I’m still too busy laughing at the recent insistence of the Office of the Vice President (with the tacit blessing of the President) that Dick Cheney is above the law (as usual) to comment on it. This time, Cheney and Addington argue that OVP is above the law of handling classified information, because the office of the vice-president, which John Adams and numerous others have regarded as the epitome of a do-nothing post when they held the office– is super-special and part of the legislative branch! Hey, whatever gets you above the law, right? This LATimes piece, “No veep is...

Such is the story we get from this WaPo piece documenting the sorry saga of one Bradley Schlozman, acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights of the United States Justice Department. Schlozman removed a number of career attorneys from key civil rights functions. Those attorneys happened to be women of various ethnic minorities, only to be replaced by White males… to be fair, some of those women were Democrats… (and I understand one couldn’t be trusted because she once voted for McCain). Traditionally, it was felt that “diversity” in the government agency responsible for ensuring diversity elsewhere… is a good...

And so House Speaker Pelosi had to intervene against two of her Democratic denizens (Reps. John Dingell and Rick Boucher, [“D”-Auto-Industry]), and killed their proposals to load up a House energy bill with wet-dreams-for-the-auto-industry, including such measures as pre-empting California’s ability to regulate auto emissions on its own, a measure that has been extraordinarily helpful in reducing air pollution there and elsewhere, and which will be helpful in California efforts to reduce greenhouse gases. Well, here we go again: if you want to help Detroit’s real problems, free GM, Ford and Chrysler from their killling health care costs and pension...

Well, well… it seems that Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who was part of a surrender associated with tying conditions to Iraq war funding for troop withdrawal (even symbolic conditions and goals) lest Democrats be called for “not supporting the troops” by not working over Memorial Day weekend… has decided that Democrats shall, if necessary, work over the precious July 4th vacation “district work interval”… to pass the President’s signature immigration bill. Which leads to the simple question of… wtf? This is not a Democratic signature issue… and if it is, the solution proposed (creating a legal class of...

It looks like it could be a complete, clean slate (i.e., the Palestinian Authority, a/k/a the Fatah movement) may be just about ready to give up amidst fighting with Hamas in Gaza, and pull back to the West Bank, leaving Hamas in Gaza… in short, this LA Times analysis suggests the possible end of the so-called two-state solution, with Palestinians resigned to the simple reality that their procreation habits (i.e. having a lot more children than Israeli Jews) will eventually make them the majority, and eventually, the vast majority, in the population of “the neighborhood” of Israel, Gaza and the...

I think its not an irrational position to suggest that increasing fuel efficiency standards in our automobiles and trucks will have a number of salutory effects, from reducing emissions, to improving our national security by, among other things, lowering our dependence on Middle Eastern oil. Which explains why the effort to thwart the recently passed increases in such standards in the House is being thwarted in the Senate by Kit Bond (R-MO) and, of course, two Democrats from Michigan (Levin and Stabenow). Naturally, the Big Three auto-makers contend that they will be at a competitive disadvantage if they are obliged...

Coming as it does exactly 69 months to the day after September 11th, one of the most conservative courts in the United States, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Richmond, issued a stinging rebuke to the Bush Administration and granted a habeas corpus petition filed by our old friend Saleh Al-Marri. You will recall that Mr. Al-Marri is a lawful U.S. resident, native and national of Qatar, who had been living in Peoria, IL with his wife and five children when he was arrested on various charges, but then at the whim of the President...

In this case, that would be former Secretary of State Colin Powell calling for the closure of the detention facility at Guantanano Bay. Powell suggested he would close it not tomorrow, but this afternoon– immediately, and move its detainees to within the United States, with full access to the appropriate legal system, whether the federal courts or proper military courts martial. Powell correctly notes that the perception of the United States running a legal black hole undermines our standing in the world and our carrying out our strategic goals in combatting terror, and it would be better if we were...

WaPo gives us this account of a recently released report from the Council of Europe and its point-man on this, Swiss legislator Dick Marty, documenting European cooperation in CIA detention/torture facilities in Poland and Romania, in which, among other things, the CIA abused NATO relationships to enable it to do these things in those venues. I think that’s a little extreme; both Poland and Romania are relatively poor countries very close to the former Soviet Union who were more than eager to help out their new pal, Uncle Sam, in any way they could. Either way, our readers are already...

Proving that his vaunted personal loyalty is about as real as his Texas accent, the President “reluctantly” acceded to the decision of Poppy, Jim Baker and the Cabal SecDef Robert Gates, and hence, Gates announced that General Peter Pace, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will not be reappointed. General Pace kind of went over the top recently with his remarks that homosexuality shouldn’t be tolerated in the military because its “immoral,” and by sending in his personal recommendation letter for old Scooter Libby to get a lighter sentence… but, come to think of it, for that and...