Top Items:
Emptywheel:
Whitehouse Reveals Smoking Gun of White House Claiming Not to Be Bound by Any Law — Damn, I love me some Sheldon Whitehouse. He, like, actually knows the law. And he, like, is willing to actually read the stuff he is exercising oversight over. — Which is why this speech he gave today …
RELATED:
whitehouse.senate.gov:
In FISA Speech, Whitehouse Sharply Criticizes Bush Administration's Assertion of Executive Power — Washington — , D.C. - U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, delivered the following remarks on the floor of the U.S. Senate today:
Faiz / Think Progress:
Sen. Whitehouse Reveals Secret DoJ Legal Memos: Bush Determines What Is Constitutional — This morning, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) delivered an impassioned floor speech to help frame the debate over FISA reform. Using his privilege as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee …
Michael Hirsh / Newsweek:
Huckabee Surges, Obama Gains in Iowa — The new NEWSWEEK poll shows the former Arkansas governor now has a two-to-one lead over Romney, while Barack improves against Hillary. — Yana Paskova / Getty Images — Looking Up: Huckabee now seems unstoppable in the Iowa caucuses
RELATED:
Mark Mazzetti / New York Times:
Democrats Call for Inquiry in Destruction of Tapes by C.I.A. — Angry Democratic lawmakers called for investigations today into the Central Intelligence Agency's destruction in 2005 of at least two videotapes documenting the interrogation of two Qaeda operatives in the agency's custody.
RELATED:
Lee Harris / TCS Daily:
How and Why Romney Bombed — The Reuters headline said: "Mitt Romney Vows Mormon Church Will Not Run White House." Unfortunately, this time Reuters got its story right. In his long-awaited speech designed to win over conservative evangelicals, Romney actually did say something to this effect …
RELATED:
Satyam / Think Progress:
O'Reilly: Progressive blog readers = 'devil worshippers.' — On Fox News yesterday, Bill O'Reilly let loose on "far-left websites" like DailyKos, stating, "If you read these far-left websites, you're a devil worshipper. You are." O'Reilly's ombudsman responded, "As a journalist, you know better than that."
Mike Allen / The Politico:
Pelosi calls Cheney swipe undignified — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) says a swipe that Vice President Cheney took at Democratic House leaders is "beneath the dignity of his office." — Capitol Hill was abuzz Thursday with discussion of the vice president's assertion in an interview …
Pamela Bone / The Australian:
Why we stay mute on Islamic sex apartheid — US Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton last week urged President George W. Bush to call on King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia to drop all charges against a 19-year-old Saudi woman who had been gang-raped at knifepoint …
Discussion:
The Belmont Club
RELATED:
Mesh / Harvard:
Iran NIE and a prediction — From Stephen Peter Rosen — For the most part, the arguments about the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran have been and will be a debate, not about intelligence, but about Bush foreign policy. But the NIE also provides an opportunity to assess …
RELATED:
Yaakov Katz / Jerusalem Post:
IDF to show US nuclear data on Iran
IDF to show US nuclear data on Iran
Discussion:
Guardian, Hot Air, JOSHUAPUNDIT, The Newshoggers, Early Warning, The Strata-Sphere and Israel Matzav
John Distaso / New Hampshire Union Leader:
Site of Barack-Oprah event isn't unionized — MANCHESTER - Barack Obama's presidential campaign deeply concerned organized labor by booking its big rally Sunday with superstar Oprah Winfrey at the Verizon Wireless Arena. — A union representing organized stage hands have been trying unsuccessfully …
RELATED:
Daily Mail:
Imam's daughter in hiding after her conversion to Christianity sparked death threats — The daughter of a British imam is living under police protection after receiving death threats from her father for converting to Christianity. — The 31-year-old, whose father is the leader of a mosque in Lancashire …
KNTV-TV:
Penn Endorses Kucinich For President In SF — Sr. Advisor Confirms Endorsement To NBC11 — Academy Award-winning actor Sean Penn endorsed Dennis Kucinich for president in San Francisco Friday. — Penn made what had been billed as a "major political statement" at San Francisco State University.
Discussion:
Little Green Footballs
Eric Kleefeld / TPM Election Central:
Romney Spokesman Won't Say If Atheists Have Place In America — A spokesman for the Mitt Romney campaign is thus far refusing to say whether Romney sees any positive role in America for atheists and other non-believers, after Election Central inquired about the topic yesterday
Discussion:
New York Times, Washington Post, The Right's Field, Comments from Left Field, The Mahablog, Balkinization, MyDD, Outside The Beltway, ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES, The RBC, The Atlantic Online, No More Mister Nice Blog, The Huffington Post, Scholars and Rogues, Redstate, Washington Monthly, The New Republic, The Carpetbagger Report, Shakespeare's Sister, National Review, The Corner, CNN and Middle Earth Journal
Blue Texan / Firedoglake:
Peggy Noonan Admits GOP Is Controlled By Fundies, "Idiots" — Nooner, who's apparently been in a coma for the past 30 years, is shocked, shocked! to find that the GOP's base is a bunch of [flat-earther homophobic] religious bigots. … And why would that be? … You don't say! Goodness, who let them in?
The Corner:
Steynophobia — Late yesterday I stumbled across an article about a "human rights complaint" filed by the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC) against Maclean's, Canada's most widely-read news magazine, for running a "flagrantly Islamophobic" excerpt from Mark Steyn's book, America Alone.