Captured AQ Documents: "Every Year Is Worse Than The Previous Year"  —  CENTCOM announced today that they had captured al-Qaeda correspondence in Iraq that discusses the state of the insurgency, especially around Baghdad but also around the entire country.  Far from optimistic …

Murdoch to host fundraiser for Hillary Clinton campaign  —  Rupert Murdoch, the conservative media mogul whose New York Post tabloid savaged Hillary Clinton's initial aspirations to become a US senator for New York, has agreed to host a political fundraiser for her re-election campaign.

Digital Lynch Mob  —  Two weeks ago I wrote about Al Gore's new movie on global warming.  I liked the film.  In response, I instantly got more than 1,000 e-mails, most of them praising Gore, some calling him the usual names and some concluding there was no such thing as global warming, if only because Gore said there was.

Rove prepares 20 judges  —  Presidential adviser Karl Rove and White House counsel Harriet Miers yesterday told conservative activists and Senate staff that the administration would soon send the names of more than 20 judicial nominees to Capitol Hill for confirmation.

After this bloody shambles, a question.  Is Tony Blair his own worst enemy?  —  IT IS said by some that David Bowie created his epic song Life On Mars by writing a series of rhyming couplets, chucking them all up in the air and organising the lyrics in the order that they landed.

CIA Official Quits; FBI Probes Role in Defense Contracts  —  The FBI is investigating whether a top-ranking CIA official who announced his resignation yesterday steered contracts to a boyhood friend at the center of a congressional bribery scandal, law enforcement officials said.

Iran Letter to Bush Criticizes U.S. Govt  —  NEW YORK (AP) — Iran's president declared in a letter to President Bush that democracy had failed worldwide and lamented ''an ever-increasing global hatred'' of the U.S. government.  Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice swiftly rejected the letter …

Optimistic, Democrats Debate the Party's Vision  —  WASHINGTON, May 8 — With Democrats increasingly optimistic about this year's midterm elections and the landscape for 2008, intellectuals in the center and on the left are debating how to sharpen the party's identity and present a clear alternative …

Lesbians' brains respond differently from those of heterosexual women  —  WASHINGTON — Homosexuals' brains respond differently from those of straight men and women when exposed to sex hormones, but researchers now say the difference is less pronounced in lesbians than in gay men.

MSNBC reporter: 'I am convinced that Karl Rove will, in fact, be indicted'  —  Rush transcript from Countdown with Keith Olbermann / MSNBC.  —  MSNBC's Keith Olbermann: There are stories — possibly apocryphal — from the medieval courts of chancery in England, of lawsuits that took so long …

Out and About  —  The Vice President's Daughter Tells The Inside Story in Her New Book.  But the Subject Is Politics.  —  NEW YORK  —  "Are the eyes too much?"  —  Mary Cheney is peering into the makeup artist's mirror in the early hours of the morning, getting "done" for her appearance on …

Looking Inside Hamas: Search for Martyrdom, Hatred of Israel  —  May 8 (Bloomberg) — Anyone hoping that Hamas's parliamentary triumph will convert that martyr-making machine into a vehicle of peaceful democracy may be seriously dismayed by a new PBS special.

Experts See a Strategy Behind CIA Shuffle  —  General May Help Intelligence Chief Rein In Rumsfeld and His Military Spy Plans  —  Gen. Michael V. Hayden isn't the first active-duty military officer tapped to lead the CIA — he is in fact the fifth — but many intelligence experts and officers …

As Cuba Plans Offshore Wells, Some Want U.S. to Follow Suit  —  WASHINGTON, May 8 — In 1977, the United States and Cuba signed a treaty that evenly divided the Florida Straits to preserve each country's economic rights.  They included access to vast underwater oil and gas fields on both sides of the line.

Feingold: Democrats Must Stand Up to Bush  —  WASHINGTON - Sen. Russ Feingold (news, bio, voting record), a potential anti-war candidate in the 2008 presidential field, urged fellow Democrats on Monday to show more backbone in challenging President Bush on Iraq.

We're the Decider  —  Drum provides the regular lament that there ain't enough wonk talk in the blogosphere.  There's more than he gives credit for - there's certainly a lot of reacting to the atrocity-in-Congress-of-the- day - and as Stoller points out it is to a great degree a waste of time.