I know, it’s Mardi Gras. And Mayor Nagin is trying to be funny. Probably he believes he is paying tribute to that "John Wayne Dude," Lt. Gen. Russel Honore.

But still, there’s something bizarre about the imagery.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse now have a new riding companion.

(Thanks to Eagle334th for the tip on “the General.”)

You have to admit, this is some chutzpah , even for the "Paper Of Treason" the New York Times.

From Saudi-owned Reuters:

 

NYT sues Pentagon over domestic spying

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The New York Times sued the U.S. Defense Department on Monday demanding that it hand over documents about the National Security Agency’s domestic spying program.

The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval. It also seeks the names of the people or groups identified by it.

The Times in December broke the story that the NSA had begun intercepting domestic communications believed linked to al Qaeda following the September 11 attacks. That provoked renewed criticism of the way U.S. President George W. Bush is handling his declared war on terrorism.

Bush called the disclosure of the program to the Times a "shameful act" and the U.S. Justice Department has launched an investigation into who leaked it.

The Times had requested the documents in December under the Freedom of Information Act but sued upon being unsatisfied with the Pentagon’s response that the request was "being processed as quickly as possible," according to the six-page suit filed at federal court in New York.

David McCraw, a lawyer for the Times, acknowledged that the list of documents sought was lengthy but that the Pentagon failed to assert there were "unusual circumstances," a provision of the law that would grant the Pentagon extra time to respond.

The Defense Department, which was sued as the parent agency of the NSA, did not immediately respond to the suit.

McCraw said there was "no connection" between the Justice Department probe and the Times’ lawsuit.

"This is an important story that our reporters are continuing to pursue and of the ways to do that is through the Freedom of Information Act," McCraw said.

The U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act requires the federal government to obtain warrants from a secret federal court for surveillance operations inside the United States.

But the Bush administration says the president as commander in chief of the armed forces has the authority to carry out the intercepts and that Congress also gave him the authority upon approving the use of force in response to the September 11 attacks.

Let’s see. The Times sues to have classified material released by government officials. Meanwhile, they are calling for Libby’s head and Bush’s impeachment for "leaking" classified material.

Of course we realize that foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.

It certainly has never been a concern of the America-hating NY Times. But then again, what is?

Gosh, "Scooter" Libby has been graciously allowed to subpoena witnesses in his trial. This comes on top of yesterday's decision to allow him to see his own notes.

How generous is our system of justice.

From the DNC operatives at MSNBC:

Judge OKs press subpoenas in CIA leak case

Libby defense aims to show any false statements were result of confusion

Feb. 27, 2006

WASHINGTON - The judge in the CIA leak case said Monday that lawyers on both sides in the perjury trial of former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby will be allowed to subpoena journalists and news organizations.

The issue of calling reporters and news organizations to supply information or testify in the trial was raised at a hearing on Friday.

At the hearing, Libby, who worked for Vice President Dick Cheney, won the right to review his handwritten notes for a nine-month period surrounding the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's name.

Judge Reggie Walton seemed skeptical about a second request by the defense that it also be given highly classified documents known as the President's Daily Brief for a similar period. The judge deferred a final ruling on that request, which Libby's defense team says is essential in demonstrating that he was busy with other national security matters at the time of the Plame leak.

Libby, 55, was indicted last year on charges that he lied about how he learned Plame’s identity and when he subsequently told reporters.

The CIA operative’s identity was published in July 2003 by syndicated columnist Robert Novak after Plame’s husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused the Bush administration of twisting intelligence about Iraq’s efforts to buy uranium in Niger. The year before, the CIA had sent Wilson to Niger to determine the accuracy of the uranium reports.

A strategy to 'sabotage' case?

Defense lawyers have said that if Libby's statements to investigators were untrue, it was a case of innocent confusion or faulty memory because of his preoccupation with pressing national security matters at the time.

Walton said he is concerned that Libby’s request could “sabotage” the case because President Bush probably would invoke executive privilege and refuse to turn over the classified reports.

“The vice president — his boss — said these are the family jewels,” the judge said, referring to Cheney’s past description of the daily briefings. “If the executive branch says, 'This is too important to the welfare of the nation and we’re not going to comply,’ the criminal prosecution goes away.”

Ted Wells, one of Libby's lawyers, said the judge needs to take time to make sure Libby gets the evidence he needs to defend himself. “If it’s done in a quick and dirty way, he’s going to be convicted,” Wells said.

The court set an April 7 deadline for any reporters or news organizations to produce the requested items. Any motions to quash or modify the subpoenas must also be filed by that time.

A trial date has been set for January 2007.

It will be interesting to see how many of the media's champions of truth and justice will plead the fifth rather than testify in this trial.

More on the world's touchiest people.

Turns out that the recent Afghan prison riots have all been over a fashion dispute.

From the Voice Of America:

The Policharki prison in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Standoff Continues at High-Security Prison in Afghanistan

By Benjamin Sand
Islamabad
27 February 2006

Hundreds of Afghan forces - backed by tanks and rocket launchers - have surrounded the country's main high security prison after Taleban and al-Qaida prisoners seized control Saturday evening. Authorities restarted negotiations Monday but warned the government could use force end the standoff.

Afghan officials are blaming the uprising on hundreds of al-Qaida and Taleban inmates housed in the Pol-e-Charkhi jail just outside Kabul.

Deputy Afghan Justice Minister Mohammed Qasim Hashimzai says more than a thousand inmates armed with makeshift weapons began the revolt late Saturday. He says the riots started in block two of the prison, which houses more than 13 hundred of facility's 2,000 inmates. He says the violence erupted after inmates rejected new uniforms.

The uniforms were meant to improve security after seven Taleban detainees disguised as civilians escaped last month.

Officials say dozens of inmates have been injured but details are sketchy.

This is probably why you don't have too many Moslem students in Catholic schools.

There’s still hope yet for the media and their dreams of an Iraq civil war.

From Saddam’s undying fans at the DNC’s Associated Press:

Multiple Bombings in Baghdad Kill 41

By ALEXANDRA ZAVIS, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A suicide bomber detonated an explosives belt at a crowded gas station Tuesday — one of five attacks that rocked Baghdad in quick succession, killing at least 41 people and wounding scores, police said.

The surge of violence, including three car bombs, unsettled an Iraqi capital already shaken by fears the country teeters on the brink of sectarian civil war. Iraqis have suffered through days of reprisal killings and attacks on Sunni mosques since bombers blew apart the gold dome of the revered Shiite Askariya shrine in Samarra on Wednesday.

The Iraqi Cabinet said 379 people had been killed and 458 wounded in reprisal attacks in the week since the shrine was destroyed.

In Washington, President Bush decried the latest surge in sectarian violence in Iraq and declared that for Iraqis "the choice is chaos or unity."

Fears of civil war have been complicated by the continuing struggle among Iraqi politicians to form a new government. National security adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie traveled to the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Tuesday to meet with Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the Shiite community’s most revered leader.

North of Baghdad, a blast badly damaged a Sunni mosque where the father of Saddam Hussein was buried in the family’s ancestral hometown, Tikrit.

The deposed leader’s trial resumed in Baghdad with his defense team ending their monthlong boycott and prosecutors presenting a document they said was signed by the former leader approving the executions of more than 140 Shiites in southern Iraq after an assassination attempt in the 1980s.

The Iraqi Islamic Party said a Sunni mosque in Baghdad’s northern al-Hurriyah neighborhood was destroyed in an explosion before dawn Tuesday. The Sunni organization blamed the Shiite-dominated government that, it said, "cooperates with the criminal hands that sabotaged God’s houses and lighted the fires of sedition."

At a gas station in the mostly Shiite eastern New Baghdad neighborhood, a suicide attacker joined a line of people waiting to buy kerosene before detonating the explosives strapped to his body, witnesses said. The blast killed 23 people and injured 51, Interior Ministry official Maj. Falah al-Mohammedawi said.

The charred remains of metal carts used by customers to transport kerosene drums littered the scene.

In the same region, a car bomb targeting a police patrol killed nine people and wounded 17 — all civilians, police and paramedics said.

Another car bomb exploded near a Shiite mosque in the crowded southeastern Karada neighborhood, killing four and wounding 16, al-Mohammedawi said.

Police said the vehicle was parked next to a small market opposite the Timimi mosque, which was closed for repairs. But witnesses said the vehicle was driven by a suicide attacker.

Distraught residents rushed to the scene, as firefighters fought back flames from burning cars.

A roadside bomb targeting the convoy of a defense ministry adviser killed five soldiers and wounded seven others in the eastern Zaiyona neighborhood, ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari said. The adviser, Lt. Gen. Daham Radhi al-Assal, was not injured.

The U.S. military reported a U.S. soldier was killed by small-arms fire west of Baghdad on Monday. At least 2,292 members of the U.S. military have died since the war began, according to an Associated Press count.

In the south Tuesday, two British soldiers were killed in Amarah, 180 miles from Baghdad, the Defense Ministry reported in London. A witness said a car bomb targeted a British patrol and helicopters were seen taking away casualties.

The deaths raised the British toll in the Iraq conflict to 103.

The Baghdad bombings occurred as Iraqi leaders sought to dampen the threat of civil war between the nation’s Shiites and Sunnis, but nine bullet-riddled bodies, including that of a Sunni Muslim tribal sheik, were found Tuesday off a road southeast of Baghdad, police and hospital officials said.

The Iraqi army found the bodies near two burned out minibuses along the road from Baghdad into Iraq’s strife-prone Diyala province. The victims included Sheik Hamid Irbat Ghazi, of the influential Mahamdeh tribe, and two of his nephews, police said.

Al-Rubaie emerged from his meeting to tell reporters "the way to forming the government is difficult and planted with political bombs. We ask the Iraqi people to be patient, and we expect forming the government will take a few months."

He added: "The (United Iraqi) Alliance has chosen (Prime Minister Ibrahim) al-Jaafari and will not give up this choice. We expect that our partners in this country will respect this choice … taking into consideration the election results."

That balloting gave the Shiite bloc a majority of parliamentary seats but not enough to rule alone.

Al-Jaafari, the interim prime minister, has been criticized by opponents for weak leadership that has allowed militias to carry out reprisals on Sunnis and to infiltrate the police. Al-Jaafari’s links to Muqtada al-Sadr, who helped secure his nomination for another term, has alarmed some Shiites and others who fear the rise of the radical young cleric.

Leaders of all major sects and ethnic groups have appealed for calm, and U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told American television networks he believed "the crisis is over."

"I think the country came to the brink of a civil war, but the Iraqis decided that they didn’t want to go down that path and came together," Khalilzad told CNN on Monday. "Clearly the terrorists who plotted that attack wanted to provoke a civil war.

"It looked quite dangerous in the initial 48 hours, but I believe that the Iraqis decided to come together."

On Tuesday, wailing relatives collected the bodies of their loved ones killed in last week’s sectarian violence.

The Washington Post reported Tuesday that more than 1,300 Iraqis had been killed since then, but Tuesday’s Cabinet statement described that account as "inaccurate and exaggerated."

The Post cited figures from the Baghdad central morgue, but an official there told The Associated Press that as of Sunday night they had received only 249 bodies tied to the violence. The Post figure appeared high based on police and hospital reports from the major population centers at the time of the attacks.

More than 60 relatives of the dead — many of them women dressed in black, beating their chests while wailing in grief — assembled there with empty coffins to take away their dead family members.

One young man, who refused to give his name, said his three brothers went to buy bread Saturday night and were killed during a drive-by shooting.

Also Tuesday, gunmen in two speeding cars opened fire on the Sunni al-Salam mosque in the western Baghdad’s Mansour district, killing the guard, said police Lt. Maitham Abdul-Razaq.

Gunmen in Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, killed four police and a doctor, Dr. Bahaa al-Bakri of the city general hospital said. Three gunmen broke into the clinic of Dr. Yousif Ibrahim and shot him to death.

Her handlers have decided that mocking wounded soldiers might not play too well even in our one party media.

Unsurprisingly, this breaking news comes from her promoters via the Palestine Chronicle:

Cindy Sheehan: Camp Casey and Germany

Our struggle is with the industrial military complex and the people who put our soldiers in harm's way in the first place for no valid reason.

By Cindy Sheehan

Tuesday February 28, 2006

I have been invited to speak to the European Union Parliament in March in Strasbourg, France. My message will be one of peace and non-violent unity against the out of control murderous and disastrous policies of the Bush Administration. I wrote extensively about meeting with other world leaders in my article, "Friends don't let Friends Commit War Crimes."

My message to the EU will focus on "we the people" forcing the leaders of all countries to work diplomatically and peacefully to solve problems. It is time we reach across artificial borders of lines drawn on a map to forge bonds of love and friendship with all members of humanity no matter what color, religion, language group or nationality that other person is. Killing other members of the human race is barbaric and abhorrent and should never be used to solve conflicts. This is so important with the current beating of the war drums against Iran, and we must not let off the President of Iran for his inflammatory and non-peaceful statements. The wonderful and innocent citizens of Iran don't deserve the fate that the undeserving citizens of Iraq received and are receiving on a daily basis still.

In the frenzy and excitement of my trip to France and Germany, some well meaning pacifists in the area have scheduled me to set up a Camp Casey outside of Landsthul, Germany, in front of the military hospital. I won't agree to do that.

The Camp Casey movement is pro-peace and pro-soldier. We love our troops so much that we want them to come home alive from the fiasco in the Middle East.

Camp Caseys have been set up all over the USA and the world and they are set up in front of the seats of power. The politicians and the war machine got us into this war, our soldiers are trying to protect each other and do the best that they can do under horrifically difficult circumstances.

The Camp Casey in Germany could be moved to a place where people with decision making power can see it. The soldiers have very little to say in their fates after they enlist (which is an entirely different subject) but especially the ones who have already been wounded in the service of their country…no matter how evil and greed-serving the phony mission is.

Let's set up Camp Caseys in front of recruiter's offices to stop our children from even enlisting to wear a uniform for the war profiteers. Let's set up Camp Caseys in front of the Pentagon…Congress…Congressional offices…embassies…the White House…propaganda media centers…war profiteers…President's vacation homes…Karl Rove's DC home…the list for valid protest locations is endless…but not in front of our troops.

Our struggle is with the industrial military complex and the people who put our soldiers in harm's way in the first place for no valid reason and who are keeping them in harm's way despite all evidence that this war is a nightmare and a mistake.

Let's leave our soldiers out of our protests. They have been put through so much by their commander in chief and his callous cronies already.

Does this mean that she will encourage her partners in Code Pink to give up their ghoulish vigil in front of the Army's Walter Reed Hospital every weekend?

Yes, Mother Sheehan has so much respect for our soldiers she calls them "war criminals."

Mind you, this is the same woman who calls terrorists "freedom fighters."

Some hard hitting, fact based, unbiased reporting from the economists at the Christian Science Monitor:

More Americans Turn to Soup Kitchens

America’s Second Harvest Is Helping More Than 25 Million People, an 8-Percent Increase Over 2001
By ALEXANDRA MARKS

NEW YORK, Feb. 26, 2006 — As the economy has steadily grown over the last four years, so too has the number of Americans going hungry.

America’s Second Harvest, the nation’s largest charitable-food distribution network, is now providing help to more than 25 million people, an 8-percent increase over 2001, the last time the organization did a major survey of its more than 200 food banks in all 50 states.

That increase in the number of people who are hungry or "food insecure" — Washington bureaucratese for "not sure where their next meal will come from" — is reflected in data collected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as well. In 2005, it found that more than 38 million Americans lived in "hungry or food insecure" households, an increase of 5 million since 2000.

"Even though individuals may have a job, they still are having a hard time making ends meet," said Maura Daly, a spokeswoman for Second Harvest, which is based in Chicago. "We find many people have to make choices between food and other basic necessities like paying for utilities and heat."

Working, but Hungry

More than 35 percent of the people who are served by Second Harvest come from homes with at least one working adult, according to a study, which was conducted by Mathematica Policy Research. The social-policy research firm is based in Princeton, N.J. Many of those hungry are children, almost 9 million, or 31 percent. An additional 3 million of the hungry are senior citizens, about 11 percent.

"Food banks are like the canary in the mine shafts. They see trends in underreported populations long before they show up in other statistics," said Doug O’Brien, vice president for public policy and research at Second Harvest. "People access emergency-food systems because something in their household economy has gone wrong."

In other words, their incomes are not keeping up with their cost of living. And the food budget, studies have shown, is the most flexible. It can be cut with a visit to a soup kitchen, while the mortgage, rent, gas or electric bills are less fungible.

"The fact that so many working people still have to go to a soup kitchen or a food bank to make ends meet shows there’s something structurally wrong with the economy," O’Brien said. "If you work, you should be able to provide enough for your family. That’s part of the social contract we have with our citizens."

Look, if you want our one party media to write you up a good obit, you have to "grow" as a person. Even a blond male surfer type can do it.

Just take a great newspaper like the Los Angeles Times and turn it into yet another outlet for the Democrat Party, thereby running it right into the ground.

And subtlety be damned.

From the DNC’s Associated Press:

Former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, third from left, and his wife, Nancy Reagan, right, pose with Otis Chandler, then Editor-in-chief of Times Mirror, and his mother, Dorothy Chandler at a reception held in honor of the Reagans in Los Angeles, in this Dec. 1, 1980 file photo. Otis Chandler, who transformed his family’s Los Angeles Times from a provincial, conservative paper into a respected national media voice, died Monday, Feb. 27, 2006.

Feb 27, 11:09 AM EST

Former L.A. Times Publisher Chandler Dies

By GARY GENTILE
Associated Press Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Otis Chandler, the former publisher of the Los Angeles Times who transformed his family’s provincial, conservative newspaper into a respected national media voice, died early Monday. He was 78.

Chandler had been suffering from a degenerative brain disorder known as Lewy body disease, said Tom Johnson, who succeeded Chandler as publisher.

Chandler’s wife, Bettina, was with him when he died at his home in Ojai, said Johnson, the retired chairman and chief executive of CNN News Group.

Chandler was the scion of a family that wielded financial and political power in the Los Angeles area for decades.

As publisher, he spent most of his career chafing against what he sensed was an East Coast bias against Los Angeles and fought to elevate the Times to a par with Eastern rivals.

"No publisher in America improved a paper so quickly on so grand a scale, took a paper that was marginal in qualities and brought it to excellence as Otis Chandler did," David Halberstam wrote in his 1979 book "The Powers that Be."

"He was a strong leader and dedicated his paper to excellence as well as financial success, and there weren’t many of those," Ben Bradlee, vice president at large of The Washington Post, said in a telephone interview.

With his blond hair, weightlifter physique and love of surfing and hot cars, Chandler was a quintessential Californian of his generation.

He was an avid hunter as well as a collector of antique cars and motorcycles. He bagged an elephant in Mozambique, antelope in Chad, a leopard in Kenya and the four rarest species of bighorn sheep in North America. Many of his trophies were displayed at his home and at his Vintage Museum of Transportation and Wildlife in Oxnard.

Chandler resigned as the paper’s publisher in 1980 following 20 years at the helm.

He remained mostly quiet about the paper’s operation after he left as chairman and editor in chief in 1985. But he returned as a newsroom hero in 2000 to publicly chide the paper’s management, which he blamed for a scandal involving an advertising arrangement with a sports arena and severe cost-cutting that damaged its reputation.

Soon after, the Chandler Family Trust sold newspaper parent company Times Mirror Co. to the Tribune Co.

"I was building up a hell of a head of steam," he said in an interview in The New York Times in 2000. "The Times is not as dear to me as my own family, but it’s close."

Otis Chandler was born in 1927, the son of Times publisher Norman Chandler and great-grandson of Times founder Harrison Gray Otis.

His mother was Dorothy Chandler, the philanthropist and arts patron who led a campaign in the 1950s to save the financially troubled Hollywood Bowl and a drive to build a permanent home for the Los Angeles Philharmonic - the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

Chandler was groomed from an early age to take control of the family’s newspaper. He worked as a printer’s apprentice, reporter and in the advertising and circulation departments.

He succeeded his father as publisher in 1960 at age 33.

The paper then was considered parochial and partisan, a mouthpiece for conservative political causes.

Almost immediately, Chandler initiated changes designed to make the paper one of the country’s best. He moved it toward the political center and angered conservative allies - and family members - by publishing a series of stories on the right-wing John Birch Society.

He hired more reporters, raised salaries, opened overseas bureaus and beefed up the paper’s coverage of Washington.

Chandler also expanded the reach of Times Mirror, starting a news service with The Washington Post and acquiring newspapers, television stations and other media outlets.

Chandler’s efforts resulted in the Times winning seven Pulitzer prizes during his tenure.

Louis D. Boccardi, retired chief executive of The Associated Press, said Chandler was "a beacon for quality journalism."

" In his determination to bring the Los Angeles Times to the front rank of the nation’s newspapers, Otis Chandler came to stand for the best of what we journalists believe in," Boccardi said Monday.

While serving on the board of Times Mirror until 1998, Chandler approved the hiring of Mark Willes, a cereal company executive with no newspaper experience, to run Times Mirror in 1995 when the company was mired in sagging profits.

Chandler remained silent while Willes shuttered New York Newsday, a paper Chandler had opened, and began to collapse the walls traditionally separating the business operations of the company from the editorial side.

That policy culminated in the 1999 publication of a special Sunday magazine section on the newly opened Staples Center, the downtown sports arena.

It was later revealed that the paper split about $2 million in advertising revenue from the magazine with the arena. The deal led to widespread unrest in the newsroom and the paper later issued a front-page apology.

In 2000, disgusted with the direction the paper was headed, Chandler dictated a statement that was read aloud in the newsroom: "… I have reluctantly decided that I can no longer sit idly by and watch a very serious decline in the morale of people throughout the Times."

Chandler railed against "this unbelievably stupid and unprofessional handling of the Staples special section."

He also criticized the management for staff cuts and reductions in the size of the paper, which he said threatened its credibility.

"Respect and credibility for a newspaper is irreplaceable," Chandler wrote. "The trust and faith in a newspaper by its employees, its readers, and the community is dearer to me than life itself."

In addition to his wife, survivors include sons Harry and Michael and daughters Carolyn Chandler and Cathleen Chandler.

A memorial service is scheduled for March 6 at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, Johnson said. Plans for a separate tribute were incomplete.

The value of  the LA Times’ parent company, Tribune, over the last five years:

But what’s that compared to gaining respect from our one party media?

What if our one party media declared a civil war and nobody came?

From those crestfallen lovers of mayhem at the DNC's Associated Press:

Iraqi women pass by an Iraqi army tank which is guarding the street, in Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, Feb.27, 2006 .

Sunnis Ready to End Boycott, Leader Says

By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) — Sunni Arabs are ready to end their boycott of talks to form a new Iraqi government if rival Shiites return mosques seized in last week's sectarian attacks and meet other unspecified demands, a top Sunni figure said Monday.

Meanwhile, Iraq's interior minister told ABC News that he believes American journalist Jill Carroll is alive and will be released, even though the Sunday deadline set by her kidnappers had passed.

Interior Minister Bayan Jabr also said he knew who abducted the 28-year-old journalist last month.

"We know his name and address, and we are following up on him as well as the Americans," he said. "I think she is still alive."

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told Fox News Channel's "Fox and Friends" Monday that he spoke with Jabr about Carroll's plight.

"We are doing all that we can to help bring about a release and will persist with that," Khalilzad said.

Carroll, a freelancer working for the Christian Science Monitor, was abducted Jan. 7 in Baghdad and was last seen on a videotape broadcast Feb. 10 by a Kuwaiti television station, Al-Rai. The station said the kidnappers threatened to kill her unless the United States met unspecified demands by Sunday.

In Germany, the government denied a New York Times report that its intelligence service had passed information about Saddam Hussein's plans for defending Baghdad to the United States a month before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The Times said a German intelligence officer supplied the information to the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency in February 2003.

"This account is wrong," German government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm said. "The Federal Intelligence Service and, therefore, also the government, had until now no knowledge of such a plan."

In continuing violence, four mortar rounds exploded Monday in a Shiite neighborhood, killing four and wounding 16, police Maj. Moussa Abdul Karim said. U.S. helicopters fired on three houses 15 miles west of Samarra and arrested 10 people, Iraqi police said.

It was unclear whether the raid was linked to Wednesday's bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra, triggering the wave of reprisal attacks that shook the nation last week.

The Sunnis boycotted the talks Thursday after the Askariya shrine bombing sparked attacks against Sunni mosques in Baghdad, Basra and elsewhere. The walkout and Sunni-Shiite clashes threatened U.S. plans to establish a unity government capable of luring Sunnis away from the insurgency and raised doubts about U.S. plans to begin withdrawing some of its 138,000 soldiers this year.

Adnan al-Dulaimi, whose Iraqi Accordance Front spearheaded the Sunni boycott, said the Sunnis have not decided to return to the talks but are "intent on participating" in a new government.

"The situation is tense and within the next two days, we expect the situation to improve and then we will have talks," he told The Associated Press. "We haven't ended our suspension completely but we are on the way to end it."

He said there were "some conditions" that must be met first, chief among them the return of mosques still occupied by Shiite militants in Baghdad and Salman Pak. Al-Dulaimi did not mention the other demands, but some Sunni politicians have insisted on replacing Shiite police with Sunni soldiers in heavily Sunni areas.

Four people were killed Monday when several shells exploded near the Nasir Market in the mostly Shiite Shula area of western Baghdad, police said.

Otherwise, the city was generally peaceful Monday - the first day without extended curfews or a ban on private vehicles since the crisis erupted, pushing the nation to the brink of civil war.

Four bodies - blindfolded and handcuffed - were found Monday in Dora, a Baghdad neighborhood where a mortar barrage the night before killed 16 people and wounded 53. Two Iraqi soldiers were wounded in an ambush Monday in Mahmoudiya, about 20 miles south of the capital, officials said.

The U.S. military said an American soldier had died from non-combat related injuries suffered Friday north of Baghdad. The statement did not elaborate. Three soldiers were killed Sunday in combat in the capital.

Their deaths brought to at least 2,291 the number of members of the U.S. military who have died since the war began, according to an Associated Press count.

Four people were killed in a pair of shootings Monday in Baqouba, the Diyala provincial capital. The day before, gunmen killed two youths playing soccer in Baqouba and wounded five.

Although sectarian violence has receded since the attacks last week, tensions remain high between majority Shiites and the minority Sunnis. Shiites dominate ranks of the government security forces and most of the insurgents are Sunnis.

More than 60 Shiite families fled their homes in predominantly Sunni areas west and north of Baghdad after receiving threats, said Shiite legislator Jalaladin al-Saghir and Iraqi army Brig. Gen. Jalil Khallaf.

Sunni and Shiite religious leaders have called for unity and an end to attacks on each other's mosques.

Where is Mother Sheehan?

She could get this all hashed out with just one $30,000 speech.

Never mind that it was the Democrats who made sure the Special Counsel law was allowed to lapse.

When did reality ever get in the way of a DNC press release from the Associated Press?

Feb 27, 1:04 AM EST

Democrats Seek Probe of NSA Eavesdropping

By KATHERINE SHRADER

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should appoint a special counsel to investigate the legality of the Bush administration's eavesdropping program, 18 House Democrats told President Bush in a letter released Monday.

The lawmakers said the surveillance of terrorists must be done within the bounds of U.S. law, but complained that their efforts to get answers to legal and factual questions about the program have been stymied - "generally based on the feeblest of excuses."

"If the effort to prevent vigorous and appropriate investigation succeeds, we fear the inexorable conclusion will be that these executive branch agencies hold themselves above the law and accountable to no one," wrote the lawmakers, led by Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., a member of the Judiciary and Homeland Security committees.

A White House spokeswoman, reached Sunday in advance of the letter's release, declined to comment immediately.

The lawmakers initially asked the independent watchdogs at the Justice and Defense departments to open inquiries. Both declined.

Justice's inspector general Glenn Fine said he lacked authority, and deferred to the department's Office of Professional Responsibility. That office has said it is investigating the conduct of the department's lawyers, but not the program's lawfulness.

Congress' investigative arm, the General Accountability Office, similarly declined to open a review, noting the administration would be expected to designate the necessary documents as foreign intelligence materials and limit access to them.

The Democrats see "ample precedent" for a special counsel, citing the Justice Department's appointment of U.S. attorney Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate the leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

After 22 months of investigation, Fitzgerald indicted the vice president's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, for allegedly lying about his role in the disclosure.

"Indeed, the allegation of a secret NSA spying program conducting warrantless domestic surveillance of U.S. persons is at least as serious" as the matter Fitzgerald investigated, the Democrats wrote.

In their six-page letter, the Democrats said the special counsel should investigate any possible violation of federal criminal law, noting that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act says the monitoring of U.S. citizens and residents - without a warrant - is punishable by imprisonment.

Bush administration officials have argued the program does not fall within that law. They say Bush was exercising his constitutional authority as commander in chief when he allowed the National Security Agency to monitor - without court approval - the international calls and e-mails of people inside the U.S. when one party may be linked to terrorism.

The administration also maintains the president had the power to order the surveillance under a broad 2001 authorization to use military force in the war on terror.

The 18 lawmakers also want the special counsel to consider any crimes that may be committed to interfere with the investigation, including perjury, obstruction of justice, destruction of evidence and witness intimidation.

The request harkens back to Libby, who was not indicted specifically for leaking Plame's name, but for an alleged cover-up that included five counts of obstruction of justice, perjury and making false statements to FBI agents.

Given the ample precedence, and the fact that no laws were broken, this seems like a perfect job for Patrick Fitzgerald.

Maybe after a couple years and a few million dollars he can nail a secretary or janitor for perjury when they misremember what they had for lunch five years ago.

From the Teresa Heinz Kerry supported tax exempt 501c3 “charity,” United For Peace And Justice:

Storm the White House

Multi-Day Event, Beginning March 15, come when you can and stay as long as you can - we are taking over the White House until they leave. Torture, Occupation, Genocide - Must End Now.

Wednesday, March 15th 2006 12:00 AM
Washington, DC USA

TAKE THE WHITE HOUSE BY STORM - Stop Genocide, Torture and Occupation

For Nat Turner, For Martin and Coretta, For all the Torture and Assassination in Afghanistan, Iraq, Haiti and many others - We will not allow the Slave Holders that Still Prevail in this Country to Rule us any longer. Imprisonment and torture based on race, religion, resources or region is no different than the slavery we sought to abolish years ago. The Administration is Criminal and if they will not step down, we must storm in, show them how many of us do not accept a criminal government. How can we stand by and watch them kill our brothers, sisters, journalists and friends for their dollars?

We are calling on all Member Nations of the U.N., All Representatives and Justices in the World Court and International Criminal Courts, all soldiers and CIA agents and government officials who have been blackmailed by the dictators to incarcerate Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld. The Political Cooperative will put a new government in place that is comprised of people from Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and all the organizations that have finally made us aware of the truth of the savage practices and illegal policies of our government in assassinating our own officials as well as people throughout the world who oppose their criminal activity. We need all of you to save U.S. citizens and Global Victims from their ongoing criminal activity. We are calling on the military, police, citizens and religious organizations to stand with us and help us to bring democracy back to the United States and by doing so, free the world from the wrath, occupation, theft, torture, blackmail and assassination by the Criminals in the United States Government. What they have done all over the world is much worse than what Saddam Hussein has done, so why are they not in jail too? They have admitted to international and national crimes, so why have they not been taken to Court too?

Location: 
White House, Washington DC 1600 Pennsylvania Ave Washington DC 20500 

Contact:
Darrow Boggiano
admin@politicalcooperative.org
415.409.2611

Sponsored By:
We are requesting participation from all members of the United Nations, PFAW, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Code Pink, police, soldiers, ACLU, CIA, NSA and International Courts of Justice/World Court.
http://www.PoliticalCooperative.Org

More from the "organizer" of this clambake, Darrow Boggiano:

TAKE THE WHITE HOUSE BY STORM - Stop Genocide, Torture and Occupation

By: Darrow Boggiano

If we were being bombed and our journalists were being murdered here in the U.S. by a foreign country’s military, we would hope that the people of that country would stop what they are doing and go to their president’s office and demand that it was stopped. If we were the ones burying thousands and thousands of our family members and watching the destruction of the homes, schools, churches and offices that we had worked for decades to build, we would hope that someone, somewhere would care enough to do something for us. We must stop the criminals in our government NOW. There is no meeting with Congress that is going to change what they are doing. We must put the power of the people into action and stay there until they leave!

For all the Torture and Assassination in Afghanistan, Iraq, and all over the world by the U.S. - We can not allow the Slave Holders that Still Prevail in this Country to Rule us any longer. They plan for permanent occupation in Iraq and they are intentionally inciting religious violence in Iraq by killing people on both sides and by destroying their mosques, homes and lives. Illegal Imprisonment and torture based on race, religion, resources or region is no different than the slavery we sought to abolish years ago; the administration is violating laws every day and no one will hold them accountable. The Bush Administration is Criminal and if they will not step down, we must storm in. By changing laws to immunize themselves from legal action, they have left the people with no other choice. It is our duty to rescue the people of the world from the dictators. Once we come together, the police and soldiers will see that they are not alone, and they will join us, because everyone knows that murder for occupation and theft of land is illegal.

We are calling on all Member Nations of the U.N., All Representatives and Justices in the World Court and International Criminal Courts, all soldiers and CIA agents and government officials who have been blackmailed by the dictators to go with us and remove Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and their friends from our House. The people of the Political Cooperative will put a new government in place that is truly representative of the people and comprised of the people through social justice organizations that have been fighting for our rights all along. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and national organizations have finally enabled us to know the truth of the savage practices and illegal policies of our government in assassinating our own officials as well as people throughout the world who oppose their criminal activity. George Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld have all admitted to violating international and national crimes, so why have they not been taken to Court? Because their lawyers are now our judges, that’s why.

Think about it - how could any detainee still have valuable information related to future crimes, after being tortured and detained for 3 years? There is no reason on earth to continue detaining or torturing people other than for the purpose of instilling fear in an entire population. They would have to lock up everyone who hates the Bush Corporate Empire and that is way more than half of the world. They can keep telling us that it is top secret, but that is only because they have no other reason for their actions.The entire war on terror is a farce - Bush attacked Saddam because Saddam would not cooperate with the Corporate Empire’s Invasion of the Middle East

As U.S. citizens, we have the obligation to help Worldwide Victims to be rescued from the ongoing criminal activity of our government. We are calling on the military, police, citizens and religious organizations to stand with us and help us to bring democracy back to the United States and by doing so, free the world from the wrath, occupation, theft, torture, blackmail and assassination by the Criminals in the United States Government. What they have done all over the world is much worse than what Saddam Hussein has done, so why are they not in jail too?

We’ve had enough killing in our name. We’ve had enough Corporate Takeover of Democracy, Land and Resources with their Secret Prisons for Secret Torture, Secret Deals to Wage War for Oil, Lies Accepted by Corrupt Judges and Congress - Oppression of the Poor to Make the Rich Filthy Rich. If you protest, they tell someone to kill you or jail you - this is no Democracy. If we all stand up against them, like they do in other countries, we will take back OUR Country.

Join the Police Officers, the Military personnel, the small business owners, the African Americans, The Muslims, the Jews, the Christians, the Decent Human Beings who are mothers, fathers, childrens and citizens who are sick of the lies, and the murder for money. It is time for everyone to stop following orders of this lying, stealing Dictatorship!

Of course it is a Federal offense to advocate the overthrow of the government of the United States:

US CODE: Title 18, 2385. Advocating overthrow of Government

TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 115 > § 2385

§ 2385. Advocating overthrow of Government

Whoever knowingly or willfully advocates, abets, advises, or teaches the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of overthrowing or destroying the government of the United States or the government of any State, Territory, District or Possession thereof, or the government of any political subdivision therein, by force or violence, or by the assassination of any officer of any such government; or

Whoever, with intent to cause the overthrow or destruction of any such government, prints, publishes, edits, issues, circulates, sells, distributes, or publicly displays any written or printed matter advocating, advising, or teaching the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of overthrowing or destroying any government in the United States by force or violence, or attempts to do so; or

Whoever organizes or helps or attempts to organize any society, group, or assembly of persons who teach, advocate, or encourage the overthrow or destruction of any such government by force or violence; or becomes or is a member of, or affiliates with, any such society, group, or assembly of persons, knowing the purposes thereof—

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both, and shall be ineligible for employment by the United States or any department or agency thereof, for the five years next following his conviction.

If two or more persons conspire to commit any offense named in this section, each shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both, and shall be ineligible for employment by the United States or any department or agency thereof, for the five years next following his conviction.

As used in this section, the terms “organizes” and “organize”, with respect to any society, group, or assembly of persons, include the recruiting of new members, the forming of new units, and the regrouping or expansion of existing clubs, classes, and other units of such society, group, or assembly of persons.

But UFPJ probably won’t even have their tax exempt status questioned. And Mr. Boggiano will happily go on his merry way.

In case you missed it the "Paper Of Treason" the New York Times has a glowing profile of a (former?) Taliban spokesterrorist on the cover of their Sunday magazine section.

The article, "The Freshman," is as long as it is fulsome in its praise of this bravo.

Here is a synopsis from Editor & Publisher:

Although Rahmatullah had begun to question some aspects of Taliban life, in 2000 Afghanistan’s foreign minister designated him to be the bridge between the Islamic world and the West.

‘NYT’ Sunday Preview: Former Taliban Spokesman Finds New Haven–at Yale

By E&P Staff

February 24, 2006

NEW YORK The Taliban’s former spokesman, Rahmatullah Hashemi, is now an undergraduate at Yale University, The New York Times reveals in a lengthy cover story by Chip Brown in its Sunday magazine this weekend.

The cover line reads, “He was the Taliban’s spin doctor. So what’s he doing at Yale?"

In fact, the story shows, Hashemi was at Yale once before—in 2001, appearing at a forum representing the Taliban, a few months before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

A small clip of Hashemi appears in Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11” film.

“In some ways,” Hashemi, 27, says today, “ I’m the luckiest person in the world. I could have ended up in Guantanomo Bay. Instead I ended up at Yale. ” One of the courses he is taking: Terrorism—Past, Present and Future.

His road to America was paved largely by Mike Hoover, an American TV cameraman who had met Hashemi in Afghanistan. “ I thought he could do a lot as a student/teacher,” Hoover said.

In his first semester at Yale, Hashemi scored a 3.33 GPA.

So let’s see. Harvard Presidents are forced to quit for noting the differences between men and women. Meanwhile, a Taliban spokesman is welcomed back to Yale with open arms.

I guess nobody at Yale
cares to remember what the Taliban’s opinions of women are.

Say what you will about the Associated Press, they are always doing their best to buck up their masters in the DNC:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., questions government witnesses during a Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill Thursday, Feb. 23, 2006, on a plan allowing a United Arab Emirates company to take over significant operations at six U.S. seaports.

Ports Debate Gives Democrats Opportunity

By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent Fri Feb 24, 9:31 PM ET

WASHINGTON - Eight months before midterm elections, Democrats sense political opportunity in a Republican revolt over the Bush administration’s handling of port security in an age of terrorism.

Rather than risk attacking the president alone in an area of his unquestioned political strength, they can stand with GOP critics. And hope to benefit while the commander in chief is forced to defend his credentials in the war on terror.

The challenge for Democrats, says former White House press secretary Michael McCurry, is to "thread it into a larger tapestry" that challenges the administration’s policies.

"Port security is national security, and national security is port security," Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said Thursday at the first of what may be many hearings in the GOP-controlled Congress into the issue.

The New York Democrat is a potential presidential contender in 2008, but in this case her criticism was no match for the brisk, one-sentence letter that North Carolina Republican Rep. Sue Myrick dispatched to the White House. "In regards to selling American ports to the United Arab Emirates, not just no, but hell no," she wrote to a president from her own party.

In fact, the transaction doesn’t involve selling ports. It involves a state-owned company in the United Arab Emirates taking over a British firm that holds contracts at ports in six U.S. cities. In response to the furor, the company has offered to delay its plans.

Whatever the details of the deal, there is little stomach for it among congressional Republicans, many of whom are clamoring for legislation to prevent the takeover and talking of overriding a veto if it comes to that.

The controversy came at a time when Democrats had been straddling other issues related to national security, looking for ways to criticize the president on the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretapping without leaving themselves vulnerable to seemingly inevitable attacks that they were soft on terror.

"What Democrats need to do is make clear that we favor a strong, aggressive posture toward going after terrorists, going after terrorist networks, breaking up terrorists before they strike, hunting them down and killing them," said Mark Mellman, a pollster who recently gave a private briefing to several Democratic senators.

"It is critical that we make it clear that Democrats yield to nobody in protecting the American people. Until we establish that fact, it’s hard to have a conversation (with voters) on any other subject," added McCurry, who was White House press secretary under President Clinton.

Thus, a Democratic-led filibuster against the anti-terror Patriot Act in the Senate melted away this month after four Republicans who had also opposed the bill reached a separate peace with the White House.

An initial Democratic staff memo said Patriot Act changes had made the legislation worse in one instance. But Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat, attended the news conference where Republicans announced their agreement. The party’s leader, Sen. Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record) of Nevada, swung behind it, and it quickly became clear that Democrats would not press a filibuster.

An outcry against Bush’s program of warrantless wiretapping of certain terrorism suspects softened, too. Rather than stress opposition to the eavesdropping itself, several Democrats chose to emphasize that no president was above the law, and added they were eager to work with the administration if changes were needed in a 1970s-era wiretap statute.

"It’s clear that Democrats can’t afford to have Americans believe that they would sacrifice our security for the principle of civil liberties," said pollster Geoff Garin. "Democrats, I think, need to be more assertive in a pro-security message."

One recent poll suggested that stronger criticism of Bush would appeal to partisan Democrats. Not so the voters more likely to make a difference in competitive House and Senate races. The ABC survey taken in January found that 65 percent of those polled said investigating terrorism was more important than protecting privacy. Among Republicans, the figure was 84 percent. Among Democrats, it was 51 percent. Among independents, 61 percent.

Democrats seek to calibrate their rhetoric in anticipation of Republican attacks. They paid close notice when Karl Rove, the top White House political strategist, promised recently to make the war on terrorism a central campaign issue in November. It’s a play the Republicans have called, successfully, in both national elections since Sept. 11, 2001.

"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."

Bush himself made similar comments to House Republicans. He urged them to stress the war on terror as well as the economy. And he defended his administration’s program of wiretapping, vowing to stay the course in a global campaign to wipe out terrorism. "Don’t lose your nerve. I’m not going to lose mine," one member of his audience quoted him as saying.

Too bad Hillary and company didn’t bother to learn enough about the subject before making jackasses out themselves.

But the AP says, keep trying.

Some good news for a change.

From Stars & Stripes:

A Code Pink member holds a sign that reads "maimed for a lie" as part of their weekly demonstration in front of the US Army’s Walter Reed Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland.

Counterprotests in works for Sheehan’s Germany protests

By Steve Mraz, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Sunday, February 26, 2006

RAMSTEIN, Germany — Efforts are under way to stage a counterprotest to Cindy Sheehan’s planned March 11 demonstration outside Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and Ramstein Air Base.

Sheehan, who is the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq and who protested the war last summer outside President Bush’s Texas ranch, is scheduled to participate in a daylong war protest.

Stefan Prystawik, a German writer in Bonn, is working to stage a counterprotest. On his Web site, at www.stefan-prystawik.de, Prystawik characterizes Sheehan as “the great-great grandmother of all Bush haters.”

Sheehan’s planned protest is highly inappropriate, and her complaints are “very much an internal U.S. matter,” Prystawik said.

“First of all, it’s completely inappropriate to instrumentalize the troops here particularly, and above all, those who have suffered severe injuries and are at the hospital,” he said. “They are coming here with an attitude to deliberately demoralize troops who just got back or are going to go back [to Iraq].”

Also Friday, organizers of Sheehan’s protest said that they had obtained permission from German officials in Landstuhl and Ramstein to have their demonstration March 11.

On that morning, a press conference will take place in a Protestant parish hall in Landstuhl. After the press conference, Sheehan is scheduled to share her views, said Detlev Besier, a Protestant pastor in Landstuhl and an event organizer.

It is still possible that the group may try to take gifts and baked goods to troops in Landstuhl, the U.S. military hospital where wounded troops are treated before being flown from Ramstein to the United States.

After a break for lunch, protesters will walk from Landstuhl to a parking lot outside Ramstein’s west gate where a “Camp Casey” will be set up to pay tribute to those who have died in the Iraq war.

Sheehan’s son, Army Spc. Casey Sheehan, was killed in Iraq on April 4, 2004.

Besier said his group does not like the high emotions stirred by news of Sheehan’s visit.

“We want to bring the emotion down,” he said.

“We don’t want to have emotional conflict. It’s not our aim to come too close to somebody. We want to have discussion, and we know Cindy Sheehan wants to open the minds of mothers who have sons, children around the world.”

It really does sound like the whole idea is to take their despicable Walter Reed Hospital protest on the road.

I hope somebody does counter them.

A small victory for the "Scooter" in the latest round from his show trial.

No, this is not from Orwell, not from Kafka. It’s from the "Paper Of Treason," the New York Times:

Former Aide to Cheney Gains Access to His Notes

By NEIL A. LEWIS
Published: February 25, 2006

WASHINGTON, Feb. 24 — I. Lewis Libby Jr., the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney who is charged with lying to investigators about his role in the disclosure of the identity of a C.I.A. officer, won the right Friday to review his handwritten notes for a nine-month period surrounding the publication of the information.

But the federal judge hearing Mr. Libby’s case seemed markedly skeptical to a second request that the defense also be given the highly classified documents known as the President’s Daily Brief for a similar period. The judge, Reggie B. Walton, suggested that the requests for those documents by Mr. Libby’s lawyers might "sabotage" the case against him.

Mr. Libby has been charged with lying to investigators about his role in the disclosure of Valerie Wilson’s role as a Central Intelligence Agency operative.

In court on Friday, his chief defense lawyer, Theodore H. Wells Jr., argued that Mr. Libby needed the highly sensitive documents he was privy to as Mr. Cheney’s top assistant and national security adviser to mount his defense. Defense lawyers have said that if Mr. Libby’s statements to investigators were untrue, it was a case of innocent confusion or faulty memory because of his preoccupation with weightier national security matters at the time.

Mr. Wells said that even though the daily briefs were so valuable that they are often called the nation’s "family jewels," he needed to show the jury the kinds of momentous issues with which Mr. Libby was involved.

But Judge Walton, who deferred a final ruling on the matter, said the briefs were so sensitive that "the White House will never agree" to release them, adding, "If I order this, it will sabotage the prosecution."

The judge also suggested that Mr. Libby’s personal notes for that period, which he had just ordered to be turned over to the defense, could be sufficient to remind Mr. Libby of the issues he was involved in.

Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel prosecuting Mr. Libby, told the judge that if he agreed to order the intelligence briefs made available to Mr. Libby, the result would be months of arguments over executive privilege and relevancy that "would derail the case."

Mr. Fitzgerald has said in court papers that the request for the briefs was an obvious effort at "graymail," a technique in which defense lawyers demand highly sensitive information from the government to force the prosecution to choose between providing the information or dropping the case. He noted that the disclosure of part of the Aug. 6, 2001, daily brief to the Sept. 11 commission was the sole instance of a daily brief’s being publicly disclosed and that occurred only after much wrangling.

Judge Walton scheduled Mr. Libby’s trial to begin Jan. 7, 2007, a long lead time to allow for expected pretrial battles over difficult issues like the presidential briefs and whether reporters will resist subpoenas to testify.

Mr. Fitzgerald said Friday that he would readily agree that Mr. Libby had an important job and dealt with weighty matters. But he said that the presidential briefs would provide far more detail than Mr. Libby needed to make that argument.

Further, he said, in July 2003 when Mr. Libby had conversations with three reporters, he was "deeply involved" in dealing with the issue of Ms. Wilson and her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV. Mr. Wilson, a former ambassador, had provoked the anger of the Bush administration when he asserted that the White House had exaggerated and twisted intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s efforts to buy uranium in Africa in order to make the case for invading Iraq.

Mr. Wilson has said the White House blew his wife’s cover to retaliate and to discredit his claims.

Judge Walton also rejected a request by Mr. Libby’s lawyers to obtain information about an unnamed official who worked in the administration but not in the White House who discussed Ms. Wilson’s identity with reporters.

Of course if this wasn’t Saturday, the slowest news day of the week, The Times wouldn’t have even told us this much good news.

But watching how Fitzgerald is fighting tooth and claw against discovery in this case is very revealing to say the least.

Why won’t Fitzgerald give Libby the material he needs to defend himself? Why isn’t he allowed the same rights any serial killer would be granted. Why isn’t he being given whatever he requests, and more?

Of course I think we all know why. This has nothing to do with justice. And everything to do with a witch hunting. Getting the scalp of at least one administration official.

Shame on Patrick Fitzgerald. He should be fired, fined and disbarred. Then, as an established hero of the left, he can get his mega million dollar book deal and give high priced speeches on the same circuit with Joe Wilson and Mother Sheehan.

Just as he has undoubtedly planned all along.