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Archive: Jun 2007

Is “Smothers Brothers” Diplomacy the Way Out of Iraq?

As the news goes from bad to worse in Iraq, some in Congress are looking for new ways to bring an end to the American occupation. I’ve learned today that…

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“Civil Rights” in the Gonzales Justice Department

The New York Times’s Neil Lewis profiles exactly what the Civil Rights Division does under Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Racial discrimination and protection of the voting rights of minorities is…

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U.S. Attorneys Scandal—Birmingham

The U.S. Attorney in Birmingham, Alice Martin, is currently under investigation on perjury charges, according to the Political Parlor. The investigation relates to statements that Martin made in an EEOC…

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Exposing a Farce in the Middle East

As followers of this column know, I’ve been tracking the Neocon manipulations in Israeli-Syrian relations for some time, drawing largely on reports in the Israeli press and some scattered sources…

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U.S. Attorneys Scandal – Little Rock: All Roads Lead to Rove

I’ve now heard from several sources within the Administration that a significant part of the documents which are being withheld–both by the Department of Justice and the White House–demonstrate Karl…

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The Cost of Rogue Prosecutors

Michael B. Nifong was the state prosecutor in Durham, North Carolina, who brought and trumpeted rape charges against a group of Duke University lacrosse players. The charges were false, and…

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Now Top This, George Orwell

Yesterday, White House press spokesman Tony Snow assailed the Fourth Circuit’s ruling that President Bush does not have the power to lock away people lawfully in the United States forever…

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French Lessons

Only a short while back, Senator Majority Leader Trent Lott was denigrating “French socialists” and their influence. And Congressman Bob Ney was forcing the House cafeteria to change “french fries”…

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The Gay Bomb

I recently spoke with one of the Pentagon’s most senior medical officers. Official DOD attitudes towards homosexuality, he said, had followed a strange trajectory over the last decade. From a…

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A Conservative Voice

In America today, we have political figures who call themselves Conservatives, but whose notions of what constitutes conservatism seem drawn from certain political movements in Europe between the wars. They…

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A Vindication of the Constitution

Last week two military judges collapsed the Bush Administration’s plans to try two Guantánamo detainees before military commissions. Today the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, the most conservative court in…

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No Confidence in Fredo

On March 27, 1782, the House of Parliament at Westminster voted no confidence in Lord North, then serving as Prime Minister. He immediately announced that in view of the expression…

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Weekly Review

President George W. Bush traveled to Europe, where he declared an end to the Cold War, suggested that a U.S. missile shield was “not something we ought to be hyperventilating…

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David Broder Grapples With Reality

In an op-ed column that appears in today’s Washington Post, the “dean of the Washington press corps,” David Broder, struggles with the trial and sentencing of Scooter Libby. It raises…

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The Unwanted Immigrant

Mark Twain, “Stirring Times in Austria,” Harper’s, March 1898 Mark Twain, “Concerning The Jews,” Harper’s, September 1899 In the last days, an important compromise bill negotiated between Republican and Democratic…

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Colin Powell: Close Gitmo, Restore Habeas

Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, National Security Advisor and Secretary of State Colin Powell has clear advice to the Bush Administration and to Congress on the steps…

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Lessons Learned

I’m just back from an off-the-record meeting with group of a couple of dozen senior Pentagon and intelligence community folks with academics, think-tankers and industry spokesmen. The meeting was convened…

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From Days to Come

(with apologies to H.G. Wells) The New York Times, June 9, 2007: In the prosecution of United States v. Padilla, the following are code words, and their meanings, as described…

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Bush Greets Pontifex Maximus, “Texas Style”

The latest leg of Bush’s European tour includes a visit to the Vatican and an audience with Pope Benedict XVI. Apparently, Bush did not attempt to deliver a massage, but…

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Abramoff and “Justice” in the Heart of Dixie

On a hill above Birmingham, Alabama stands a statue of Vulcan, the Roman god of the forge, a symbol of the city’s debt to the steel industry around which it…

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Ask Not for Whom the Bell Tolls, It Tolls for Fredo

The Senate prepares for a vote of no-confidence in the service of Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General on Monday. In the meantime, the list of accusations of criminal conduct and…

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A Swarm in Anger

Notwithstanding the case made for Wordsworth in the current Harper’s, I hold steadfast to the belief that Samuel Taylor Coleridge is the Prometheus of English Romanticism. Moreover, Coleridge is such…

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A D-Day Lesson

This week we mark the 63rd anniversary of the D-Day invasion that commenced the liberation of continental Europe. Earlier this week, the editors of the Washington Post provided a reminder…

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Iran and the Taliban–Less Than Meets the Eye?

Brian Ross and Chris Isham over at ABC News – who have been on a streak lately with important breaks in the intelligence arena – offer a report today on…

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The Report from Cloudcuckooland

Humor is a fickle thing. So much of it is culturally specific, and the result is that comedies can be the most challenging literature to translate. But occasionally we have…

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The Ship of Fools Flounders On

The Brennan Center at NYU has released an important study of the conduct of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division over the last three-years. The shorter version would be…

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Karl Rove Works His Magic

Karl Rove promised to transform the American political scene for a generation, locking in a majority that would provide a basis for Republican government for decades. But as they say,…

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Media Alert–CBS Evening News

You can catch me discussing the recent decisions at Gitmo and the disclosures about the extraordinary renditions program on Friday night on the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric. Check…

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