memeorandum: When a dilettante takes on Hizbullah (Michael Young/Lebanon Daily Star)

2:55 AM ET, April 7, 2007

Top Items:

Illegal Diplomacy — Did Nancy Pelosi commit a felony when she went to Syria? — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may well have committed a felony in traveling to Damascus this week, against the wishes of the president, to communicate on foreign-policy issues with Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Discussion: Hot Air, TIME: Swampland, The Mahablog, Redstate, The American Mind, The Strata-Sphere, Wake up America, Macsmind, Wizbang, Confederate Yankee and Iowa Voice

Michael Young / Lebanon Daily Star:

When a dilettante takes on Hizbullah — We can thank the US speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, for having informed Syrian President Bashar Assad, from Beirut, that "the road to solving Lebanon's problems passes through Damascus." Now, of course, all we need to do is remind Pelosi …

Discussion: TigerHawk and QandO

Greg Sargent / Horses Mouth:

Oh, dear. Guess who's taking the Washington Post's editorial board to task for its editorial stance against Nancy Pelosi's trip to Syria? One of the Post's own Op ed columnists, Eugene Robinson. — Check out this appearance by Robinson on Hardball. Robinson defends Pelosi's trip to Syria …

Discussion: Daily Kos, Matthew Yglesias and Norwegianity

USA Today:

Pelosi steps out of bounds on ill-conceived trip to Syria — Bush's no-talk policy is flawed, but speaker's tactics are no solution. — Democrats in Congress have been busy flexing their foreign policy muscles almost from the moment they took power in January, for the most part responsibly.

Discussion: TBogg, QandO, Sister Toldjah, Washington Post, Gateway Pundit, News Bloggers Blog, Blue Crab Boulevard, Cadillac Tight and philly.com

Tom Lantos / USA Today:

Within the bounds — USA TODAY's views distort both the nature of Speaker Pelosi's trip and the constitutional role of Congress in foreign policy. As a member of the speaker's delegation who accompanied her to every meeting, I would like to set the record straight. — Let's be clear.

Discussion: The Impolitic, Kesher Talk, Liberal Values and Wake up America

Dan Froomkin / Washington Post:
Cheney Sticks to His Delusions

Discussion: Firedoglake, About Liberal Politics, No More Mister Nice Blog, Lawyers, Guns and Money, Telegraph Blogs, Wonkette, Democratic Underground and Norwegianity

Anne Flaherty / Associated Press:
Pelosi: Mideast Trip Strengthened Ties

Discussion: Redstate, Gateway Pundit, Little Green Footballs and TIME

Faiz / Think Progress:
Lauer On Pelosi Syria Visit: 'Let's Face It, A Lot Of People …

Discussion: Reuters, Booman Tribune, Daily Kos, TalkLeft, The Carpetbagger Report, Media Matters for America, Betsy's Page, Redstate, Blue Crab Boulevard and Associated Press

Associated Press:

Goodling said she would invoke 5th Amendment if called before Congress — WASHINGTON - Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' top aide, who refusedto testify before Congress about her role in the politically charged firing of eight U.S. attorneys, abruptly quit her job Friday.

Discussion: Minneapolis Star Tribune, Sisyphus Shrugged, Firedoglake, PoliBlog (TM) and Middle Earth Journal

Lara Jakes Jordan / Associated Press:

Gonzales aide who asserted Fifth resigns — WASHINGTON - A top aide to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales abruptly quit on Friday, almost two weeks after telling Congress she would not testify about her role in the firings of federal prosecutors. — There was no immediate reason given …

Discussion: Think Progress and Crooked Timber

David Stout / New York Times:

Gonzales Aide Who Refused to Testify Resigns — Monica Goodling, the Justice Department official who helped coordinate the firings of eight United States attorneys, an episode that has jeopardized the position of Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, resigned today.

Discussion: Prairie Weather, DownWithTyranny!, The Rachel Maddow Show and Abovethelaw.com

Dan Eggen / Washington Post:

Counselor To Gonzales Announces Resignation — Goodling Had Refused to Testify on Prosecutor Firings — The senior counselor to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales submitted her resignation yesterday, becoming the third high-ranking Justice Department aide to quit in the aftermath of the firings of eight U.S. attorneys.

Guardian:

Americans offered 'aggressive patrols' in Iranian airspace — The US offered to take military action on behalf of the 15 British sailors and marines held by Iran, including buzzing Iranian Revolutionary Guard positions with warplanes, the Guardian has learned.

Discussion: Political Animal, New York Times and Washington Post

Alan Cowell / New York Times:

Britons Say They Feared for Lives in Iran Captivity — Their greatest scare, they recalled, came on the second day, when they were flown to Tehran, blindfolded and backed up against a prison wall while their Iranian captors fiddled with weapons, cocking rifles and making them fear for their lives.

Cernig / NewsHog:
Brits Told Bush To Back Off

Discussion: Booman Tribune and At-Largely

Tom Kelly / Daily Mail:

Blindfolded Britons tell of the moment the guards' guns clicked — * We were blindfolded and subjected to interrogation — * We were told we faced seven years in prison if we did not 'confess' — * Iranians entered Iraqi waters deliberately to detain us. Fighting back was not an option

Discussion: In From the Cold, Blue Crab Boulevard, The Daily Dish, Wake up America and Wizbang

Tariq Panja / Associated Press:
Britons: Iran bound, threatened captives

Discussion: piglipstick and NewsHog

Richard Holt / Telegraph:
Sailors 'blindfolded, bound and threatened'

Discussion: Hot Air, Pajamas Media, Jules Crittenden and The Corner

Ann Althouse / Althouse:

Let's keep talking about breasts. — Jessica Valenti is writing in The Guardian and connecting the violent threats against Kathy Sierra to my old blog post making fun of a photograph of her and a bunch of other bloggers posing with President Clinton. Read the whole thing. I just want to focus on this:

Discussion: Dohiyi Mir, Lawyers, Guns and Money, Liberal Values and ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES

Guardian:
How the web became a sexists' paradise

Discussion: TAPPED

Bruce Bartlett / New York Times:

How Supply-Side Economics Trickled Down — AS one who was present at the creation of "supply-side economics" back in the 1970s, I think it is long past time that the phrase be put to rest. It did its job, creating a new consensus among economists on how to look at the national economy.

Discussion: Political Animal, The Carpetbagger Report and PrestoPundit

Mark Thoma / Economist's View:
Bruce Bartlett: How Supply-Side Economics Trickled Down

Discussion: Angry Bear and Ezra Klein

El Presidente / Slapstick Politics:

Colorado Statue Honoring Fallen Navy SEAL Opposed, "Glorifies Violence" — **Welcome Michelle Malkin readers—scroll for updates —City of Littleton confirms that statue (based on the last known picture of Dietz) will proceed with the unveiling on July 4, Dietz family speaks as police officers applaud:

Discussion: Michelle Malkin, Sadly, No! and Little Thom's Blog

Joey Bunch / Denver Post: Line drawn in park over statue

Peter Spiegel / Los Angeles Times:

Pentagon probe fills in blanks on Iraq war groundwork — A memo calling for progress on linking Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein marked the beginnings of Feith's project. — WASHINGTON — Just four months after the Sept. 11 attacks, then-Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz dashed off …

Discussion: DownWithTyranny!, Lawyers, Guns and Money, The Reaction, Ezra Klein and TPMmuckraker

Tim Sullivan / Associated Press:

India High-Tech Industry Out of Workers — MYSORE, India (AP) - At the heart of the sprawling corporate campus, in a hilltop building overlooking the immaculately shorn lawns, the sports fields and the hypermodern theater complex, young engineers crowd into a classroom.

Discussion: Political Animal and Sirotablog

James Taranto / Opinion Journal:

Best of the Web — Our item yesterday on Jenny Ballantine, the 22-year-old University of New Hampshire undergrad made famous when Rush Limbaugh played her question at a John Edwards "town hall" meeting on his radio show, prompted this email from reader Nate Brown:

Discussion: Hot Air, SCSUScholars, Power Line and Redstate

Michael D. Shear / Washington Post:

McCain to Stake Bid On Need to Win in Iraq — Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) will launch a high-profile effort next week to convince Americans that the Iraq war is winnable, embracing the unpopular conflict with renewed vigor as he attempts to reignite his stalling bid for the presidency.

Discussion: The Gun Toting Liberal™ and Middle Earth Journal