TheStar.com - Kerry fails Iraq test: "Practical politics undoubtedly prompted Kerry's reply. He is loath to admit he cast a foolish vote in 2002. He does not want to alienate voters who were similarly duped, and who are not keen to be reminded of it. And he must not be seen as 'soft' on Saddam. "

The Unofficial Paul Krugman Web Page: "When Friday's dismal job report was released, traders in the Chicago pit began chanting, 'Kerry, Kerry.' "

Salt Lake Tribune - Opinion: "For Fox News, MSNBC and, most disappointing of all, CNN - the Network of Record - to be spending so much time hashing, rehashing and, most of all, speculating on the gory details of this single case is an excellent example of what's wrong with the mass media today."

Yahoo! News - U.S. Barred From Weakening Dolphin Rules
: "'The record is replete with evidence that the secretary was influenced by policy concerns unrelated to the best available scientific evidence,' Henderson wrote in a strongly worded 51-page opinion. 'This court has never, in its 24 years, reviewed a record of agency action that contained such a compelling portrait of political meddling.' "

Diplomacy Sidelined as US Targets Iran: "The US charge sheet against Iran is lengthening almost by the day, presaging destabilizing confrontations this autumn and maybe a pre-election October surprise. "

Capitol Police Chief Sees No Specific Threat to Hill (washingtonpost.com)

Yahoo! News - Pat Oliphant

Telegraph | News | Iraqi judge orders arrest of American aide to Chalabi Regarding the current charges against Salen Chalabi, Francis Brooke says, "He wouldn't hurt a fly." And many US news services carry that quote. They don't tell us Brooke is on the lam just like his boss.

Yahoo! News - Unmasking of Qaeda Mole a U.S. Security Blunder-Experts: "The revelation that a mole within al Qaeda was exposed after Washington launched its 'orange alert' this month has shocked security experts, who say the outing of the source may have set back the war on terror. "

Chalabi Nephew Under Investigation in Killing LA Times breaks the Chalabi story on 8/3.

Yahoo! News - Iraq invasion a "tremendous gift" to bin Laden: CIA analyst: "It validated so many of the arguments he's made over the past decade,' 'Anonymous' said, particularly the claim by the Saudi-born al-Qaeda leader that the West seeks to occupy the Islamic holy places.
'We have the first one, the most important in the Arabian peninsula, we occupy that in their eyes,' he said in a reference to Saudi Arabia. 'We now occupy Iraq, the second holiest place, and the Israelis have Jerusalem, the third.
'The idea that we would smash any government that posed a threat to Israel -- that's validated by our actions,' he continued. 'And his claim that we lust after control of Arab oil; Iraq has the second greatest reserves in the Arab world.
'So it's been an astounding victory for Osama bin Laden"

CNN.com Chalabi and his friends

CJR July/August 2004: The List by Douglas McCollam Ahmad Chalabi’s defectors told stories to a lot of
reporters who now wish they’d kept their distance
How Chalabi Played the Press

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Stay calm everyone, there's Prozac in the drinking water: "It should make us happy, but environmentalists are deeply alarmed: Prozac, the anti-depression drug, is being taken in such large quantities that it can now be found in Britain's drinking water. "

JohnKerryIsADoucheBagButImVotingForHimAnyway.com

Yahoo! News - Halliburton Accused of Accounting Fraud: "Halliburton Co. and several top executives intentionally engaged in 'serial accounting fraud' from 1998 to 2001, including when it was led by Vice President Dick Cheney"

Mike Whitney: The Arbitrary Imprisonment of Jose Padilla: "Their message is quite clear; THEY WILL NOT DEFEND EVEN THE MOST BASIC TENANTS OF THE CONSTITUTION, but will defer to the executive as the sole arbiter of justice."

Confusion Mounts Over Threat (washingtonpost.com): "Americans should prepare for more confusion, uncertainty and cynicism"

heraldtribune.com: Southwest Florida's Information Leader: "He said that making such statements without providing specific details to back them up 'only serves to erode public confidence' in the credibility of government."

Bush, Family and Top Aides Received $127,600 Gifts Last Year from Saudi Crown Prince

They Knew...: Despite the whitewash, we now know that the Bush administration was warned before the war that its Iraq claims were weak -- In These Times

Yahoo! News - Boondocks

Ashcroft Tells Libraries to Destroy Citizen-Friendly Publications - BuzzFlash News Alert: "[T]he Department of Justice asked the Government Printing Office Superintendent of Documents to instruct depository libraries to destroy five publications the Department has deemed not 'appropriate for external use.' The Department of Justice has called for these five these public documents, two of which are texts of federal statutes, to be removed from depository libraries and destroyed, making their content available only to those with access to a law office or law library.



The topics addressed in the named documents include information on how citizens can retrieve items that may have been confiscated by the government during an investigation. The documents to be removed and destroyed include: Civil and Criminal Forfeiture Procedure; Select Criminal Forfeiture Forms; Select Federal Asset Forfeiture Statutes; Asset forfeiture and money laundering resource directory; and Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 (CAFRA)."

Will Ferrell - A message from White House West Will Ferrell for President!

Yahoo! News - Pre-9/11 Acts Led To Alerts: "Most of the al Qaeda surveillance of five financial institutions that led to a new terrorism alert Sunday was conducted before the Sept. 11, 2001,"

Daily Yomiuri On-Line: "As the Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) presidential election nears, what was considered the likeliest scenario--the uncontested reelection of incumbent Katsuya Okada--is being questioned by some Minshuto legislators.

...What triggered skepticism about giving Okada an uncontested ride were the remarks he made last week in the United States regarding his desire to revise Japan's war-renouncing Constitution. "

Housing Costs, Layoffs Boost Need for Food Banks : "According to the Agriculture Department, 11% of U.S. families - 34.9 million people - are 'food insecure,' meaning they lack the means to ensure themselves of healthy meals and are vulnerable to at least a mild form of chronic malnutrition. A U.S. Conference of Mayors survey of 25 cities found that demand at food banks rose 17% in 2003....While very few Americans, even the poorest, risk starvation, Hofer said many wind up with long-term health problems as they cut financial corners."

BUSH NOTEBOOK - zanesvilletimesrecorder.com: "The public was not allowed to bring umbrellas, which were collected by security personnel outside of the park. [While both campaigns announced before the rallies that umbrellas would not be permitted, attendees who brought umbrellas to Kerry's rally were allowed to bring them in.] ... Area media, including the Times Recorder, WHIZ, Daily Jeffersonian in Cambridge and the Columbus news stations, had to sit outside in the rain with their equipment. However, a tent was set up for the national media to stay dry."

Iraq Funds Are Focus of 27 Criminal Inquiries

Faithful, undecided preparing for area Kerry, Bush rallies - zanesvilletimesrecorder.com: "[T]his swing voter could be swung one way or the other Saturday, depending on what she hears at Bush's rally in Cambridge and Kerry's rally in Zanesville.

'I want to hear what they both have to say,' she said, noting that she will be particularly interested in each candidate's plan for peace in Iraq."

My Plea to John Kerry: Stand Up for the Progressive Agenda that the Majority of America Already Agrees With: "A few weeks ago I was flipping around on the dial and I came across a NASCAR Race on FOX and there was NASCAR champion Dale Earnhardt Jr. FOX asked him, what did you do the night before while you were getting prepared for the big race? He said, 'Well, I took my crew to go see Fahrenheit 9/11.' And then he said, and 'I think all of America should see this movie.' "

Democracy Now! | Medea Benjamin Dragged Off DNC Floor in Handcuffs For Unfurling "End the Occupation of Iraq" Banner

Ray McGovern: How the 9/11 Report Soft-Pedaled Root Causes: "It's the policy, stupid!"

Touchscreen Vote Records Lost in Florida

CJAD 800 : News: "The group said the U.S. military was using humanitarian aid 'for political and military motives"

bmj.com Lenzer 329 (7459): 189: "Daniel Troy, chief counsel to the US Food and Drug Administration, is under fire for inviting drug companies to inform him of lawsuits against them so the FDA could help in their defence. 'We can't afford to get involved in every case - we have to pick our shots,' he said, advising them therefore to 'make it sound like a Hollywood pitch.' "

Rock Royalty to Join Voices Against Bush With Fall Concerts There is a range of feeling about Kerry," the source said, "but a uniform belief that Bush must go.

The real election: Voting for the next Supreme Court justices: Holding one's nose is not nearly enough for a vote for Kerry. But I may have to get a hazmat suit and vote for him anyhow, and this is why. The issue is framed all the more clearly by the House's vote last week purporting to exempt DOMA from federal Constitutional review. A Bush-majority Court could well uphold such a provision, effectively abrogating the Constitution altogether.

Yahoo! News - U.S. Public Found to Reject Detainee Torture and Coercion University of Maryland survey finds Americans far more compassionate than this spring's media-sponsored survey.

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Contributor: Honorable Commission, Toothless Report: "Among the obvious truths that were documented but unarticulated were the facts that the Bush administration did little on terrorism before 9/11, and that by invading Iraq the administration has left us less safe as a nation."

Election Law Website at The Ohio State University

Public Less Fearful Of Terrorist Attack (washingtonpost.com) If your neighbors and friends pooh-pooh Tom Ridge, they're a danger to you.

Coshocton reflects on native soldier who died in Iraq - zanesvilletimesrecorder.com: Always remember: a cycle can be broken at any point on its path.

This family has established a memorial scholarship fund, "to help students who find themselves in the same position as Paul was in 1998 [when he joined the Army] -- wanting to go to college but without the means to do so."

Omaha.com: "Lumping minor crimes under the terrorism label could wrongly heighten public anxiety and provide a questionable rationale for more anti-terror resources"

Victory Slipping Away for Black Farmers (washingtonpost.com): "The Department of Agriculture has denied payments to almost 90 percent of black farmers who sought compensation for discrimination under a landmark court settlement the agency reached with African American growers five years ago...The Justice Department spent 56,000 hours of attorney and paralegal time challenging 129 claims, and billed USDA $12 million."

WorkingForChange-This Modern World: The Sensible Liberal

The Memory Hole > Classified Letters Regarding FBI Whistleblower Sibel Edmonds

Interior Dept. Inquiry Faults Procurement (TechNews.com) Army's Abu Ghraib interrogators and Navy's Guantanamo interrogators were hired via IT contracts with the Department of the Interior.

Former CIA Director Used Pentagon Ties to Introduce Iraqi Defector

Ron Jacobs: Kucinich Surrenders: "the fact that the Kerry people fought even the inclusion of a statement that called the Iraq war wrong from its inception proves once again how little difference there really is in the campaigns of the two men running for president of the United States "

KRT Wire | 07/15/2004 | Civil rights panel says disenfranchisement of voters was deliberate

baltimoresun.com - DiBiagio voices frustration over pace of top cases: "Maryland U.S. Attorney Thomas M. DiBiagio has told his staff he wants three 'front page' indictments for public corruption or white-collar crimes by November and is frustrated with the pace of cases against elected officials, according to...two July e-mails and a staff meeting agenda, all written by DiBiagio."

U.S. Won't Turn Over Data for Iraq Audits (washingtonpost.com): "The Bush administration is withholding information from U.N.-sanctioned auditors examining more than $1 billion in contracts awarded to Halliburton Co. and other companies in Iraq without competitive bidding, the head of the international auditing board said Thursday. "

State Reports - Prisoners of the CensusMaps of 10 states by county and/or Congressional district, showing how the prisoner census shifts voting power from diverse urban precincts towards rural areas with a strong stake in the prison-industrial complex.

Yahoo! News - Fair Use Bill Gains Ground

Blackwell, Householder at odds over firings - zanesvilletimesrecorder.com Contracts released this week by Householder show the House Republican Campaign Committee -- funded largely by donations from GOP House member campaigns -- owes fired consultants Brett Buerck and Sisk $100,000 and $50,000, respectively, in severance pay.

Buerck and Sisk were fired by the caucus in early June, after they became centerpieces for federal and state investigations into alleged heavy-handed fundraising and campaign irregularities.

Paying the Price: The Mounting Costs of the Iraq War

The Washington Dispatch: "In the midst of our bloodiest war, the fratricide of the Civil War, Mr. Lincoln managed to get reelected. The "Greatest Generation" made it through WWII without having to alter the traditional, scheduled, legal election process. Throughout the Cold War we teetered on the brink of a nuclear war with the Soviet Union - yet we somehow maintained the regular, constitutionally mandated requirements of our republic. Nineteen hijackers, however, have turned the entire federal government inside-out (i.e. the creation of the Department of Homeland Security - the largest reorganization of the government since the Defense Department was created in 1948); suspended some of our civil liberties (i.e. the USA PATRIOT Act); and opened the door to the Trotskyite "creative destruction" embraced by the neocon chickenhawks who started whispering into President Bush's ear by midday on Sept. 11th."

Use this link: web.mit.edu/simsong/www/iraqreport2-textunder.pdf
to access a searchable version of the Senate's report on intelligence. It's a 14 megabyte file. Then search for "Feith" and read through the first item found to get this:
"The August 20th meeting is clear evidence of the Administration politicizing an
analytical process that should be protected from the meddlesome reach of policy officials."
And here I thought it was the CIA's fault. It's that durned liberal media!

Is Fabulous President George W. Bush a Fabulous Homosexual? Baptists Are Saving Homosexuals asks what conservative Christians demand to know

Telegraph | News | Fury over Pentagon cell that briefed White House on Iraq's 'imaginary' al-Qaeda links: "Mr Feith's cell undermined the credibility of CIA judgments on Iraq's alleged al-Qa'eda links within the highest levels of the Bush administration.
The cell appears to have been set up by Mr Feith as an adjunct to the Office of Special Plans, a Pentagon intelligence-gathering operation established in the wake of 9/11 with the authority of Paul Wolfowitz. Its focus quickly became the al-Qa'eda-Saddam link.
On occasion, without informing the then head of the CIA, George Tenet, the group gave counter-briefings in the White House."

Bay Area group in flap over anti-war billboard / Clear Channel kills nonprofit's ad for N.Y.'s Times Square: "I'm constantly shocked by how there is such an effort to really prevent people from contemplating the difficult issues of our time,'' Waters said. 'The message of the sign was trying to get people to think about this. And clearly, it's not what the powers-that-be want people to do."

HoustonChronicle.com - Reviewers of DeLay's ethics got his money: "Four of the five Republicans investigating an ethics complaint against House Majority Leader Tom DeLay have received campaign contributions from DeLay's political action committee"

MSNBC - Exclusive: Election Day Worries: "Ridge's department last week asked the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel to analyze what legal steps would be needed to permit the postponement of the election"

Kerry to Reach Out to 'People on the Right': "Kerry seemed unconcerned about antagonizing his liberal supporters"

Yahoo! News - Question of Pressure Splits Panel Democrats on the committee, while acknowledging that they had unanimously approved the report, said they disagreed with the conclusion that there had been no political pressure.

TNR Online | July Surprise? (print): "according to this ISI official, a White House aide told ul-Haq last spring that 'it would be best if the arrest or killing of [any High Value Target] were announced on twenty-six, twenty-seven, or twenty-eight July'--the first three days of the Democratic National Convention in Boston. "

Asia Times - Asia's most trusted news source: "social psychologist Erich Fromm had written on 'socially patterned defects' that enabled large groups of people to adjust themselves comfortably to a system that, humanly speaking, is 'fundamentally at odds with our basic existential and human needs'. Burston observed that this resulted in 'deficiencies, or traits, or attitudes which don't generate internal conflict when, in fact, they should"

MSNBC - As rationales for war erode, issue of blame looms large: "The larger question is whether voters will blame the White House for these two massive mistakes."

Bush's War-Era Records Damaged (washingtonpost.com): "The payroll summaries destroyed were for the first quarter of 1969 and the third quarter of 1972." But none of the 13 intervening quarters?

WILLKOMMEN BEI REPORT MAINZ
Irak: US-Soldaten sollen inhaftierte Kinder misshandelt haben
Over 100 children at Abu Ghraib. German TV and "Der Spiegel" broke this story last Sunday, and it still hasn't made the English-language press. Video and transcript.

IPA News Release: 9-11 FBI Whistleblower: "Ashcroft Denying 9-11 FBI Whistleblower Day in Court"

Survey: Public Wants Press to Fully Describe Sources in Science Stories

Yahoo! News - Rights Groups Accuse Pentagon of Subverting Court Ruling on Guantanamo Detainees

The Smoking Gun: Archive Ken Lay informs George Bush about Enron's plans to pipe gas across Afghanistan.

Bush Again Turns Down Invitation to Address NAACP Convention (washingtonpost.com): "The president's decision means he will be the first sitting president since Warren G. Harding not to address the NAACP. A White House spokeswoman said Bush had a scheduling conflict, but would not specify the conflict with the six-day convention."

Foreign Policy: Imperial Amnesia

Yahoo! News - Times: Bush Military Service Files Were Destroyed

U.S. Cuts Number of Delegates to World AIDS Meeting (washingtonpost.com): "The decision to cut attendance [by three-fourths] was reached long after many government scientists had made plans to attend the conference, which is held every two years....

Almost nobody was willing to speak on the record because of fears of retaliation....The NIH released details of the cutbacks only in response to a Freedom of Information Act request....

HHS officials [also] tried to cancel a $250,000 CDC grant to the conference for scholarships for Third World AIDS researchers, said a person familiar with agency. When told the money could not be reclaimed, Thompson's office stipulated it go only to scientists in the countries getting aid under the [U.S.] program....

A CDC official [said,] 'This is clearly the result of the booing of Secretary Thompson in Barcelona, which he took quite personally.'"

The New Yorker: The Talk of the Town Dr. Malakoff is no longer a member of the team that treats the Vice-President

WorkingForChange-This Modern World: The Liberal Media Compares the Candidates

Amanpour Says Saddam TV Was Distorted ...

The Spoof - Hells Angels to Take Over War on Terrorism Bikers for Bush

AlterNet: Election 2004: A Serious Threat to Democracy

Probe takes twist - newarkadvocate.com

Fund-raising memo: Steer 'wimps' toward county GOP parties - zanesvilletimesrecorder.com

Iraq Deal on Airline Is Probed

AP Wire | 06/22/2004 | Ohio Democrats call on agriculture official to resign over food bank comment: Eric Bost, the Agriculture Department's undersecretary for the Food & Nutrition Service, "described people who eat at food banks as 'taking the easy way out.'"

Inmate populations skew representation

HoustonChronicle.com - 'A Pretext For War' by James Bamford: "the basic blueprint for the administration's Middle East policy had been drawn up in the mid-1990s by Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser, three neoconservatives who would be named to influential positions in the Bush administration.
Described as a kind of 'American privy council' to former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the three proposed what they called a 'Clean Break' plan, which involved getting the United States to pull out of the peace negotiations in order to let 'Israel take care of the Palestinians as it saw fit.' Under the 'Clean Break' plan, Israel would launch pre-emptive attacks against its major Arab enemies and replace Saddam Hussein with a puppet leader friendly to Israel.
Bamford records that Netanyahu wisely rejected the plan but that the Perle group found a more receptive audience for their recommendations inside the Bush administration. The fact that several of the key players most aggressively pushing the Iraqi war had originally outlined it for the benefit of another country raises 'the most troubling conflict of interest questions,' he writes."

Aspen Times News for Aspen Colorado - News: "How does this sound - Vice President Hunter Thompson"

baltimoresun.com - Powell gave U.N. 'ambiguous' data on Iraqi weapons, NSA chief says

KR Washington Bureau | 06/21/2004 | Intelligence experts cast doubt on ties between Iraq, al-Qaida: "officials said they were unsure why Lehman portrayed the documents as possible new intelligence on Iraq's links to al-Qaida"

Newsday.com - National News The CIA concluded "a long time ago" that an al-Qaida associate who met with two of the Sept. 11 hijackers in Malaysia was not an officer in Saddam Hussein's army

United Press International: Outside View: Have you any idea why they're lying to you?

One million black votes didn't count in the 2000 presidential election
It's not too hard to get your vote lost -- if some politicians want it to be lost

Index: "REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION SCHEDULE"

bmj.com Lenzer 328 (7454): 1458: "Bush plans to screen whole US population for mental illness "

Wired News: Pentagon Seeks U.S. Spy Powers: "The bill would allow Pentagon intelligence agents to work undercover and question American citizens and legal residents without having to reveal that they are government agents."

Observer | Cheney in firing line over Nigerian bribery claims