Frist calls Alito Democrats' "nightmare"

Reuters
Frist calls Alito Democrats' "nightmare"

By Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist told Republican Party activists on Friday night that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito was the "worst nightmare of liberal Democrats."

Frist, a Tennessee Republican, made the remark to fellow Republicans during a private tour he gave them of the Senate chamber when the Senate was not in session.

Frist was not available for comment following his remarks.

Asked about the senator's remark, Frist spokesman Bob Stevenson said that Alito "is a thoughtful mainstream conservative jurist who is well respected by his peers, by Democrats and Republicans alike."

Stevenson added, "There are liberals, many of them represented by the outside groups, who will do anything to kill any nominee put forward by this administration."

Democrats have expressed concerns the conservative Alito would push the nation's highest court to the right in areas such as abortion rights, civil rights and presidential powers.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on Tuesday on the Alito nomination and the full Senate intends to debate it next week.

Three top Democrats announced this week they would vote against sending Alito to a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court. They are Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Dick Durbin of Illinois.

No Democrat so far has said he or she would try to block a Senate floor vote on Alito through a procedure known as a filibuster.

The Republican National Committee was holding a winter meeting in Washington this week, and the 50 or so party activists from across the United States were invited by Frist to tour the Senate chamber.

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Libby lawyers to subpoena reporters in CIA leak

Reuters
Libby lawyers to subpoena reporters in CIA leak

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lawyers for a former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney plan to issue subpoenas to journalists and news organizations for documents to be used at his trial involving the leak of a CIA operative's name, according to a court document filed on Friday.

The expected move by attorneys for Lewis "Scooter" Libby was disclosed in a joint status report that defense lawyers and prosecutors filed with the federal judge overseeing the case.

Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff, has pleaded not guilty to five counts of obstructing justice, perjury and lying in the two-year investigation into the leak to the news media of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.

Plame's identity was leaked to reporters in July 2003 after her diplomat husband, Joseph Wilson, accused the Bush administration of twisting intelligence on weapons of mass destruction to justify the war in Iraq.

A number of journalists already have testified as part of prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation into the leak and could be called as prosecution witnesses. New York Times reporter Judith Miller spent 85 days in jail last year before she agreed to testify.

In the six-page court filing, defense attorneys said the subpoenas to journalists and news organizations would be to obtain additional necessary documents for trial. They did not identify who would be subpoenaed or say what they would be seeking.

They also said there could be litigation before U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, who is presiding over the case, and perhaps the U.S. Court of Appeals if the reporters or news organization fight the subpoenas, as expected.

Such a legal battle could delay any trial. The judge has yet to set a trial date.

Libby's lawyers also said that it may be necessary for the defense to issue subpoenas to government agencies but they did not indicate which agencies.

The next hearing in the case is scheduled for February 3.

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Some House Democrats seek election public funds

Reuters
Some House Democrats seek election public funds

By Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Public financing of elections for the U.S. House of Representatives, not lobbying reform, is the best way to end ethic scandals, a top Democrat said on Friday.

"You can talk all you want about nibbling at the margins about ethics and House rules and all the rest, but unless we deal with the nexus between politics and money, damned little is actually going to change over time," Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin said in a telephone interview.

Obey said he and fellow Democrat Barney Frank of Massachusetts would offer legislation this month requiring that general elections for the 435 House seats be financed purely with public funds.

Obey, senior Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, conceded he did not expect "any massive instant support for it" in the Republican-controlled Congress.

A senior House Republican aide dismissed Obey's approach saying, "This is exactly the wrong place to go." The aide noted that Republicans were pushing for "more transparency" in lobbying activities, such as their campaign contributions, and added, "What's wrong with people just choosing candidates to give money to?"

Earlier this week, Republicans and Democrats in the House and Senate offered a series of reforms in response to the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal.


Abramoff, who this month pleaded guilty to fraud in a wide-ranging bribery investigation, is cooperating with prosecutors and several lawmakers could be implicated.

Obey noted recent reports that Americans did not want to pay for public financing of campaigns and did not want lobbyists contributing. "What that leaves is campaigns financed through immaculate conception and I don't think that's a reliable financing basis for campaigns," Obey said.

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"Intelligent design" debate goes to kids' TV

Reuters
"Intelligent design" debate goes to kids' TV

By Jamie McGeever

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The debate over whether children should be taught "intelligent design" in U.S. public schools as an alternative to evolution is moving to children's television.

"There's a fight going on the science room," says Linda Ellerbee, presenter of "Nick News," a news magazine on the children's TV cable channel Nickelodeon.

The channel is tackling the subject on Sunday by presenting both sides of the controversy in "God, Science, Politics and Your School."

Supporters of intelligent design say that nature is so complex that it must have been the work of an unnamed creator, rather than the result of random natural selection as outlined in Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.

"The goal of this show is not to debate the issues of evolution, intelligent design or creationism," Ellerbee said in a statement.

"We just want to give kids a better understanding of what all the shouting is about. We also want to hear from kids affected by these disputes."

The controversy, stirred by a recent court case in Pennsylvania, centers on whether teaching intelligent design violates U.S. constitutional separation of church and state.

Ellerbee talks to religious, scientific and educational figures on both sides of the debate, who use plain English and simple terms to explain the complex arguments.

She also travels to Dover, Pennsylvania, where the teaching of intelligent design was banned last year, and to Kansas where the State Board of Education recently approved a set of science standards that question the evolution theory.

Ellerbee gives young Kansas teenagers the chance to weigh in on the debate.

"They don't have to say that God made everything but I think they should give intelligent design the benefit of the doubt, really," one boy said.

"Science is about facts and I don't see any facts proving that a higher power has created us," countered one girl.

The vast majority of the scientific community believes that the evolution of human life is explained by natural selection. The Roman Catholic Church, the largest single denomination of the Christian faith in the world, weighed in on the debate this week by restating its support of the theory of evolution.

The Catholic Church has sometimes been considered an ally for those promoting intelligent design. While the church is socially conservative, it has a long theological tradition that rejects fundamentalist creationism.

Nickelodeon is owned by Viacom Inc..

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Rove: GOP to Use Terror As Campaign Issue

Rove: GOP to Use Terror As Campaign Issue
By RON FOURNIER
AP Political Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Embattled White House adviser Karl Rove vowed Friday to make the war on terrorism a central campaign issue in November. He also said Democratic senators looked "mean-spirited and small-minded" in questioning Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito.

"Republicans have a post-9/11 view of the world. And Democrats have a pre-9/11 view of the world," Rove told Republican activists. "That doesn't make them unpatriotic, not at all. But it does make them wrong - deeply and profoundly and consistently wrong."

Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean denounced Rove's remarks and renewed his call for the deputy White House chief of staff to be fired for his role in leaking a CIA official's name. "That is both unpatriotic and wrong," Dean said.


Rove, making a rare public address while under investigation in the CIA leak case, joined Republican Party chairman Ken Mehlman in warning GOP leaders against falling prey to the corrupting nature of power.

"The GOP's progress during the last four decades is a stunning political achievement. But it is also a cautionary tale of what happens to a dominant party - in this case, the Democrat Party - when its thinking becomes ossified; when its energy begins to drain; when an entitlement mentality takes over; and when political power becomes an end in itself rather than a mean to achieve the common goal," Rove told Republican National Committee members ending a two-day meeting.

"We need to learn from our successes," he said, "and from the failures of others."

The admonition reflects growing concerns among senior Republicans that ethics scandals in the Republican-led Congress could hurt the party in November, even among staunch GOP voters who may begin to blame corruption for Congress' runaway spending habits.

Mehlman couldn't have been more blunt: "One of the oldest lessons of history is that power corrupts," he said, telling RNC members that any Republicans guilty of illegal behavior should be punished.

The investigation of lobbyist Jack Abramoff threatens to ensnare at least a half dozen members of Congress of both parties and Bush administration officials. His ties to GOP congressional leaders and the White House pose a particular problem for Republicans. Abramoff, who has admitted to conspiring to defraud his Indian tribe clients, has pleaded guilty to corruption-related charges and is cooperating with prosecutors.

In an unrelated scandal, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, is expected to stand trial in the CIA leak case this summer, just ahead of the midterm elections.

The special prosecutor's inquiry is still under way, leaving the fate of other senior White House officials, notably Rove, in doubt.

Bush's political guru opened his remarks with a joking reference to the unwanted attention the case has brought him. "Anybody want to get their picture in the paper? Come on up here," he said.

In 2002, Rove caused a stir among Democrats when he told RNC members to make the war on terrorism an issue in the midterm elections. "We can go to the country on this issue because they trust the Republican Party to do a better job of protecting and strengthening America's military might and thereby protecting America," he said at the time.

Rove made the same case Friday, though his words were a bit more measured. Reading from a prepared text, he began with a call for election-year civility - "Our opponents are our fellow citizens, not our enemies" - and quickly turned to portraying Democrats as weak on defense.

"The United States faces a ruthless enemy - and we need a commander in chief and a Congress who understand the nature of the threat and the gravity that American finds itself in," Rove said. "President Bush and the Republican Party do. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for many Democrats."

He said some Democrats want to abandon Iraq too soon, which would cause enemies to "laugh at our failed resolve." Rove added: "To retreat before victory would be a reckless act - and this president and our party will not allow it. This is worthy of a public debate."

Rove also criticized Democrats for opposing extension of the USA Patriot Act and warrantless eavesdropping, before turning to Alito, newly minted Chief Justice John Roberts and their Democratic opponents on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"Every effort to smear the name of these good men blew up in the face of those making the malicious charges. Some committee members came across as mean-spirited and small-minded - and it left a searing impression," Rove said. He specifically accused Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., of creating "an ugly display" during Alito's hearing.

Before the RNC members returned to their home states, they approved an immigration resolution supported by the White House. A competing measure backed by hard-line conservatives opposed to Bush's guest worker program was withdrawn under pressure from White House allies.

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Rove tells Republicans to run on Bush's record

Reuters
Rove tells Republicans to run on Bush's record

By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House political adviser Karl Rove on Friday said Democratic critics of the Iraq war were wrong and Republicans should highlight the issue in November's congressional elections.

Most polls show majorities of Americans have lost confidence in President George W. Bush's handling of the war. But Rove, still under the threat of indictment in a CIA-leak probe, said Republicans should emphasize Bush's record on security, the economy and the courts during the November campaign.

"We need a commander in chief and a Congress who understand the nature of the threat and the gravity of the moment America finds itself in," Rove told a meeting of the Republican National Committee in a rare public appearance.

"President Bush and the Republican Party do. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for many Democrats," he said.

Rove, Bush's top political guru, also capitalized on the party's traditional advantage on national security issues to help Republicans sweep to victories in elections in 2002 and 2004, citing new dangers after the September 11 attacks.

This year Rove and Republicans have grown nervous about their prospects in November amid public doubts about the Iraq war and corruption scandals involving prominent party members, including former House Republican Leader Tom DeLay and Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Rove himself remains under threat of indictment in an investigation into who leaked the name of a CIA agent whose husband is a prominent Iraq-war critic.

Rove said a quick pullout from Iraq would be a "reckless act" and criticized demands by some Democrats for a troop withdrawal.

"Republicans have a post-9/11 view of the world and Democrats have a pre-9/11 view of the world," Rove said. "That doesn't make them unpatriotic, not at all, but it does make them wrong -- wrong deeply and profoundly and consistently."

Rove made no mention of his own legal jeopardy. The leak probe led late last year to the indictment and resignation of his White House colleague, Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff.

RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman told the meeting that "if Republicans are guilty of illegal or inappropriate behavior, then they should pay the price and they should suffer the consequences."

But Democratic Party chief Howard Dean said Rove did not have any standing to attack their commitment to security. "Karl Rove breached our national security for partisan gain and that is unpatriotic and wrong," Dean said.

Tackling an issue that has split the party, RNC members passed by voice vote an immigration resolution that called for better border security but included a guest worker program supported by Bush.

A competing resolution that did not include a guest worker program was withdrawn without a vote.

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US author's sales jump after Osama mentions book

Reuters
US author's sales jump after Osama mentions book

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An unexpected endorsement from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has resulted in a huge jump in sales for a book by a critic of U.S. foreign policy.

William Blum's "Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower" was ranked 209,000 on Amazon.com's sales list before bin Laden mentioned it in an audiotape released on Thursday. By Friday, the book was No. 30 on the Amazon.com list.

Bin Laden said al Qaeda group was preparing more attacks in the United States but also told Americans, "It is useful for you to read the book 'The Rogue State.'"

"I was quite surprised and even shocked and amused when I found out what he'd said," Blum said on Friday in an interview with Reuters Television in his Washington apartment.

"I was glad. I knew it would help the book's sales and I was not bothered by who it was coming from.

"If he shares with me a deep dislike for the certain aspects of U.S. foreign policy, then I'm not going to spurn any endorsement of the book by him. I think it's good that he shares those views and I'm not turned off by that."

Blum said some friends and family members were afraid the bin Laden endorsement might endanger him but he said there had been no threats and he was not concerned.

Blum's 320-page book, which was published in 2000, begins with a chapter titled "Why Do Terrorists Keep Picking on the United States." The first sentence says, "Washington's war on terrorism is as doomed to failure as its war on drugs has been."

Other chapters in "The Rogue State" are titled "America's Gift to the World -- the Afghan Terrorist Alumni," "The U.S. Versus the World at the United Nations" and "How the CIA Sent Nelson Mandela to Prison for 28 Years."

Blum's other books include "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II," "Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire" and "West Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Political Memoir."

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Democrats Scold White House Over Spying

LaGrande Observer
Democrats Scold White House Over Spying
By PETE YOST
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Democratic senators took the Bush administration to task Friday for four years of domestic spying, while the president fought back with a planned embrace of the intelligence agency that is carrying out the effort.

In preparation for Senate hearings, Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts noted that President Bush asserted in 2004 that "when we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so."

That Bush statement came at the same time the National Security Agency was engaging - at the president's direction - in warrantless eavesdropping on Americans.

"If President Bush can make his own rules for domestic surveillance, Big Brother has run amok," Kennedy said in a statement.

Introducing a proposed Senate resolution, Kennedy and Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont rejected White House assertions that congressional action after Sept. 11 authorized warrantless eavesdropping inside the United States.

A joint resolution of Congress authorized the use of force against those responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, but it "says nothing about domestic electronic surveillance," Kennedy declared.

Pushing back, Bush plans a Wednesday visit to the NSA, where he will reassert his claim that he has the constitutional authority to let intelligence officials listen in on international phone calls of Americans with suspected ties to terrorists.

"We are stepping up our efforts to educate the American people," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said of the trip to the NSA, based at Fort Meade in Maryland. McClellan called the program "a critical tool that helps us save lives and prevent attacks. It is limited and targeted to al-Qaida communications, with the focus being on detection and prevention."

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said the new audio tape of Osama bin Laden threatening attacks on American soil "is a vivid reminder why we must continue to intercept communications between al-Qaida overseas and potential operatives in the United States."

On Monday, deputy national intelligence director Mike Hayden, who led the National Security Agency when the program began in October 2001, will speak on the issue at the National Press Club.

On Tuesday, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is delivering a speech on the program in Washington.

Gonzales also plans to testify Feb. 6 about the secret program before the Senate Judiciary Committee where Kennedy and Leahy are members.

House Democrats said Bush has committed a crime in authorizing the spying and that House Republicans have abdicated their responsibilities by refusing to hold hearings.

Rep. John Conyers, the House Judiciary Committee's top Democrat, and other Democrats met in a basement room of a House office building Friday to hear a panel of lawyers and activists discuss whether Bush had committed an impeachable offense.

Meanwhile, the Justice Department on Wednesday issued a 42-page legal justification for the eavesdropping program, an expanded version of a document the agency sent Congress last month.

"Making their argument longer didn't make it any better," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., a Judiciary Committee member. He said Bush's secret approval of warrantless eavesdropping had made congressional debate on the Patriot Act meaningless.

The NSA's warrantless eavesdropping program is "an intelligence operation in search of a legal rationale," said George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley.

"What the president ordered in this case was a crime," added Turley, who said House Republicans are establishing a terrible precedent by not holding oversight hearings.

To fend off criticism, Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove and White House spokesman Scott McClellan referred to statements by John Schmidt, a Clinton administration associate attorney general who defended the program.

Schmidt wrote last month in the Chicago Tribune that Bush's authorization of the NSA surveillance is consistent with court decisions and Justice Department positions under prior presidents.

---

AP White House reporter Deb Riechmann contributed to this story.

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Libby's Lawyers Want to Subpoena Reporters

LaGrande Observer
Libby's Lawyers Want to Subpoena Reporters

By TONI LOCY
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Lawyers for a former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney told a federal judge Friday they want to subpoena journalists and news organizations for documents they may have related to the leak of a CIA operative's name.

In a joint filing with prosecutors, lawyers for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, 55, warned U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton that a trial likely will be delayed because of their strategy to seek more subpoenas of reporters' notes and other records.

Libby was indicted last year on charges that he lied to FBI agents and a federal grand jury about how he learned CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity and when he subsequently told reporters.

Plame's identity was revealed in July 2003 by columnist Robert Novak after her husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused the Bush administration of twisting intelligence about Iraq's efforts to buy uranium "yellowcake" in Niger. The year before, the CIA had sent Wilson to Africa to determine the accuracy of the uranium reports; he concluded they were untrue.

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, in announcing the charges against Libby, portrayed Cheney's former chief of staff as the first government official to have shared Plame's name and her work at the CIA with reporters in the summer of 2003.

Libby's defense team did not disclose the names of reporters or news organizations it wants to subpoena.

The filing provides the most concrete indication yet that a large part of Libby's trial strategy will be identifying other government officials who knew Plame was a CIA operative and told reporters about it.

The kind of subpoena cited is for documents or records, not testimony. Such subpoenas usually require records to be turned over before trial so the defense team would have a chance to review them. Libby's team said it expects a delay in the trial while news organizations fight the subpoenas, if Walton agrees to issue them.

Last summer, several reporters were subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury investigating the leak of Plame's identity. New York Times reporter Judith Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to discuss her source.

Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said the defense's strategy is no surprise but still alarming.

"Every key witness in this case is going to be a reporter," Dalglish said. "It's an absolutely ugly situation, ... putting reporters in a very, very bad position, ... and it should send a chill up the spine of American citizens across the country."

The defense attorneys also told Walton that a significant disagreement is brewing between Libby's team and Fitzgerald's prosecutors over whether reporters heard Plame's name from government sources other than Libby.

Libby's lawyers said information about other sources used by reporters is "material to the preparation of the defense."

No trial date has been set. Walton had requested the update on the prosecution's exchange of evidence with the defense before a Feb. 3 hearing in the case.

Fitzgerald said he has turned over 10,150 pages of classified and unclassified documents to Libby's defense team.

But the defense attorneys said they want more. They said they may subpoena other executive branch agencies - besides the special prosecutor's office and the FBI - if Fitzgerald continues to refuse to turn over information he has from those departments. They did not specify which agencies.

Shortly after Libby's indictment, The Washington Post revealed that one of its editors, Bob Woodward, who achieved fame for his reporting on the Watergate scandal during the Nixon administration, may have been the first reporter to learn about Plame.

Woodward gave a sworn deposition to Fitzgerald late last year, telling the special prosecutor that a top administration official told him in mid-June 2003 that Wilson was married to Plame.
And here is the rest of it.

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Democrats Hear Angry Seniors on Medicare

LaGrande Observer
Democrats Hear Angry Seniors on Medicare

By KEVIN FREKING
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said Friday that "SWAT teams of technicians" were working to improve the new Medicare drug benefit.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, senior citizens and pharmacists complained to Democratic lawmakers of being put on hold endlessly as they tried to get prescriptions filled.

"Unfortunately, the start of the new prescription drug benefit would be described by many patients and pharmacists as a nightmare," said Tim Tucker, a pharmacist from Huntington, Tenn., who is a member of the American Pharmacists Association Board of Trustees.

Tucker spoke at a hearing organized by Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif. Only Democratic lawmakers attended. Tucker said he saw some good things occurring at his pharmacy since the government began subsidizing the cost of prescription drugs.

"Some of my patients are returning to my practice because they are now able to afford their medications," he said.

However, he described the first few weeks overall as a fiasco. And he placed the blame with the prescription drug plans themselves. Many were not prepared, and some have yet to improve, he said.

Leavitt, who visited Wisconsin, Ohio and Alabama on Friday to hear from state officials, agreed with that assessment. "I would also acknowledge that some of the insurance plans did not properly anticipate the level of service that would be required," he said.

Under the drug program, about 42 million senior citizens and disabled are eligible to enroll in private plans run by insurers and pharmaceutical benefit companies. The government subsidizes the drug coverage, with additional subsidies provided for the poor.

Leavitt said two other problems occurred.

First, many participants automatically enrolled by the government into plans found another that they preferred. However, they waited until late December to make the switch. Their status was not updated before Jan. 1, so pharmacists could not locate their files to determine how much to charge them.

Secondly, large data files transferred from states to the federal government, or from the federal government to an insurance plan, contained errors. That meant people who had previously received their drugs through Medicaid did not make it into a Medicare plan.

"It continues to get better every day," Leavitt said.

But Ruth Grunberg from Cortland, N.Y., told Democrats that her pharmacist's computer rejected her card on Jan. 1, as if she didn't even exist, and she spent days trying to rectify the problem.

"I was starting to feel like the people trapped in the incompetency of the response to Katrina," Grunberg said.

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Hardball Scandal: Bin Laden = Michael Moore (plus a note to Howard Kurtz)

Huffingtonpost.com
Hardball Scandal: Bin Laden = Michael Moore (plus a note to Howard Kurtz)
Peter Daou

A blogswarm has erupted over Chris Matthews' comparison of Osama Bin Laden to Michael Moore. John Aravosis, DarkSyde at Daily Kos, Crooks and Liars, Jane Hamsher, Matt Stoller, Digby, Dave Johnson, and others have pointed out that this is not just about Chris Matthews or Michael Moore or Osama Bin Laden, it's about the willingness of a prominent media figure to slander an opponent of the war.

John Kerry has weighed in with a strong statement
http://daoureport.salon.com/synopsis.aspx?synopsisId=c4f13a24-a385-4395-b342-7d3d378bb0f2 .
And an apology from Matthews is surely in order.

Equating a prominent conservative activist to a murderous terrorist would bring the wrath of the rightwing machine on Matthews' head. But in today's political environment, Dems and liberals are fair game, either through insidious pro-Bush narratives like "Bush is firm" and "Dems are muddled," or through blatant and vile comments like the one Matthews so glibly foisted on us.

A few days ago I wrote that Democrats need to go after the media institutionally, they need to understand that the deeply-etched storylines that are perpetuated by trusted media figures like Tim Russert and so many others damage them and stifle their message. If myths such as "Bush is likable" or "Bush is firm" or "Democrats don't have a message" or "Democrats are weak on national security" or "Republicans are corrupt but everybody does it" are repeated enough, Americans will internalize them. And they have. Breaking that cycle is exceedingly difficult.

It's obvious to bloggers, who are unabashed media critics, and it's obvious to the right, for whom "liberal media" is virtually a war cry. But it's alien to the Democratic establishment. Who knows why.

Howard Kurtz wondered out loud what I meant by "go after" the media:

"Salon blogwatcher Peter Daou says television blew it:

"A former Vice-President of the United States delivers a major speech accusing George W. Bush of breaking the law. What do all three cable news nets cover under the 'Breaking News' banner? An overturned tanker truck on a New York highway. THIS is the problem for the left. And as I've said a hundred times: if the Dem establishment doesn't go after the media institutionally, things simply will not change. It's astonishing to me that they haven't gotten it yet."

Hmmm . . . I wonder what he means by "go after."

Well, Howie, here's an example: a Democratic outcry over Matthews' disgusting comment would certainly be a start.

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Clinton Library Prepares to Open Records

ABC News
Clinton Library Prepares to Open Records
On Fifth Anniversary Since His Presidency, Clinton Library to Open Records to Researchers
By ANDREW DeMILLO
The Associated Press

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Researchers can start requesting any of the millions of presidential records at Bill Clinton's library Friday, the fifth anniversary of his departure from the White House.

The library has 80 million pages of documents that will be available to scholars through the Freedom of Information Act.

"For someone like me, this is huge," said Margaret Scranton, a political science professor at the University of Arkansas. "This is big because this begins the process of getting those records."

Clinton has already opened several hundred thousand pages to the public, but most were domestic policy documents of White House staffers. The library has also opened its holdings for some federal court cases, including a lawsuit over Jewish property looted by Nazis in World War II.

Library Director David Alsobrook said getting documents would be a lengthy process. With just 10 archivists to handle requests, the library cannot provide documents quickly.

"It could take months. It could take years," Alsobrook said. "You're going to be bitterly disappointed if you're looking for something immediately."

Complicating Friday's release is an executive order signed by President Bush that requires his consent and the former president's before any documents can be released to the public.

Because of privacy and national security concerns, some of the documents will not be available Friday. But under the Presidential Records Act, those papers will be reviewed again in 12 years and more released.

Alsobrook said he does not know how many of those documents will be restricted from public view. "We won't really know until we get the request and get in there," he said.

Supervisory archivist Melissa Walker said the library is not expecting long lines of researchers. Most requests will come through the mail.

On the Net:

Clinton library http://www.clintonlibrary.gov

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Retired military officers push Bush on torture ban

Reuters
Retired military officers push Bush on torture ban
By Vicki Allen

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of retired military officers urged President George W. Bush on Thursday to spell out how he will enforce a ban on the torture of U.S.-held prisoners, complaining he muddied the issue in a statement last month.

Bush reluctantly accepted the ban, pushed by Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, after scandals over abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, harsh interrogations at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and reports the CIA ran secret prisons abroad to hold terrorism suspects.

Retired military leaders including Marine Gen. Joseph Hoar, who was U.S. Central Command commander-in-chief, said Bush should clarify his stance after making a statement last month that some experts said signaled he would bypass rules for treatment of detainees when he saw fit, even after he signed them into law.

The 22 former military officers in their letter said Bush should ensure that "your administration speak with a consistent voice to make clear that the United States now has a single standard of conduct specified in law that governs all interrogations."

In a telephone news conference, Hoar said Bush's statement last month "diluted the impact of the McCain amendment" by indicating "that there were going to be exceptions and the president has the ability to do that."

McCain, who endured torture as a war prisoner in Vietnam, spearheaded the bill to set standards for detainees' treatment that won big majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives.

Bush's statement, issued on a Friday evening after he signed the bill putting the amendment into law, said the "executive branch shall construe (the law) in a manner consistent with the authority of the president ... as commander in chief."

The statement also said the White House's approach would be "consistent with the constitutional limitations on the judicial power, which will assist in achieving the shared objective of the Congress and the president ... of protecting the American people from further terrorist attacks."

Elisa Massimino, Washington director of Human Rights First, said Bush should "clarify the signing statement so there is no question that the commander-in-chief considers this law binding on all U.S. personnel."

Human Rights First held a news conference on the letter from retired generals and admirals.

Retired Rear Admiral John Hutson, a former Navy judge advocate general, said the McCain amendment reinstated long-standing U.S. policy on the treatment of prisoners. "Then to have a signing statement in which that becomes blurred again causes us great concern," he said.

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Top Senate Democrats oppose Alito nomination

Yahoo! News
Top Senate Democrats oppose Alito nomination
By Thomas Ferraro
Reuters

Three top Senate Democrats said on Thursday they would vote against U.S. Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito because they feared he would not provide an effective check on what they described as President George W. Bush's bid for expanded power.

While Alito appeared headed toward confirmation by the Republican-led Senate, Sens. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, Dick Durbin of Illinois and Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts made the case against Bush's 55-year-old conservative candidate.

In separate speeches, they expressed concern that if confirmed, Alito would push the nation's highest court to the right in such areas as abortion rights and civil rights as well as presidential powers.

Even if Democrats cannot stop Alito from becoming a Supreme Court Justice, they want to set the stage to make him an issue in the November congressional elections, along with Bush's recently disclosed program to eavesdrop on some telephone calls without warrants as part of his war against terrorism.

"I will not lend my support to an effort by this president to move the Supreme Court and the law radically to the right," said Leahy, top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, which plans to vote on Alito's nomination on Tuesday and send it to the full Senate.

"There is no reason to believe that Judge Alito will serve as an effective check and balance on government intrusion," Leahy said in a speech. "Indeed, his record suggests otherwise."

Durbin, the assistant Senate Democratic leader, said, "Based on his record, I'm concerned that Judge Alito will not be willing to stand up to a president who is determined to seize too much power over our personal lives."

In a speech in Chicago, Durbin also said, "In case after case, he has voted -- often as the lone dissenter on his court -- against the dispossessed, the poor and the powerless."

Kennedy, the leading liberal voice in Congress, declared his opposition to Alito in a speech, saying, "His record just does not show a judge who is committed to equal justice under law."

PRAISE AND FRUSTRATION

If confirmed, Alito would replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a moderate conservative who often has been the swing vote on the nine-member court on social issues.

At his confirmation hearing before the Judiciary Committee last week, Alito won praise from Republicans, who noted he received the American Bar Association's top rating for a seat on the high court based on his qualifications, integrity and judicial temperament.

But Alito repeatedly frustrated Democrats.

Democrats were unable to secure a commitment from Alito that if confirmed to the Supreme Court he would uphold its 1973 decision that legalized abortion. He had opposed abortion while a Reagan administration lawyer two decades ago.

Democrats also wrestled with Alito over his views of presidential powers, which they argued were overly broad. Alito deflected questions about the legality of the administration's warrantless eavesdropping on Americans but did say no president was above the law.

Republican Sen. John Cornyn (news, bio, voting record) of Texas said, "Despite the ongoing attacks from the hard left and their allies in the Senate, Judge Alito should be, and will be confirmed.... Judge Alito earned bipartisan support."

So far, just one of the Senate's 44 Democrats, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, has announced he will vote for Alito. All but about a half dozen others appear certain to oppose him.

None have threatened a filibuster since they do not appear to have the votes to sustain such a procedural roadblock in the 100-member Senate.

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Governors aim to prevent cuts in National Guard

Yahoo! News
Governors aim to prevent cuts in National Guard
By Will Dunham
Reuters

U.S. state governors called on the Pentagon on Thursday not to make cuts in the National Guard, calling such a move "inconceivable" considering the role played by Guard troops in Iraq, disaster relief and homeland defense.

"We need more Guard troops at this time, not less," the National Governors Association wrote to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in a letter signed by Govs. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, Janet Napolitano of Arizona, Dirk Kempthorne of Idaho and Michael Easley of North Carolina.

The National Guard's part-time troops come under the command of state governors for use in natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina and other domestic emergencies, and also can be mobilized by the Pentagon for overseas duty. The Pentagon has relied heavily on Guard soldiers for combat duty in Iraq.

Army Secretary Francis Harvey said on Wednesday the Army had decided to fund the Army National Guard at its current level of 333,000 soldiers rather than the congressionally authorized level of 350,000. But Harvey argued that "there's no cut in force structure of the Guard at all."

Governors also have been concerned by the closure of Air National Guard bases and potential cuts in National Guard aircraft.

Huckabee, chairman of the association, and Kempthorne are Republicans. Napolitano and Easley are Democrats.

The four governors told Rumsfeld that "we hope that the reports about force reductions in the Guard are not true."

"Our National Guardsmen and women have provided nearly 50 percent of the combat forces in Iraq, and the bulk of the U.S. personnel in the Balkans and Sinai Peninsula (peacekeeping missions)," the governors said. "In addition, they comprised about 90 percent of the troops on the ground in Louisiana and Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina.

"Given their performance, at this time in our history, it is inconceivable that anyone would seriously consider a reduction in the National Guard force structure."

The Pentagon fiscal 2007 budget and a separate broad assessment of military needs are due to be unveiled next month.

Harvey also said the Army National Guard was being reorganized to have 28 combat brigades, down from a planned 34, while the number of combat support brigades such as military police, civil affairs and engineer brigades would increase, leaving the total number of brigades unchanged at 106.

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Gonzales makes legal case for domestic spying

Reuters
Gonzales makes legal case for domestic spying

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Justice Department, facing lawsuits and congressional hearings on President George W. Bush's domestic eavesdropping program, sought on Thursday to persuade congressional leaders the surveillance was lawful and did not violate civil liberties.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who plans to testify at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on February 6, sent a report to Capitol Hill outlining the legal basis for the National Security Agency's activities that Bush approved after the September 11 attacks.

The highly classified program allows the monitoring of international communications, like telephone and e-mail messages, into and out of the United States of persons linked to al Qaeda or related terrorist groups, without a warrant.

Disclosure last month of the program sparked an outcry by Democrats and Republicans, with many lawmakers questioning whether it violated the U.S. Constitution. Civil liberties groups filed lawsuits challenging the program's legality.

A 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, makes it illegal to spy on U.S. citizens in the United States without the approval of a special, secret court. Bush secretly gave the NSA authority to intercept the communications without such approval.

"These NSA activities are lawful in all respects," Gonzalez said in a letter to Senate leaders in releasing the Justice Department's 42-page legal analysis.

"They represent a vital effort by the president to ensure that we have in place an early warning system to detect and prevent another catastrophic terrorist attack on America," he said.

LETTER TO CHENEY

Four top congressional Democrats sent a letter to Vice President Dick Cheney on Thursday, asking the administration to expand beyond a small group of lawmakers briefings about the domestic eavesdropping program to ensure adequate oversight.

"We ask that all future consultations with Congress on this program be open to all members of the Senate and House intelligence committees," said the letter signed by Senate and House Democratic leaders, Nevada Sen. Harry Reid and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, and the senior Democrats on the Senate and House intelligence panels.

The American Civil Liberties Union, one of the groups challenging the program, rejected the administration's legal justifications.

"Any opinion coming from the Justice Department has to be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism," said Anthony Romero, the group's executive director. "Congress must hold open, substantive hearings to let the American public know how their privacy was invaded."

Gonzales maintained that Bush's use of his authority to approve the eavesdropping program was "consistent" with the 1978 law.

He said the program "is also fully protective of the civil liberties guaranteed" by the Constitution protecting against unreasonable searches and seizes of evidence.

Besides Bush's constitutional power as commander in chief, Gonzales said the authorization of military force by the U.S. Congress after the September 11 attacks gave Bush the authority for the domestic surveillance.

A January 5 study by the Congressional Research Service, a nonpartisan research arm of Congress, questioned the administration's legal defense of the program but came to no firm conclusion about its legality because so many underlying facts are classified.

The study said it was unlikely Congress had expressly authorized Bush to conduct warrantless surveillance and suggested that Congress had intended the 1978 law to govern electronic surveillance during wartime.

"The history of Congress's active involvement in regulating electronic surveillance within the United States leaves little room for arguing that Congress has accepted by acquiescence the NSA operations here at issue," the study said.

(Additional reporting by David Morgan and JoAnne Allen)

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Feds Seek Google Records in Porn Probe

Yahoo! News
Feds Seek Google Records in Porn Probe

The Bush administration, seeking to revive an online pornography law struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court, has subpoenaed Google Inc. for details on what its users have been looking for through its popular search engine.

Google has refused to comply with the subpoena, issued last year, for a broad range of material from its databases, including a request for 1 million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches from any one-week period, lawyers for the U.S. Justice Department said in papers filed Wednesday in federal court in San Jose.

Privacy advocates have been increasingly scrutinizing Google's practices as the company expands its offerings to include e-mail, driving directions, photo-sharing, instant messaging and Web journals.

Although Google pledges to protect personal information, the company's privacy policy says it complies with legal and government requests. Google also has no stated guidelines on how long it keeps data, leading critics to warn that retention is potentially forever given cheap storage costs.

The government contends it needs the data to determine how often pornography shows up in online searches as part of an effort to revive an Internet child protection law that was struck down two years ago by the U.S. Supreme Court on free-speech grounds.

The 1998 Child Online Protection Act would have required adults to use access codes or other ways of registering before they could see objectionable material online, and it would have punished violators with fines up to $50,000 or jail time. The high court ruled that technology such as filtering software may better protect children.

The matter is now before a federal court in Pennsylvania, and the government wants the Google data to help argue that the law is more effective than software in protecting children from porn.

The Mountain View-based company told The San Jose Mercury News that it opposes releasing the information because it would violate the privacy rights of its users and would reveal company trade secrets.

Nicole Wong, an associate general counsel for Google, said the company will fight the government's efforts "vigorously."

"Google is not a party to this lawsuit, and the demand for the information is overreaching," Wong said.

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How the Press Played Dumb About the K Street Project

The Huffington Post
Eric Boehlert
How the Press Played Dumb About the K Street Project

One of the most depressing traits of the news media's timid performance during the Bush years has been their newfound fear of facts and the consequences of reporting them. Where Beltway journalists once eagerly corralled facts and dispensed them to the public, scribes today, like youngsters' endless checking to see if it's safe to cross the street, over-think the consequences and end up giving the Bush administration and Republicans a pass.

For instance, in the wake of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff's guilty plea on Jan. 3, some press outlets did their best, belatedly, to explain the crooked lobbying empire Abramoff had built with the help of Rep. Tom DeLay. And specifically, some news outlets addressed the K Street Project, the DeLay/Abramoff/Santorum/Norquist pay-to-play money machine that's playing a pivotal role in the GOP's deepening ethical morass. (Read a smart, concise description of the K Street Project here:
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/01/13/k-street-project/ ) But even then, the media's descriptions have often been half-hearted at best. Appearing on the Don Imus radio show recently, Newsweek's Evan Thomas mentioned, "this thing called the K Street Project," as if he'd just heard about the day before over lunch at The Palm.

In truth, there's not a serious reporter in Washington, D.C. who for the last three years did not know exactly what the K Street Project was. (The GOP openly boasted about it.) The K Street Project was, hands down, the most important behind-the-scenes development in terms of how power/legislation was bought and sold inside the Beltway and represented an epic story with endless angles and repercussions. And yet for the last three years those same serious MSM reporters participated in a virtual boycott of the story, refusing to detail corruption inside the GOP. (Curious, because during the Clinton years the press couldn't stop writing about alleged Democratic funny money scandals that never actually materialized into criminal wrongdoing by prominent Dems.) Only in recent weeks, after Abramoff pleaded guilty and DeLay's grip on power loosened, have reporters felt confident enough to cross the street--to explain what the K Street Project is.

And yes, boycott really is the word that described the MSM's previous don't-ask/don't-tell policy regarding the K Street Project. It's true that on June 10 2002, the Washington Post and the New York Times both published articles detailing the creation of the K Street Project. (Again, GOP leaders were practically advertising it.) But then the cones of silence went up. Between June 10, 2002, and Jan. 3, 2006, here's how many news articles produced by the Times' D.C. bureau mentioned the K Street Project: 4. Here's how many mentioned it three or more times: 0. Between June 2002 and Jan. 3, 2006, here's how many Los Angeles Times articles mentioned the K Street Project three or more times: 0. USA Today: 0. Associated Press: 0. Miami Herald: 0. Chicago Tribune: 0. Boston Globe: 0. Newsweek: 0. Even the Washington Post, which is supposed to meticulously detail the legislative culture of D.C., published just three news articles that contained three or more references to the K Street Project.


As for television news? Here's how many references ABC News made to the K Street Project between June 2002 and Jan. 3, 2006: 1. CBS: 0. NBC: 1. MSNBC: 1. Fox News: 0. CNN: 5. CNN never aired a reported piece explaining what the K Street Project was, although CNN International did. If you do the math for that 2002-to-2006 timeframe, we're talking about thousands and thousands of hours of network and cable news programming aired with a grand total of 8 mentions of the K Street Project.

The MSM were simply afraid of the facts.

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Congressional Agency Questions Legality of Wiretaps

washingtonpost.com
Congressional Agency Questions Legality of Wiretaps

By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer

The Bush administration appears to have violated the National Security Act by limiting its briefings about a warrantless domestic eavesdropping program to congressional leaders, according to a memo from Congress's research arm released yesterday.

The Congressional Research Service opinion said that the amended 1947 law requires President Bush to keep all members of the House and Senate intelligence committees "fully and currently informed" of such intelligence activities as the domestic surveillance effort.

The memo from national security specialist Alfred Cumming is the second report this month from CRS to question the legality of aspects of Bush's domestic spying program. A Jan. 6 report concluded that the administration's justifications for the program conflicted with current law.

Yesterday's analysis was requested by Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, who wrote in a letter to Bush earlier this month that limiting information about the eavesdropping program violated the law and provided for poor oversight.

The White House has said it informed congressional leaders about the NSA program in more than a dozen briefings, but has refused to provide further details. At a minimum, the briefings included the chairmen of the House and Senate intelligence oversight committees and the two ranking Democrats, known collectively as the "Gang of Four," according to various sources.

"We believe that Congress was appropriately briefed," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said in a statement last night.

Bush has publicly acknowledged issuing an order after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that allowed the National Security Agency to intercept telephone and e-mail exchanges between the United States and overseas without court authorization. The cases were limited to people suspected of al Qaeda ties, Bush and his aides said.

Cumming's analysis found that both intelligence committees should have been briefed because the program involved intelligence collection activities.

The only exception in the law applies to covert actions, Cumming found, and those programs must be reported to the "Gang of Eight," which includes House and Senate leaders in addition to heads of the intelligence panels. The administration can also withhold some operational details in rare circumstances, but that does not apply to the existence of entire programs, he wrote.

Unless the White House contends the program is a covert action, the memo said, "limiting congressional notification of the NSA program to the Gang of Eight . . . would appear to be inconsistent with the law."

Also yesterday, the Electronic Privacy Information Center said it would file a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit today demanding information about the NSA spying. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights filed separate lawsuits Tuesday asserting that Bush exceeded his authority and violated Fourth Amendment guarantees in authorizing the NSA surveillance.

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Republican Former EPA Chiefs Accuse President Bush of Neglecting Global Warming

ABC News
Ex-EPA Chiefs Blame Bush in Global Warming
Republican Former EPA Chiefs Accuse President Bush of Neglecting Global Warming
By JOHN HEILPRIN
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Six former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency five Republicans and one Democrat accused the Bush administration Wednesday of neglecting global warming and other environmental problems.

"I don't think there's a commitment in this administration," said Bill Ruckelshaus, who was EPA's first administrator when the agency opened its doors in 1970 under President Nixon and headed it again under President Reagan in the 1980s.

Russell Train, who succeeded Ruckelshaus in the Nixon and Ford administrations, said slowing the growth of "greenhouse" gases isn't enough.

"We need leadership, and I don't think we're getting it," he said at an EPA-sponsored symposium centered around the agency's 35th anniversary. "To sit back and just push it away and say we'll deal with it sometime down the road is dishonest to the people and self-destructive."

All the former administrators and the EPA's current chief, Stephen Johnson, raised their hands when asked whether they believe global warming is a real problem and again when asked if humans bear significant blame.

Agency heads during five Republican administrations, including the current one, criticized the Bush White House for what they described as a failure of leadership.

Defending his boss, Johnson said the current administration has spent $20 billion on research and technology to combat climate change after President Bush rejected mandatory controls on carbon dioxide, the chief gas blamed for trapping heat in the atmosphere like a greenhouse.

Bush also kept the United States out of the Kyoto international treaty to reduce greenhouse gases globally, saying it would harm the U.S. economy, after many of the accord's terms were negotiated by the Clinton administration.

"I know from the president on down, he is committed," Johnson said. "And certainly his charge to me was, and certainly our team has heard it: 'I want you to accelerate the pace of environmental protection. I want you to maintain our economic competitiveness.' And I think that's really what it's all about."

His predecessors disagreed. Lee Thomas, Ruckelshaus's successor in the Reagan administration, said that "if the United States doesn't deal with those kinds of issues in a leadership role, they're not going to get dealt with. So I'm very concerned about this country and this agency."

Bill Reilly, the EPA administrator under the first President Bush, echoed that assessment.

"The time will come when we will address seriously the problem of climate change, and this is the agency that's best equipped to anticipate it," he said.

Christie Whitman, the first of three EPA administrators in the current Bush administration, said people obviously are having "an enormous impact" on the earth's warming.

"You'd need to be in a hole somewhere to think that the amount of change that we have imposed on land, and the way we've handled deforestation, farming practices, development, and what we're putting into the air, isn't exacerbating what is probably a natural trend," she said. "But this is worse, and it's getting worse."

Carol Browner, who was President Clinton's EPA administrator, said the White House and the Congress should push legislation to establish a carbon trading program based on a 1990 pollution trading program that helped reduce acid rain.

"If we wait for every single scientist who has a thought on the issue of climate change to agree, we will never do anything," she said. "If this agency had waited to completely understand the impacts of DDT, the impacts of lead in our gasoline, there would probably still be DDT sprayed and lead in our gasoline."

Three former administrators did not attend Wednesday's ceremony: Mike Leavitt, now secretary of health and human services; Doug Costle, who was in the Carter administration, and Anne Burford, a Reagan appointee who died last year.

On the Net:

EPA: http://www.epa.gov

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