The O'Reilly Fracture: Ratings Bad To The Bone

Bill O'Reilly just got some more bad news (pdf). His hairline isn't the only thing that's receding. The February ratings show that he has the slowest growing program (11%) of all the cable news primetime programs in the 25-54 demographic. And he is clearly bringing down the Fox network because the same is true for their whole primetime block. This despite the fact that Greta Van Susteren had the 2nd highest growth (49%) after Keith Olbermann's Countdown (61%).

More

Ever since the Bush administration shocked the legal community by dismissing eight U.S. attorneys in December, Justice Department leaders have vigorously denied that the firings were politically motivated. "I would never, ever make a change in the United States attorney position for political reasons," Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said lied in Senate testimony in early January. In a Feb. 6 hearing, Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty told lawmakers, "When I hear you talk about the politicizing of the Department of Justice, it's like a knife in my heart."

But at least three of the eight fired attorneys were told by a superior they were being forced to resign to make jobs available for other Bush appointees, according to a former senior Justice Department official knowledgeable about their cases. That stands in contradiction to administration claims that the firings were related either to job performance or policy differences.

(snip)

"It's hard not to think you did something wrong when you get a call like this, but that's not always the case." Two other U.S. attorneys in the group, upon seeking clarification from superiors in Washington, were told by a different top Justice Department official that they were being pushed out to give other Bush appointees their posts.

(snip)

"It's really remarkable to have a wholesale removal of an administration's own U.S. attorneys, particularly this deep into the term," said John Kroger, a federal prosecutor under Clinton and Bush who now teaches at Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Ore. "Clearly there was a concerted decision made to ask a bunch of them to leave. It suggests a desire to more tightly control policy. With the Democrats in control of Congress, perhaps it's because this is one of the few levers of government they have left."

President Bush and his Senate allies will kill a Sept. 11 antiterror bill if Congress sends it to the White House with a provision to let airport screeners unionize, the White House and 36 Republicans said Tuesday.

"As the legislation currently stands, the president's senior advisers would recommend that he veto the bill," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel.

I read your column faithfully every week in the Orlando Weekly. But I need to ask two things. What does the abbreviation GGG stand for? And what was the website that you mentioned a while ago for men to meet transsexuals?
~A Faithful Reader

GGG stands for "good, giving, and game," which is what we should all strive to be for our sex partners. Think "good in bed," "giving equal time and equal pleasure," and "game for anything-within reason." And that tranny website I mentioned was, I believe, http://www.freerepublic.com/.
~Savage

Pakistan makes a deal with the Taliban

KARACHI - The Pakistani establishment has made a deal with the Taliban through a leading Taliban commander that will extend Islamabad's influence into southwestern Afghanistan and significantly strengthen the resistance in its push to capture Kabul.

One-legged Mullah Dadullah will be Pakistan's strongman in a corridor running from the Afghan provinces of Zabul, Urzgan, Kandahar and Helmand across the border into Pakistan's Balochistan province, according to both Taliban and al-Qaeda contacts Asia Times Online spoke to. Using Pakistani territory and with Islamabad's support, the Taliban will be able safely to move men, weapons and supplies into southwestern Afghanistan.

The deal with Mullah Dadullah will serve Pakistan's interests in re- establishing a strong foothold in Afghanistan (the government in Kabul leans much more toward India), and it has resulted in a cooling of the Taliban's relations with al-Qaeda.

Despite their most successful spring offensive last year since being ousted in 2001, the Taliban realize they need the assistance of a state actor if they are to achieve "total victory". Al-Qaeda will have nothing to do with the Islamabad government, though, so the Taliban had to go it alone.

Linky

The rules were simple. The official who briefed reporters on Cheney's plane could be identified only as a senior administration official. But the high-ranking official wasn't very careful about concealing his identity as Cheney wrapped up his round-the-world trip with surprise stops in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Pay attention to the pronouns - me and I - that the official uses in describing the vice president's mission.

"The reason the president wanted me to come, obviously, is because of the continuing threat that exists in this part of the world on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border," the senior administration official said Tuesday.

"Let me just make one editorial comment here," the official said. "I've seen some press reporting says, 'Cheney went in to beat up on them, threaten them.' That's not the way I work. I don't know who writes that, or maybe somebody gets it from some source who doesn't know what I'm doing, or isn't involved in it. But the idea that I'd go in and threaten someone is an invalid misreading of the way I do business.

"I would describe my sessions both in Pakistan and Afghanistan as very productive. We've had notable successes in both places. I've often said before and I believe it's still true that we've captured and killed more al-Qaida in Pakistan than anyplace else. And I think we're making progress in Afghanistan."

Wall Street hammered in global sell-off

NEW YORK - The Dow Jones industrial average plunged over 500 points Tuesday, with losses accelerating in the final hour of trading, as Wall Street joined a global stock decline sparked by growing concerns that the U.S. and Chinese economies are cooling and that U.S. stocks are embarking on a major correction.

A 9 percent slide in Chinese stocks earlier set the tone for U.S. trading, a day after investors sent Shanghai's benchmark index to a record high close.

Investors' confidence has been knocked down by a slew of data showing that the economy may be decelerating more than anticipated. A Commerce Department report that orders for durable goods in January dropped by the largest amount in three months exacerbated jitters about the direction of the U.S. economy, which were raised a day earlier when former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the economy may be headed for a recession.

Soup Line

"And many parts of Iraq are stable now. But, of course, what we see on television is the one bombing a day that discourages everybody."
~Laura Bush on Larry King Live, 2/26/2007

18 Iraqi children killed by car bomb; The victims, all boys, were on soccer field in Ramadi

Disapproval on Iraq Hits Record
More Than Half Favor a Deadline for Withdrawal, Bush Suffers Longest Streak Without Majority Support Since Truman

Feb. 26, 2007 - A record number of Americans disapprove of the war in Iraq and a clear majority now favors the eventual withdrawal of U.S. forces even if civil order has not been restored there - potentially a tipping point in public attitudes on the war.

While solutions remain vexing, for the first time in ABC News/Washington Post polls a narrow majority of Americans supports setting a deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. Two-thirds oppose George W. Bush's troop surge; most, strongly so.

It all makes for a continued hard slog for the president: Just 36 percent approve of his job performance overall, very near his career low 33 percent last month. Bush hasn't seen majority approval in more than two years - the longest run without majority support for any president since Harry Truman from 1950-53.

While rooted in Iraq, Bush's problems with credibility and confidence reach beyond it. Sixty-three percent of Americans don't trust the administration to convey intelligence reports on potential threats from other countries honestly and accurately. And 58 percent lack confidence, specifically, in its ability to handle current tensions with Iran.

ABC

U.S. Patrols Still Unable to Tell Friend From Foe

American military commanders in Iraq describe the security plan they began implementing in mid-February as a rising tide: a gradual influx of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops whose extended presence in the city's violent neighborhoods will drown the militants' ability to stage bombings and sectarian killings.

But U.S. troops, Iraqi soldiers and officials, and Baghdad residents say the plan is hampered because security forces cannot identify, let alone apprehend, the elusive perpetrators of the violence. Shiite militiamen in the capital say they are keeping a low profile to wait out the security plan. U.S. commanders have noted increased insurgent violence in the Sunni-dominated belt around Baghdad and are concerned that fighters are shifting their focus outside the city.

The first brigade of 2,700 American reinforcements is patrolling the capital, bringing the total U.S. troop presence in Baghdad to 40,000, and members of three additional Iraqi military brigades have entered the city, though not at full strength. Soldiers have opened 14 of the estimated 30 joint policing stations they will operate in the capital.

Military patrols frequently push into neighborhoods where they have been shot at or struck with improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, only to find no one to arrest.

"I don't know who I'm fighting most of the time," said Staff Sgt. Joseph Lopez, 39, a soldier based in the northern outskirts of the capital. "I don't know who is setting what IED."

Sitting Ducks

New Yorker columnist Sy Hersh says the "single most explosive" element of his latest article involves an effort by the Bush administration to stem the growth of Shiite influence in the Middle East (specifically the Iranian government and Hezbollah in Lebanon) by funding violent Sunni groups.

Hersh says the U.S. has been "pumping money, a great deal of money, without congressional authority, without any congressional oversight" for covert operations in the Middle East where it wants to "stop the Shiite spread or the Shiite influence." Hersh says these funds have ended up in the hands of "three Sunni jihadist groups" who are "connected to al Qaeda" but "want to take on Hezbollah."

Hersh summed up his scoop in stark terms: "We are simply in a situation where this president is really taking his notion of executive privilege to the absolute limit here, running covert operations, using money that was not authorized by Congress, supporting groups indirectly that are involved with the same people that did 9/11."

New Yorkers got to kick President George W. Bush's butt on Thursday, sort of.

Performance artist Mark McGowan kicked off his bid to crawl for 72 hours across Manhattan dressed as the president, offering the opportunity to kick his backside.

"It felt real good to kick Bush," said Casmirr Sharp, 52, of New York's Queens borough. "He really deserves more than a kick."

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Researchers have witnessed a chimpanzee skewering a lemur-like creature for supper, but it's unclear whether the spectacle was a bit of luck or an indication that chimps have a more advanced ability to hunt than was thought.

A team led by Iowa State University anthropology professor Jill Pruetz witnessed the spearing of a bushbaby in Fongoli, Senegal, during an observation of chimpanzees from March 2005 to July 2006. In a study being released Thursday in the online version of the journal Current Biology, Pruetz documents 22 cases of chimps using spear-like tools to hunt bushbabies - a small primate that lives in hollow branches or tree trunks.

"It's not uncommon to have chimps use tools. But to use them in the context of hunting" is nearly unheard of, she said.

McChimp In Chief

Four years ago, Congress passed legislation authorizing President Bush to go to war in Iraq. Now Senate Democrats want to take it back.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., intends to present the proposal to fellow Democrats next week, and he is expected to try to add the measure to anti-terrorism legislation scheduled to be debated later this month. Officials who described the strategy spoke only on condition of anonymity, noting that rank-and-file senators had not yet been briefed on the details.

Republicans recently thwarted two Democratic attempts to pass a nonbinding measure through the Senate that was critical of Bush's decision to deploy an additional 21,500 combat troops.

After failing on his second attempt last Saturday, Reid said he would turn his attention to passing binding legislation.

Lieberman to Dems: Cut off funding and I'll become a Republican

Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut told the Politico Thursday that he has no immediate plans to switch parties, but suggested Democratic opposition to funding the war in Iraq might change his mind.

Lieberman, a registered independent who caucuses with Democrats, has been among the strongest supporters of the war and President Bush's plan to send another 21,500 combat troops into Iraq to help quell the violence there.

Sucks!

White House Brings in Nixon-Era Counsel

WASHINGTON -- In his first job as a White House lawyer, Fred Fielding, barely in his 30s, broke the news to President Nixon about the Watergate break-in.

Fielding was born in Philadelphia and grew up on a farm in Bucks County, Pa. His father died when he was 11. He attended public schools, played football, fished and worked on neighborhood farms in the summers. He attended Gettysburg College and the University of Virginia School of Law on scholarships.

After law school, he worked with a Philadelphia law firm, and in 1970 became deputy to former White House Counsel John Dean. As news of the break-in at the Democratic national headquarters broke over the capital, Fielding remembers trying to convince Dean, who was on his way back from a trip to the Philippines, that he should return to Washington at once instead of staying over in California to rest.

Impeach

In a victory for the White House, a U.S. appeals court Tuesday threw out the legal claims brought on behalf of the hundreds of prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay and ruled that they do not have a right to plead their innocence in an American court.

The ruling sets the stage for a historic showdown in the Supreme Court over whether the White House and Congress can deny habeas corpus -- the right to go before a judge and ask to be released -- to some people who are held for years without charges.

"This decision empowers the president to do whatever he wishes to prisoners without any legal limitation, so long as he does it offshore. (It) encourages such notorious practices as extraordinary rendition and contempt for international human rights law," said Shayana Kadidal, an attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York.LINK

Federal prosecutors and the FBI have significantly overstated the number of terrorism-related investigations and prosecutions they pursue, according to a highly critical report released Tuesday by a Justice Department watchdog.

The study by Inspector General Glenn Fine concluded that the overstatements occurred in large part because authorities counted offenses such as document and marriage fraud and immigration violations as terrorism-related even when there was no discernible tie to terror.

"The notion that we ought to now go to Baghdad and uh uhh somehow take control of the country strikes me as as an extremely uh serious one in terms of uh what we'd have to do once we got there. You'd probably have to put some new government in place. It's not clear what kind of government that would be, how long you'd have to stay. For the U.S. to get involved militarily in determining the outcome of uh the struggle over who's going to govern in Iraq uh strikes me as a uh classic definition of a quagmire."

RAED JARRAR:There are three major points that I think we should talk about. Financially, it legalizes very unfair types of contracts that will put Iraq in very long-term contracts that can go up to thirty-five years and cause the loss of hundreds of billions of dollars from Iraqis for no cause.

And the second point is concerning Iraq's sovereignty. Iraq will not be capable of controlling the levels -- the limits of production, which means that Iraq cannot be a part of OPEC anymore. And Iraq will have this very complicated institution called the Federal Oil and Gas Council, that will have representatives from the foreign oil companies on the board of it, so representatives from, let's say, ExxonMobil and Shell and British Petroleum will be on the federal board of Iraq approving their own contracts.

And the third point is the point about keeping Iraq's unity. The law is seen by many Iraqi analysts as a separation for Iraq fund. The law will authorize all of the regional and small provinces' authorities. It will give them the final say to deal with the oil, instead of giving this final say to central federal government, so it will open the doors for splitting Iraq into three regions or even maybe three states in the very near future.


ANTONIA JUHASZ:Well, in my mind, the law certainly opens the door to US oil companies and the Bush administration winning a very large piece of their objective of going to war in Iraq, at least winning it on paper. The law does almost word for word what was laid out in the Baker-Hamilton recommendation, which I discussed previously on your show, which is, at the very basic level, to turn Iraq's nationalized oil system, the model that 90% of the world's oil is governed by, take its nationalized oil system and turn it into a commercial system fully open to foreign corporate investment on terms as of yet to be decided. So it leaves vague this very important question of what type of contracts will the Iraqi government use. But what it leaves clear is that basically every level of the oil industry will be open to private foreign companies.

The law definitely sets up a very dangerous setup for Iraq's future economic stability, economic development, and certainly sets the stage for a tremendous amount of increased hostility and violence to US soldiers positioned on the ground, as being seen as the implementers of this oil hijack.

Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Wash Post

Inside Mologne House, the Survivors of War Wrestle With Military Bureaucracy and Personal Demons

Some soldiers and Marines have been here for 18 months or longer. Doctor's appointments and evaluations are routinely dragged out and difficult to get. A board of physicians must review hundreds of pages of medical records to determine whether a soldier is fit to return to duty. If not, the Physical Evaluation Board must decide whether to assign a rating for disability compensation. For many, this is the start of a new and bitter battle.

Months roll by and life becomes a blue-and-gold hotel room where the bathroom mirror shows the naked disfigurement of war's ravages. There are toys in the lobby of Mologne House because children live here. Domestic disputes occur because wives or girlfriends have moved here. Financial tensions are palpable. After her husband's traumatic injury insurance policy came in, one wife cleared out with the money. Older National Guard members worry about the jobs they can no longer perform back home.
The Hotel Aftermath

"No," he said. "We are not planning to go across the border [into Iran]. But the president also is not going to rule out any alternatives. But for those who think we are beating the war drums, no [no plans to invade Iran]."
Snow: No Plans To Invade Iran

Bush dismissed warnings from US lawmakers against attacking Iran, saying: "I don't know how anybody can then say, 'Well, protecting the troops means that we're going to invade Iran.'"

"I have no intent upon going into Iran," said the president.
Bush: No Plans To Invade Iran

US contingency plans for air strikes on Iran extend beyond nuclear sites and include most of the country's military infrastructure, the BBC has learned.

BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner says the trigger for such an attack reportedly includes any confirmation that Iran was developing a nuclear weapon - which it denies.

Alternatively, our correspondent adds, a high-casualty attack on US forces in neighbouring Iraq could also trigger a bombing campaign if it were traced directly back to Tehran.
Plans to Invade Iraq

A federal appeals court issued a Valentine's Day ruling upholding an Alabama law banning the sale of sex toys. But the devices won't disappear from store shelves immediately.

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Alabama's sex toy ban is constitutional because "the state's interest in preserving and promoting public morality provides a rational basis for the challenged statue."

(snip)

Alabama's solicitor general, Kevin Newsom, said he was pleased the 11th Circuit rejected the plaintiffs' argument that public morality was an insufficient basis for the legislation.

"In rejecting that view, which necessarily would have invalidated traditional prohibitions on, for instance, incest, polygamy, and prostitution, the 11th Circuit recognized and reiterated that 'the law is constantly based on notions of morality,'" Newsom said.
Use your hand, or your little sister

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow was asked about this today at the daily briefing, following the release of military documents from 2002 that revealed that the U.S. expected that by now a token American force of 5,000 would be able to keep things under control in Iraq -- and the occupation would require only a two or three month "stabilization" period.

"What went wrong?" the reporter reasonably asked.

Snow replied: "I'm not sure anything went wrong."

Republicans choose Guantanamo for 2008 Presidential Convention

The Republican party has recently announced its decision to hold its 2008 convention at the prison facilities in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, currently being used to detain terror suspects. The unexpected choice of location beat out other contenders such as Chicago, Phoenix and Houston.

In a press conference Thursday afternoon, GOP spokesman Hal Atosis announced the decision handed down by senior Republican party members, including the Leader himself. "It has been decided that the 2008 convention will be held at Guantanamo Bay, in order to show our support for the War on Terror, as well as accomodate any Republican delegates who might also be serving time concurrently."

Indeed, the decision has been described as "brilliant" and "visionary" by cable news pundits such as Bill O'Reilly. The decision to use the Guantanamo facility "provides a boost to the Republicans strong anti-terror stance, and will provide lodging for all the incarcerated Republican lawmakers who are in federal detention facilities," said Republican activist Stew Pidasse. "We thought this might be an ideal situation, as the speakers could address both delegates and inmates at the same time."

RepubliCONS

Some of the planning by Gen. Tommy Franks and other top military officials before the 2003 invasion of Iraq envisioned that as few as 5,000 U.S. troops would remain in Iraq by December 2006, according to documents obtained by a private research organization.

Slides obtained by the National Security Archive under the Freedom of Information Act contain a PowerPoint presentation of what planners projected to be a stable, pro-American and democratic Iraq after the ouster of Saddam Hussein.

"Completely unrealistic assumptions about a post-Saddam Iraq permeate these war plans," said National Security Archive Executive Director Thomas Blanton in a statement posted on the organization's Web site along with copies of some charts used in the PowerPoint presentation. (Read the documents on the National Security Archive Web site)

"First, they assumed that a provisional government would be in place by 'D-Day', then that the Iraqis would stay in their garrisons and be reliable partners, and finally that the post-hostilities phase would be a matter of mere 'months'. All of these were delusions."

Senate Dems To Force Up Or Down Vote On Bush's War Plan

Developing...Senate Democrats will force an up or down vote Saturday on the resolution opposing President Bush's troop increase, under debate in Congress.

Congress opened debate on the measure on Tuesday and is expected to vote by Friday. Read the Resolution here.

HuffPo

"These two regimes (Irand and Syria) are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq," he said in that address. "Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We'll interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."
San Diego Union-Tribune

The aid is being channeled to Iraqi groups by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' al-Quds force, a covert military branch of the Iranian military that reports directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the officials said.

"This is coming from the highest level of the Iranian government," said a senior intelligence analyst, who briefed reporters along with a senior U.S. defense official and an explosives expert on condition that they not be identified.
Kansas.com

"What we don't know is whether or not the head leaders of Iran ordered the Quds Force to do what they did. Either they knew or didn't know. What matters is that (the weapons) are there," Mr Bush told a White House press conference.
The Australian

The bill, titled the "Restoring the Constitution Act of 2007," strikes at the core of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 by giving detainees access to U.S. courts. It was introduced by Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (Conn.), a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The bill would also prevent the executive branch from making blanket determinations about who is an enemy combatant and would restrict the president's authority to interpret when certain human rights standards apply to detainees. The legislation would limit the label "enemy combatant" to a person "who directly participates in hostilities in a zone of active combat against the United States" or who took part in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

The bill would also restore to the detainees numerous rights they lost under the Military Commissions Act, including the right, under a habeas corpus petition, to challenge their detention in federal court.

"I take a backseat to no one when it comes to protecting the country from terrorists," Dodd said in an e-mail statement yesterday. "But there is a right way to do this and a wrong way to do this....In taking away their legal rights, the rights first codified in our country's Constitution, we're taking away our own moral compass, as well."

Bush to allow 7,000 Iraqi refugees to immigrate to US

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration plans to allow about 7,000 Iraqi refugees to settle in the United States over the next year, a huge expansion at a time of mounting international pressure to help those who have fled in the nearly four-year-old war.

The United States has allowed only 463 Iraq refugees into the country since the war began, even though some 3.8 million have left. A senior State Department official described the expanded program on condition of anonymity ahead of a formal announcement later Wednesday.

The administration also plans to pledge $18 million for a worldwide resettlement and relief program. The United Nations has asked for $60 million from nations around the world.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met Wednesday with U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres to outline the expanded U.S. program. The 7,000 would be resettled from nations outside Iraq where they have fled. The U.S. proposal also includes plans to offer special treatment for Iraqis still in the country whose cooperation with the U.S. government puts them at risk from sectarian reprisal.

Green card

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's budget assumes cuts to funding for veterans' health care two years from now - even as badly wounded troops returning from Iraq could overwhelm the system.

Bush is using the cuts, critics say, to help fulfill his pledge to balance the budget by 2012. But even administration allies say the numbers are not real and are being used to make the overall budget picture look better.

After an increase sought for next year, the Bush budget would turn current trends on their head. Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly - by more than 10 percent in many years - White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter.

In fact, even the White House doesn't seem serious about the numbers. It says the long-term budget numbers don't represent actual administration policies. Similar cuts assumed in earlier budgets have been reversed.

The veterans cuts, said White House budget office spokesman Sean Kevelighan, "don't reflect any policy decisions. We'll revisit them when we do the (future) budgets."

• DPRK's graphite-moderated nuclear power plants, which could easily produce weapons grade plutonium, would be replaced with light water reactor (LWR) power plants by a target date of 2003 (paid for by S.Korea and Japan)
• Oil for heating and electricity production would be provided while DPRK's reactors were shut down, until completion of the first LWR power unit. (starting within 3 months and increasing to 500,000 tons/year)
• The two sides would move toward full normalization of political and economic relations.
• The U.S. would provide formal assurances to the DPRK, against the threat or use of nuclear weapons by the U.S. (we promised not to "shock and awe" them)
• The DPRK would take steps to implement the Korean Peninsula Denuclearization Declaration.
• The DPRK would remain a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
  IAEA ad hoc and routine inspections would resume for facilities not subject to the freeze.
• Existing spent nuclear fuel stocks would be stored and ultimately disposed of without reprocessing in the DPRK.
• Before delivery of key LWR nuclear components, the DPRK would come into full compliance with its safeguards agreement with the IAEA.

In the current agreement (according to this story in the Guardian):

• N.Korea will receive initial aid equal to 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil and eventually receive another 950,000 tons in aid
• N.Korea will shut down and seal its main nuclear reactor and related facilities at Yongbyon, north of the capital, within 60 days, to be confirmed by international inspectors.
• North Korea will state all its nuclear programs including plutonium already extracted
• North Korea and United States will embark on talks aimed at resolving disputes and restarting diplomatic relations
• The United States will also begin the process of removing North Korea from its designation as a terror-sponsoring state and also on ending U.S. trade sanctions

The biggest difference between the agreements is that now N.Korea actually has nuclear weapons. Hopefully this time Congress will provide funding and Bush will sign off on it so that the United States can live up to our part of the deal and give it a chance to work. One glance at the Iraq budget provides ample evidence that a little prevention like this is a whole lot cheaper than shocking and awing them. Besides, it has to be more effective.

Three weeks after promising that it would show proof of Iranian meddling in Iraq, the Bush administration has laid out its evidence - and received in return a healthy dose of skepticism.

Asked for direct evidence linking Iran's leadership to the weapons, Tony Snow, the White House spokesman, said, "Let me put it this way. There's not a whole lot of freelancing in the Iranian government, especially when it comes to something like that."
Int'l Herald Tribune

"That does not translate that the Iranian government per se, for sure, is directly involved in doing this," Pace told reporters in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta. "What it does say is that things made in Iran are being used in Iraq to kill coalition soldiers."

His remarks might raise questions on the credibility of the claims of high-level Iranian involvement, especially following the faulty U.S. intelligence that was used to justify the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Guardian

Administration officials say their approach was carefully calibrated to focus on concerns that Iran is providing potent weapons that are used against U.S. troops in Iraq, not to ignite a wider war.

Novak Takes the Stand As Libby Trial Resumes

WASHINGTON After a long weekend off, the defense took the field this morning and attempted to hold the line against the prosecution in the perjury trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in Washington, D.C. The witness list remains in flux, and could include Libby himself and Vice President Cheney -- or maybe not.

But by late morning, Bob Woodward and Walter Pincus of The Washington Post had taken the stand, followed by David Sanger of The New York Times. Pincus said that Libby did not leak Valerie Plame's identity -- but Ari Fleischer did. Then Robert Novak took the stand just after lunch. He named Karl Rove and Richard Armitage as the two sources for his famous "outing" column.

Novak said Armitage, a key State Dept. official, was his primary source and Rove only a "confirming" source. On July 8, 2003, Armitage referred to former Ambassador Joe Wilson's wife as "Valerie" and Novak then looked up his name in Who's Who to determine that he last name seemed to be Plame.

Plamegate

A vice president fixated on finding ways to debunk a former diplomat's claims that Bush misled the U.S. people in going to war and his suggestion Cheney might have played a role in suppressing contrary intelligence.

Cheney told Libby to speak with selected reporters to counter bad news. He developed talking points on the matter for the White House press office. He helped draft a statement by then-CIA Director George Tenet. He moved to declassify some intelligence material to bolster the case against Wilson.

A former Cheney press aide, Cathie Martin, testified she proposed leaking some news exclusives but was kept partly in the dark when Cheney ordered Libby to leak part of a classified intelligence report. Later she arranged a luncheon for conservative columnists with Cheney to help bolster the administration's case.

"The details suggest Cheney was almost a deputy president with a shadow operation. He had his own source of advice. He had his own source of access. He was making his own decisions," Light said.

This week, Congress held its first hearing on the landmark IPCC report on climate change. That report concluded that global warming is "unequivocal" and human activity is the main driver, "very likely" causing most of the rise in temperatures since 1950.

During the hearing, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) - one of the 87 percent of congressional Republicans who do not believe in man-made global warming - questioned the authors of the report about a period of dramatic climate change that occured 55 million years ago. "We don't know what those other cycles were caused by in the past. Could be dinosaur flatulence, you know, or who knows?"

Watch the video and read the transcript at ThinkProgress.org:

Presumably, Rohrabacher was referencing a period known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. Then, as in now, "sharp rises in temperature were initiated and driven by large spikes in greenhouse gases.... It took over 100K years for the ocean, atmosphere, and temperatures to return to their previous state. The result was a mass extinction event that took millions of years to recover from." But scientists believe that massive methane releases from the ocean floors - not dinosaur farts - were the cause.

In sharp contrast to Rohrabacher, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) delivered an opening statement recommending mandatory caps on global warming pollution and calling out conservatives for rejecting science. "For twelve years, the leadership in the House of Representatives stifled all discussion and debate of global warming. That long rejection of reality is over, to the relief of Members on both sides of the aisle."

Shipped to Iraq by the ton on C-130 cargo planes laden with bricks of U.S. tender, the funding in question, held in the Development Fund for Iraq and totaling some $8.8 billion, was doled out by the CPA to Iraq's fledgling government ministries between October 2003 and June 2004. Ostensibly, the cash went to pay for such things as salaries and overhead. Where it actually wound up is another story entirely.

(snip)

At one point, Diane Watson, the California Democrat, replayed comments David Oliver (once the CPA's director of management and budget) made to the BBC in November, in which he expresses indifference over how the reconstruction funds were spent. "I have no idea, I can't tell you whether or not the money went to the right things or didn't - nor do I actually think it is important," he says on the recording. "Billions of dollars of their money disappeared, yes I understand, I'm saying what difference does it make?"

Bill Livingood, the House sergeant-at-arms whom Hastert appointed to the job in 1995, was negotiating with the Air Force about what plane from the government fleet of passenger jets should be made available when she needs it. The plane also would be used on other government missions.

"It has everything to do with security," Pelosi said. She added that Bush had personally told her that because the speaker is second in line of presidential succession, behind Vice President Dick Cheney, he was concerned about her security.

That concern apparently included the desire that Pelosi's plane not land for refueling.

Russert says he didn't give Libby agent's ID

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- NBC's Tim Russert, the last prosecution witness in Lewis "Scooter" Libby's perjury trial, testified Wednesday he did not inform Libby of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity, as Libby has claimed.

Libby, the former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, told FBI investigators and a grand jury he first learned Wilson's identity from Russert during a conversation on July 10, 2003. He later recanted, saying a note he found had jogged his memory, and that he initially heard the name from Cheney about a month before.

Russert was asked by Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald whether the two discussed Wilson. "No, that would be impossible because I did not know who that person was until several days later," Russert said.

Asked whether Libby told him about Wilson, Russert responded, "No."

CNN

Fruitcake Polling Higher Than Bush

According to the latest CBS News poll, the president's overall approval rating has dipped to 28 percent-the lowest number in his presidency and dangerously close to Nixon's all-time low of 24 percent. To lend a little context to this historic feat, we found some other people and things with equal or greater popularity.

OTHER THINGS WITH A 28 PERCENT APPROVAL RATING

Cottage Cheese
Boxer Briefs
Body Hair on Guys
A Wall Along the Mexican Border
Kelly Osbourne
Reptiles
Text Message Flirting

THINGS WITH AN APPROVAL RATING HIGHER THAN GEORGE W. BUSH

Kevin Federline (45%)
Fruit Cake (40%)
The Dentist (45%)
Hanson (53%)
Ryan Seacrest (60%)
The "Dude, You're getting a Dell!" Guy (42%)
Small Breasts (50%)
Getting Kicked in the Balls (41%)

Lots More!

Republicans blocked a full-fledged Senate debate over Iraq on Monday, but Democrats vowed they still would find a way to force President Bush to change course in a war that has claimed the lives of more than 3,000 U.S. troops

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky described the test vote as merely a "bump in the road" and added that GOP lawmakers "welcome the debate and are happy to have it."

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat, echoed Reid. "If the Republicans want to stand by their president and his policy, they shouldn't run from this debate. If they believe we should send thousands of our young soldiers into the maws of this wretched civil war, they should at least have the courage to stand and defend their position," he said.

Scarborough: Bush willing to take his party over a cliff to prove his point
The slow demise of the national Republican Party just took a turn for the worse. Hard to believe that the GOP's prospects could actually become more bleak after two years of unrelenting bad news, but it has.

Republican senators are now turning their rhetorical guns away from Democrats and toward one another. A few conservative Republican senators, whose votes usually cheer me up during bleak political times, are actually accusing Virginia's senior senator, John Warner, of providing comfort to terrorists.

The White House even got involved in the name calling when Tony Snow suggested Warner's actions could embolden the likes of Osama Bin Laden.

The message from the Bush administration seems to be this: "Thanks for carrying our water on this miserable war for four years. Now we're going accuse you of helping terrorists."

More Good Stuff

US lawmakers on both sides of the US Senate drummed up support for a compromise bill slamming a hike in US forces in Iraq, saying it was the best chance of forcing President George W. Bush to drop his unpopular plan.

After days of hardknuckle bargaining, top congressional Democrats and key Republicans finally agreed late Wednesday on a bill that censures Bush's plan to boost US forces in the war zone with another 21,000 troops.

The breakthrough measure, likely to garner wide support, means the White House could face an embarrassing -- but ultimately symbolic -- vote of no-confidence when the bill hits the Senate floor next week.

"Now we have a real opportunity for the Senate to speak clearly. Every senator will have a chance to vote on whether he or she supports or disagrees with the president's plan to send more troops into the middle of a civil war," said Senator Joe Biden, one of the key authors of the motion.

ExxonMobil has best year ever for any U.S. company even as Q4 profit falls

NEW YORK (AP) - ExxonMobil (XOM) on Thursday posted the largest annual profit by a U.S. company - $39.5 billion - even as earnings for the last quarter of 2006 declined 4%.

The 2006 profit topped the previous record of $36.13 billion, which Exxon set in 2005.

Revenue from the world's largest publicly traded oil company rose to $377.64 billion for the year, surpassing the record $370.68 billion that Exxon posted in 2005.

For the fourth quarter, net income slipped to $10.25 billion, or $1.76 a share, from $10.71 billion, or $1.71 a share, a year earlier.

Oil

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said yesterday that he will turn over secret documents detailing the government's domestic spying program, ending a two-week standoff with the Senate Judiciary Committee over surveillance targeting terror suspects.

"It's never been the case where we said we would never provide access," Gonzales said. "We obviously would be concerned about the public disclosure that may jeopardize the national security of our country. But we're working with the Congress to provide the information that it needs."

The administration still won't release other documents that could explain how the court's orders comply with the 1978 surveillance law that the court oversees, said Representative Heather Wilson, a New Mexico Republican and a senior member of the House Intelligence Committee. She said the deal to release the documents stems from a briefing in front of that panel last week.

"We are playing hide the ball down at the Justice Department," said Wilson, who has told Silvestre Reyes, the Texas Democrat who heads the House panel, that she will support a subpoena, if need be.