The hounds of justice close in on Rove...

.
Thanx again to the most intrepid poll-watcher and election integrity advocate on the blogs, Brad Friedman of Bradblog. Here's the latest from his blog, and links to the original.

PLEASE NOTE THE LAST SENTENCE REFERENCED HERE, IT IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT REVELATIONS IN THIS ARTICLE!

Karl Rove has threatened a GOP high-tech guru and his wife, if he does not "'take the fall' for election fraud in Ohio," according to a letter sent this morning to Attorney General Michael Mukasey, by Ohio election attorney Cliff Arnebeck.

The email, posted in full below, details threats against Mike Connell of the Republican firm New Media Communications, which describes itself on its website as "a powerhouse in the field of Republican website development and Internet services" and having "played a strategic role in helping the GOP expand its technological supremacy."

Connell was described in a recent interview with the plaintiff's attorneys in Ohio as a "high IQ Forrest Gump" for his appearance "at the scene of every [GOP] crime" from Florida 2000 to Ohio 2004 to the RNC email system to the installation of the currently-used Congressional computer network firewall.

Connell and his firm are currently employed by the John McCain campaign, as well as the RNC and other Republican and so-called "faith-based" organizations.

For the rest of the story, and the email to Mukasey requesting protection for Connell from Rove and his minions, go to;

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6214

HJC issues subpoena for Rove to testify about Siegelman

By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 23, 2008; Page A03

The House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed former presidential adviser Karl Rove yesterday to testify about his alleged meddling in Justice Department operations, escalating a long fight over lawmakers' authority to question Bush administration aides.

Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) wants to ask Rove about alleged politicization of the Justice Department, including the firings of U.S. attorneys and any role Rove may have played in the prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman. Siegelman, a Democrat, was convicted on fraud charges but was released from prison in March pending the results of his appeal.

In recent weeks, Siegelman has intensified his accusations that the Bush administration targeted him for political reasons.

Separately, Conyers disclosed yesterday that the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility has opened an investigation of possible selective prosecution of Siegelman and at least three others, at the request of the House Judiciary panel.

Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey has vigorously rejected allegations of political motivation by department lawyers.

Rove's lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, accused House Democrats of "provoking a gratuitous confrontation" and of refusing reasonable offers in which Rove would have provided written answers to questions. (since when did the defendant get to name the terms of his own testimony?)

"The decision about when, where and what a former assistant to the President (remember when Karl Rove was a walking Hatch Act violation?) may testify about raise issues of Executive Privilege and separation of powers (I think the term he's grasping for is "lawlessness") that Mr. Rove does not control," Luskin wrote in a letter dated May 21 that was released yesterday.

"It is unfortunate that Mr. Rove has failed to cooperate with our requests," Conyers said in his own statement. "Although he does not seem the least bit hesitant to discuss these very issues weekly on cable television and in the print news media, Mr. Rove and his attorney have apparently concluded that a public hearing room would not be appropriate."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/22/AR2008052203563.html

Siegelman; 2002 Alabama Gov. Election stolen!

Former AL Gov. Don Siegelman Says Media Ignoring Details
of His 'Electronically Stolen' 2002 Election

Has Given Story to 60 Minutes, Dan Abrams, LA Times...All Have Failed to Report His Allegations While Covering Other Aspects of His Story...

Still paging Dan Abrams...
The following email comes from Mark Crispin Miller, NYU media professor, and author of the landmark election integrity book, FOOLED AGAIN.
It includes an email exchange from yesterday with the finally-free-on-bond former Democratic Governor of Alabama Don Seigelman, concerning his allegations that his 2002 election was electronically flipped. (A rarely seen video interview, featuring Siegelman in 2004 discussing details of what he believes happened, is at posted at end of this article.)
Yesterday I emailed Don Siegelman, as I had a few matters to discuss with him.
Here's the crucial part:
At 12:12 AM -0400 4/9/08, Mark Crispin Miller wrote:
The other, more important thing is this: As you may or may not know, the one aspect of your long ordeal that the press has stubbornly refused to mention--or, I think, even to perceive--is the theft of that election in 2002. Like you, I believe that that was crucial; but the press, quite typically, won't mention it. Frankly, I believe that they, and most leading Democrats, are in denial about it, as its implications are too frightening. Just as they've looked away from all the evidence of vast election fraud throughout Bush/Cheney's reign, therefore, they've also looked away from the subversion of that gubernatorial race in Alabama. And so that chapter of your story is unknown to most Americans, even those who've lately heard the rest of it.
Here is his reply:

"Mark, I mention the vote stealing in every interview. 60 Minutes cut it out. Don Abrams didn't want to go there either. I have told the story to the Washington Post and LA Times. The hook is Rove's fingerprints are found there too. First, in that Rove's friend Jack Abramoff hires Dan Gans,was in charge of " electronic ballot security" in Baldwin County, Alabama,where the votes were stolen. Gans, working for the Alexander Strategies Group, claims credit for the win on his website, which he then takes down when Abramoff gets arrested. The second is Rove's business partner, Kitty Mc Cullough (a/k/a Kelly Kimbrough) is given credit for the electronic vote switch by the state Republican Party."

I asked Don if I could send that out, and he said yes ("Have at it"). So now I offer it to you. If you're an election reform activist, please start your (search) engines. If you're a journalist, please do your job. And if you're just another patriotic citizen, please do whatever you can do to get the press, and/or the Democratic Party, to pay heed.
For starters, how about asking "60 Minutes" why they "cut it out," and asking Dan Abrams why he "didn't want to go there either"? And since Don also told the Washington Post and LA Times about the theft of that election, how about we ask them, too?
This stuff will just keep on happening, until we make it dangerous to do such things."
thanx once again to BradBlog...
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5889





for more, go to THIS LINK!

Siegelman on CBS

Rove considers CBS "shoddy"??
Time to blame the messenger...

2008 Election already stolen by Republicans?

Probing Rove; it ain't over til' it's over...

Ever wonder how Bush managed to get re-elected in 2004? I never quite understood it, but apparently, all the stops had been pulled out, and Rove was in full-politics mode at every level of our supposedly non-partisan government.

Here's one good reason Rove managed to "win", and it represents a patent violation of the Hatch Act.

"Thirteen months before President Bush was reelected, chief strategist Karl Rove summoned political appointees from around the government to the Old Executive Office Building. The subject of the Oct. 1, 2003, meeting was "asset deployment," and the message was clear: The staging of official announcements, high-visibility trips and declarations of federal grants had to be carefully coordinated with the White House political affairs office to ensure the maximum promotion of Bush's reelection agenda and the Republicans in Congress who supported him, according to documents and some of those involved in the effort."The White House determines which members need visits," said an internal e-mail about the previously undisclosed Rove "deployment" team, "and where we need to be strategically placing our assets." Many administrations have sought to maximize their control of the machinery of government for political gain, dispatching Cabinet secretaries bearing government largess to battleground states in the days before elections. The Clinton White House routinely rewarded big donors with stays in the Lincoln Bedroom and private coffees with senior federal officials, and held some political briefings for top Cabinet officials during the 1996 election. But Rove, who announced last week that he is resigning from the White House at the end of August, pursued the goal far more systematically than his predecessors, according to interviews and documents reviewed by The Washington Post, enlisting political appointees at every level of government in a permanent campaign that was an integral part of his strategy to establish Republican electoral dominance. (The Thousand Year Republican Reign?) Under Rove's direction, this highly coordinated effort to leverage the government for political marketing started as soon as Bush took office in 2001 and continued through last year's congressional elections, when it played out in its most quintessential form in the coastal Connecticut district of Rep. Christopher Shays, an endangered Republican incumbent. Seven times, senior administration officials visited Shays's district in the six months before the election -- once for an announcement as minor as a single $23 government weather alert radio presented to an elementary school. On Election Day, Shays was the only Republican House member in New England to survive the Democratic victory. " (HATCH ACT VIOLATIONS GALORE!!!)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/18/AR2007081801182.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter

Tuesday News

KARLULU STIRS AGAIN;

ROVE'S

POLITICAL OPS

INFECTED STATE

DEPARTMENT!

DIPLOMATIC CORPS JOIN GAO, DOJ, ON ROVE'S LIST OF PLACES TO INFLUENCE PERNICIOUSLY

thanx to TPM for the link!

White House aides have conducted at least half a dozen political briefings for the Bush administration's top diplomats, including a PowerPoint presentation for ambassadors with senior adviser Karl Rove that named Democratic incumbents targeted for defeat in 2008 and a "general political briefing" at the Peace Corps headquarters after the 2002 midterm elections.
The briefings, mostly run by Rove's deputies at the White House political affairs office, began in early 2001 and included detailed analyses for senior officials of the political landscape surrounding critical congressional and gubernatorial races, according to documents obtained by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The documents show for the first time how the White House sought to ensure that even its appointees involved in foreign policy were kept attuned to the administration's election goals. (...DOES ANYONE REALLY BELIEVE THIS DOES NOT VIOLATE THE HATCH ACT ?) Such briefings occurred semi-regularly over the past six years (Multiple Hatch Act violations...) for staffers dealing with domestic policy, White House officials have previously acknowledged. In one instance, State Department aides attended a White House meeting at which political officials examined the 55 most critical House races for 2002 and the media markets most critical to battleground states for President Bush's reelection fight in 2004, (and that, by definition, is politicization of the State Department, or better put, a violation of the Hatch Act, just like the GAO and the DOJ and all the other branches)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/23/AR2007072301907.html

OIL FUTURES LOCKING IN AT $100 PER BARREL

thanx to TomPaine for the link

The $100-a-barrel oil that Goldman Sachs Group said would prevail by 2009 may be only a few months away. Jeffrey Currie, a London-based commodity analyst at the largest brokerage firm, said that $95 crude was quite likely this year unless OPEC unexpectedly increased production and that declining inventories were raising the chances for $100 oil. Jeff Rubin at CIBC World Markets said $100 a barrel could come as soon as next year. John Kilduff of the New York office of the futures trading firm Man Financial said: "We're only a headline of significance away from $100 oil. The unrelenting pressure of increased demand has left the market a coiled spring." New disruptions of Nigerian or Iraqi supplies, Kilduff said, or any military strike against Iran might trigger the rise. (COULD THIS BE THE REAL INCENTIVE FOR THE NEOCONS TO INVADE IRAQ?) Higher prices will increase revenue for energy producers from Exxon Mobil to PetroChina, while eroding profit for airlines and railroads (AND ANYONE ELSE WHO USES GASOLINE) . The United States and other oil-importing nations risk higher inflation, while increased energy costs could restrain growth. The benchmark crude oil future ended last week at $75.57 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, up 51 percent since mid-January and twice the level of early 2003. A record number of options have been sold that give the buyer the right to buy crude oil at $100. The contracts, covering 50 million barrels, pay off only if oil were to go above the target price. (THESE GUYS DON'T GAMBLE, THEY INVEST. SO WE CAN COUNT ON THE PRICES MATCHING THEIR PROGNOSTICATIONS SOON)

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/07/23/business/oil.php

Cloudy Friday

Red text is the "real" headline buried in the news.
Blue text is my own commentary.
Violet text is the blog quote of the day.

BUSH'S REAL LEGACY BEGINS TO SHOW;
HIS STACKED SUPREME COURT NOW DECIDEDLY CONSERVATIVE;
The decision, coming on the last day of this year's term, highlighted the fact that a conservative bloc led by Roberts prevailed in nearly all of the major cases that came before the court. On abortion, religion, campaign finance and now school integration, the chief justice has put together a five-member majority to move the law to the right. Roberts cited the decision in Brown in support of his opinion in the current case. Just as Brown struck down forced segregation nationwide, he said, the court is now declaring that students may not be classified "based on the color of their skin."The court's four liberal justices accused the majority of turning its back on Brown and the promise of racial integration."This is a decision that the court and the nation will come to regret," Justice Stephen G. Breyer said in a long dissent delivered in the courtroom."It is not often so few have quickly changed so much," he said at one point.In a separate dissent, 87-year-old Justice John Paul Stevens noted how far the court had moved in his long tenure. "It is my firm conviction that no member of the court that I joined in 1975 would have agreed with today's decision," he wrote.
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-scotus29jun29,0,2454560.story?coll=la-tot-topstories&track=ntothtml

Which brings us to the blog quote of the day,

from E.J. Dionne at Truthdig

"Just say no."
The Senate’s Democratic majority—joined by all Republicans who purport to be moderate—must tell President Bush that this will be their answer to any controversial nominee to the Supreme Court or to the appellate courts. The Senate should refuse even to hold hearings on Bush’s next Supreme Court choice, should a vacancy occur, unless the president reaches agreement with the Senate majority on a mutually acceptable list of nominees. And no Bush nominee to a lower court deserves any deference now that we learn that U.S. Circuit Court Judge Brett Kavanaugh may have misled the Senate during his confirmation hearings. Kavanaugh claimed he was not involved in administration discussions about setting the rules for the treatment of enemy combatants. The Washington Post reported that he actually was. Although a spokeswoman for Kavanaugh insisted that his testimony was “accurate,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy said, “I don’t believe that he was truthful with us.” As for the Supreme Court, we now know that the president’s two nominees, Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Samuel Alito, are exactly what many of us thought they were: activist conservatives intent on leading a judicial counterrevolution. Thursday’s 5-4 ruling tossing out two school desegregation plans was another milestone on the court’s march to the right.

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070629_three_words_for_bush_and_his_judges/

AND WITH THAT SOCIAL ISSUE OUT OF THE WAY, HERE'S THE R E A L REASON THESE CONSERVATIVE JUDGES ARE SEATED RIGHT NOW; CORPORATE GREED TRUMPS PUBLIC INTEREST EVERY TIME, 5-4
Striking down an antitrust rule nearly a century old, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that it was not automatically unlawful for manufacturers and distributors to agree on minimum retail prices. Five justices, agreeing with the nation’s major manufacturers, said the new rule could in some instances lead to more competition and better service. But four dissenting justices agreed with 37 states and some consumer groups that abandoning the old rule could result in significantly higher prices and less competition (now wasn't that paltry sum they spent on Republican political campaigns over tha past ten years a great investment!!!) for consumer and other goods. The court struck down the 96-year-old rule that resale price maintenance agreements were an automatic, or per se, violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. In its place, the court instructed judges considering such agreements for possible antitrust violations to apply a case-by-case approach, known as a “rule of reason,” (sounds like a floating decimal point is being tacked on the "rule of law") to assess their impact on competition. The new rule is considerably more favorable to defendants (big corporations). The decision was handed down on the last day of the court’s term, (as were some other very historically significant decisions, this is like a Supreme Court version of a Friday dump!) which has been notable for overturning precedents and for victories for big businesses and antitrust defendants. It was also the latest of a series of antitrust decisions in recent years rejecting per se rules that had prohibited various marketing agreements between companies. (are they simply protecting gasoline manufacturers ??? Bush is doing pretty well by book-cooking, no-bid CEO standards)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/29/washington/29bizcourt.html

BUT HE'S NOT DONE SO WELL ON THE DOMESTIC FRONT
The paradigm shift that senior adviser Karl Rove saw (and convinced every doofus on the right was inevitable, which inevitably led to some very careless arrogance and delusions of legal impunity) after the 2004 election has now proved illusory. The Ownership Society that Bush promised to build in 2005 is rarely mentioned these days. (that's because "they" already own all of it!!!) Even the hope-against-hope optimism of finding bipartisan common ground after the 2006 elections has officially evaporated. "Sand is flowing out of the hourglass," said Fred I. Greenstein, a Princeton University scholar on the presidency, who was struck by the gloomy tone of Bush's televised statement. "He looked much less like the kid on the cover of Mad magazine without a care. . . . He looked very angry and almost having difficulty getting the sentences out. (Alfred E. Bush, the consumate oriator) That seems to me to contrast with some of the early stages" of his presidency. Bush emerged from reelection (election theft chapter 2) with four main domestic priorities for his second term, as identified by Rove and other aides: He planned to reinvent Social Security to allow investment of some funds in the stock market, overhaul the tax code from top to bottom, bring millions of illegal immigrants out of the shadows and impose tough new curbs on what he called excessive litigation. He is now almost zero-for-four.
The Social Security plan died when a Republican Congress decided not to take it up. Tax overhaul died when Bush took the report he commissioned and put it on a shelf because it would be too provocative. And though he pushed through limits on class-action lawsuits, the rest of his litigation program -- proposals to restrict medical malpractice awards and settle long-standing asbestos claims -- has been stalled for years. Bush has lately sketched out a new agenda in areas such as energy and health care, and he may yet make progress on those in the 18 months he has left. But going forward, aides acknowledged, the once swaggering president will be in a defensive crouch. His immediate domestic plans include imploring lawmakers to reauthorize his No Child Left Behind education program, while trying to stop Congress from expanding a children's health insurance program and, with it, the federal deficit. (maybe some of those corrupt no-bid KBR/Halliburton contracts would be a better place to cut those deficits? ...not if you're a no-bid Halliburton executive profiteer.) Although each fight has had its own dynamics, aides broadly blame the collapse of Bush's domestic agenda on the war in Iraq, (can I get a group "DUH!") which soured Congress and the public even before Democrats won control of the Hill last November. (IT IS THE REASON DEMOCRATS WON IN NOVEMBER!)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/28/AR2007062802585.html?referrer=email

CHENEY WATCH
More solid opinions from the Seattle PI, (I sure do agree with these Seattle folks so often...) this time from columnist Bonnie Erbe;
Cheney and t(his) administration are not only toxic, they are downright radioactive. It is almost as if they covet the No. 1 spot in the Guinness Book of World Records as the worst administration in American history. (unless you are a Halliburton executive raking in all that no-bid cash) Any Republican running for president knows that an affiliation with the Bush administration is the political equivalent of Superman touching green kryptonite. Democrats will be able to posture and do nothing for decades and win elections merely by running against the Bush legacy. A front-page story in Wednesday's New York Times reveals the depth of damage the Angler and his co-president, "W," have done to the party. The Times reports on a poll showing that young Americans have shifted dramatically left in their political thinking. "They share with the public at large a negative view of President Bush, who has a 28 percent approval rating with this group, and of the Republican Party. They hold a markedly more positive view of Democrats than they do of Republicans." What Republican in his right mind would want an affiliation with this crowd? (key words; right mind...)
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/321727_erbe29.html

Wednesday Morning US Blues

Red text is the"real" headline buried in the news.
Blue text is my own commentary.
Violet text is the blog quote of the day.

BUSH WARS
ETHNIC CLEANSING OF CHRISTIANS FROM IRAQI NEIGHBORHOODS
The two men knocked on Abu Salam's door on a Friday morning. He was one of the last remaining Christians on his block. "Peace be upon you," they said, and Abu Salam, a man in his 50s, repeated the greeting. The pair, one fat and the other thin, spoke politely. Both were cleanshaven and wore slacks and button-down shirts. "You are now aware the neighborhood of Muwallamin belongs to the Islamic State of Iraq," the bigger man said. "We have three conditions you can accept: You can pay a tax, become a Muslim or you can leave your house and we will help you take out your furniture. "We'll let you make up your mind. "Peace be upon you," the men repeated as Abu Salam watched them leave.Within hours, Abu Salam and his family left their neighborhood of more than 50 years. They joined an exodus that has all but emptied Dora, a large district in south Baghdad, of its once-thriving Christian population. Abu Salam, who spoke on condition that he not be fully identified, citing fears for his safety, is staying elsewhere in Baghdad for now."People will leave if things don't get better. It is chaos," he said. "If there is no imminent solution, Iraq is finished."Christian leaders say 500 families left Dora in April and May. The U.S. military acknowledges that a large number of Christians were uprooted but says the number is significantly less. The United Nations' refugee agency said it counted 100 families at one location who had fled Dora.The flight of Dora's Christians is an example of how the initial phase of the U.S. security crackdown here has failed to establish security and stop the sectarian "cleansing" of Baghdad's neighborhoods.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-christians27jun27,0,695981.story?coll=la-tot-world&track=ntothtml

PROBING ROVE
ROVE ACCUSED OF INFLUENCING ALABAMA DOJ PROSECUTIONS
The convicted former governor of Alabama, Don E. Siegelman, faced prosecutors who urged a long prison sentence here on Tuesday in a federal corruption case that has unexpectedly transcended the confines of this sleepy state capital. The talk in the courtroom was of local things — dubious warehouses, a landfill, a lucrative hospital. But as he emerged from court today, Mr. Siegelman, a Democrat, tried to paint a bigger picture, saying he was a victim of Karl Rove, the senior political adviser in the White House. The origins of this case are political,” Mr. Siegelman said. “There’s no question that Karl Rove’s fingerprints are all over this case, from the inception.” His words, in turn, have been fueled by an affidavit that seems to link his prosecution to high government circles, which has given the case a serious jolt. Mr. Siegelman was convicted of bribery, conspiracy and mail fraud last year after being accused of persuading Richard M. Scrushy, then the chairman of the HealthSouth Corporation, to pay off $500,000 in debt from a lottery campaign the governor had initiated, in exchange for a seat on a state hospital licensing board. (...how does that compare to Bush and Rove handing out plum State Department posts, particularly ambassadorships, to Rangers and Pioneers? Lets focus the same laws on Bush that were applied here, maybe that magnifying glass will heat things up a bit.) Mr. Scrushy was also convicted. It was a small part of a voluminous Justice Department bribery-and-racketeering case, most of which — 25 out of 32 counts — was dismissed by the jury. Nonetheless the government is urging a sentence of 30 years and is asking Judge Mark Fuller of Federal District Court to even weigh charges on which Mr. Siegelman was acquitted. That incomplete government victory, in turn, loomed in the background of the arguments of Mr. Siegelman’s lawyers Tuesday as they urged Mr. Fuller, an appointee of President Bush, to go easy on their client, who was sitting in the dock with Mr. Scrushy. In particular, Mr. Siegelman and his backers refer to the affidavit of a Republican lawyer, released this month, that appears to implicate Mr. Rove. The lawyer, Jill Simpson, claims to have heard a top Alabama Republican operative with longstanding links to Mr. Rove boast over the phone in 2002 that Mr. Siegelman’s political career would soon be scuttled.
(...so when does Karl's career get to be ruined?)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/27/us/27alabama.html?_r=2&th&emc=th&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

GONZALES DUG IN LIKE A TEXAS TICK
Opinion from Joel Connelly at the Seattle PI
If Attorney General Alberto Gonzales steps foot in the federal courthouse while visiting Seattle on Wednesday, it'll be akin to a teenager entering a high school that he just vandalized. Our city's federal bench has been home to first-rate, non-ideological judges, regardless of who held power in Washington, D.C. Cool, professional U.S. attorneys, of both parties, have prosecuted difficult cases. Six months ago, a politically driven Justice Department under Gonzales fired one of those U.S. attorneys -- John McKay -- because of his professionalism and resistance to pressure. Gonzales violated what our courthouse represents, as well as the independent legal-judicial system, which is the key check on power in the American government... The "other" Washington is, increasingly, an Orwellian place of twisted language and wars by proxy. As in Iraq, the casualties are those of lower ranks. Cheney gets angry about Ambassador Joseph Wilson's editorial, and retaliates by "outing" Wilson's CIA agent wife, Valerie Plame. What happens? Scooter Libby is convicted, Cheney carries on. "Fredo" fires a bunch of U.S. attorneys for improper reasons. The consequences? Virtually all of his top deputies resign under pressure. Gonzales goes free. (... at least thus far...)
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/connelly/321410_joel27.html

CHENEY, EVER THE HALLIBURTON CEO
Blog Quote of the Day,
from Robert Scheer at Truthdig
No company has profited more from the carnage in Iraq than Halliburton, which Cheney headed before choosing himself as Bush’s running mate. One shudders at the blissful arrogance of this modern Daddy Warbucks, who sees no conflict of interest over the blood-soaked profits garnered by the once-bankrupt division of the company that left him rich. This week’s evidence of the continuing corruption of Halliburton and its subsidiaries profiteering from contracts costing American taxpayers an unbelievable $22 billion stems from a report by the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. The report, only one of many about Halliburton’s recently severed subsidiary KBR, focuses on work done in Baghdad’s super-secure Green Zone. While parent company Halliburton insults U.S. taxpayers by relocating its headquarters to the tax shelter of Dubai, subsidiary KBR has been spun off to focus more directly on the American military contracts that form the core of its operations. The corrupt reconstruction project has left a wasteland of failed energy, water, educational and political reform plans. As report after report details, garbage is not collected, hospitals are not staffed, schools close soon after they are opened and factories sit idle in shocking refutation of the vaunted efficiency of the United States’ political economic model. (...I wonder just what the total corruption $ figures are, Bush's bubbas and Cheney's partners have all done quite well by this war, over and under the table.)
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070626_taxpayers_losses_halliburtons_gains

Foggy Tuesday

Bush Wars
Seven children were killed during an airstrike by the United States-led coalition against a religious compound thought to be a Qaeda sanctuary in remote eastern Afghanistan, the coalition said Monday. The death of the children on Sunday may well add to the crescendoing anger many Afghans feel about civilian casualties from American and NATO military operations. More than 130 civilians have been killed in airstrikes and shootings in the past six months, according to Afghan authorities. That toll may soon inflate dismally. Afghan officials said late Monday that more than 50 civilians may have died during fierce fighting over the past three days between NATO forces and the Taliban in the Chora district of the southern province of Uruzgan.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/19/world/asia/19afghan.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Probing Rove
White House aides made extensive use of political e-mail accounts for official government business, despite rules requiring that they conduct such business through official communications channels, according to new evidence disclosed yesterday by congressional investigators. The Republican National Committee told the investigators that White House senior political adviser Karl Rove alone sent or received more than 140,000 (illegal) e-mails between 2002 and 2007, more than half of which involved individuals using official ".gov" e-mail accounts, a report from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said. The RNC said it still has copies of those e-mails. (Well, then, fork em' over!)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/18/AR2007061800809.html?referrer=email

Which Brings us to the blog quote of the day, from Marcy Wheeler at "The Next Hurrah", with some more revelations into Roves meanderings back and forth across legal lines (AKA "LAWLESSNESS"!!) "As part of his interim report on RNC emails, Waxman released Susan Ralston's testimony before the committee. Reading the deposition, it becomes pretty clear why Tom Davis was trying to warn Rove of the danger of Ralston's testimony. Because even what she was willing to testify to makes it clear that Rove is in some deep legal trouble. And then when you look at the areas where she carves out immunity for herself, you realize that if she were ever to testify under immunity, Rove would be in deeper trouble."
http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/

Under a New Category Label called;
"The Lawlessness Files"
Federal officials have disobeyed at least six new laws that President Bush challenged in his signing statements, a government study disclosed yesterday. The report provides the first evidence that the government may have acted on claims by Bush that he can set aside laws under his executive powers. In a report to Congress, the non partisan Government Accountability Office studied a small sample of the bill provisions that Bush has signed into law but also challenged with signing statements. The GAO found that agencies disobeyed six such laws, while enforcing 10 others as written even though Bush had challenged them. House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers, Democrat of Michigan, said yesterday that the GAO's findings demonstrated a need for a more "extensive review" of how the government has followed up on hundreds of other laws challenged by Bush. Bush's signing statements have drawn fire because he has used them to challenge more than 1,100 sections of bills -- more than all previous presidents combined. The sample the GAO studied represents a small portion of the laws Bush has targeted, but its report concluded that sometimes the government has gone on to disobey those laws. (and that is the definition of "LAWLESSNESS!!!)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/06/19/us_agencies_disobey_6_laws_that_president_challenged/

THE ENVIRONMENT
The Birds AND the Bees?
We got trouble, right here in River City!
Last week, the Audubon Society released a new report describing the sharp and startling population decline of some of the most familiar and common birds in America: several kinds of sparrows, the Northern bobwhite, the Eastern meadowlark, the common grackle and the common tern. The average decline of the 20 species in the Audubon Society’s report is 68 percent. Forty years ago, there were an estimated 31 million bobwhites. Now there are 5.5 million. Compared to the hundred-some condors presently in the wild, 5.5 million bobwhites sounds like a lot of birds. But what matters is the 25.5 million missing and the troubles that brought them down — and are all too likely to bring down the rest of them, too. So this is not extinction, but it is how things look before extinction happens. The word “extinct” somehow brings to mind the birds that seem like special cases to us, the dodo or the great auk or the passenger pigeon. Most people would never have had a chance to see dodos and great auks on their remote islands before they were decimated in the 17th and 19th centuries. What is hard to remember about passenger pigeons isn’t merely their once enormous numbers. It’s the enormous numbers of humans to whom their comings and goings were a common sight and who supposed, erroneously, that such unending clouds of birds were indestructible. We recognize the extraordinary distinctness of the passenger pigeon now because we know its fate, killed off largely by humans. But we have moralized it thoroughly without ever really taking it to heart. (So now we have the Birds AND the Bees both suffering tragic, mysterious declines? So what about the proverbial canary in the coal mine? How long has that little bird been DEAD, but no one told us miners about it??? I would wager Chernobyl is at the root os this, but other influences contributed. The evergreens seem to have been similarly decimated, at least here in Kansas, one ot of every ten sthat you see in the wild is turning brown and dying.)http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/19/opinion/19tue4.html?th&emc=th

Monday Morning, Again No Africa News...

Red text is the "real" story buried in the news.
Blue text is my own commentary.
Violet text is the blog quote of the day.

BUSH; BAD INFLUENCE ON TEXAS LEGACY?
The latest Texas era in Washington — the last for a while, some say — is grinding toward its last roundup, its final rodeo, the last stampede or any cliché you prefer about a state where even the clichés are bigger. The big-time Texans in Congress (think Tom DeLay, Dick Armey) are gone. And soon (CAN WE REALLY AFFORD TO WAIT THAT LONG?) President Bush will be just another retired Texan with a ranch and a Dallas home. So the time approaches to gauge the impact of the Connecticut-born Texas president (son of a Massachusetts-born Texas president) on the image of his beloved home state and its residents. Not good, says Southern Methodist University political scientist Cal Jillson. "He has fed into that sort of image of Texas as shooting from the hip and proceeding on the basis of your own sense rather than consulting more broadly and looking for common ground," Jillson said. "A lot of people think of that overconfidence, bordering on arrogance, (Bush crossed that border LONG AGO) ask-questions-later kind of view that has characterized George W. Bush, if not all Texans."
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/nation/05/14/14bushtexas.html

BUSH WARS;
Cheney, Rice continue good-cop, bad-cop routine;
PART ONE; CONDI'S STORY
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Monday the United States decided to hold talks with Iran about security in wartorn Iraq because officials believed the timing was right. (how abgout five years late?) "We've had that channel (for talks) for some time, and it seemed like a good time to activate it," Rice told reporters accompanying her here for talks with Russian officials. She said the idea of the talks came from talks with Iraq's neighboring countries in the region, (and what of all the bloggers advising this for years?) saying "we all made a commitment there to do what we can to help the Iraqis."
"And one of the most important things is to help the Iraqis is dealing with their border issues, with the flow of foreign fighters and arms across the border," Rice added, "and from our point of view and the coalition's point of view, dealing with the dangerous technologies that are originating in Iran that are putting our soldiers at risk. So this seemed to be a good time to follow up on some of the general commitments that the neighbors took." The announcement that the United States and Iran would hold the talks represented a historic political turnabout for the two countries with the most influence over Iraq's future. Expectations of progress remain low, however, with tough issues at stake and mutual suspicions running high. Even as it announced the talks, Iran lashed out at Vice President Dick Cheney's weekend warnings about its nuclear program, saying it would retaliate if the U.S. attacked it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1152AP_US_Iran.html

PART TWO, CHENEY'S STORY
Cheney visited Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt in a bid to get moderate Arab states to do more to support the fragile government of Iraq and to promote reconciliation among rival factions. (YEAH, RIGHT, RECONCILIATION DOESN'T MAKE FOR EFFICIENT WAR PROFITEERING...) He also sounded out (threatened) the governments on increasing Iranian influence in the region and took a hardline stance against Iran's nuclear ambitions and efforts to dominate the Gulf region. The vice president's tour appeared to have mixed results, and on some stops he found an eagerness to talk as much about the Israeli-Palestinian peace process as the situation in Iraq. (What Condi does, Cheney undoes, and it all seems quite deliberate and well orchestrated.)
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1151AP_Cheney.html

Iraq
The insurgent coalition that includes al-Qaeda in Iraq asserted responsibility on Sunday for the ambush south of Baghdad that left four U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter dead and three other American soldiers missing. A brief statement purporting to be from the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella organization that includes al-Qaeda in Iraq, appeared on insurgent Web sites a day after the fiery attack in the rural terrain near Mahmudiyah. The statement praised the insurgents for their "blessed operation" involving a "clash with a convoy of crusaders in Mahmudiyah," but offered few details and no evidence, such as photographs or video, to verify the claims.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/13/AR2007051300288.html?referrer=email

The US military surge in Iraq, designed to turn around the course of the war, appears to be failing as senior US officers admit they need yet more troops and new figures show a sharp increase in the victims of death squads in Baghdad. In the first 11 days of this month, there have already been 234 bodies - men murdered by death squads - dumped around the capital, a dramatic rise from the 137 found in the same period of April. Improving security in Baghdad and reducing death-squad activity was described as one of the key aims of the US surge of 25,000 additional troops, the final units of whom are due to arrive next month.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2078422,00.html

...which brings us to the blog quote of the day, thanx once again to Scarecrow at Fire Dog Lake;
"John McCain tried to argue to Tim Russert (h/t to Crooks and Liars) that what the Iraqis want doesn’t matter. And for McCain, their views don’t matter, since he assumes he knows what’s good for the Iraqi and American publics better than they do. But will he say that to the Generals in the Pentagon? We’ll see. If by September, American casualties are still running high, the American and Iraqi legislatures have voted to end the occupation, and the Generals agree, the only people left to help McCain’s son and the British heir continue the US occupation of Iraq will be the children of Georgy Bush, Dick Cheney, Joe Lieberman, and Mitt Romney. That should settle the matter fairly quickly. (in a New York minute)
http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/05/14/listening-to-the-generals/

Pakistan/Afghanistan conflict awakening?
Clashes between government supporters and opposition activists flared for a second day Sunday in the country's largest city, bringing the weekend death toll to about 40. The clashes in the southern city of Karachi were prompted by a judicial crisis that has gripped the country since March 9, when the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, suspended Pakistan's chief justice for alleged abuses of office. Since then, protesters have frequently taken to the streets to rally against what they see as an attempt by Musharraf to snuff out fledgling democratic institutions and ease his way to another term. In unrelated violence (no such thing, it is all related somewhere) Sunday, Pakistani and Afghan military forces exchanged mortar and small-arms fire as tensions along the 1,500-mile border increased. A Pakistani military spokesman, Maj. Gen. Waheed Arshad, accused Afghan forces of "unprovoked firing" and said half a dozen Afghan soldiers had been killed. Afghan military officials denied that, but said two Afghan civilians had been killed. Pakistan has been seeking to erect a fence along its border with Afghanistan, a move that has rankled Afghans.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/13/AR2007051300499.html?referrer=email

A day after political clashes claimed 39 lives in Karachi, analysts said the violence — and accusations that the government had done little to stop the killings — had put renewed pressure on the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. News reports said government troops had been in the southern port city, but had not taken action to separate armed pro-government and opposition groups who were shooting at each other. Dawn, an English-language newspaper in Karachi, said troops had “suddenly disappeared from the troubled spots.” The government has not responded to those claims.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/14/world/asia/14pakistan.html?th&emc=th

The man who probably was the Taliban’s foremost operational commander, Mullah Dadullah, was killed in a joint operation by Afghan security forces, American forces and NATO troops in Helmand Province, Governor Asadullah Khaled of the neighboring Kandahar Province said Sunday. His death would cause a “significant blow to the Taliban’s command and control,” said Maj. Chris Belcher, an American military spokesman at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, the capital. He added that Mullah Dadullah “was a military leader, primarily in charge of the effort to recapture the city of Kandahar,” once the Taliban’s stronghold.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/14/world/asia/14afghan.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

DOJ SCANDAL (a.k.a. "PROBING ROVE")
It all begins to unravel; spider Karl's web is full of holes.
The committee empowered its Democratic chairman, in consultation with its top Republican, to issue subpoenas for D. Kyle Sampson, Gonzales's former chief of staff; Michael J. Elston, chief of staff to Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty; Monica Goodling, the Justice Department's White House liaison; William W. Mercer, a nominee to become associate attorney general; and Michael A. Battle, who directed the office overseeing the nation's 93 U.S. attorneys and carried out the firings. The committee also authorized subpoenas for six of the eight fired U.S. attorneys: Carol S. Lam of San Diego, Bud Cummins of Little Rock, Paul K. Charlton of Phoenix, John McKay of Seattle, Daniel G. Bogden of Las Vegas and David C. Iglesias of Albuquerque. All six testified under oath last week before the House Judiciary Committee. The other two fired U.S. attorneys, who were not included in today's subpoena authorization, are Margaret Chiara of Grand Rapids, Mich., and Kevin V. Ryan of San Francisco.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/15/AR2007031500213_2.html
This list would be complete if, Biskupic, Griffin, Shlozman, and Palouse were all somewhere in the lineup. And what do they all have in common? They are all still "in the loop." And they might represent just the tip of a much deeper and constantly unfolding RNC/WH/DOJ/FedSoc conspiracy (not necessarily in that order).

Leahy's hot on the right trail now...
"We need to close the (clandestinely added) loophole exploited by the Department of Justice and the White House that enabled this abuse to occur," Leahy said. Documents turned over to the committee this week by Justice and the White House show that officials there "chose to exploit this authority to make an end run around the Senate," he said. "It is time to roll back the change in law." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/15/AR2007031500213_2.html
(and then write another law that absolutely prohibits future such midnight insertions. In a democratic republic, it should be a felony just like counterfeiting, because it creates counterfit laws.)

Kerry's closing in, too
Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) called on Bush to make Rove and Miers available to the Judiciary Committee. "We know Karl Rove has been at the helm of the most blatantly political White House agenda in years," Kerry said. Bush "should tell Rove to willingly answer any and all questions, as part of this investigation into the purge of prosecutors who didn't toe the Republican Party line," he said. "The integrity of our U.S. Attorney system is critical to the confidence in our legal system. The president must move quickly to stop the bleeding and restore public trust."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/15/AR2007031500213_2.html

Nearly half the U.S. attorneys slated for removal by the administration last year were targets of Republican complaints that they were lax on voter fraud, including efforts by presidential adviser Karl Rove to encourage more prosecutions of election- law violations, according to new documents and interviews. Of the 12 U.S. attorneys known to have been dismissed or considered for removal last year, five were identified by Rove or other administration officials as working in districts that were trouble spots for voter fraud -- Kansas City, Mo.; Milwaukee; New Mexico; Nevada; and Washington state. Four of the five prosecutors in those districts were dismissed.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/13/AR2007051301106.html?referrer=email

The White House told a Republican member of Congress last summer about its plans to fire a U.S. attorney in Arkansas and replace him with a former aide to presidential adviser Karl Rove, but it did not tell Democratic lawmakers, according to a new Justice Department e-mail released yesterday. The White House called Rep. John Boozman (R-Ark.) "and pretty much told him what they are doing with this appointment and how they are going about it," according to a July 6 e-mail from Bud Cummins, then the U.S. attorney in Little Rock. The message indicates that Bush administration officials told Boozman about their plans to fire Cummins at the same time that Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) and other Democrats say they were being stonewalled. Pryor has accused Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and other Justice officials of lying to him about the firing of Cummins, who was replaced by Tim Griffin, a former Rove aide and an opposition researcher at the