Check this out — the offices of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are denying a Washington Post story today saying that Congressional Democrats have backed down to the White House by offering to remove Iraq withdrawal language from the now-vetoed Iraq bill.  —  Pelosi just went before the Democratic caucus …

Veto may hit sexual orientation in hate crime bill  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House issued a veto threat Thursday against legislation that would expand federal hate crime law to include attacks motivated by the victims' gender or sexual orientation.  —  The hate crimes bill …

Rice meets with Syrian foreign minister … SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met Syria's foreign minister Thursday in the first high-level talks between the two countries in years.  —  The meeting came hours after the chief U.S. military spokesman in Iraq …

Q-Poll: Giuliani Tumbles, Thompson Explodes, McCain Tastes Hope  —  Ahead of tonight's first Republican primary debate, the Quinnipiac Poll out this morning has bad news for Rudy Giuliani (and Mitt Romney), good news for Fred Thompson, and mixed news for John McCain.  —  To the Ludicrously Early Poll Mobile, Robin! ...

Comey Details U.S. Attorney Firings  —  If there was one major revelation during the hearing today, it was that James Comey had been involved in the firing of two U.S. attorneys when he was deputy attorney general.  —  But these firings were worlds away from the firing of the eight U.S. attorneys last December.

The Times Names Public Editor  —  The New York Times today named its next public editor, Clark Hoyt, a former Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and editor who oversaw the Knight Ridder newspaper chain's coverage that questioned the Bush administration's case for the Iraq war.

Virgin Atlantic Loose Change update: Axed Update: Audio added Update: Virgin Atlantic statement added  —  Folks, we made a difference.  After our post about Virgin Atlantic airing the 9-11 conspiracy film Loose Change 2 as in-flight entertainment last night, the producer …

D.C. Law Firm Suspends Woman Who Worked as Escort  —  Brian Ross, Rhonda Schwartz & Justin Rood Report:  —  A legal secretary at one of Washington's most prominent and well-connected law firms, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, has been suspended after telling her bosses she secretly worked …

Setting the Stage: The Republicans' First Debate  —  Tonight the ten — that's right TEN — candidates running for the Republican presidential nomination square off for the first time.  —  The Fix didn't make the trip out to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California for the gathering …

ECONOMIC UPDATE....Productivity figures dropped precipitously last year, but the team at Goldman Sachs says they can explain it: … Well, look: anytime any aggregate growth figure is low you can always point to its weakest component and say that things look a lot better if you just exclude it.

Lawmakers wants VA to explain bonuses  —  WASHINGTON - Congressional leaders on Thursday demanded that the Veterans Affairs secretary explain hefty bonuses for senior department officials involved in crafting a budget that came up $1 billion short and jeopardized veterans' health care.

The Politico: Exhibit A for our broken political press  —  This week, the Bush administration sought vastly increased powers to spy on the telephone conversations of Americans, and then threatened to begin spying again illegally and without warrants.  It was revealed that Condoleezza Rice …

DOES THE MIDDLE EAST MATTER?....Edward Luttwak asks, "Why are middle east experts so unfailingly wrong?"  I've often wondered the same thing!  He proposes three fundamental mistakes that underlie their unfailing wrongness:  — "Arab-Israeli catastrophism": the idea that we're continually …