You could devote an entire blog to Katherine Harris (someone already has) so we try to ration the Katherine Harris posts. But each day brings a new Harris temptation and, as much as you try to stay off the sauce, sometimes you fall off the wagon.
The latest installment in the soap opera that is the Harris campaign finds Harris, burned by her connection to defense contractor MZM, trying to shift the focus by claiming that her opponent, Sen. Bill Nelson, accepted illegal campaign contributions several years ago.
The problem is Harris' former campaign manager was named as a co-conspirator in that case. Oops.
The Orlando Sentinel's Jim Stratton has the details.
--David Kurtz
Over at TPMmuckraker, Paul Kiel has a rundown on the latest documents from the Secret Service showing Jack Abramoff's White House visits.
The Secret Service has been less than forthcoming about Abramoff's White House contacts, despite a lawsuit seeking to enforce FOIA.
The first batch of records released showed just two Abramoff visits. The latest batch identifies six other times when Abramoff was scheduled to be at the White House.
Jack, we hardly knew ya.
--David Kurtz
Speaking of the Geneva Conventions, the Red Cross has consistently held to its position that it should have access to those captured by the United States and held at undisclosed locations around the world.
In light of the Hamdan decision, has the Red Cross again approached U.S. officials about gaining such access? What has been the U.S. response? I haven't seen any reporting on this issue. If any TPM readers have, send me the link and I'll post a follow up.
--David Kurtz
Style note to editors/producers:
Describing those held at Guantanamo as "detainees" or "enemy combatants" is not accurate.
The Supreme Court's Hamdan decision declared them to be prisoners of war, entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions, until such time as a properly constituted tribunal concludes otherwise. The thrust of the Court's decision was that the military commissions set up by the Administration did not include the basic procedural safeguards necessary to qualify as a properly constituted tribunal.
As a matter of law now, the United States is holding prisoners of war at Guantanamo Bay. That's a fact, which is obscured when journalists continue to use language first put forth by the Administration specifically to avoid the strictures of the Geneva Conventions.
Update: Nothing like giving style instructions, and being incorrect. A number of readers have correctly pointed out that the Supreme Court in Hamdan did not reach the issue of whether Hamdan was a prisoner of war. So I overstated the case when I wrote that the Supreme Court had declared his POW status. Rather, the District Court had made that determination, and the judgment of the District Court was affirmed by the Supreme Court, but on different grounds. It simply did not decide the POW issue one way or the other. I think it's fair to say that the District Court's opinion that Hamdan is a prisoner of war remains good law, but that decision does not have the imprimatur of the Supreme Court, as my post stated. My apologies for the error and thanks to the readers who caught it.
--David Kurtz
The evidence mounts.
As you know by now, New 
Jersey senate candidate Tom Kean, Jr. refuses to say whether he's for the Bush plan to phase out Social Security and replace it with private accounts. We're now on Day 8 trying to get a straight answer out of him.
And now we've found a second reporter whom Kean told back in 2000 that he supported the Bush plan. That was when Kean was running for a House seat in 2000. (The first was a reporter for the Westfield Leader, noted here.)
According to a May 15th 2000 Associated Press article by Laurence Arnold, Kean said that he, like the other four candidates for the GOP nomination supported "the idea of letting people invest part of their Social Security payroll taxes into a private investment account they would manage."
In other words, in 2000 Kean supported President Bush's partial phase-out plan.
One of our spies on the ground in New Jersey tells us that Kean's got his own Garden state version of the Bush bubble and isn't making appearances before non-stacked audiences (if folks in state have more details on this, let us know.) So it may be hard for TPM Readers to get a chance to ask Kean whether he still supports the Bush plan. But he's got to come out of hiding at some point.
--Josh Marshall
More on the latest New York terror case, from the WP:
There were conflicting assessments among U.S. counterterrorism officials about the significance of the plot.Two U.S. counterterrorism officials, speaking on the condition that their names and agencies not be identified because the FBI is the government's lead agency, discounted the ability of the conspirators to carry out an attack.
One said the plot was "not as far along" as described and was "more aspirational in nature." The other described the threat as "jihadi bravado," adding "somebody talks about tunnels, it lights people up," but that there was little activity to back up the talk.
. . .
Like the plot announced yesterday, the Miami group's plans were described by investigators as "aspirational."
The Miami group had a leg up on this newest bunch; its members were actually in the country.
--David Kurtz
They always say everything is bigger in Texas, but this is too much even for the Lone Star State.
Reckoning that two U.S. senators and 32 congressmen were insufficient representation in Washington (not to mention that fella in the White House), Texas created an independent state agency to advance the state's interest in Washington, the only state with such an arrangement.
But that wasn't enough, not for Texas.
Even though the Office of State-Federal Relations has its own staff and an office in Washington, it decided to hire outside lobbyists to represent the agency, signing Drew Maloney, Tom Delay's former chief of staff, and Todd Boulanger, a former member of Team Abramoff, to contracts together worth more $1 million. Some of that money made it back into GOP campaign coffers, but that's a whole other story.
The next step would be for Maloney and Boulanger to hire their own lobbyists--because, really, with things like they are in Washington these days, how can the good people of Texas compete for federal dollars without their elected representatives' agency's lobbyists' lobbyists?
Showing some of the common sense Texas prides itself on, a state advisory commission has now recommended that the Office of State-Federal Relations be abolished. Republicans in the Texas Legislature oppose the idea.
--David Kurtz
Well, turns out the Holland Tunnel wasn't the target after all, according to the NYT. But what does that matter?
Representative Peter T. King, the chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said today that even though the Holland Tunnel was not the target this time, the tunnel has been a target of terrorists before, including a plot against the Hudson River tunnels and other New York landmarks uncovered after the World Trade Center bombing in 1993.
By that logic, we'd better keep a close eye on, say, Pearl Harbor.
Think it's time to compare the number of announced terrorism cases in pre-election 2004, post-election 2005, and, now, pre-election 2006?
--David Kurtz
Ahhh, a sight to behold. Video of Joe Biden explaining his recent remarks. He was praising Indian-Americans for overcoming their historic exclusion from small retail shop ownership.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, I think the folks at Bluejersey.com may be in the hunt in the Straight Answer from Tom Kean, Jr. on phasing out Social Security contest.
As we noted back on Tuesday, Tom Kean, Jr. (R) is running for the Senate in New Jersey. And even though President Bush and the Social Security chair in the House both say they'll go for Social Security phase-out again next year if they hold the Congress, Kean refuses to say whether he favors preserving Social Security in its present form or phasing it out and replacing it with private accounts.
Go to his events, call his campaign, whatever, he's keeping mum.
But this guy at bluejersey.com has dug up some info.
Turns out that back in 2000, Kean tried to run for a seat in Congress. And back then he was in favor partially phasing out Social Security and replacing the phased out part with private accounts.
Reported the Westfield Leader on May 25th, 2000 ...
Mr. Kean supports investing 2 percent of the Social Security Trust Fund in the Stock Market, in the form of personal retirement accounts that would be controlled by individuals rather than the government.
This is a little garbled. But what the reporter is referring to is taking about 18% of the money that goes to Social Security and putting it into private accounts. (2 percent refers to 2 percentage points out of the total of 12.4% of payroll that goes to Social Security.) That's the Bush plan from 2000.
In other words, back in 2000 Kean was in favor of what President Bush tried to do last year and says he'll try to do again next year. In 2000, Kean was for it. Now he refuses to say whether he's for it or not.
The contest prizes await whoever can get him to say whether he's still for it or whether he's changed his mind.
It can't be that hard. He can't stay silent forever, can he?
--Josh Marshall
Ken Mehlman ...
From MSNBC, June 30th, 2006 ...
The [Justice Department IG] report also contained evidence of Abramoff's strong ties to the Bush White House. One White House political official, Leonard Rodriguez, told Fine's investigators he kept Abramoff aware of information relevant to Guam "at the behest of Ken Mehlman, the White House Political Director," the report said. There was no explanation of why Mehlman would have wanted the information shared with Abramoff.
Ken Mehlman, quoted in Vanity Fair, May 2006: "Abramoff is someone who we don't know a lot about. We know what we read in the paper"
--Josh Marshall
I'm curious to hear more about this alleged plot to bomb the Holland Tunnel in New York. Unlike the ridiculousness down in Florida, this seems like it may have been a serious effort, albeit in the very early stages, and some solid inter-agency work rolling it up. Like I said, curious to hear more.
--Josh Marshall
Over the last several days, TPMmuckraker.com 
has been reporting on the evolving allegations of plagiarism in the work of Ann Coulter. The allegations come from several different sources, including the New York Post. And a number of readers have written in to ask to see the actual alleged instances of plagiarism to evaluate the charges for themselves.
The TPMmuckraker staff spent a day working on this. And we've now compiled a comprehensive list of all the allegations we're aware of, with Coulter's text listed along with the alleged original and the party that first identified the similar passages.
To me personally, some of the examples/accusations seem strained -- simply similar statements of the same basic facts. And sometimes there are only so many ways to describe one set of facts. In other cases the similarities of the wording strike me as hard to see as a coincidence. Especially when there seem to be multiple instances of similarities in the same column coming from the same source.
In any case, we're not making judgments one way or another. But if you're interested in this story. Here's the evidence. Make your own judgment.
--Josh Marshall
"We've got Aryan Nations graffitti in Baghdad. . . that's a problem." That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
Bush on Lieberman on Larry King ...
LARRY KING: Move to politics. An unusual situation in Connecticut. Joe Lieberman is running for reelection to the Senate.He's in the primary fight, may lose, and has said that if he loses, he might well run as an independent.
He supported you staunchly on Iraq and Iraq is the major issue in that campaign, the primary.
Would you support him if he ran as an independent?
G. BUSH: First, the Democrats have to sort out who their nominee is going to be and that's going to be up to the Democrats. And the rest of it's hypothetical.
LARRY KING: But he said he would run as an independent, if he were...
G. BUSH: He also has said he's going to win his primary.
LARRY KING: I know you like him.
G. BUSH: You're trying to get me to give him a political kiss, which may be his death.
LARRY KING: You hugged him before the State of the Union, right?
No, I know you generally...
G. BUSH: The Democrats are going to figure it out. They'll figure it out.
LARRY KING: So you would not make a decision on that.
G. BUSH: Well, I'm not going to wade into a Democratic primary in the state of Connecticut.
--Josh Marshall
Coulter investigation heats up; lib schadenfreude epidemic fells thousands.
--Josh Marshall
Did you see the Lieberman/Lamont debate? What did you think? Share your thoughts here.
--Josh Marshall
Good for the Jews? JTA: "It’s unclear how many Jewish Democrats share that view. Jewish fund-raisers canvassed by JTA said they favored Lieberman — even those who profoundly disagree with him on Iraq. But an internal Democratic poll of Connecticut Jews sees Lamont leading by 50 percent to 41 percent, JTA has learned. The sample was small, but the results were a dramatic departure from the 90-plus approval rating Lieberman scored among Jews after Al Gore named him as his running mate in 2000."
--Josh Marshall
Uh-boy. Hookergate Limo Company Shirlington Limo got yet another government contract with the Pentagon. This one with the National Defense University. And ... well, it didn't turn out so well.
--Josh Marshall
More on Tom DeLay's defeat down in Texas today.
Texas Republicans, fighting to keep DeLay off the ballot, had the case moved to a conservative judge. And this is what they got.
--Paul Kiel
Kevin Drum: "But that's really just a single piece of a broader, and even more remarkable turn of events: the Bush administration literally seems to have no foreign policy at all anymore. They have no serious plan for Iraq, no plan for Iran, no plan for North Korea, no plan for democracy promotion, no plan for anything. With the neocons on the outs, Condoleezza Rice at the State Department, and Dick Cheney continuing to drift into an alternate universe at the OVP, the Bush administration seems completely at sea. There's virtually no ideological coherency to their foreign policy that I can discern, and no credible followup on what little coherency is left. As near as I can tell, George Bush has learned that "There's evil in the world and we're going to stand up to it" isn't really adequate as a foreign policy for a superpower but is unable to figure out anything better to replace it with. So he spins his wheels, waiting for 2009. Unfortunately, the rest of us are left spinning with him."
--Josh Marshall
Miami 'terror' group "that mixes Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Freemasonry, Gnosticism and Taoism" plotted world takeover, Sears Tower demolition, also trained with paintball guns.
--Josh Marshall
Coulter syndication service and plagiarism sleuth, two ships passing in the night?
--Josh Marshall
Court: DeLay's gotta stay on the Texas ballot. The move to Virginia didn't cut the mustard. Nick Lampson, pick one of your lucky stars to kiss.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader BB can't get a straight answer from Rep. Regula (R-OH) ...
I called my congressman's office [Ralph Regula]. The spokesman said that as long as Social Security reform is not an issue that the congressman will vote on this year that he has no statement about the need for reform. Until the president puts forth a plan he has no comments on the president's suggestions.
Has anyone else tried to get a straight answer from Rep. Regula?
--Josh Marshall
Plagiarism sleuth at the center of the Ann Coulter imbroglio talks to Justin Rood at TPMmuckraker.com, confirms he was contacted twice yesterday by Coulter's newspaper column syndicate.
--Josh Marshall
More bad news for the lobby firm in the middle of the Jerry Lewis investigation. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
Hmmm.
WaPo: Lobbying Firm Underreported Income: Some Clients Paid With Public or Tax-Exempt Funds in Bids for 'Earmarks'
I guess imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
--Josh Marshall
Here's a good article in Slate by Amanda Schaffer. She tells the story of how some new public health studies and the new HPV vaccine have -- in addition to saving a lot of women's lives over the coming decades -- dealt a severe blow to the always highly mendacious abstinence-only campaign against condom use.
--Josh Marshall
Ann Coulter charges that the NY Post, which first published the plagiarism charges against her, "has been reduced to tabloid status." But ... um, it's a tabloid, right?
Ahhh, when wingnuts attack. This should be fun to watch.
--Josh Marshall
I think Laura may be on to something here. This isn't directly tied to the Niger stuff. But I think Laura's reading of the macro-politics is likely on the mark. And it could lead to more.
--Josh Marshall
Guns, sex, and earmarks. Highlights from today's Vanity Fair expose of Duke Cunningham.
--Paul Kiel
TPM Reader LB has an idea on congressional candidate Peter Roskam's bailing on that Social Security vote ...
Oh, man, would that ever make a super campaign ad. The scene: the floor of the Illinois state senate. The voice of clerk of the senate (or whoever performs this duty) intones, "We are voting on SJR0013, a resolution urging the US Congress to protect Social Security and reject any diversion of its funds into private accounts." And then he launches into a voice roll-call -- and here you'd need to fudge a little bit, since the top of the roster starts with a non-vote and a series of nays -- but you'd want it to go something like "Mr. Hunter?" "Yea." Mr. Jacobs?" Yea." "Mr. Raoul?" "Yea." "Mr. Roskam?" Silence. "Mr. Roskam?" Silence. Pan to empty chair. "Mr. Roskam?" Then a voice-over with something to the effect that the voters of the 6th District deserve better than an empty chair when it comes to important issues like protecting Social Security.
For now I'll just settle for getting a straight answer out of him on where he stands. Can anyone track him down and ask him?
--Josh Marshall
Joe Lieberman's letter explaining his decision to collect signatures for a possible independent run.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, now we're getting somewhere.
As you know, Peter Roskam, who's running to succeed Henry Hyde in Illinois' 6th district is one of the seven 
congressional candidates currently on our "Straight Answer Wanted" list of Social Security phase-out weasels. And he and Tom Kean (R-NJ) are currently the subjects of our latest contest to see who can be the first to find out where these two guys stand on the issue of whether or not to phase out Social Security.
Anyway, as TPM Reader RC points out, getting Roskam to come clean on where he stands will not be an easy task. Roskam is currently in the Illinois state senate. And last year state Sens. Martinez, Collins and Hunter introduced a resolution calling on Congress to oppose private accounts, i.e., to oppose the Bush plan which was then still before Congress.
That gave state senators an opportunity to go on the record on whether they opposing phasing out Social Security or supported it. The vote was 32 Yeas (i.e., they opposed phase-out) and 19 Nays (meaning they supported it.)
So how'd Peter Roskam vote? Well, you can see the roll call here. He decided duck out that day. He's down there as "NV".
The vote was on May 20th, 2005, four days after Roskam announced his candidacy for the House seat on May 16th. So you can see why Roskam decided not to make it in that day.
(Update: As TPM Reader TCB notes, Roskam made it to plenty of other votes the same day. He just bailed when the Social Security vote came up.)
Now, the current contest prize for finding out where Roskam stands is the TPM t-shirt and the TPM mug. But clearly Roskam is some sort of arch-weasel on Social Security and it'll be a profound challenge to ever get him to come clean. After all, Tom Kean in New Jersey showed up for a similar vote in the New Jersey state senate not once but twice. So, in light of Roskam's extenuating weaselhood we're upping the bounty for a t-shirt and a mug to a TPM t-shirt and two TPM mugs.
So if you're up for a challenge, see if you can get a straight answer out of Roskam. See the contest rules here for further details.
--Josh Marshall
AG Ashcroft's tight ties to Jack Abramoff revealed. Including special skybox love. Is Ashcroft lawyered up?
--Josh Marshall
Hmmm. TPM Reader ML asked me whether I knew where Ned Lamont stood on the issue of Net Neutrality. I said I didn't know. And he pointed me to this passage in an interview Lamont did last month with Jonathan Singer at MyDD ...
Singer: Let's talk a little bit more about telecommunications. Again, your background is in that area. Specifically, you've worked in the cable industry. I was wondering if you had some thoughts on so-called "network neutrality." I know a number of cable companies, the cable industry in general, is pushing for an opportunity to make more of a profit off of data that is sent over their wires, over their cables, over their fiber optics. Yet there is a concern that by allowing them to tier the internet, it will decrease Americans' access to certain information, perhaps on political reasons or perhaps just because companies don't have the money to pay the big Comcast and AT&T, etc. Where do you come down on the net neutrality debate?Lamont: As you point out, I started up a company some years ago and we compete with the largest cable companies out there. You mention Comcast and AT&T. We primarily provide service to college campuses. We build systems at probably a couple hundred campuses around the country.
It's very important that you don't allow the ISPs and the large operators out there to determine who gets access to what content. When it comes down to net neutrality, this is a pipe and we're providing equal access to all of the content providers out there. And the last thing you want is large conglomerates picking and choosing who gets access to what.
I can understand where if there's some services that use up a lot more bandwidth than others, there's a tier or cost that's associated with that. But when it comes to content, when it comes to what people can see, everybody has equal access to that, and again you can't have, again, conglomerates picking and choosing and making those choices on behalf of consumers. That would be wrong, like de facto censorship.
That's not as clear cut an answer as I might have thought. The issue of tiers for high-bandwidth content is a pretty central issue to the debate. Here Lamont says he's for Net Neutrality.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader ER writes in asking which email address to send Social Security updates to. Send them to our regular comments email address, which is talk(at)talkingpointsmemo.com. TPM Reader ES says that Rep. Sue Kelly's (R-NY) office told her this morning that Kelly is in fact opposed to phasing out Social Security and replacing it with private accounts, even though her website lists no position. So we're trying to get to the bottom of that. I tried calling the congresswoman's office to ask her spokesman if she's come out against privatization. But he wasn't available to take my call. If you're in Kelly's district, what have you heard from her?
--Josh Marshall
Ann Coulter has reportedly been caught plagiarizing in her books and articles. That's a career-ender for most writers -- but the hate-filled conservative blowhard appears to be an exception to the rule.
--Justin Rood
McCain staffers defend their Abramoff report -- and their boss -- against Grover Norquist. That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Justin Rood
Are there any TPM Readers out there from New Jersey or Illinois? If there are, we've got a contest for you. Actually, you don't have to be from either state. But folks from New Jersey and Illinois might be most motivated.
As mentioned earlier, we've been starting to compile our nationwide list of Social Security phase-out weasels -- congressional candidates who refuse to reveal whether they favor preserving Social Security or phasing it out and replacing it with private accounts (aka, the Bush plan).
So today we're starting out with two candidates: senate candidate Tom Kean, Jr. (R-NJ) and House candidate Peter Roskam (R-IL), who's running for the 6th District seat in Illinois.
In both cases, it's pretty clear they support President Bush in his desire to phase out Social Security and replace it with private accounts. But now that an election is coming they refuse to state their views publicly. From what we can tell, Roskam's site contains no mention of Social Security at all even though signs indicate he'll support phasing it out as President Bush says he'll try to do next year if he keeps his majorities in Congress. Kean's site ducks the issue. So we're looking to find out clearly and definitively which side they're on.
Are they for phasing it out? Or against phasing it out? Which is it?
If you can find out where either Kean or Roskam stands you'll win a special TPM 'Privatize This' t-shirt, a TPM mug and ... and a special place in our new TPM Hall of Social Security Heroes.
So, how do you find out? Well, all sorts of ways. You can pose the question at a town meeting. You can call in on a radio call in show. Candidates have to campaign and that means going out and meeting voters and answering their questions. So there are plenty of opportunities. You can do research on the web. You can call their campaign office and ask. Maybe some reporter in the area gets a scoop and gets the candidate's position. If you're the first one to send us the link to the article, you win.
(Sub-contest: If you get a chance to pose the question to Kean or Roskam and you have a video or audio recording or the question is written up in the press, you'll win a special runner-up TPM mug, even if Kean or Roskam weasel out and refuse to answer your question. In fact, anyone who can provide particularly choice examples of Social Security weaseldom from Kean or Roskam will be awarded a TPM mug.)
Here are some quick rules.
1. If you find out where a given
candidate stands on phasing out Social Security, the answer must be independently confirmable by TPM reporters. For example, if you ask a candidate at a candidate forum and you get an answer, you've got to have some sort of proof -- a tape recording, a video, a news write-up of your question being answered, etc. Different circumstances will require different sorts of proof of authentication. But the point is that we can't just take your word for it.
2. You are encouraged to be creative and persistent in your quest for an answer to this critically important question. However, any evidence that a contestant's behavior has been disrespectful, harrassing or in any way inappropriate will be grounds for immediate disqualification. Be firm, polite and persistent.
3. Full-time, professional journalists covering the races in question are not eligible. (This is mainly a favor to them. If they won by doing their job, it would place them in an awkward position anyway.)
4. All questions about what constitutes a straight answer and who got the answer first are to be decided by TPM.
We'll be announcing other contest candidates soon.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader PK on the Lieberman meta-message ...
My moment of Zen today came a few minutes back when I was checking in on your site, reading your morning post on the Lieberman situation (geeze, if only he was a tad less dry you could have the makings of a Robert Ludlum novel there) and listening to Randy Newman's "Political Science".I think you nailed it. While the progressive community has been hammering Joe for this decision, the fact remains that the flat-out politics of his announcement yesterday scream fear and cowardice. The best play would have been a decisive course, one of the two you offered...either challenge Democrats to support Joe Lieberman, life-long Democrat or play the "I'm doing what's best for the people of Connecticut" card. But going the "I've been around long enough to have my cake and eat it too and deserve better than having my ass handed to me by a political newcomer" route, Joe has essentially abandoned ship and pushed the women and kids out of the way to take the last remaining lifeboat for himself.
Not the best move given the fact that it plays into his overriding negative, which you mentioned and which I will call "the weasel factor".
--Josh Marshall
Okay, so ... North Korea test fires four missiles, one of which was the long-range Taepodong-2. The Taepodong-2 failed about thirty seconds after lift-off.
Press reports frequently claim that the Taepodong-2 is capable of hitting the United States. The fine print is important, though. As the Times notes in their dispatch today: the Taepodong-2 "is thought to be potentially capable of reaching United States territory in Alaska, if North Korea perfects the technology. But that ability has never been demonstrated in a test. (emphasis added)"
It's a serious issue that bears watching. But also note that UN Ambassador John Bolton is the lead-milker of this story.
--Josh Marshall
Okay, enough about Joe Lieberman for the moment, how about giving TPM some tech advice? As a number of you know, I bought my first Mac a few months ago. And at the moment I have a PC at home, which I'm writing on now, and a Mac over at TPM HQ -- the reverse of the normal bi-OS set up. Now, we're planning on adding a video component to our offerings at TPM. So I'm looking at different machines that are high-powered enough to deal well with video editing. My limited experience working with video on the Mac Mini I have at work tells me that the Mac really was pretty impressive working with video on the ease of use -- 'it just works' -- front, even working with HD video. But because of Mac's transition to their new Intel processors, the most high-powered machines they have are the souped-up iMacs. (The G5s Mac is selling still have the old PowerPC processors -- so they're soon to be out of date.) Has anyone out there done video editing on one of those machines? I'm wondering whether it makes sense to get one of those or whether I should get something in the PC world. Advice appreciated.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader MM says the anti-Joe campaign is getting out of hand ...
C'mon Josh, quit accepting the standards of the disinfo crowd, when did Lieberman say he would be campaigning as both independent and democrat at the same time? He said that if he lost the democratic primary, he would run as an independent.. but that's not quite the same thing. Lieberman isn't my favorite guy in the world, but this propaganda campaign is getting a bit pathetic. Back in the day, Lieberman was activist and fighting to end Jim Crow, the propagandists from outside CT who are waging war against him can't even be bothered to care about the issues of poverty and class.. for Christ's sake, some of them who post on TPM are against the labor movement and rationales for class inequity. If you're looking for parallels between extremes, start looking at some of those in your own backyard.
I'm not really sure where MM is coming from. The only way you 'run' to get on the ballot as an Independent is to collect signatures, which he's doing. So I'm not sure there's anything unfair or incorrect about what I said below.
--Josh Marshall
I find myself not knowing quite what to say or to think about this unexpectedly fast emerging dust-up in the Connecticut Senate race. TPM Reader SS wrote in the following yesterday in response to Lieberman's decision to run in the primary and run as an independent if he loses the primary.
Received a phone message today from Lieberman asking for signatures on his petition to run as an independent. He promises he will always vote Democratic. While I think we are better off with a two way race and hope he wins in the primary, he makes it harder and harder to support him.
Reed Hundt yesterday said that Lieberman has every right to run as an Independent. The question is whether he'd really serve as a Democrat. And I agree.
But like I think SS is suggesting, I think Lieberman may have done himself great damage by choosing to run both ways (as a Dem and an Independent) at the same time.
Politics is all about maintaining the initiative and, well ... momentum. And just evaluating this in strategic terms, I think that Lieberman's key issue in this race is proving, to put it bluntly, that he's not a weasel.
Two ways suggest themselves to demonstrate that. One way was for him to call a press conference and say 'People say I'm not a Democrat. But I've been a Democrat for 40 years. I've been representing this state for 18 years. And I'm going to put my fate in the hands of the Democrats of this state. And I'm gonna fight for this nomination and tell the voters of this state ..."
You get the idea. Lieberman would send a very powerful message to Democrats by putting his fate in their hands.
Or he could say, "I've represented this state in the Senate for 18 years. I'm a Democrat. But I don't represent the Democratic party in the senate. I represent the people of the state of Connecticut ..."
Both of those would have, I think, given Lieberman serious forward momentum. In different ways, yes. But both forward. Remember, there aren't just Democrats in Connecticut. There are Republicans and more importantly Independents. And my impression is that Lieberman is still pretty popular among Connecticut voters generally. The latter choice would play to their strengths with them. The former, of course, would play to Democrats.
Which he should do depends on who he is.
But here he's just covering his bases. He'll play whichever card works best for him when the time comes. Most importantly, he's not showing any Connecticut voters he's willing to take risks. And in so doing I think he may be taking a much bigger risk than he knows. He's telegraphing weakness and equivocation and the alleged trait that got him in this fix to start with.
--Josh Marshall
Right-wing nutballs: NYT would have revealed hiding place of Anne Frank.
--Josh Marshall
Murray Waas has a new story on the Valerie Plame investigation -- what President Bush told Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald in 2004.
--Paul Kiel
The best evidence yet surfaces of a quid pro quo between Jack Abramoff and Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA).
--Paul Kiel
Hey Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA), swing batter batter! That and other news of the day in today's Daily Muck.
--Paul Kiel
We need your help.
It's nothing short of amazing how many candidates there are out there this election season who refuse to give a straight answer on whether they support preserving Social Security or phasing it out and replacing it with private accounts. President Bush says he'll try to phase it out next year if he holds on to Congress. The Republican Social Security chairman in the House says the same thing. So it's definitely an issue on the ballot this November. But dozens and dozens of candidates -- like Tom Kean, Jr. and Michael Steele and Mike DeWine -- simply refuse to answer the question.
As the Cincinnati Post put it charitably last year during the thick of the Social Security debate, DeWine's office "had a tough time explaining whether or not he stands with the president" on Social Security phase out. As near as we can tell, they're still having a tough time.
So, with that in mind, we're putting together a list of candidates around the country who just plain won't come clean on this vital question. We've started compiling names here on this list. But we need your help. Who's running for Congress in your district? And who's running for the senate in your state?
If they won't give a straight answer or won't answer the question at all, tell us. Send us an email at the comment email up over on the right.
Once we have our list in order we're going to start trying to get answers from the folks on the list. Last week, we announced a contest to see who could get a straight answer from Washington senate candidate Mike McGavick. But our effort was sort of short-circuited when David Postman of the Seattle Times got an interview with McGavick and got him to admit that, yes, he does support phasing out Social Security and replacing it with private accounts. Actually, short-circuiting probably isn't the best way to put it since Postman said he asked McGavick about his position on Social Security in response to our contest.
So McGavick has sort of come clean -- though we're still looking at the weasel words in his answer. But what about Tom Kean, Jr. in New Jersey. State voting record says he's a phase-out man on Social Security. But guy's criss-crossing the state and refusing to say what his position is on Social Security.
In any case, we want to get everyone's position on the table before the November election. So take a look at the list and tell us who's not on it. And for folks who can get straight answers out of these bamboozlers there will of course be prime TPM T-shirts and special place in our new TPM Hall of Social Security Heroes -- whether you have to do research on the web to dig up the answer, ask a question at a town hall meeting, call in on the radio, or whatever. Yes, the fun and TPM merchandize will be endless.
So get ready. And drop us a line with the name of the Social Security bamboozlers in your neck of the woods.
--Josh Marshall
News Flash: Longtime Hillary pollster and consultant Mark Penn says Hillary can be elected president.
--Josh Marshall
As Josh has rightly noted, the current wave of public corruption cases is largely the result of GOP machine politics.
It's easy to get distracted by the baubles and the booty. Scottish golf trips. Persian rugs. Limousines and hookers.
But personal aggrandizement is not the sum total of these various cases. That's just the carrying charge, the price of doing business.
The GOP machine is built on the nexus of earmarks, lobbying fees, government contracts, and laundered monies. Aboveboard campaign contributions (i.e., corporate cash) play a part, but the under-the-table money fuels the machine.
That's why a Jack Abramoff has access to the White House. It's why a Tom Delay rises to become House majority leader. It's why the revolving door keeps spinning.
Machine politics subordinates ideology to the exigencies of keeping the machine running. Thus you have out-of-control federal spending under professed small-government conservatives. You have conservative foreign policy elites wary of foreign entanglements suddenly proclaiming the good news of nation-building.
Independents and honest Republicans recognize the threat that machine politics poses to democratic institutions. It trumps party, ideology, and competent government. It also trumps God, flag, and country.
So, in the 2006 elections, are you with the machine or are you against it?
--David Kurtz
In a post last night I waded into the soup of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I figured, why not? I'm only guest posting. If I leave carnage in my wake, Josh will be the one who gets to clean it up.
For the most part, the email response was temperate and quite thoughtful, but by no means was there a consensus, as these two TPM readers demonstrate:
From TPM Reader SS:
I couldn't disagree more with your post regarding the so-called "disproportionate" Israeli response to the kidnapping of one of its soldiers.First, to frame the debate as you did--a response over the kidnapping of a single soldier--is disingenuous. Israel's response is not over the kidnapping of a single soldier. It concerns the elevation of a terrorist organization into political power--in Israel's own backyard.
Hamas has vowed, and continues to vow, to destroy Israel. In the same incident in which a soldier was kidnapped, two others were murdered and one seriously injured. Qasam rockets rain into Israel regularly.
I do not understand why Israel does not have the right to self-defense and self-preservation. Regardless of how you view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict--and I for one believe in a negotiated two-state solution--it is impossible to negotiate with an entity that predicates its existence upon Israel's complete destruction.The United States attacked and destroyed the Afganistan political establishment because it harbored terrorists. Everyone applauded. Israel has been living side-by-side with a people that harbored a substantial number of people who supported its destruction, and tacitly went-along with (or at a minimum refused to condemn or attempt to stop) these terrorists. Now they control the government. I think that Israel's response to having a people call for its destruction has been remarkably constrained. I don't think, in fact, we could find a more restrained response in history.
Then again, from TPM Reader JB:
The "kidnapping" of the Israeli soldier in a daring commando raid, an Israeli military disaster btw, was the pretext for this operation, which very likely was planned well-before the soldier was seized.Discussing what the Israelis are doing as though it were really in reaction to this incident is to buy into Israeli propaganda. What they are really up to is simply to destroy the (democratically-elected) Hamas government and prevent the formation of a viable government in Palestine as part of PM Olmert's "Convergence Plan."
If anything, Israel's kidnapping of the eight Palestinian civilian cabinet members and the shelling of their civilian PM's offices is probably in reaction to the joint statement agreed to recently by both Fatah and Hamas pledging to reduce violence and by implication recognizing Israel's
right to exist. Oops. The one thing Israel cannot countenance is peace.
Doesn't look like I'll be unleashing world peace during this guest posting stint. Maybe next time.
--David Kurtz
When exactly did the NSA start monitoring domestic telecommunications traffic, after September 11--or before?
--David Kurtz
Are the Russians calling our bluff?
At the Thursday meeting of G8 foreign ministers in Moscow, someone forgot to turn off the audio feed from what was supposed to be a private luncheon. Reporters were able to listen in on what turned out to be, in diplo-speak, "frank discussions" between Condi Rice and Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov.
Toward the end of the back and forth, came this pointed jab from Lavrov, as described by Glenn Kessler in the WP:
The two continued to squabble when Lavrov threw out a new concept -- that the new Iraqi government had to answer questions about former president Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction because last week Republican lawmakers in the United States had said there was evidence of chemical munitions."I think it's serious," he said. "While we want to support this government, we also believe that this government has something to do to finalize the leftovers of the past, which is basically nonproliferation concerns."
This line of conversation riled Rice, but once again other ministers suggested a compromise that mentioned the idea without endorsing it.
I'll confess I had missed this exchange until an astute TPM reader pointed it out to me. But it appears that the Russians, as skeptical as the rest of us of claims from some in Congress that WMD really was found in Iraq after all, is telling the Bush Administraton to put up or shut up.
If what members of the President's party are saying is true, then it logically follows that the international community will need certain assurances, such as guarantees that all such weapons and weapons capabilities are destroyed and commitments by the new Iraqi government that it will not pursue any such capabilities.
It's not clear from the WP piece exactly what a "riled" Rice said in response, but as Laura Rozen put it:
The Russian government anyhow seems to be taking Hoekstra/Santorum/Weldon's Iraq WMD concerns seriously. The Bush administration, not so much. What's wrong with this picture?
(Thanks to TPM Reader GP)
--David Kurtz
So Jack Abramoff wanted a federal prosecutor fired, the prosecutor was demoted, but Abramoff didn't have anything to do with it, huh? Over at TPMmuckraker, we finally got our hands dirty with the Justice Department's recent IG report on U.S. Attorney Frederick Black's demotion.
--Paul Kiel
The Air Force is venturing forth into the virtual blue yonder with $450,000 in funding for a three-year project entitled “Automated Ontologically-Based Link Analysis of International Web Logs for the Timely Discovery of Relevant and Credible Information.”
That's right. The Air Force is studying blogs. All part of Rumsfeld's military transformation, I suppose. Here's some of what the Air Force has deduced so far:
“It can be challenging for information analysts to tell what’s important in blogs unless you analyze patterns,” [senior scientist Brian] Ulicny said.
He must be talking about these guys.
One of the problems analysts may have with blog monitoring, Ulicny noted, is there is too much actionable information for the analyst to properly analyze.
I've always said that about Wolcott's blog--too much actionable information.
“Blog entries have a different structure,” Ulicny said. “They are typically short and are about something external to the blog posting itself , such as a news event. It’s not uncommon for a blogger to simply state, ‘I can’t believe this happened,’ and then link to a news story.”
“The fact that the web is a vast source of information is sometimes overlooked by military analysts,” Kokar said. “Our research goal is to provide the warfighter with a kind of information radar to better understand the information battlespace."
I could not agree more.
--David Kurtz
In a remarkable piece of enterprise journalism, trumpeted above the Sunday fold, the LA Times reports:
Now, in the face of increasing violence in Iraq and eroding public support for the war at home, Republicans are turning again to the theme of toughness — with gloves off.. . .
But the Democrats' response so far has been less unified, less pointed and less memorable than the Republicans' attacks.
As if on cue, the article goes on to offer tough-talking quotes from Republicans and insipid, navel-gazing quotes from Democrats.
And so begins another campaign season of trail-blazing political reporting.
--David Kurtz
In response to the post below, TPM reader DS correctly notes, among other points, the chicken/egg conundrum:
I see your point . . . and will go you one further.First, the US has pretty much said that our allies can do virtually anything when it comes to fighting terrorism. Wiretapping, check. Library and Bank records, check. Detention without charges our trials, check. Torture, c