U.N. Adopts Syria Resolution

"The U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution Monday demanding Syria's full cooperation with a U.N. investigation into the assassination of Lebanon's former prime minister and warning of possible "further action" if it doesn't."

A direct threat of sanctions was dropped in order to get support for the resolution from Russia and China.

More here.
--LynZee

Horror Story

It was a dark and stormy night.....
Cut to the chase of the most horrific, nightmarish scenario imaginable --
John Kerry as President!

Bush Nominates Alito

Impeccable credentials and qualifications. Extensive paper trail. In the mold of Scalia -- "Scalito", "Scalia Light".

Conservatives wanted a showdown fight, they'll probably get one.

They should be prepared to go to the mattresses and come out with more than a filibuster in their hands.

Re: Bush -- "He needs a fight that would help re-energize the conservative Republican base," Mr. Cook said. "But at the same time he can't afford a loss. He is in a profoundly weakened condition, and a loss on top of everything else that has happened all year would be terrible."

--LynZee

Historical Amnesia

"Hillary: S.Koreans have historical amnesia"

Teddy To The Rescue !

"Sen. Edward Kennedy attempted to rescue six men..."

Don't Fear Tough Issues

Bill Clinton to Dems:
"You can't say, 'Please don't be mean to me. Please let me win sometimes.'"
"If...you can't figure out how to beat these people then find something else to do."

Intellectual Web Of Dishonesty

"The Intellectual Dishonesty of Paul Krugman"

"Pelosi's attack on DeLay symbolizes Democrats' failures."

Boo....b !

"The Howard Dean wing of the Democratic Party has said you don't win by running as a paler version of the Republican mandate."

Libby Indicted

Lewis "Scooter" Libby was indicted for obstruction, false statement, and perjury in the CIA leak case.

No charges were brought for "outing" Valerie Plame or for leaking classified information.

Pat Fitzgerald analogizes that Joe Wilson’s wife got hit in the head with a baseball, and Libby’s alleged lying obstruction threw sand in umpire Fitz’s eyes, thereby preventing Fitz from determining intent of the leaks.

Fitz doesn’t know what Libby’s motives were, therefore he cannot charge Libby (or apparently anyone else) with “outing” a classified CIA officer.

So, Fitz can’t prove INTENT to knowingly “out”, and he’s left with what some categorize as “technical” crimes, by only one person, against the investigation.

But, to Fitz, Libby’s conviction for the indicted “technical” crimes will “vindicate the public interest” regarding the leak itself. Fitz said: “…it doesn't really, in the end, matter what statute you use if you vindicate the interest”.

Fitz believes a classified CIA officer’s cover was “blown”, and the public interest needs to be vindicated.

We know where Fitz is coming from -- any statute will do -- he’ll go with what he thinks he can prove, and it looks like a convincing case that Libby lied. However, there is always a presumption of innocence.

Karl Rove escaped indictment altogether to the dismay of the media and other Bush bashers. No charges for lying or “outing”. Evidence against Rove had to be very thin despite Rove’s identification as “Official A” who chatted with Bob Novak and then Libby.

If Fitz could have indicted Rove, he would have indicted Rove. At this point, it seems remote that Rove will ever be indicted.

Yet, Fitz said “the bulk” of the investigation is over, later “it’s not over”, and the investigation is ongoing.

It looks like Rove is off the hook UNLESS something comes out in the process of Libby’s prosecution -- trial testimony, plea copping, etc. -- and Fitz will pounce on anything close to intent or lesser charges.

After two years, the investigation produced no proof that a classified CIA officer was intentionally “outed”.

I believe there was no intent to “out”. The intent was to discredit a critic, Joe Wilson.

Libby Indicted
The Indictment
Press Release Describing the Indictment
Fitzgerald Press Conference
Libby Resigns
Cheney Statement
Statement by Counsel for Lewis Libby
Libby Defense Outlined
Charges Don't Address Leak
Rove Identified as "Official A"
Probe Not Over
New York Times take -- Fitz did say the indictments are not about the debate over the Iraq War.
Is That All There Is

"nothing in this indictment suggests a broad-based conspiracy" that requires endless further investigation by Congress or others.

Contradictions Between Testimony

Regarding Rove: clear him or indict him

Bush's Remarks on the Resignation of Scooter Libby:
"I got a job to do, and so do the people who work in the White House.

--LynZee

Plamegate

Special Prosecutor Pat Fitzgerald is expected to announce a final decision on Plamegate tomorrow.

--LynZee

"Miered"

"Miered" -- "unscrupulously torpedoed by an ally"

"Borked" -- "unscrupulously torpedoed by an opponent"

--LynZee

World Series Game 4

World Series Game 4

Sox 1
'Stros 0

Sox Sweep To Win World Series

Congrats to the Chicago White Sox.

Nobody enjoys losing, but Houston Astros fans aren't hanging our heads and we're not embarassed.

We are proud of the Astros and their National League Championship.

We Still B-lieve!

--LynZee

Conservative Rebellion Victorious

Harriet Miers has withdrawn her Supreme Court nomination.

Here's to finding an ideologue nominee that will satisfy conservatives who feel entitled AND not be filibustered.

Rotsa Ruck!

--LynZee

World Series Game 3

World Series Game 3

14 Innings

Sox 7
'Stros 5

--LynZee

"It Wasn't Just Miller's Story"

Robert Kagan debunks the increasingly popular claim that Judith Miller's pre-war reporting on Iraq WMD "was the primary reason Americans went to war".

That this absurd claim even needs debunking is testament to the self possessed inflated esteem of the New York Times.

--LynZee

Rosa Parks

"Y'all better make it light on yourselves and let me have those seats."

Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat for a white man.

"...the only tired I was, was tired of giving in."

She wouldn't get up, but she took a stand and launched the modern civil rights movement.

Rosa Parks died yesterday. She was 92.

--LynZee

Iraq Has A Constitution

Iraq's Draft Constitution Approved with a 61% voter turnout and a 78% national approval.

The Sunnis could not muster a 2/3 majority "no" vote in at least 3 provinces.

It's a slap in the face defeat for terrorist insurgents, and a victory for ballots over bombs.

--LynZee

Joe Wilson's Wife

NYT is reporting:

George Tenet, then-director CIA, told Dick Cheney that Wilson's wife worked at CIA.

Dick Cheney told Scooter Libby on June 12, 2003.

Notes of the conversation "contain no suggestion that either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby knew at the time of Ms. Wilson’s undercover status or that her identity was classified".

"It would not be illegal for either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby, both of whom are presumably cleared to know the government’s deepest secrets, to discuss a C.I.A. officer or her link to a critic of the administration."

There has been a lot of leaking of grand jury proceedings in this case. But, I guess it's NOT criminal if the NYT benefits from the leak with a splashy front page headline: "Cheney Told....".

Notes of the conversation conflict with Libby's testimony that he first learned about Ms. Wilson from journalists. That's the hot water for Libby.

How long will it take the attack dog speculators to spin this one -- who else did Cheney tell. Think about it.

The administration is smart enough to strategize to answer a critic, but not stupid enough to knowingly out an undercover CIA operative.

It's time to dispense with the waiting game. Fitzgerald needs to either poop or get off the pot. If he has a case against Libby, Rove, and/or others lying, obstructing justice, or whatever -- then get on with it.

I, for one, am sick of Judith Miller, anonymous sources, and grand jury leaks about investigating leaks.

When are all the chicken sh*t, leaky lawyers and confidential sources going to go on the record with this stuff? Oh, that's right, it's CRIMINAL to go on the record about grand jury proceedings. I'm sick of reading about grand jury leaks in the Washington Post and New York Times.
--LynZee

"Fourth Estate's vainglorious paeans to source confidentiality"

"So vital to our democracy, to our liberties, yea, to our very lives is the principle that a reporter must be able to conceal the identity of a source that nothing can supersede it. No subpoena, no public-safety urgency, no cry for justice. The lips of these titans are sealed."

"Unless you've been living under a rock, you now know that Scooter Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, was Miller's source that Plame worked at the CIA. And you know that Karl Rove, President Bush's top political adviser, was a source who confirmed that fact for Cooper."

"But how do you know?"

"the journalists decided to tell you"

"Miller and Cooper both made certain that the public knew every syllable uttered by the sources they've sanctimoniously told us, again and again, they made commitments to shield."

"And they did it in the worst possible way: in hyper-hyped, autobiographical, self-adulating accounts of their valiant struggle to withhold information from a grand jury despite that nagging inconvenience the rest of us know as the law."

Read all of it. (via Power Line)

Then check out Judith Miller's response in the latest round of mud slinging e-mails. Ugly.

If only Fitzgerald could / would indict these fools for hypocrisy.
--LynZee

World Series Game 2

World Series Game 2

Sox 7
'Stros 6

--LynZee

Bizarre Irony

"In July 2003, Joseph Wilson used his insider status as a former CIA consultant to accuse the Bush Administration of lying about Iraq WMD as an excuse to go to war. A political furor erupted, and Mr. Wilson became an antiwar celebrity who joined the Kerry for President campaign."

"Amid an election campaign and a war, Bush Administration officials understandably fought back. One way they did so was to tell reporters that Mr. Wilson's wife, CIA analyst Valerie Plame, had been instrumental in getting him the CIA consulting job. This was true--though Mr. Wilson denied it at the time--as a bipartisan report by the Senate Intelligence Committee documented in 2004."

"Mr. Wilson's original claims about what he found on a CIA trip to Africa, what he told the CIA about it, and even why he was sent on the mission have since been discredited." (Butler Report and Senate Intell Report)

"What a bizarre irony it would be if what began as a politically motivated lie by Mr. Wilson nonetheless leads to indictments of Bush Administration officials for telling reporters the truth."

"Ms. Plame was surely not undercover, and her own husband had essentially made her "outing" inevitable when he exploited his former CIA consultant status (that she had helped him obtain) to inject himself in the middle of a Presidential campaign."

"You could hardly pick up a paper in 2004 without reading selectively leaked details from classified documents leading up to the Iraq War--an obvious attempt to discredit the war and elect John Kerry."

"The temptation for any special counsel, who has only one case to prosecute, is to show an indictment for his money and long effort. But Mr. Fitzgerald's larger obligation is to see that justice is done, and that should include ensuring that he doesn't become the agent for criminalizing policy differences."

"Defending a policy by attacking the credibility of a political opponent--Mr. Wilson--should not be a felony."

Read the whole thing.
--LynZee

Year of the Hurricanes

Wilma Picks Up Speed, Heads for Florida

Alpha Sets Record As 22nd Atlantic Storm

Enough already.
--LynZee

Judith Miller, You're Fired!

Byron Calame, New York Times public editor, on The Miller Mess:

"It seems to me that whatever the limits put on her, the problems facing her inside and outside the newsroom will make it difficult for her to return to the paper as a reporter."

Not quite bitchy enough? Send in MoDo.

--LynZee

World Series Game 1

World Series Game 1:

Sox 5
'Stros 3

-LynZee

Running Amok

Judith Miller "misled" The New York Times.
So says Bill Keller, Times' executive editor, in a wish-list e-mail of what he shoulda, coulda done differently while all those "alarm bells" were going off.

He's long distance running amok from Judy Miller.

His defense -- we did the right thing, but Judy "misled" [insert lied] to us.

"If we had lanced the WMD boil earlier, we might have damped any suspicion that THIS time, the paper was putting the defense of a reporter above the duty to its readers."

Big "if". I doubt that boil lancing (yuk) would have damped suspicions because "putting the defense of a reporter above the duty to its readers" is exactly what the Times did.

But, hey, don't blame Bill: Judy..."misled Phil Taubman about the extent of her involvement."

"But if I had known the details of Judy's entanglement with Libby...". Wink, wink -- we all know what "entanglement" is supposed to mean.

Now is revealed more about the sudden mysterious appearance of Judy's notes and notebook of a June
23 meeting with Libby. In another section of the notebook, she wrote the name "Valerie Flame" (can anybody keep a straight face?) and can't recall who told her the name.

"The New York Times' Judith Miller belatedly gave prosecutors her notes of a key meeting in the CIA leak probe only after being shown White House records of it"

So, they got the goods on her -- she had to cough up the notebook and testify about this meeting, too.

Judy's lawyer, Bob Bennett, says it is "absolutely false" to suggest she withheld information about a June 2003 meeting with Libby.

Not volunteering info sounds like withholding info. But remember Judy cut a deal to narrow the scope of her testimony.

Miller says Keller's e-mail is "seriously inaccurate".

"As for Keller's remark about "my `entanglement' with Mr. Libby, I had no personal, social, or other relationship with him except as a source," Miller wrote."

Now there is a boil that needs to be lanced.

While the Times is divorcing Miller, they should lance all their boils that plague the newspaper
with all the pus that's fit to print.

--LynZee

Accountability For Syria

"the Security Council has a rare opportunity to enforce consequences for a state-sponsored act of political murder."

"The Syrian sponsors of Mr. Hariri's murder must be identified and brought to justice; if that includes Mr. Assad and his relatives, so be it."

""there is probable cause to believe" that the decision to assassinate Rafik Hariri could not have been taken without the approval of "top-ranked" Syrian security officials."

"The publication of the report on the deaths of Hariri and 22 other people in a car bombing in Beirut on Feb. 14 unleashed a reaction seldom seen in the Middle East. To many people here, its publication marked a turning point in Middle East politics.....The most immediate fallout was growing pressure in Lebanon for the resignation of the country's pro-Syrian president, Emile Lahoud."

February, 2005: "Iran has vowed to back Syria against "challenges and threats" as both countries face strong US pressure."

--LynZee

Update:
UN office doctored report on Hariri
Is there someone in high office at the U.N. who can't handle the truth?

Houston Astros' Fans Gone Wild !

Celebrations reach fever pitch!

We B-lieve!

City of Houston going wild over the 'Stros!

It's "No Sox" day in Houston. The city is electrified over the Astros National League Championship. It's been a long time coming. Win or lose, there is jubilation for the first ever Astros World Series appearance.

Thank God or the Devil, but -- how sweet it is!

We want to "knock their socks off".

Whatever happens in the Series, we love our 'Stros and our Killer B's.


Brandon Backe
Craig Biggio
Jeff Bagwell
Chris Burke
Eric Bruntlett
Lance Berkman
Brad Ausman

Roy Oswalt
Roger Clemens
Andy Pettitte
Chad Qualls
Brad Lidge
Dan Wheeler

Morgan Ensberg
Mike Lamb
Jason Lane
Adam Everett
Willie Taveras
Orlando Palmeiro

Jose Vizcaino
Mike Gallo
Russ Springer
Wandy Rodriguez
Ezequiel Astacio
Raul Chavez

Go 'Stros !!!

Related:

Astros: National League Champs !

Go 'Stros !

"Bye, Bye, Hariri"

LGF: "The UN has concluded that Syrian and Lebanese security officials stalked former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri for weeks before murdering him in February"

WaPo: In blunt language, the report by German
prosecutor Detlev Mehlis concludes that the Valentine's
Day bombing of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri
and 22 others "could not have been taken without the
approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and
could not have been further organized without the
collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security forces."

Duh.
--LynZee

Gateway Pundit has more.

Rush To Judgment

WaPo: If administration officials deliberately blew Valerie Plame's "undercover" status, they should be punished.

"Special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald may have evidence that they did; there is a still a great deal that is not publicly known. But so far, in the accounts given by reporters about their conversations with administration officials, no such crime has been described. What has been depicted is an administration effort to refute the allegations of a critic (some of which did in fact prove to be untrue) and to undermine his credibility, including by suggesting that nepotism rather than qualifications led to his selection."

"If such conversations are deemed a crime, journalism
and the public will be the losers."

Power Line: Plame Indictments -- If what I'm hearing is reliable, expect some soon.

Update:
NYT: "Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby have been advised that they may be in serious legal jeopardy" "Among the charges that Mr. Fitzgerald is considering are perjury, obstruction of justice and false statement"

Related:
Conspiracy Theory -- Again
--LynZee

THIS Is A Mug Shot?

Rep. Tom DeLay was photographed, fingerprinted and released on bond on state conspiracy and money laundering charges.

"A photo of DeLay grinning from ear to ear doesn't pack quite the punch in a Democratic attack ad as one that looks more like the mugshot of, say, actor Hugh Grant."

"The photo looks like it could have been taken anywhere."

"And that was just the point."
--LynZee

Astros: National League Champs !

Houston Astros

Win National League Championship !

Woo - Hoo !

First World Series Appearance !

Go 'Stros !!!

Miers Backed Anti-Abortion Amendment

Harriet Miers "pledged support in 1989 for a constitutional amendment that would ban abortions except when necessary to save the life of the woman."

"The disclosure virtually guarantees that Ms. Miers will be questioned heavily during hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee on abortion rights and whether she can separate her personal views from legal issues."

"Miers indicated her support for a "Human Life Amendment" on an April 1989 questionnaire she filled out for Texans United for Life when she was a candidate for the Dallas City Council."

"A candidate taking a political position in the course of a campaign is different from the role of a judge making a ruling in the judicial process." said Jim Dyke, a White House spokesman.

--LynZee

"return every single illegal entrant, no exceptions"

"Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said his department aims without exception to expel all those who enter the United States illegally."

"Our goal at DHS (Homeland Security) is to completely eliminate the 'catch and release' enforcement problem, and return every single illegal entrant, no exceptions.

All right, Mike. You've said it, now do it.
--LynZee

Butcher of Baghdad Goes on Trial

Saddam Hussein goes on trial tomorrow for the 1982 murder execution of nearly 150, mainly Shiite, Iraqis following a failed assassination attempt on his life.

This trial is being held first because it was the easiest and quickest case to put together.

An Iraqi tribunal will conduct the trial.

Critics argue that the proper forum should have been similar to the international tribunal in the Hague conducting the never-ending trial of former Yugoslav president, Slobodan Milosevic.

Enter the human rights groups with their concerns about the possibility, or rather to them, the impossibility of a fair trial in Iraq.

I'm confident the Iraqis will deal fairly with Saddam. He will get a fair trial, unlike those who were massacred.
--LynZee

CIA vs. The White House

IT WAS THE ELECTION, STUPID

"As Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald readies his indictments against probable targets Lewis I. “Scooter” Libby and Karl Rove, the unfortunate truth is that any criminal proceedings against these or other current and former White House officials will validate the partisan political tactics used by the CIA to undermine the Bush Administration’s case for war."

"This was not a case of a faction at the CIA resisting White House blame shifting. It was not a case of “setting the record straight” or “protecting the integrity” of the CIA. It was a case of naked, power politics played out at the highest levels of government as a small, partisan group of CIA analysts and operatives sought, through the use of selected leaking of cherry-picked information to friendly reporters, to influence the Presidential election of 2004."

Read the whole thing at Right Wing Nut House.
--LynZee

Harriet Miers: The Conference Call

John Fund WSJ:

"On Oct. 3, the day the Miers nomination was announced.....religious conservatives held a conference call to discuss the nomination. One of the people on the call took extensive notes, which I have obtained. According to the notes, two of Ms. Miers's close friends--both sitting judges--said during the call that she would vote to overturn Roe."

"The benign interpretation of the comments is that the two judges were speaking on behalf of themselves, not Ms. Miers or the White House, and they were therefore offering a prediction, not an assurance, about how she would come down on Roe v. Wade. But the people I interviewed who were on the call took the comments as an assurance, and at least one based his support for Ms. Miers on them."

This will almost certainly provoke Democrat opposition to Miers' confirmation. But isn't that what Miers' conservative critics want -- her name withdrawn, her confirmation opposed?
--LynZee

"The Cause" and "Little Miss Run Amok"

The Cause: The New York Times wants a federal shield law for journalists.

Run Amok: They used Judith Miller to try and get it.

“My notes do not show that Mr. Libby identified Mr. Wilson’s wife by name. Nor do they show that he described Valerie Wilson as a covert agent or “operative”.”

Judy testified before the grand jury AFTER she cut a deal with prosecutor Pat Fitzgerald to “limit his questions to Mr. Libby and the Wilson matter.”

The “deal” is the crux of this entire charade. The bit about the voluntary waiver seems a bunch of baloney.

Without the “deal”, Judy “would have been unable to protect other confidential sources who had provided information - unrelated to Mr. Wilson or his wife – for articles published in The Times”.

It’s the “other sources” and herself that Judy was protecting -- not Libby -- and she was willing to be the so-called martyr for The New York Times’ “cause”, provided she didn’t have to stay in jail for too long a time.

Judy testified that Libby told her on July 8, 2003 that Wilson’s “wife works at Winpac”.

Judy testified that in her July 12, 2003 Libby interview notes, the words “Victoria Wilson” were written in her notebook: “I told Mr. Fitzgerald that I was not sure whether Mr. Libby had used this name…”.

After Judy’s first grand jury appearance, she “found” another notebook. This one had notes from a June 23, 2003 interview with Scooter Libby. Judy noted: “wife works in bureau?” -- referring to Libby’s first mention of Wilson’s wife. In a different section of the notebook, Judy had written “Valerie Flame”.

Judy was asked to explain the “Valerie Flame” notation: “I said I believed the information came from another source, whom I could not recall”.

Maybe she could not recall, maybe not.

Judy IS a real whack job: “Valerie Flame”, “Victoria Wilson”.

The New York Times has rightly been heavily criticized about their participation in, and coverage of this story. But Judy didn’t want to play the martyr anymore. She was “dealt” a get out of jail free card.

From martyr to patsy: “Interviews show that the paper’s leadership, in taking what they considered to be a principled stand, ultimately left the major decisions in the case up to Ms. Miller, an intrepid reporter whom editors found hard to control.”

Yeah, right.
--LynZee

Iraq Votes on Constitutional Referendum

Network Megaphones

“The big three nightly newscasts have become megaphones for the anti-war movement,”

via Barone.

--LynZee

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Here's Michelle Kosinski paddling fast as she can in the floodwaters of Wayne, New Jersey.

Poor Michelle -- the stunt was given away when two dudes in hip boots walked in front of the camera showing the water to be only ankle deep!

Ah, a picture paints a thousand words -- all of them "laughing stock" -- and proves the shallowness of the main stream media.

"It's not like we were trying to pass it off as something it wasn't," spokeswoman Lauren Kapp said.

Did someone mention staged?

--LynZee

Baghdad Blackout

In an effort to sabotage the Iraqi constitutional referendum on the eve of the vote, insurgents
"sabotaged power lines, knocking out electricity across
Baghdad area Friday and plunging the capital into
darkness".

Insurgents also "detonated a bomb outside the Sunni Islamic Party's office in central Baghdad, then set fire to the party's main office in Fallujah".

In preparation for voting, "Tens of thousands of Iraqi army troops and policemen, meanwhile, formed security rings around the nation's estimated 6,000 polling stations and set up checkpoints on highways and inside cities".

Passage of the referendum is a key step in Iraq's transition toward democracy.

--LynZee

Ray Nagin -- Again

At a recent seminar about the rebuilding efforts, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin asked the crowd: "How do I ensure that New Orleans is not overrun by Mexican workers?"

Via WizBang who has multiple choice reactions. Number three hits the mark: "If any white politician had said such a thing, they'd be lynched."

--LynZee

The Miers nomination didn't have to go this way.

Fred Barnes: "Bush supporters who were angry over Miers should have waited. That's the bottom line. Rather than bellow that Miers isn't qualified and won't turn the Court to the right, they should have
given her a chance to prove her conservatism at the hearings. They owed Bush at least that much."

--LynZee

Kennedy Supports Kerry

Ted Kennedy would back John Kerry for president in 2008.

"If he runs, I would support him,"

"He criticized President Bush's leadership and said of the American people: "Every day, I think they regret that John wasn't elected.""

Is he kidding or what? Every day, I give THANKS
that John wasn't elected.
--LynZee

Bird Flu

To the list of tsunamis, hurricanes, floods, wildfires, and earthquakes, add avian flu pandemic as the next disaster for which we are unprepared.

Similar to the 1918 flu, the virus is airborne and
transmitted through bird droppings and uncooked
meat. The H5N1 strain is in the bird excrement.

Currently the flu can be transmitted from bird to bird or bird to human. The concern is that the virus will mutate to a form easily transmitted from human to human.

The best response is "containment" through vaccine and quarantine. Questions are raised about stockpiles and speeded up production of vaccines, and whether troops should be used to enforce quarantines.

Meanwhile, birds are being slaughtered by the thousands in Asia, imports are banned, and the virus has reached Europe.

Sadly it isn't a question of if, but when.
--LynZee

Another Katrina Media Myth

CQ: "Remember the "toxic soup" that flooded New Orleans, the one that the media widely reported was so polluted that mere momentary exposure could burn the skin and create potentially mortal illness for Katrina victims?

As with the widespread gunfire, rapes, and murders, the toxic soup turns out to be another media myth. The Washington Post reports that an extensive look at the floodwaters reveals that its composition appears equivalent to floodwaters anywhere else:"

The media coverage of Katrina would be laughable if it weren't so pathetic -- another entity that can't be trusted to tell the truth.
--LynZee

Compromise

"Parliament on Wednesday approved a set of last-minute amendments to Iraq's draft constitution, sealing a compromise aimed at gaining Sunni support in this weekend's crucial referendum, the parliament speaker said.

The deal - which greatly increases the chances the constitution will be passed in Saturday's vote - came as insurgents pressed their campaign to wreck the referendum."

Good news for Iraq, bad news for terrorists.
--LynZee

Terrorist Pen Pals

Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s number two world terrorist, has penned an epistle to his pal Zarqawi, al-Qaeda’s number one terrorist in Iraq.

There is much concern here about maintaining the popular support that will be needed to fill the void after the U.S. exits Iraq. Televised beheadings won’t win support. Killing Shia won’t win support. The Shia must be appeased and civil war avoided. Iran must not be antagonized. Half the battlefield is in the media.

The basic message is: when the Americans run, move in for the take-over. Maintain popular support for the take-over. In the meantime, send money.

Highlights of the letter:

Zawahiri is facing “difficulty and hardships”.

“danger comes from the agent Pakistani army that is carrying out operations in the tribal areas looking for mujahedeen.”

“our intended goal in this age is the establishment of a caliphate”

Stages to attain goal:
1. “Expel the Americans from Iraq.”
2. “Establish an Islamic authority or amirate”
3. “Extend the jihad wave to the secular countries neighboring Iraq.”
4. “the clash with Israel”

Establishment of the caliphate through jihad requires popular support.

“The Americans will exit soon”

“Things may develop faster than we imagine. The aftermath of the collapse of American power in Vietnam-and how they ran and left their agents-is noteworthy. Because of that, we must be ready starting now, before events overtake us, and before we are surprised by the conspiracies of the Americans and the United Nations and their plans to fill the void behind them.”

“it's imperative that…there be an appeasement of [Shia] Muslims and a sharing with them in governance”

“We don't want to repeat the mistake of the Taliban, who restricted participation in governance to the students and the people of Qandahar alone.”

Attacks on Shia mosques “won't be acceptable to the Muslim populace”

Zawahiri questions the wisdom of inciting civil war with Shia: “is the opening of another front now in addition to the front against the Americans and the government a wise decision?”

“And do the brothers forget that we have more than one hundred prisoners - many of whom are from the leadership who are wanted in their countries - in the custody of the Iranians? And even if we attack the Shia out of necessity, then why do you announce this matter and make it public, which compels the Iranians to take counter measures? And do the brothers forget that both we and the Iranians need to refrain from harming each other at this time in which the Americans are targeting us?”

Scenes of Slaughter:
“Among the things which the feelings of the Muslim populace who love and support you will never find palatable - also- are the scenes of slaughtering the hostages.”

“we are in a battle, and that more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media. And that we are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our Umma.”

“And we can kill the captives by bullet. That would achieve that which is sought after without exposing ourselves to the questions and answering to doubts. We don't need this.”

“I have a definite desire to travel to you but I do not know whether that is possible”

“many of the lines have been cut off. Because of this, we need a payment while new lines are being opened. So, if you're capable of sending a payment of approximately one hundred thousand, we'll be very grateful to you.”

“American Intelligence” acquired Zawahiri’s computer, and published some of the contents.
--------
Popular support for a democratic Iraq terrorizes the terrorists. It’s what they fear most as Iraq moves toward a constitutional referendum.

The battlefield is also in the liberal, American media. The agenda is to hasten an early, pre-mature U.S. exit from Iraq. Zawahiri is preparing.
--LynZee

New York Subway Threat Was A Hoax

"The subway terrorist threat that gripped New York last weekend was a hoax stemming from false intelligence provided by a normally reliable informant, US law enforcement officials were quoted as saying."

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, "We're going to take every single threat that has any chance of being credible seriously and do exactly what we did."

Remember, we have to get it right every time, the terrorists only have to get it right once.
--LynZee

Ronnie Earle Subpoenaed

It's a fight all right. But it takes place in a courtroom -- not the O.K. Corral.

"Lawyers for indicted Rep. Tom DeLay on Tuesday subpoenaed the prosecuting Texas district attorney [Ronnie Earle] in an effort to show he acted improperly with grand jurors."

Earle has been shopping for grand juries.

The first one indicted DeLay for a crime that did not exist.

Dick DeGuerin, DeLay's attorney, filed a motion to have those charges dismissed.

Earle then came up with money laundering charges. A second grand jury decided against an indictment of DeLay. This really made Earle mad, and for some reason the jury's refusal to indict was not made public.

A motion filed last week said Earle "'incited' the foreman [William Gibson] of the first grand jury to violate grand jury secrecy by talking publicly about the case - in an effort to influence grand jurors still sitting".

"The lawyers said Earle then spoke about the case with members of the first grand jury, whose work was finished, to get their opinion of what they might have done if they had known their conspiracy indictment was flawed."

"Earle then submitted the grand jury opinions to the third grand jury to persuade it to hand down the money laundering indictment."

Prosecutorial abuse -- fancy term for "dirty tricks" from the "Earle of Injustice".

Power Line has the letter Dick DeGuerin sent to Earle.
--LynZee

Sexism? It's Possible

One can't help but wonder if Harry Miers would receive as much criticism as Harriet Miers.

A "possibility" of sexism is a valid response.

"Asked by host Matt Lauer if sexism might be playing a role in the Miers controversy, she [Laura Bush] said, "It's possible. I think that's possible. . . . I think people are not looking at her accomplishments.""

If confirmed, Harriet Miers will be only the third woman to sit on the Supreme Court. It's reasonable to conclude that sexism has been a factor in the dearth of female nominees.

This time, to conservatives, ideology trumps gender. Otherwise, exhortations to nominate a woman would be heard more loudly.

Personally, I don't defend a person because I expect to be thanked.
--LynZee

Update: WaPo and Reuters got it wrong
(?on purpose?). Laura Bush wasn't quoted accurately! (via Big Lizards)

Cowboys And Cowgirls

Big Lizards pegs Bush a Cowboy and Harriet Miers a Cowgirl.

Cowboys "are intelligent but non-intellectual (even anti-intellectual) folks who don't try to articulate their conservativeness... they simply live it."

Yee-ha!
--LynZee

Firing Squad For Miers -- IT'S NUTS

Right Wing Nut House:
"The consequences of a Presidential defeat over the Miers nomination at this point in the Bush Presidency cannot be overstated."

"the quickest way to emasculate the President and make the rest of his term an irrelevancy is to have conservatives gather around in a circle and open fire at the nominee."

"More of a problem for the White House are conservative activists who are heavily represented on the web and are actually writing about some kind of bloody coup d’etat to either defeat the nominee on the floor of the Senate or put enough pressure on the White House to withdraw the nomination."

"Lame Duckiness is staring George Bush right in the face and here comes a bunch of conservatives running toward this particular gasoline dump trying desperately to keep the match lit long enough so that they can experience the deep and abiding satisfaction of self-immolation."

--LynZee

Just Wondering

Re: CIA leak case.

Just One Minute wonders if The New York Times had Judy Miller's recently discovered notebook in their possession, and misled the prosecutor.

Jack Shafer at Slate wonders if prosecutor Fitzgerald will invoke "espionage law" in his pursuit of the Plame leakers. (via Instapundit)

"National-security reporters—none of whom have clearances—receive classified information for a living. If the government used espionage law to investigate government leaks to the press, the effect would be an unofficial secrets act criminalizing thousands, if not tens of thousands, of annual conversations between sources and reporters."

--LynZee

Listen To The Base

"Nearly half of Senate Republicans say they remain unconvinced that Harriet Miers is worthy of being confirmed to the Supreme Court, according to a survey conducted by The Washington Times."

On the other hand:

"Most Republican chairmen interviewed expressed confidence in Mr. Bush's choice and said they were picking up little, if any, criticism from their rank and file."

"They said we trust the president,"

"From my perspective, the skepticism and criticism [from conservative groups] is an inside-the-Beltway phenomenon,"

Comments from Squiggler via Instapundit.

"I think the "inside the beltway" crowd of pundits and loudmouths needs to shut up and listen to the Republican base, which according to today's Washington Times has no complaints about Miers. This isn't about Harriet Miers, this is about a bunch of massive egos getting bruised because the President didn't say "how high" when they ordered him to jump. I just can't believe how otherwise smart people are being so incrdedibly stupid on this one. It isn't the President who screwed up here, it is Kristol, Krauthammer, Coulter, Buchanan, et al who are destroying five years of hard work and who, like little children who don't get their way, are having public temper tantrums..."

Perhaps Senate Republicans should listen to the Republican base, too.

WSJ: "Readers make the case against the case against the Miers nomination."

--LynZee

Earthquake

Massive earthquake in Pakistan.

Gateway Pundit has the round-up here, here, here.


Tsunamis, hurricanes, floods, wildfires, earthquakes. What next?
--LynZee

New Orleans Latest

What can a poor, stressed out cop do except beat up an old drunk?

Add video-taped assault and battery, looting, desertion, corruption, and theft of 41 Cadillacs to the list of "troubling" actions of the New Orleans Police Department.

Troubling, indeed. That's putting it mildly.

Mayor Ray Nagin has an economic solution: casino gambling. At least the city wouldn't have to pay for cops' Vegas vacations.

Get this: Levee breaches did not result from "hurricane surges that sent water over the tops of the walls" -- the breaches were caused by "massive soil failures under concrete storm walls".

--LynZee
Update: The cops in the beating video plead not guilty!

Don't Go There

"a coalition of Democrats and conservative Republicans could possibly sink this nomination.....conservative Republican Senators shouldn't go there."

"In the case of Harriet Miers...we are talking about someone who might be another O'Connor but is just as likely to vote with Scalia in the vast majority of big cases."

"In this situation, it seems imprudent to blow up the confirmation process---and possibly the Bush presidency and the Republican party--to block her nomination."

--LynZee

Promises For Votes

Ruth Ginsberg set the precedent:
"...it is best that I not do anything that could be...used as a prediction of how I might vote...".

John Roberts played umpire:
"Judges are not politicians who can promise to do certain things in exchange for votes."

But "promises for votes" is exactly what conservatives want from Harriet Miers.

They equate promises with past rulings and paper trails. Miers has neither.

Lacking a promise in the form of past rulings and paper trails, conservatives attack Miers' background, experience, scholarship, and friendship with Bush.

Bush promised "to nominate justices who would interpret the law strictly and not legislate from the bench. He believes Ms. Miers would be such a justice".

"it is no more legitimate for conservatives than for liberals to demand satisfaction on the "key issues of the day,"."

"it is no more Ms. Miers's job to promise Mr. Brownback her vote to overturn Roe than it was Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.'s job to promise Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) his vote to sustain it."

Incrementalism: "Republican majority can be made a permanent feature of the landscape if you build it one small brick at a time. Miers is, at best, such a brick"

--LynZee

Go 'Stros

The Astros were down 6-1 against the Atlanta Braves, tied it up 6-6 in the ninth, and went on to win the historic Game 4 of the National League Division Series 7-6 on Chris Burke's walkoff home run in the 18th inning.

Go 'Stros

--LynZee

Ideological Battle

Argument: There are not enough Republican votes in the Senate to win an ideological fight over a nominee like Michael Luttig, Edith Jones, or Janice Rogers Brown.

Mark Levin: The Gang of 14 "did make it much more difficult for the president to win an ideological battle over a Supreme Court nominee."

"The Democrats did, in fact, send warnings that they were prepared to filibuster the second nominee."

"And under such circumstances, the president would have needed 60 votes to confirm his candidate, not 51."

"Today the president would have to persuade seven of the most unreliable Republican senators to trigger the so-called nuclear option in order to clear the way for an up-or-down vote for, say, a Luttig."

"And it's likely the Democrat leadership would have succeeded in convincing at least some (if not most) of the seven Democrat moderates to oppose a rule change."

"I have no doubt that this was part of the White House's political calculation."

Read all of it.
--LynZee

Does Anybody Else Want To Testify?

Federal prosecutors have accepted an offer, made in July, from Karl Rove.

Bush Speech

Bush at his best today, delivering a major War On Terror speech that was originally slated for the 9/11 anniversary but was postponed due to hurricanes.

"Some call this evil Islamic radicalism. Others militant jihadism. Still, others Islamo-fascism."

"This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision: the establishment, by terrorism and subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom. "

"Their tactic to meet this goal has been consistent for a quarter century: They hit us and expect us to run."

"the militants believe that controlling one country will rally the Muslim masses, enabling them to overthrow all moderate governments in the region and establish a radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia. "

"With greater economic and military and political power, the terrorists would be able to advance their stated agenda: to develop weapons of mass destruction, to destroy Israel, to intimidate Europe, to assault the American people and to blackmail our government into isolation. "

"The hatred of the radicals existed before Iraq
was an issue and it will exist after Iraq is no
longer an excuse."

"Over the years, these extremists have used a litany of excuses for violence: Israeli presence on the West Bank or the U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia or the defeat of the Taliban or the crusades of a thousand years ago.

"In fact, we're not facing a set of grievances that can be soothed and addressed. We're facing a radical ideology with unalterable objectives: to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world."

"Overall, the United States and our partners have disrupted at least 10 serious Al Qaida terrorist plots since September the 11th, including three Al Qaida plots to attack inside the United States. We've stopped at least five more Al Qaida efforts to case targets in the United States or infiltrate operatives into our country."

Read the whole thing, or watch the re-broadcast on c-span at 11:00 pm eastern time tonight.
--LynZee

Re: Bill Bennett's Comments On Blacks, Abortion, And Crime

Food for thought from Courtland Milloy:

"Forget about Bennett's absurd crime cure — a proposal he acknowledged would be morally wrong — and just look at the most recent analysis of abortion data, released in July by the Alan Guttmacher Institute."

"African-American women, who make up only 13 percent of the U.S. female population, accounted for 32 percent of the 1,293,000 abortions performed in the United States in 2002."

"That's 413,760 abortions performed on black women in one year"

"If the Ku Klux Klan were killing blacks the way blacks kill blacks, we'd be up in arms."

Read the whole thing.

I agree that abortion as a cure for crime is morally wrong.
--LynZee

Step Aside -- Hint, Hint

Bill Kristol is so disappointed, depressed, and demoralized that he is hinting/urging/pressuring
Harriet Miers to step aside.

"Maybe she would do the president a favor by stepping aside."

"And, she could well decide that this is hurting the president...and that the best thing to do would be step aside...and let him make another pick."

Call it the "step aside" strategy to scuttle Miers' nomination.

And this from the premiere Richard Nixon loyalist, Pat Buchanan:

"Republican Senators Should Not Rally Around Their President".

Call it the "party loyalty asks too much" strategy. (But, Watergate Was A Coup D'Etat!)

They're part of George Will's very large bandwagon.

--LynZee

Louis Freeh Rattles Clinton's Skeletons

Via Drudge: Former FBI Director Louis Freeh had a terrible relationship with President Bill Clinton "because Clinton’s scandals made him a constant target of FBI investigations".

Clinton's "closets were full of skeletons just waiting to burst out".

Freeh "sought to distance himself from Clinton because of Whitewater".

According to Freeh, Clinton wouldn't press the Saudis to allow FBI to question Khobar Towers bombing suspects. Instead, Clinton "hit Abdullah up for a contribution to the Clinton Presidential Library".

Freeh also details the chicanery involved in securing Clinton's blood sample for the Lewinsky investigation.

The Dems have lately been bemoaning the shame of corruption, and no one knows more about those subjects than the Dems, "who shamelessly defended the corruption of the last Democrat president".

Cal Thomas reminds those with short memories:

"The Clinton administration gave the country the only president ever impeached on grounds of personal malfeasance; the highest number of convictions and guilty pleas by friends and associates; the highest number of cabinet officials to come under criminal investigation; the highest number of witnesses to flee the country; the highest number of witnesses to die suddenly; the first president to be sued for sexual harassment; the first president accused of rape; the first first lady to come under criminal investigation; the largest criminal plea agreement in an illegal campaign contribution case; the first president to establish a legal defense fund; the first president to be held in contempt of court; the greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions; the greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions from abroad."

These are only the highlights of an eight page compilation!

--LynZee

Democrats Delighted By The Division On The Right

Democrats are delighted by the division on the right over Harriet Miers.

Heck, they're probably dancing jigs.

Ever since Katrina, the Dems have been in heavy attack mode, gearing up for the 2006 mid-terms.

If the "conservative base" wants to effect change on the Supreme Court, then they must vote to keep
Republicans in power.

Justice Paul Stevens is 85.

Miers is a heck of a lot better than anyone the Dems would nominate.

--LynZee

George Will, Elitist Snob

George Will has told the U.S. Senate to NOT confirm Harriet Miers.

Ooooh, the guru has spoken. So let it be written, so let it be done.

George Will proclaims that Bush is too stupid to nominate anyone, and by association, Harriet Miers is too stupid to be a Supreme Court justice.

Will proclaims that Miers' nomination is a frivolous whim lacking standards of seriousness not worthy of Senate consideration or deference, and that her confirmation would reduce the Supreme Court to Bush's "private plaything".

George Will, that self-important snob, has looked down his nose from the perch of intellectual pomposity to issue his proclamation.

With a pretentious air of self-satisfied superiority, delivered from his self-imposed Mount Olympus, he issues three rules to which the peons should extend op-ed deference.

Oh baloney. What he's really mad about is McCain-Feingold!

--LynZee

Harry And Harriet

Harry's just wild about Harriet.

Harry Reid likes Harriet Miers.



"In my view, the Supreme Court would benefit from the addition of a justice who has real experience as a practicing lawyer."

Both of them had bootstraps to pull up.

"We need people like that who have real-life experiences."

Reid advised Bush, "I think that rather than looking at the people your lawyer's recommending, pick her".

Hosed into a rude awakening?

--LynZee

Juries Grand

How many grand juries does it take to pull off a political vendetta?

Answer: three and counting.

"In a written statement Tuesday, Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle acknowledged that prosecutors presented their case to three grand juries — not just the two they had discussed — and one grand jury refused to indict Tom DeLay."

"...the second grand jury refused to indict DeLay."

"Earle's statement on Tuesday said he took money-laundering and conspiracy charges to a third grand jury on Monday after prosecutors learned of new evidence over the weekend."

"What could have happened over the weekend?" said Austin lawyer Bill White, who represents DeLay. "They investigate for three years and suddenly they have new evidence? That's beyond the pale!"

--LynZee

Miers: Extreme End Of Pro-Life?

"...a former campaign manager says she [Miers
opposed abortion rights while running for Dallas City
Council in 1989."

"She is on the extreme end of the anti-choice movement," said Lorlee Bartos, who managed Miers' first and only political campaign and said they discussed abortion once during the race.

"I think Harriet's belief was pretty strongly felt," Bartos said Monday. "I suspect she is of the same cloth as the president."

"Bartos said Miers told her she was "pro-choice in her youth" but underwent "a born-again, profound experience" that caused her to oppose abortion."

Chuck Schumer, et al, are gonna love this, but will Sam Brownback?

Those critical of Miers' nomination may get the ideological battle they crave, after all.

--LynZee

Bush Press Conference

Transcript.

Some of Bush's comments on Harriet Miers:

"She shares my philosophy that judges should strictly interpret the laws and the Constitution of the United States and not legislate from the bench."

"I'm interested in people that will be strict constructionists."

"And I've told that to the American people ever since I started running for office. I said: Vote for me, this is the kind of judges I'll put on the bench. There should be no doubt in anybody's mind what I believe the philosophy of a judge. And Harriet Miers shares that philosophy."

"her philosophy won't change"

"People know we're close. But you've got to understand, because of our closeness, I know the character of the person."

If confirmed, Harriet Miers may be as close as anyone can get to having George Bush sit on the Supreme Court.
--LynZee

Layoffs In New Orleans

"New Orleans must lay off as many as 3,000 city workers, Mayor Ray Nagin announced Tuesday."

"Only essential police and firefighters remain, Nagin said during a press conference. He said the cost of the recovery from Hurricane Katrina, which flooded the city five weeks ago, made the job cuts necessary."

I wonder how many of those 3,000 workers are even in the city.

Conditions remain bleak.

"The power company reports that electricity has been restored to about 28 percent of New Orleans."

"Hospitals are still shut down."

"The city literally stinks. Piles of garbage cover every street corner."

"This is the fifth week they haven't even picked up the trash. They're worried about the air and the quality of it, and they haven't picked up the trash."

"Nagin is trying to bring people back to the city. But some say the mayor helped drive them away with exaggerated reports of violence and by saying early on that as many as 10,000 people could be dead."

"All that did was convince the young people to get the hell out of here and work somewhere else. And in fact they're doing so in droves."

--LynZee

Operation "River Gate"

"U.S. Marines on Tuesday launched their biggest offensive this year against al Qaeda guerrillas in western Iraq"

Codenamed River Gate, "The offensive centered on Haditha, Haqlaniyah and Barwana, Sunni cities located in the Euphrates River valley".

"Flames from U.S. air strikes illuminated the skylines of the three cities."

"Bridges across the Euphrates River between Haqlaniyah and Haditha were bombed to prevent insurgents from using them."

"most of the neighborhoods of all three cities were under control of the joint forces by late afternoon."

"86 suspects were detained. Two large weapons caches were discovered."

"Meanwhile, Operation Iron Fist, another assault launched four days ago in the Qaimregion of Anbar province near the Iraqi-Syrian border continued, as troops searched for fighters connected to al Qaeda in Iraq who freely roamed the streets of Sadah and surrounding towns."

The offensives in western Iraq "aim to put down Al Qaeda in Iraq and other Sunni-led insurgent groups that have waged a campaign of violence aimed at wrecking a crucial Oct. 15 national vote on a new constitution".

--LynZee

More On DeLay's Re-Indictment

"But a source close to the investigation, who requested anonymity, noted that Earle told reporters last week his investigation was continuing, and asserted that Earle had intended to bring these charges even before the challenge raised by DeLay's lawyers."

This sounds like a big fat lie. If Earle "intended" to bring money laundering charges, then why didn't he do it with the first grand jury instead of dancing a scrambling Texas two step to find a newly sworn in grand jury to re-indict DeLay within hours after DeLay's lawyers filed a motion
to have the conspiracy to violate campaign law
charges dismissed?

If DeLay has committed crimes, then he needs to be held accountable. But, if Earle is inventing crimes, grasping at straws, and trumping up charges, then Earle needs to be held accountable for prosecutorial abuse of power.

Abuse of power exacted through indictments that amount to little more than political vendettas.

--LynZee
Related: "Do-Over"

Wild Card

The Astros clinched the National League wild-card berth with a 6-4 win over the Chicago Cubs.

Go 'Stros!

"Do-Over"

Tom DeLay's lawyers filed a motion to dismiss criminal conspiracy charges on the grounds "arguing that the charge of conspiring to violate campaign finance laws was based on a statute that didn't take effect until 2003 — a year after the alleged acts".

"Since the indictment charges no offense, and since you have professed not to be politically motivated in bringing this indictment, I request that you immediately agree to dismiss this indictment so that the political consequences can be reversed," DeGuerin wrote."

Ronnie Earle must have been worried that the case would be thrown out (a testament to the weakness of his case), because he scrambled to find a newly sworn in grand jury to indict DeLay again -- this time on charges of money laundering.

“Ronnie Earle has stooped to a new low with his brand of prosecutorial abuse,” DeLay said in a statement. “He is trying to pull the legal equivalent of a ‘do-over’ since he knows very well that the charges he brought against me last week are totally manufactured and illegitimate. This is an abomination of justice.”

"If Ronnie Earle didn't exist, we'd have to invent him. Seriously, could any politician hope for a more disastrously incompetent prosector to be "hot on the trail"? His misteps and flailing about would almost be comical, if the normally right-minded folks in Texas hadn't given this boob a role in our justice system."

Well, it's the left-minded folks in Austin who continue to elect the boob.

--LynZee

Bush Nominates Harriet Miers

She's a "pit bull in size 6 shoes" who eats nails for breakfast, doesn't
have an elite pedigree, has never been a judge, and has no paper trail.

She's even contributed to Democrat campaigns.

The Dems like her, and the conservatives don't -- you can tell by all the wailing and hand wringing.

Conservatives are afraid of stealth like David Souter. Miers opinions are not on the record. But, Bush doesn't like paper trails -- John Roberts had a short one, and short trails offer less for the Dems to nitpick.

Some think Bush copped out and went for a safe pick.

But, others believe, "Harry Reid has just been hosed - and he doesn't even know it", and she will move the court to the right as a "plain spoken red stater".

Fred Barnes: "it became clear to Bush that she had exactly the philosophy of judicial restraint he favors and that she wouldn't "grow" as a justice and turn into a swing vote or a liberal....with her, Bush believes he would be altering the ideological makeup of the court, moving it to the right."

Hugh Hewitt: "Wake up people: Do you really think W is going to elevate a friend who doesn't agree with him on the crucial issues of the day just because she's a friend? Bush's picks for the Bench have been stellar, and his support for them unwavering."

I agree with Fred and Hugh.
--LynZee