Police: Many casualties in Egyptian resort blasts  —  Three explosions rocked the Sinai resort city of Dahab on Monday night leaving at least 100 dead and wounded, according to the doctor who runs Egypt's rescue squad in the peninsula.  —  Dr. Said Essa said he was headed to the scene of the blasts …

Transcript: Bin Laden accuses West  —  The following is an edited translation of an audiotape attributed to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, parts of which were aired by Aljazeera on April 23, 2006.  (It is not known where or when the recording was made.)  —  Praise be to Allah …

Ex-CIA official: WMD evidence ignored  —  '60 Minutes' report: White House disregarded good intelligence  —  (CNN) — A retired CIA official has accused the Bush administration of ignoring intelligence indicating that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and no active nuclear program …

The Internet Freedom Fight: A Round-Up  —  Background on the Issue: The internet is open because private companies haven't been allowed to block content they don't like.  Now the telcos want to make it so they can block what you see.  —  The Threat to You is real: Telcos …

INTRODUCING HOT AIR  —  I'm excited to introduce you today to Hot Air—a conservative Internet broadcast network I founded with a team of multi-talented bloggers.  (Press release here.)  —  Internet video is booming.  Apple's iTunes store has sold a gazillion videos since its debut.

7 Car Bombs Explode in Baghdad, Killing 6  —  BAGHDAD, Iraq - Seven car bombs exploded across the capital Monday, killing at least six people and wounding dozens, as politicians met to try to finalize a new Cabinet.  Police discovered the bodies of 20 Iraqis — apparent victims of sectarian killings …

A Religious Push Against Gay Unions  —  WASHINGTON, April 23 — About 50 prominent religious leaders, including seven Roman Catholic cardinals and about a half-dozen archbishops, have signed a petition in support of a constitutional amendment blocking same-sex marriage.

Cole Fire  —  Yale is set to ditch Taliban Man and may hire a notorious anti-Israel professor.  —  Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi's luck is running out.  Eight weeks ago the Taliban diplomat turned special Yale student made a media splash on the cover of the New York Times magazine in which he proclaimed …

Dissident President  —  George W. Bush has the courage to speak out for freedom.  —  There are two distinct marks of a dissident.  First, dissidents are fired by ideas and stay true to them no matter the consequences.  Second, they generally believe that betraying those ideas would constitute the greatest of moral failures.

Inspectors Find More Torture at Iraqi Jails  —  Top General's Pledge To Protect Prisoners 'Not Being Followed'  —  BAGHDAD — Last Nov. 13, U.S. soldiers found 173 incarcerated men, some of them emaciated and showing signs of torture, in a secret bunker in an Interior Ministry compound in central Baghdad.

Yelling 'Fire' on a Hot Planet  —  GLOBAL warming has the feel of breaking news these days.  —  Polar bears are drowning; an American city is underwater; ice sheets are crumbling.  Time magazine proclaimed that readers should be worried.  Very worried.  There are new hot-selling books …

An Experiment in Journalism  —  I went to the Middle East for six months so I could expand my freelance writing portfolio.  But I found, after a few months, there may be a better way forward than publishing disconnected dispatches here and there for low pay.  —  The mainstream media is an industry in decline.

MCCARTHY'S POLITICAL DONATIONS  —  I substantially agree with Jonah's point that the extraordinary amount of money at issue here is relevant but not dispositive when it comes to divining Mary McCarthy's motives.  But I do think it's highly relevant - not just another fact in a firmament of facts.

Let's Get This Right, Please  —  Walter Pincus of the WaPo tries to report on the Mary McCarthy firing and manages to bungle a related story: … No, she wasn't referring to the Valerie Plame leak, or if she was, the WaPo should have noted her error rather than reinforcing it …

Blog Fight On Capitol Hill  —  How deep is the partisan rancor in Congress?  So deep that aides are bickering over who knows more about blogs.  —  The spat broke out in the House on Friday between spokesmen for Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Georgia Republican Jack Kingston …