by statistical sample; another 21 days were suggested by the White House; and CREW, and the National Security Archive picked 33 that seemed "historically significant," from the months before the invasion of Iraq to the period when the firings of U.S. attorneys were being planned.

Also requested were several days surrounding the announcement that a criminal investigation was under way into the disclosure of then-CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson's identity. That investigation led to the conviction of White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby on charges of perjury, obstruction of justice and lying to federal agents probing the leak.

There's some hope the emails could prove "Patrick Fitzgerald never received all the documents he requested during the Plame leak probe" but even if that happens, somehow I doubt we'll ever see Cheney or Rove in an orange jumpsuit. I keep remembering that weird "April Fool's joke" and the subsequent reports that emails had been deleted. Whatever the story behind that was, Rove really did visit the server farm around that time. Still think it's a strong possibility that the damning mail was routed through a dedicated server that has been sitting on the bottom of the ocean for a very long time.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

All the news that's fit to leak

As has become customary, these are attributed to anonymous sources, but very interesting if true. It certainly seems plausible that Cheney was directly involved in deceiving Congress.

The Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney, the agency’s director, Leon E. Panetta, has told the Senate and House intelligence committees, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said Saturday. [...]

Intelligence and Congressional officials have said the unidentified program did not involve the C.I.A. interrogation program and did not involve domestic intelligence activities. They have said the program was started by the counterterrorism center at the C.I.A. shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but never became fully operational, involving planning and some training that took place off and on from 2001 until this year.

Hmmm. Wonder if that has anything to do with Cheney's extended SS protection? Also wondering how many other secret programs they had that we may never find out about. And any bets on whether Fox News will ever ask him about it?

Meanwhile, in a related development, what will Holder do?

Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do.

"I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president's agenda," he says. "But that can't be a part of my decision."

All the smart people are already blogging on this so I'm just going to say, "I'll believe it when I see it." If memory serves, I've heard this rumor before.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

They like to watch - part two

A lot more on Bush's President's Surveillance Program today. The CIA was more actively involved than anyone admitted at the time. It appears they basically functioned as the rubberstamp. "According to the report, CIA would prepare a threat briefing for President Bush justifying the need for such surveillance."

My pal, mikevotes has more links on the political pressure exerted in preparing the so-called threat assessments. Also the reviews show "not enough relevant officials were aware of the size and depth of the program."

"The Bush White House pulled in a great quantity of information far beyond the warrantless wiretapping previously acknowledged..."

"We also learned that George Bush himself was the one who ordered Gonzales to John Ashcroft's post surgery bedside looking for a signature of approval after Comey refused." Apparently it was also Bush who called Ashcroft's room at the time of that ghoulish power play. And as always, much more commentary at Memeorandum.

I have a feeling if we ever find out the full extent of this regime's criminality, it will almost defy human comprehension.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

Congressional Oversight

I don't know if this will go anywhere. I'm cynical enough to think it most probably will turn out to be little more than political theater but, at least it offers some small ray of hope that the Bush regime might be held accountable for its crimes.

In one of the first acts of the 111th Congress, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers proposed legislation to create a blue-ribbon panel of outside experts to probe the “broad range” of policies pursued by the Bush administration “under claims of unreviewable war powers,” including torture of detainees and warrantless wiretaps.

I know blue ribbon panels have traditionally had about the same impact as the ever popular sternly worded letter. Certainly, remembering what good the 9/11 Commission or the Iraq Study Group did, doesn't give one much cause for optimism, but still, maybe this time with a new president and a Democratic majority, it might amount to more than merely creating the appearance of concern.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News.]

Hand me the tinfoil, honey...

GOP IT "guru" Mike Connell, has been killed in a plane crash in Ohio. He wasn't just any guru, he was deeply connected to every GOP related scandal from the stealing of the vote in Ohio, to the "lost emails" related to the Attorney Purge, to the fraudulent prosecution of Don Siegelman. In fact he had just been deposed in the Ohio vote fraud case and was ready to testify despite having been threatened by Karl Rove, if he "didn't take the fall."

It's also useful to remember that the court just ordered the White House to take steps to retrieve the "lost emails" that covered the period of Katrina, the attorney purge and the outing of Valerie Plame. Connell is said to have hosted some of the accounts on servers in Chattanoga, TN through another of his related companies Coptix. Which leads me to recall that odd alleged April Fool's joke that had the distinct feel of a distraction tactic at the time.

My co-blogger at Newshoggers, Ken Anderson collects the relevant links to the backstory and the analogy to Forrest Gump is apt. Connell was literally present at the scene of every Bush family related crime for at least a decade. Details of the crash are sketchy but Connell is reported to have been alone in the plane and an experienced pilot. That reminds me of the death of Paul Wellstone who died in a similarly odd crash just as he was winning a race against Norm Coleman.

Add to that the other mysterious plane crash deaths listed at the last link and excuse me while I put on my tinfoil suit. I don't think just a hat is enough for this one. Further, considering that Al Franken is now winning the recount against the same Norm Coleman, let me give Al a bit of unsolicited advice. Stay the hell out of small aircraft.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Weighing Obama

The White House has helpfully issued a two page memo titled Speech Topper on the Bush Record for those in the administration that may be having a little trouble coming up with good things to say about Bush's self-designed fairytale legacy. Meanwhile, the GAO released a 150 page list of Bush engineered horror stories that will be confronting the incoming Obama administration when they take office. [pdf] There is virtually no governmental agency that is not entirely screwed up by incompetency and outright sabotage of the public interests.

Read the whole sordid capsule version at the first link at least, but here's a shorter version:

Department of Homeland Security: Failed leadership. No plan to integrate emergency efforts with other agencies in event of a crisis. Wasting bucketloads of money. Programs under its management, including TSA, FEMA, immigration and the Coast Guard have no effective policies to protect from potential attacks or disasters.

Department of Defense: Just as inefficient as it's ever been, only now with more crony corruption. No effective plan to rebuild troop and mission readiness.

Department of Agriculture: Still passing out big bucks to non-farmers and mishandling "high-consequence biological pathogens" at laboratories carrying out agency-funded work.

Department of Veterans Affairs: Completely failing to meet the needs of veterans.

Environmental Protection Agency: Policy decisions being influenced by industry groups. Total failure in safety enforcement.

Department of Commerce: Census bureau = epic failure. (Sidenote - Lieberman chairs the Senate committee in charge of overseeing this agency.)

Department of Energy: Failed leadership, inept project planning and rife with crony corruption.

Department of Transportation: Epic across the board failure. Wanton spending, failure to solve transportation problems and no Supertrain.

General Services Administration: Poster agency for incompetency. Doesn't repair the properties it owns, owns properties it doesn't need and another hotbed of crony corruption on leasing practices.

Worse yet, this is not even close to a comprehensive list. It only addresses the bare minimum of bad pratices and doesn't touch such issues as the politicalization of the DOJ for instance.

Everybody has to do what they think is best to advance the progressive, or whatever cause, they believe in. But this is why I'm willing to cut Obama some slack. It exhausts me to just think about the sheer weight of what Bush has ruined in the last eight years. I can't imagine being tasked with trying to repair it and unlike our current Thief in Chief, I believe Obama genuinely feels that weight and is trying to lift it. I don't know how exactly to help him, and I'm not advocating giving him a totally free pass, but I'm just not inclined to add to his burden as long as he's making a good faith effort to carry it himself.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Adding insult to injury

After all these years of being called a traitor and worse for opposing the occupation of Iraq and hearing the yowling about how I don't support the troops by agitating for its end, when I read about this abject mistreatment of our vets, I feel like beating those people with their yellow ribbon magnets.

Marine Cpl. James Dixon was wounded twice in Iraq -- by a roadside bomb and a land mine. He suffered a traumatic brain injury, a concussion, a dislocated hip and hearing loss. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Army Sgt. Lori Meshell shattered a hip and crushed her back and knees while diving for cover during a mortar attack in Iraq. She has undergone a hip replacement and knee reconstruction and needs at least three more surgeries.

In each case, the Pentagon ruled that their disabilities were not combat-related.

In a little-noticed regulation change in March, the military's definition of combat-related disabilities was narrowed, costing some injured veterans thousands of dollars in lost benefits -- and triggering outrage from veterans' advocacy groups.

This is just wrong in so many ways and it's certainly not an isolated incident. This administration, and its supporters who excuse the conduct, have cheated the veterans at every turn from substandard care to onerous paperwork that makes it nearly impossible for our vets to get the benefits they deserve. So where is the blogburst of outrage from all those who shameslessly continue to support this folly behind the safety of their keyboards?

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Delayed justice would be better than none

Not being a fan of talk radio, I'll have to take Scott Horton's word that Gene Burns is one of the nation’s most popular talk radio hosts who has consistently defended the Bush administration's use of torture. Like most Americans, he apparently didn't realize how far they had gone in their pursuit of 'intelligence gathering.' He's now seen the light.

And then I saw Torturing Democracy.

And I’m afraid, now that I have seen what I have seen, that I was wrong about that. It looks to me, based on this documentary, as if in fact we have engaged in behavior and practices at Guantánamo Bay, and in these illegal renditions, that are violations of the international human rights code.

And I believe that Dick Cheney is responsible. I believe that he was the agent of the United States government charged with developing the methodology used at Guantánamo Bay, supervising it for the administration, and indulging in practices which are in fact violations of human rights.

Scott notes that the Bush administration has done its best to spike both this documentary and another called Taxi to the Dark Side. It's worth noting that neither will be aired on major broadcast stations until after Bush leaves office since the stations fear White House retribution.

One can only hope that when and if these films receive wide dissemination, Americans will step up and demand that our Congresslizards finally hold Bush and Cheney accountable for this gross violation of everything this country used to stand for.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Vincent Bugliosi rips Bush a new one

expatbrian

In case you missed this over at C & L, I think it's the best thing on YouTube today. Bugliosi is given a platform before the Senate Judiciary Committee to defend his new book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder. The repubs on the committee got a little more than they bargained for.

General Accuses Bush Administration of War Crimes

expatbrian

Well George, remember what you said about "listening to your commanders in the field"?

A retired Army general who spent 10 months in Iraq and led an investigation into the atrocities at the Abu Ghraib prison there accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing war crimes and called for those responsible to be held accountable. Full article here.

"After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account,"wrote Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba.

Bush, as the Commander in Chief, and as a "war president" as he likes to call himself, is ultimately responsible for the actions of his military underlings.

"The detainees suffer permanent hearing loss, persistent and debilitating pain in limbs and joints, major depressive disorder, severe post-traumatic stress disorder, and anxiety disorders, such as panic attacks." The men were later released and were never charged with any crimes.

We may be Democrats or we may be Republicans, but we are all Americans. Is this what our founding fathers envisioned and is this what is acceptable now in the United States of America? If we are patriots, is not our first patriotic duty to uphold our own Constitution and abide by our own laws? Or are we ready and willing to uphold that Constitution only when the going is easy but when the going gets a little tough, when we feel a little insecure, we forget all that and start behaving like the very barbarians we are supposed to detest?

"With this evidentiary record, this report provides the most detailed account available thus far of the experience of detainees in US custody who suffered torture — a war crime — at the hands of US personnel. Additionally, this report provides further evidence of the role health professionals played in facilitating detainee abuse by being present during torture and ill-treatment, denying medical care to detainees, providing confidential medical information to interrogators, and failing to stop or document detainee abuse.

Just what justification is there, once we are smacked in the face with evidence of actual war crimes, to not take some kind of action against those who are responsible? Just what excuse for our actions do we expect to be acceptable by the international community? Or are we so arrogant, that we no longer care what anyone else thinks?

The report was released Tuesday, the same day documents made public by the Senate Armed Services Committee presented during a hearing on the administration’s interrogation policies showed a pattern of humiliation, abuse and even torture inflicted on detainees was a deliberate policy of the Bush administration.

Jonathan Fredman, chief counsel to the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, discussed with U.S. military officials how interrogators could use the "wet towel"technique against detainees to extract information.

Fredman added that the "wet towel"technique would only be defined as torture "if the detainee dies."

Just what kind of a fucking country are we, anyway?

Like a bad hangover

By Libby

Via Avedon, our favorite royal personage, the King of Zembla "commends to our attention an excellent five-part series by WaPo columnist Dan Froomkin, writing at his downtown crib, the Nieman Watchdog. The subject? What Mr. Bush will likely do to ensure that his pernicious influence lingers on well past the end of his benighted term as President."

I'm not even going to excerpt it as it must be read in full and he's just excerpting Froomkin.

Iraq uncomfortable on SOFA

By Libby

Bush stated long ago that his end goal was to force the incoming administration to continue his failed Iraq policies and he apparently thought he could pull off a fast one with his Status of Forces Agreement, that he's negotiating outside of any Congressional involvement. It may not be as easy as he thought. The Iraqis aren't buying it and Congress is feeling its oats.

"The Americans are making demands that would lead to the colonization of Iraq," said Sami al-Askari, a senior Shiite politician on parliament's foreign relations committee who is close to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. "If we can't reach a fair agreement, many people think we should say, 'Goodbye, U.S. troops. We don't need you here anymore.' "

Congress has grown increasingly restive over the negotiations, which would produce a status of forces agreement setting out the legal rights and responsibilities of U.S. troops in Iraq and a broader "security framework" defining the political and military relationship between the two countries. Senior lawmakers of both parties have demanded more information and questioned the Bush administration's insistence that no legislative approval is required.

I'm sure I don't need to remind you that Bush has also long insisted he had no desire for a permanent military presence in Iraq. I think in reading of the terms of the agreement, we can safely call that one a complete lie. He not only wants a permanent occupation, he's trying to sell the Iraqis on giving up even the illusion of sovereignty.

VA Won't Help Wounded Vets Register to Vote

expatbrian

After agreeing to allow voter registration drives within the VA facilities, the VA has suddenly reversed that position.

"VA's decision, during wartime, to block voter registration for our hospitalized veterans is shameful, outrageous, and despicable," said Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense. "VCS finds it unconscionable that VA would reverse position and prohibit voter registration efforts for our wounded, injured, ill, and disabled veterans in VA hospitals and nursing homes as more and more casualties flood home from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars."

The VA is citing the Hatch Act which prohibits federal employees from engaging in political activities in the work place. However, as Senators Feinstein and Kerry pointed out, the act does not prohibit voted registration activities.

"Office of Special Counsel has made it clear that federal employees, even those who are considered to be in sensitive positions, may "assist in voter registration drives."" And they questioned how voter registration drives would disrupt VA activities.

In fact, the VA is prohibiting not only federal employees from assisting the vets with registration, it is blocking non partison groups like the League of Women Voters from lending a hand as well.

Its pretty obvious that, after the VA's initial agreement, someone in the White House realized that wounded vets might be a lot less likely to vote for another bloodthirsty, warmonger president like McCain. They have no legal basis to stop the registration but that has never been an obstacle to their agenda before. The administration, indeed the Republican party does not want wounded vets, or any vets for that matter, to vote and they will do whatever they can to interfere with the vets rights to do so.

cross posted at World Gone Mad

What Happened

by Capt. Fogg

What a revelation! Scott McClellan, the guy who used to stand in front of reporters and the minority of Americans not watching Britney and Anna Nicole and "da game" and spout lies, has now revealed that he told us a lie - unwittingly, of course. It wasn't his fault that he failed to check the facts. He wasn't paid to question; he was paid to sneer dismissively at reporters who did.

Scott has a book coming out in April, titled What Happened.

"So I stood at the White House briefing room podium in front of the glare of the klieg lights for the better part of two weeks and publicly exonerated two of the senior-most aides in the White House: Karl Rove and Scooter Libby. There was one problem. It was not true. "

And guess what Scott, you didn't win the Kyrgyzstan Lottery either and the guy trying to get his millions out of Nigeria isn't any more honest than your ex-boss - and of course there's been a lot of blood under the bridge because of the crime family you covered up for. I don't mean to be cruel, but it's your turn to be sneered at. I really hope you don't make any more money from it than OJ did from If I Did It and I hope you soon get to hear the current mouthpiece defame you with the same sneer and condescension as you used from the same podium you told your lies from.

Cross posted from Human Voices

Plame was covert - Cheney is a jerk

By Libby

It's official. According to newly declassified employment records submitted by Patrick Fitzgerald in his sentencing memo on the Scooter Libby case, Plame was indeed a cover agent at the time of her outing and the CIA was actively trying to protect her status. That should put to rest all those complaints among the Bush loyalists that Libby shouldn't have been prosecuted because there was no underlying crime -- but don't hold your breath waiting for wingnuttia to admit they were wrong.

Meanwhile, Dan Froomkin puts it into context. It's clear that the investigation uncovered criminal wrongdoing in the highest levels of the White House. As Fitzgerald himself put it:

"To accept the argument that Mr. Libby's prosecution is the inappropriate product of an investigation that should have been closed at an early stage, one must accept the proposition that the investigation should have been closed after at least three high-ranking government officials were identified as having disclosed to reporters classified information about covert agent Valerie Wilson, where the account of one of them was directly contradicted by other witnesses, where there was reason to believe that some of the relevant activity may have been coordinated, and where there was an indication from Mr. Libby himself that his disclosures to the press may have been personally sanctioned by the Vice President."

In other words, evidence existed but criminality was unable to be proved specifically and only because Scooter lied to protect Cheney. Froomkin rightly points out that history is likely to read this story as a tale of one of the most successful cover-ups of criminal malfeasance in the history of our country.

Above the law

By Libby

No real surprise in the plea for immunity coming from Cheney, Rove, Libby and Armitage in Plame's civil suit, but Cheney's breath-taking hubris continues to astound. The rest of the guys are saying they can't be held liable because it was their job to lie. They are of course calling it an appropriate "foreign policy dispute." But Cheney's lawyer also advanced his favorite fourth branch of government theory, "arguing that Cheney is legally akin to the president because of his unique government role, and has absolute immunity from any lawsuit."

As I recall, the last time he used that argument was to suggest he has absolute immunity from Congressional investigations too. In the world according to Dick, he is answerable to no higher, much less equal, power because there is none. I'll be very interested to see whether or not the judge agrees.

Hume defames Plame with false smear

If this isn't defamation, I'd like to know what is. Brit Hume libels Valerie Plame , falsely accusing her of lying under oath to Congress. I know the Fox News team isn't famous for its intelligence, but any bean brain could have checked the record and discovered that the bi-partisan report most certainly did not find Plame sent her husband on the Niger trip.

Hume references an addendum to that report, written by 3 GOP senators who wrongly interpreted testimony by a witness and then refused the man's request to be recalled before the committee in order to correct the record. Hume not only could have confirmed, but as a member of the media most certainly was obligated to confirm that fact before he made such scurrilous public allegations against Plame.

I generally think our society has become much too litigious but this is one time I wish that Plame would sue the pants off Hume and Fox News - who allowed their newscaster to broadcast such irresponsible blather.