Rumsfeld's Iraq-Germany analogy disputed  —  Former top officials disagree with comparison  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — Former top officials in two presidential administrations — one Democratic, one Republican — disagreed Sunday with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's characterization …

On Anniversary, Bush and Cheney See Iraq Success  —  WASHINGTON, March 19 — On the third anniversary of a war that they once expected to be over by now, President Bush and senior officials argued Sunday that their strategy was working despite escalating violence in Iraq …

GOP Struggles To Define Its Message for 2006 Elections  —  Republican efforts to craft a policy and political agenda to carry the party into the midterm elections have stumbled repeatedly as GOP leaders face widespread disaffection and disagreement within the ranks.

Sayed and de Man at Yale  —  The campus that ran off a Nazi propagandist today welcomes one from the Taliban.  —  Three weeks after the New York Times revealed that former Taliban official Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi is attending classes at Yale, many at the university still have little to say about the controversy.

A Contractor's Purchase on Power  —  Mitchell Wade's Cultivation of 'Duke' Cunningham Was Just One Part of His Tactical Assault for MZM  —  The consulting work that MZM Inc. received from a Pentagon agency in 2003 was for only $40,000, but to company owner Mitchell J. Wade, the face value was just the beginning.

Afghan Man Faces Death for Allegedly Converting to Christianity  —  KABUL, Afghanistan — An Afghan man who allegedly converted from Islam to Christianity is being prosecuted in a Kabul court and could be sentenced to death, a judge said Sunday.  —  The defendant, Abdul Rahman …

Three Years of Dragging Democrats Through Their Iraqi Quagmire  —  "We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction... Saddam may well hide his most lethal weapons in mosques, schools and hospitals.  If our forces attempt to strike such targets …

Anti-war protesters in SLC, elsewhere lament apathy  —  By the time the war protesters began their march Saturday morning in Salt Lake City, only about 50 people had gathered.  Their numbers had swelled to about 200 by noon - and that was with a little high-tech help from a marcher who text-messaged friends to join him.

Plight Deepens for Black Men, Studies Warn  —  BALTIMORE — Black men in the United States face a far more dire situation than is portrayed by common employment and education statistics, a flurry of new scholarly studies warn, and it has worsened in recent years even as an economic boom …

Task Forces 6-26, 121 and 20  —  Today's New York Times has a front page article about torture by a special forces unit called Task Force 6-26 at a secret prison near the Baghdad airport.  I strongly recommend reading the whole thing, but here are some notable excerpts: … And one final excerpt:

Rewriting The Science  —  (CBS) As a government scientist, James Hansen is taking a risk.  He says there are things the White House doesn't want you to hear but he's going to say them anyway.  —  Hansen is arguably the world's leading researcher on global warming.  He's the head of NASA's top institute studying the climate.

Scalia loosens up  —  IT WAS AT a black-tie dinner in Washington in 1985 that Washington Redskins running back John Riggins boozily gave one of his table-mates, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a memorable piece of advice: ''Come on, Sandy baby, loosen up.  You're too tight.

Changing Public Opinion  —  John Amato has the video up of Brit Hume having a hyperventilating hissy fit this morning on Fox news at Bill Kristol's assertion that Feingold's motion is good for Democrats.  Wow.  —  Brit seemed unusually concerned that Mara Liasson, Bill Kristol and Juan Williams …

Iraqi police report details civilians' deaths at hands of U.S. troops  —  BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi police have accused American troops of executing 11 people, including a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old infant, in the aftermath of a raid last Wednesday on a house about 60 miles north of Baghdad.