Top Items:
Sheryl Gay Stolberg / New York Times:
Senator Insists Bush Aides Testify Publicly — The Democratic senator leading the inquiry into the dismissal of federal prosecutors insisted Sunday that Karl Rove and other top aides to President Bush must testify publicly and under oath, setting up a confrontation between Congress and the White House …
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Nico / Think Progress:
Tony Snow 'Defensive' On Iraq Anniversary, Tells CNN's Ed Henry To 'Zip It' — President Bush will address the fourth anniversary of the Iraq invasion in a speech today at the White House. — During this morning's press gaggle, Tony Snow told reporters that Bush will use the speech to attack …
Discussion:
AMERICAblog
Dan Eggen / Washington Post:
Prosecutor's Firing Was Urged During Probe — The U.S. attorney in San Diego notified the Justice Department of search warrants in a Republican bribery scandal last May 10, one day before the attorney general's chief of staff warned the White House of "a real problem" with her, a Democratic senator said yesterday.
Adam Cohen / New York Times:
It Wasn't Just a Bad Idea. It May Have Been Against the Law.
It Wasn't Just a Bad Idea. It May Have Been Against the Law.
Discussion:
The Carpetbagger Report, Law Blog, Crooks and Liars, The Heretik and The Democratic Daily
Gary Langer / ABCNEWS:
Voices From Iraq 2007: Ebbing Hope in a Landscape of Loss — National Survey of Iraq — A new national survey paints a devastating portrait of life in Iraq: widespread violence, torn lives, displaced families, emotional damage, collapsing services, an ever starker sectarian chasm …
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George Packer / New Yorker:
BETRAYED — The Iraqis who trusted America the most. — Text Size: … On a cold, wet night in January, I met two young Iraqi men in the lobby of the Palestine Hotel, in central Baghdad. A few Arabic television studios had rooms on the upper floors of the building, but the hotel was otherwise vacant.
Iraq — Washington Post Continuing Coverage:
Poll Shows Iraqis Feel Quality of Life Has Plunged — More than six in 10 Iraqis now say that their lives are going badly — double the percentage who said so in late 2005 — and about half say that increasing U.S. forces in the country will make the security situation worse …
Glenn Greenwald / Salon:
Republicans and U.S. attorneys — then and now — The fundamental difference between (a) a new administration replacing all U.S. attorneys (as multiple Presidents have done — including Clinton, Reagan and even Bush 41) and (b) cherry-picking ones for firing in the middle of an administration, has been amply documented.
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Atrios / Eschaton:
Massacre — I'd been meaning to take a look at real-time reaction …
Massacre — I'd been meaning to take a look at real-time reaction …
Discussion:
MyDD
Karen DeYoung / Iraq:
Iraq War's Statistics Prove Fleeting — The U.S. war in Iraq enters its fifth year today. That, and 3,197 U.S. military deaths reported by the Pentagon as of 10 a.m. Friday, are among the few numerical certainties in a conflict characterized from the start by confusion and misuse of key data.
Discussion:
The Heretik
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Michael Barone / Real Clear Politics:
The Blame-America-First Crowd — "They always blame America first." That was Jeane Kirkpatrick, describing the "San Francisco Democrats" in 1984. But it could be said about a lot of Americans, especially highly educated Americans, today. — In their assessment of what is going on in the world …
James Rainey / Los Angeles Times:
News media and politics: an uneasy union — Some prominent journalists have mates who work for a presidential candidate. They approach this potential conflict in different ways. — Some of America's most prominent political journalists are, quite literally, wedded to the 2008 presidential race …
Ann Scott Tyson / Washington Post:
Military Is Ill-Prepared For Other Conflicts — Four years after the invasion of Iraq, the high and growing demand for U.S. troops there and in Afghanistan has left ground forces in the United States short of the training, personnel and equipment that would be vital to fight …
Discussion:
Taylor Marsh
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David Carr / New York Times:
All the World's a Story — Journalism has always been a product of networks. A reporter receives an assignment, begins calling "sources" — people he or she knows or can find. More calls follow and, with luck and a deadline looming, the reporter will gain enough mastery of the topic …
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John Fund / Opinion Journal:
Whose Ox Is Gored? — The media discover the former vice president's environmental exaggerations and hypocrisy. — The media are finally catching up with Al Gore. Criticism of his anti-global-warming franchise and his personal environmental record has gone beyond ankle-biting bloggers.
CBN.com:
John McCain Rips the Club For Growth — John McCain has taken some hits for not attending certain conservative events. With CPAC, he says it was a simple schedueling conflict. But he will not be speaking at the upcoming conservative Club For Growth meeting either. Why not?
Amy Schatz / Wall Street Journal:
In '08 Race, Web Tactics Are Even More Integral — Handicapping Field — Is a Bigger Chore — As Goals Diverge — WASHINGTON — John Edwards topped the field of Democratic presidential contenders in the liberal blog DailyKos's latest straw poll. But Barack Obama has the most "friends" on MySpace.
Discussion:
Wonkette
James V. Grimaldi / Washington Post:
Smithsonian Documents Detail Chief's Expenses — Invoices Include Work on Home of Secretary Small — Internal Smithsonian documents offer a glimpse into what one senator called the "Dom Perignon" lifestyle of the taxpayer-supported institution's chief official, who turned in a $15,000 receipt …
Discussion:
TIME: Swampland