Normally I'd say boo-fuggin-hoo, another reporter complaining about how hard their life is living on a bus covering a campaign, we all know it sucks... but these paragraphs got me interested:

On the bus, the agent ran through some of the security precautions the press would face, like getting rescreened with a magnetometer each time they left the campaign “bubble” [protective cordon]—say, for a trip to the bathroom. The potential risks of such a breach: someone might slip something in your bag when you weren’t looking, or you might pay a visit to your “Lebanese cabdriver friend who hands you a machine gun,” he explained.

This last line didn’t go over so well. Journalists shot each other incredulous looks: he didn’t just say that, did he? Even worse, the network cameraman seated directly in front of the agent happened to be Lebanese. When it came time for questions, the cameraman’s hand shot up. “I take offense” he said of the implied equation between Lebanese people and terrorists. The cameraman then noted the many patriotic Americans who had Lebanese roots. “You’re right,” the agent replied, chastened. “I apologize.”

How can somebody this stupid be running protection for John Edwards? Maybe this guy shouldn't be fired, but he shouldn't be head of security... I mean- making a racist statement directly to the media? How fucking stupid is that?

All week the White House has been saying, "Gosh, we really, really would like the 9/11 commission to continue... gosh darn it... If only that Dennis Hastert wasn't being so mean and saying it shouldn't get an extension but what can we do? We're only the administration, and he's the speaker of the house... aw heck!"

Well, they've gotten their wish- Hastert caved and is now allowing the 60 day extension. Even he suddenly realized there was no way to cut this inquiry short without a good explanation.

The article states he's coming out with a children's book. That'll go well with O'Reilly "No Sperm Zone" condoms, the O'Reilly "Who's Looking Out For You" Dildo Hutch, and the O'Reilly Max "Factor" brand makeup- made specifically for old, balding, blotchy, white men.

Glenn Frankel writes in the Washington Post this morning that British spies have been listening in on Kofi Annan's conversations in the lead-up to the Iraq war.

Prime Minister Tony Blair branded Short's allegations "deeply irresponsible" but refused to confirm or deny them, saying that to do so would violate his government's policy of not discussing intelligence matters.

Yeah, deeply irresponsible to allege this, nevermind if it's true.

What a screwy story.

Drudge has the tranny... er... transcript:

'SMUT ON TV GETS PRAISED. SMUT ON TV WINS EMMYS. ON RADIO, THERE SEEMS TO BE DIFFERENT STANDARDS,' LIMBAUGH EXPLAINED.

'I'VE NEVER HEARD HOWARD STERN.

(That's a lie- Before Stern led the way Rush was spinning records for a living.)

BUT WHEN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT GETS INVOLVED IN THIS, I GET A LITTLE FRIGHTENED.

'IF WE ARE GOING TO SIT BY AND LET THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT GET INVOLVED IN THIS, IF THE GOVERNMENT IS GOING TO 'CENSOR' WHAT THEY THINK IS RIGHT AND WRONG... WHAT HAPPENS IF A WHOLE BUNCH OF JOHN KERRYS, OR TERRY MCAULIFFES START RUNNING THIS COUNTRY. AND DECIDE CONSERVATIVE VIEWS ARE LEADING TO VIOLENCE?

'I AM IN THE FREE SPEECH BUSINESS. ITS ONE THING FOR A COMPANY TO DETERMINE IF THEY ARE GOING TO BE PARTY TO IT. ITS ANOTHER THING FOR THE GOVERNMENT TO DO IT.'

Finally a conservative standing up for what's right? That's new... I'm starting to think that by November even Limbaugh won't be able to bring himself to vote for Bush.

From the 2/25/2004 show:
Howard: That's our president. Little monkey. Time for him to go. His days are over. Time for him to go.
Robin: Another one-term Bush presidency.
Howard: Yeah, please.
Robin: Be just like your dad.
Howard: Yeah, let him be like the dad- a failure. When it's all said and done. Stupid dick. Call off your attack dogs, Mr. President, get on with the real problems. Stupid-ass gay marriage crap, everything else you're into. They said to him in the paper today, "Well, how do you know gay marriage is bad?" he goes, "I just know." I just know! How does a guy like that just know? A guy who's bankrupted several companies, how does he know? Wouldn't you say to yourself "I bankrupted a bunch of companies, I don't know a goddamn thing?"
Robin: Yeah, "I better ask somebody."
Howard: "I better talk to someone about this." Yeah, what's the difference? What do I know? Do whatever you want.

Hours later Clear Channel pulled Howard from the airwaves.

The commission requested more time partially because the White House was uncooperative and stalled on handing over documents. Meanwhile:

• Condi Rice declined to testify before the commission
  
• Clinton and Gore have agreed to testify before the commission
  
• Bush and Cheney only will talk to the Republican head of the commission, not the entire board.

Before this administration I never considered Republicans inherently evil- I've since reconsidered that opinion.

This is the guy who was the biggest hawk, urged the invasion of Iraq, invented an office in the Pentagon to dream up a case for war, then last week had the balls to say Tenent should be fired for midleading intelligence.

This was one evil fuck- I'm glad he's gone.

While Howard Stern was on vacation last week he read Al Franken's latest book, "Lies and the Lying liars Who Tell Them: A Fair And Balanced Look At The Right."

A combination of the information in that book and the rediculous travesty of the recent hearings before congress about the Super Bowl Half-Time show "tragedy" have caused Howard to rethink some of his normally GOP-friendly political positions.

He's certainly a social liberal- but he's consistantly supported Republican candidates and supported the Bush doctrine of pre-emptive invasions of sovereign nations that are deemed possible threats (and about half the time turn out not to be...) Until this week, Howard (and most of the crew on the show) steadfastly defended President Bush against any and all criticism from callers and guests on a daily basis. Now Howard is making a point of saying that he is no longer planning on voting for Bush- in fact, his new mantra is "anyone but Bush."

He's also started busting the administration on obvious conflicts of interest, such as Colin Powell's son running the FCC and Dick Cheney socializing with a Supreme Court justice who has Cheney's case in front of him. Up until this week Howard was either unaware or unconcerned about these issues. Now, just days after he turned on Bush, he's been barred from all Clear Channel stations.

This is no coincidence.

Clear Channel communications has a damning history of pandering to the Bush administration. Remember the Dixie Chicks? They were suddenly pulled off of ALL Clear Channel stations for criticizing the president. How evil is that? Now that Clear Channel has become the largest radio conglomerate in history, radio has gotten incredibly bland. DJ's are no longer local. Music is programmed through a high tech version of payola. This is the final decline of radio as we know it. Radio used to be a great thing. No longer.

Howard has talked about the corruption of the FCC for years- in 1997 the FCC threatened to halt all of Infinity's paperwork and never approve future purchases of radio stations or consolidation if they challenged the millions of dollars in fines the FCC demanded to be paid. Howard cheered the news that fines were being increased after the Super Bowl Holocaust- maybe now someone will actually fight the fines instead of just writing them off as a cost of doing business.

Howard has predicted that he will be fired before the end of the year- with an environment like this it seems very likely, very soon. He also said he was going to offer his resignation next Monday to Mel Karmazin- the head of Viacom, owner of Infinity. We'll see where this goes, Howard has been threatening to quit since the early '90's because of censorship. Now finally it's coming to a head. It may take moving to a new medium- satellite- to give Howard the freedom he needs to continue doing a great show.

Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart discuss the gay marriage issue.

Right-wing ideologue Bill O'Reilly gave a speech in California last Friday and declared, "If I were gay I'd marry Hillary." This according to Scoobie Davis who attended and files his report here.

O'Reilly still claims to be a regular guy with no agenda, just a desire to set America on the right track- A Jesus (and only Jesus!) loving, gun wielding, sovereign nation invading, homo-marriage-hating, death penalty flip-flopping, hip-hop banning, right-wing nation.

He claims to not even know he's a right wing extremist! Well, we all know the truth, don't we?


What a douche-bag.

Link courtesy of Atrios

Why do I want to start every post with, "Sigh ..."? Probably because the Bushies are simply phenomenal at acting like a bunch of jackasses. The latest is the administration wondering if they could reclassify hamburger flippers as manufacturing jobs to boost numbers in a struggling business sector. Motherfuckers.

Last week the Bush administration predicted 2.6 million new jobs by the end of the year. I guess someone actually punched that number into a calculator and figured out how truly insane that prediction was- now they're backing away from it. Though they have discovered "job related program activities," and that's almost as good... right?

Press Corps getting feisty:

Q But it would appear, though, that people very high up in this administration didn't have a whole lot of faith in the forecast of the report that went up to Congress just a week ago in terms of the job creation numbers.

MR. McCLELLAN: Again, it's an annual economic report that is put out by the administration based on the economic modeling and the data that's available at that point in time.

Q Can you answer the specific question, though? Was this report -- was the prediction of this many jobs, 2.6 million jobs, vetted prior to publication by the entire economic team?

MR. McCLELLAN: It's an annual report, David. It goes through the usual -- it goes through the usual --

Q That's not the question. Was it or was it not vetted by the entire economic team?

MR. McCLELLAN: It's an annual report. It goes through the usual --

Q So you don't know, or it was, or it wasn't?

MR. McCLELLAN: Can I get -- can I finish that sentence?

Q When you answer the question. Let's hear it. What's the answer?

MR. McCLELLAN: The answer was, it is an annual economic report and it goes through the normal vetting process. And if you would let me get to that, I would answer your question.

Q -- the full economic team vetted the prediction --

MR. McCLELLAN: It's an annual economic report. It's the President's Economic Report. But again, the President --

Q Just say yes or no --

MR. McCLELLAN: -- it goes through the normal -- it goes through the normal vetting process.

Q So the answer is, yes. I'm not done yet, I've got another one.

MR. McCLELLAN: Okay.

Q Why -- if you're suggesting that people will debate the numbers, that's kind of a backhanded way to say, oh, who cares about the numbers. Well, apparently, the President's top economic advisors do, because that's why they wrote a very large report and sent it to Congress. So why was the prediction made in the first place, if the President and you and his Treasury Secretary were going to just back away from it?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, one, I disagree with the premise of the way you stated that. This is the annual Economic Report of the President and the economic modeling is done this way every year. It's been done this way for 20-some years.

Q So why not -- why aren't you standing behind it?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think what the President stands behind is the policies that he is implementing, the policies that he is advocating. That's what's important.

Q That's not in dispute. The number is the question.

MR. McCLELLAN: I know, but the President's concern is on the number of jobs being created --

Q My question is, why was the prediction made --

MR. McCLELLAN: -- and the President's focus is on making sure that people who are hurting because they cannot find work have a job. That's where the President's focus is.

Q Then why predict a number? Why was the number predicted? Why was the number predicted? You can't get away with not -- just answer the question. Why was that number predicted?

MR. McCLELLAN: I've been asked this, and I've asked -- I've been asked, and I've answered.

Q No, you have not answered. And everybody watching knows you haven't answered.

MR. McCLELLAN: I disagree.

Kerry beats Bush by 12, Edwards beats Bush by 10.

The poll, taken Feb. 16-17, indicates that if the election were held today, Kerry would be chosen by 55% of likely voters, compared to 43% for Bush. In the last polling, Feb. 6-8, Bush held a 49-48 advantage.

Edwards, Kerry's sole remaining major rival for the Democratic nomination, holds a 54%-44% advantage, the poll indicates. The question has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Wow- two candidates that could kick Bush's ass. That's very nice.

OverSpun Exclusive!
Indisputable photographic evidence shows that the former leader of Germany, Adolf "Fucking" Hitler was not only alive and well after World War 2, but he was in attendance while John Kerry testified before Congress in 1971!


Then, later in the same hearing Jane Fonda arrived and flashed the "solidarity" sign:


Then she left:


High level sources say several national magazines weren't not not investigating the Kerry/Fonda/Hitler link for some time, this space can now reveal!

Previous to this publication there's been a dearth of documentation linking war hero John Kerry with evil madman Adolf Hitler, now this space can breathlessly report about our breathless reports!

Developing... /drudge

Dan Froomkin has the scoop on the president's recent scramble for photo ops to replace the misfire of the king of all photo ops:

Yesterday, at Ft. Polk in Louisiana, the backdrop was spectacular: thousands of rowdily cheering soldiers yelling "USA!" and "Hoo-ah!" Nothing staged about that, was there?


Well, as William Taylor reports this morning in the Town Talk of nearby Alexandria, La.: "Before President Bush landed at the airfield here Tuesday, Command Sgt. Maj. Iuniasolua T. Savusa gave the troops permission to break protocol.

"'Forget it for this one day,' he said.

"Instead of coming to attention at the sounding of 'Hail to the Chief,' they were encouraged to cheer.

"They even practiced yelling, but the practice wasn't nearly as noisy as the real thing once Bush was introduced by Fort Polk commander Brig. Gen. Jason Kamiya."

And just when did the White House plan this trip, anyway? Before or after the recent controversy over Bush's National Guard duty?

"There's no relation to recent events," insisted press secretary Scott McClellan, who added that the White House had been in touch with the Pentagon for a couple of weeks, although he couldn't vouch for when base officials were brought into the loop.

The print pool reporter for the day, Maura Reynolds of the Los Angeles Times, asked one of the base spokesmen, Samantha Bingham, when they learned of the president's impending visit. "She said they received official notification on Saturday, and heard rumors of it perhaps three days before that. Definitely not more than a week."

Link

Here are the comments of James Moore, the author of "Bush's War For Re-Election"

but first in this clip is Bill Calhoun, who claims he saw George W. Bush pulling guard duty in Alabama months before Bush was transferred there. Bill tends to wander, so that's why the talk with him skips around.

It sounds like the President's military records are very murky for the last half of his National Guard commitment, but one thing they do prove is that John Calhoun's story doesn't hold together:
(via Josh Marshall)

John B. Calhoun, a retired lieutenant colonel in the Alabama National Guard, said Friday he remembered seeing Bush throughout the summer and fall of 1972 at Dannelly Field. Calhoun was a flight safety officer there.

He said Bush was assigned to him to perform nonflight status duties as a temporary transfer from the Texas Guard.

"He came in his uniform and sat in my office reading training manuals and safety reports," said Calhoun, 69, an Atlanta contractor.

"We didn't have F-102s (the aircraft Bush trained on in Texas), so he couldn't fly. He just made his drills in my office," he added.

But the documents released Friday indicated Bush's transfer to the Alabama squadron wasn't approved until September 1972, months after Bush's presence as recalled by Calhoun.

Link

The White House has turned on Novak! Top staffers are claiming that they asked him not to release Valerie Plame's name. Novak has a different recollection of the conversations.

Now that the White House has finally gotten around to alienating their most zealous supporter, will Novak stop sucking the president's ass? Doubtful.

Will self preservation finally get him to admit who leaked the name? We shall see...

Novak and his humongous teeth can be seen weekdays on CNN's Crossfire.

This came out Tuesday, I've been looking for reactions to it, but so far nobody's paying much attention... Rummy appears to be in a panic.

In one recent high-level meeting, Rumsfeld looked at Secretary of State Colin Powell and said, "Jerry (Ambassador Paul Bremer, the top U.S. civilian in Iraq) works for you, right?"

Powell looked as if he'd been struck by lightning. Bremer and every other U.S. official in Iraq reports directly to Rumsfeld and the Pentagon. Rumsfeld demanded and got complete authority over the military, over the civilian authority in charge of rebuilding the country, over the administration's $87 billion Iraq budget, over every line of every contract let. And suddenly he forgot that Bremer works for him?

That same week, Wolfowitz and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage were summoned to a closed-door session of the Senate Armed Services Committee to discuss how the U.S. contracting system is working in Iraq.

When Wolfowitz was asked a tough question about the controversies surrounding the U.S. contracting efforts in Iraq, he turned to Armitage and said: "You can answer that one, right, Rich?" Armitage answered by noting that the Department of Defense and the Office of the Secretary of Defense control every American contract let in Iraq, and that the State Department has authority over none of those contracts.

"Iraq is now a contaminated environment and Rumsfeld and his people want out," said one senior administration official. "They can't wait for July 1 when the CPA (Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority) turns into the U.S. Embassy and the whole mess they have made becomes Colin Powell's."

OVERSPUN EXCLUSIVE!!! MUST CREDIT OVERSPUN!!!

Case Closed.
/bush administration

Dave Moniz and Jim Drinkard of USA Today have this:

WASHINGTON - As Texas Gov. George W. Bush prepared to run for president in the late 1990s, top-ranking Texas National Guard officers and Bush advisers discussed ways to limit the release of potentially embarrassing details from Bush's military records, a former senior officer of the Texas Guard said Wednesday.

A second former Texas Guard official, who spoke only on condition of anonymity, was told by a participant that commanders and Bush advisers were particularly worried about mentions in the records of arrests of Bush before he joined the National Guard in 1968, the second official said.

This second former Texas Guard official is new- the first official they're referring to- Bill Burkett, has been dismissed by the administration as a disgruntled former guardsman with an axe to grind. I can see why the second official wants to remain anonymous.

Burkett says that the state Guard commander, Maj. Gen. Daniel James III, discussed "cleansing" Bush's military files of embarrassing or incriminating documents in the summer of 1997. At the time, Burkett was a lieutenant colonel and a chief adviser to James. He says he was just outside James' open office door when his boss discussed the records on a speakerphone with Joe Allbaugh, who was then Gov. Bush's chief of staff.

Bush has since made James the national director of the Air National Guard.

The White House tonight has come out with a dental exam dated January 6, 1973 from Alabama. Well... case closed... problem solved- my heartfelt apologies go out to... oh... now wait a gosh darn minute... Bush returned to Texas in November of the previous year. Hmm... weird. No explanation offered from the White House.

It's likely that in this new bundle of documents received from the DOD has his DD-214. This document would tell the whole story of his entire enlistment. It's what every other presidential candidate who served releases. Last Sunday the President agreed to release all the records related to his service in order to clear this up- now he's decided not to do that. This thing's just snowballing...

Release the president's DD-214 and this all goes away.

Here's a new O'Reilly video showing him making a statement and then flip-flopping on it within thirty seconds.
Check it out.

Here's a great clip from yesterday's Daily Show with Jon Stewart- here they're covering the sudden long overdue awakening of the White House Press Corps.

"It did not involve a lawsuit against Dick Cheney as a private individual," Scalia said in response to a question from the audience of about 600 people. "This was a government issue. It's acceptable practice to socialize with executive branch officials when there are not personal claims against them. That's all I'm going to say for now. Quack, quack."

Gee, I wonder which way Scalia will come down on this issue?

He added, "...On top of that, Cheney explained the whole thing to me. He didn't do nothin' wrong. But hey, I'm just the fuckin' judge. What do you think of them apples?"

There are a lot of questions here- like why the 9/11 panel isn't hearing all the evidence... this is a must read.

At 9:30 a.m., six minutes after receiving orders from NORAD, three F-16’s were airborne, according to NORAD’s timeline. At first, the planes were directed toward New York and probably reached 600 miles per hour within two minutes, said Maj. Gen. Mike J. Haugen, adjutant general of the North Dakota National Guard. Once it was apparent that the New York suicide missions were accomplished, the Virginia-based fighters were given a new flight target: Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. The pilots heard an ominous squawk over the plane’s transponder, a code that indicates almost an emergency wartime footing. General Haugen says the F-16’s were asked to confirm that the Pentagon was on fire. The lead flier looked down and verified the worst.

Then the pilots received the most surreal order of the morning, from a voice identifying itself as a representative of the Secret Service. According to General Haugen, the voice said: "I want you to protect the White House at all costs."

More

You can tell it's him on account of the signage that follows him everywhere he appears.

A bit of funny insider journalism today. Kerry held a conference call with Wisconsin reporters on Tuesday to take questions and talk about the campaign. During the call, with about 50 reporters listening, a reporter from the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel asks Kerry why he hasn't agreed to participate in Sunday's planned debate in Milwaukee. There's a collectinve, "Huh?" from the rest of the state press corps, which had just assumed Kerry was participating along with the remaining Dem candidates. The funny part is that the debate is being organized by, you guessed it, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, which is conveniently leaving out of its promotions the fact that the Democratic front-runner has not committed to attend. Even better, nobody knew this until the JS's own reporter told everyone.

He doesn't even believe the shit he's spreading...

But under questioning from reporters, McClellan said the records do not specifically show that Bush reported for Guard duty in Alabama, where he spent much of 1972 working on a Senate campaign. And he said the White House has been unable to locate anyone who remembers serving with Bush during that period.

From the AP story:

"These documents clearly show that the president fulfilled his duties," McClellan said.

Photocopied payroll records distributed by the White House were not all legible.

Is it really a race if your opponent doesn't know you exist?

It's a question perhaps Bill O'Reilly has been pondering since being badly beaten in a book race which he initiated with former first lady and current New York Senator Hillary Clinton. Nightly on his show, "The O'Reilly Factor" O'Reilly compared his book sales to Hillary's, but it appears he was the only one following the race.

Finally today O'Reilly is admitting defeat- remarking, "We wanted to see if we could beat her." He and the other authors of his book couldn't, it wasn't even close. Bill O'Reilly claims he's sold 800,000 books to Clinton's 1.5 Million. O'Reilly has claimed on his show that most of Hillary's sales were to the DNC, but he's offered no evidence to back these statements up. Though one does have to wonder how many copies of O'Reilly's book Richard Mellon Scaife has purchased.

Bill O'Reilly can rest assured, he leads the race against Hillary in being a complete doormat selling whore.

It took 329 days and the re-release of Bill O'Reilly's naughty pulp novel "Those Who Tresspass" to get O'Reilly to admit he was wrong and to apologize, but he still let Bush off the hook.

Previously O'Reilly said he would never trust the Bush administration again if WMD didn't turn up in Iraq. They haven't, yet unsuprisingly he seems all too willing to accept the president's current claims that it was the intelligence was faulty after years of hearing the diametric opposite of that statement. Who's spinning now?

"I was wrong. I am not pleased about it at all and I think all Americans should be concerned about this."

Update: Viewers of The GMA interview indicate that this may be less of an apology to the American people than a rare case where Bill isn't on his own show, is pinned down, and ends up being forced to admit the truth.

No mention of the apology on his radio show, no mention of it on his TV show. He's burying it. We'll give it a few days to breathe, but it's clear O'Reilly has admitted he was wrong but we still may be waiting for the apology he owes us.

Three White House aides have testified before a grand jury and eight have been interviewed by the FBI regarding the Valerie Plame "Intimigate" matter. Phone records show that several White House officials spoke to Robert Novak days before Novak's column was published and Valerie Plame was exposed as an undercover CIA agent.

Someone's goin' down.

Unfortunately this evidence is undercut somewhat by Richard Cohen's column today in which he talks about his own similar circumstances in the national guard around the time the president was there. Cohen just sort stopped showing up and played hookey from the national guard, but he was still paid for meetings he didn't bother showing up for.

This is a mess that Bush could have cleared up years ago if he'd allowed the government to release all of his military records- something that even now, after vowing to release all the records, he is unwilling to actually do.

It's a tradition for presidential candidates to release all of their military records, Bush just doesn't want to, which is his right. He just shouldn't be terribly shocked when questions are raised.

The real question here is why did he miss that physical? The Guard spent a lot of money training him, then he refuses to submit for a physical. Is it just a coincidence that random drug testing started at that time?

The Defense Department has requested that President Bush's payroll records from his service in the National Guard be sent to Washington from a DOD archive in Colorado, to ascertain whether they can be released to news organizations and public interest groups that have formally requested them in recent days, according to DOD officials.

Andrew Sullivan does a thorough fisking of the President's Meet The Press interview and finally sees what the rest of us see- a bumbling, disengaged moron. Welcome to the party, Andy!

...if this is the level of coherence, grasp of reality, and honesty that is really at work in his understanding of domestic fiscal policy, then we are in even worse trouble than we thought. We have a captain on the fiscal Titanic who thinks he's in the Caribbean.

Link

Some pretty major developments on the George W. Bush AWOL story today- first the taped interview on Meet the Press which was aired today had the president agreeing to release of all of his military records, but then claiming that they had all been released during the 2000 campaign. That's not true, but listening to Mr. Bush one gets the distinct impression that he just doesn't know...

Now Kevin Drum has a story about the laughable ripped document which was offered as proof that Bush wasn't AWOL and was subsequently inserted into Mr. Bush's military records. Now the intact document has been found.

What does this mean? Well, it raises more questions than it answers. The original document was torn very specifically to cut off the year and dates indicated. Why? What exactly does ARF stand for? Was Bush put in the Air Force Reserve (Air Reserve Force?) as punishment for skipping out on his duties in the National Guard? In any case, one more piece of the puzzle is now out there. It'll take someone smarter than I to put it all together.

***WORLD EXCLUSIVE!!! MUST CREDIT OVERSPUN!***
Pictures of the president at the beginning and at the end of his Meet The Press interview give rumors of presidential shrinkage/spinelessness new credence, this space can reveal! Also in evidence is Mr. Bush's obvious facial work during the course of the interview to make him appear more presidential with the addition of "worry lines' on his forehead. An obvious attempt to strike back at his critics who charge his is disengaged and ignorant of the problems facing this country.

Bush before:


Bush after:

Shorter, wrinklier.

Anonymous senior officials could not be reached for comment after the interview. They know who they are.

Everyone should read this.

Just trying out headlines while I wait for the rest of the media to pick up the story... no one has picked it up since it was published by UPI/Insight this afternoon. We shall see if it's legit.

Bush Underlings Probed
Investigation Sucking Dick's Staff Dry
Dick Comes To A Head
Staff Under Bush Completely Fucked
Can Dick Hold His Head Up High?
Dick's Staff Leaks
Dick's Scooter In Deep

Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Vice President Dick Cheney's office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer's identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said.

According to these sources, John Hannah and Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, were the two Cheney employees. "We believe that Hannah was the major player in this," one federal law-enforcement officer said. Calls to the vice president's office were not returned, nor did Hannah and Libby return calls.

The strategy of the FBI is to make clear to Hannah "that he faces a real possibility of doing jail time" as a way to pressure him to name superiors, one federal law-enforcement official said.

Facinating.

The fingerpointing continues.

This article again ignores the fact that UN Weapons inspectors were in Iraq in 2003, mentioning only that UN inspectors were ousted in the 90's. This is the White House line- they want us to forget that Hans Blix was there last year with his team looking for weapons. We threw them out so we could "shock and awe" the Iraqi people. These facts are obviously inconvenient for Bush, so there's an effort to flush this information down the memory hole.

Never forget.

"I called him a traitor because of his involvement in the outing of Valerie Plame, which I think is unconscionable," Carr told us yesterday, recounting the Jan. 27 incident, which he reported to police. "He gave me a dirty look and ignored me, so I followed him outside to a CNN bus [where] I called him a traitor, probably for the fifth or sixth time. . . . He turned around and grabbed me by the arm . . . gave me a little shove, cocked his arm back as though he was going to hit me, and then someone from behind dragged him away to the bus."

Developing...

The Washington Post has another rehash of the story we've all known about since 2000... some of us haven't forgotten this story- it's amusing to see the media and the American public rediscover it. Amazing how things can go down the memory hole.

If you steal a car and you're never caught you're still a thief. Bush didn't show up for at least seven months (possibly more than a year) of national guard duty. On top of that, records show he missed a mandatory physical and was grounded. That is the very definition of being Absent With Out Leave. Where's the controversy?

Bush received preferential treatment, being the son of a powerful congressman and walked away from his duties early with an honorable discharge. Anyone else in that situation would have been sent off to 'Nam.

Josh Marshall mentions tonight that pay records are more reliable than a lot of other service records- that may be a route someone can take to get a definitive answer as to what the president blew, and when he blew it.

Be horrified that you were lied to.
Be horrified by the lack of weapons found in Iraq.
Be horrified that President Bush was warned by the outgoing Clinton administration that Bin Laden was the biggest threat to this country, but didn't listen.
Be horrified one of the first things President Bush did after taking office was disband the US intelligence unit tracking funding of Al Qaeda.
Be horrified that these facts aren't reported in the United States.
Be horrified that Condoleezza Rice said no one could have imagined hijacked planes being used as weapons after being warned by the CIA that hijacked planes could be used as weapons.
Be horrified that your president was on a month long vacation in August of 2001, then blamed the previous administration for causing September 11th.
Be horrified that your president's family was still in business with the Bin Laden family after 9/11.
Be horrified that your president is planning to end the 9/11 investigation before they've finished.
Be horrified that your president hasn't cooperated with the 9/11 investigation.
Be horrified that your president is manipulating the investigation into the WMD claims, directing it away from the administration.
Be horrified that three 13-15 year olds were just released from Guantanamo after more than two years.
Be horrified that your president has failed at everything he's ever attempted.
Be horrified that your president's $2.4 Trillion budget doesn't even include funding for current military operations.
Be horrified that Kristen Breitweiser has to deal with this shit on a daily basis.
Be horrified that the "Axis of Evil" didn't include Saudi Arabia.
Be horrified that your president can't pronounce "Nuclear."
Be horrified that your president continued reading to that classroom full of kids as thousands died.
Be horrified that your president evacuated the Bin Laden family against the FBI's wishes.
Be horrified that your president inflated the threat of Saddam Hussein.
Be horrified that your president now blames the CIA for inflating the threat of Saddam Hussein.
Be horrified that 49% of Americans still believe Saddam had something to do with 9/11.
Be horrified that your president thinks that steroids in professional sports is the biggest threat to America.
Be horrified that Peter Jennings didn't know the president was AWOL while in the National Guard.
Be horrified that your president said, "Bring it on."
Be horrified that it's being brought daily.
Be horrified that Halliburton is getting no-bid contracts.
Be horrified that Halliburton is committing fraud and inflating prices on it's services.
Be horrified that Halliburton is still paying Dick Cheney to this day.
Be horrified that our soldiers' benefits are being cut.
Be horrified we're in a jobless recovery.
Be horrified that we haven't found the guy who sent the Anthrax.
Be horrified that the constitution has been gutted.
Be horrified that we supplied the gas that Saddam used on his people.
Be horrified at Fox News's definition of "fair and balanced."
Be horrified Rumsfeld said of WMD, "We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat."
Be horrified that O'Reilly won't apologize.
Be horrified that Bush thinks he can get away with it.
Be horrified that Rush Limbaugh thinks having French ancestry is a reason to hate someone.
Be horrified that pretzels are like Kryptonite to the President.
Be horrified that Dick Cheney isn't some invention of a science fiction writer's fevered imagination.
Be horrified that Jessica Lynch even says it didn't happen that way.
Be horrified that Dick Cheney thinks that "deficits don't matter."
Be horrified by the casualties on the news every night.
Be horrified by our national debt, which our kids will be paying for throughout the rest of their lives.
Be horrified that Karl Rove repeatedly saying the words, "Stick to principle" has a soothing, calming effect on the president.
Be horrified that the president knew, and did nothing.

After all this and more... and a boob gets people angry?

Here are the ads CBS has decided we're all too dumb to see. Thank God they saved a spot for a horse fart joke and JJ's right breast! As an aside, I'm surprised about the winner. The runner-up ad takes a similar concept and presents it in a more honest and brutal fashion. Yeah, the winner is slick and well filmed, but it's message is fairly soft. Plus, I had to wonder if the director was implying that all children are destined to the slums of blue collar work if Bush is re-elected. It's this sort of white collar, bourgeouis arrogance the Dems have to get rid of if they're going to win in November.