Sy Hersh: Cheney Oversaw Assassination Squads

post from Firedoglake on 11 March 2009 09:01:14 PM. © Firedoglake

Sy Hersh reveals that Cheney had an assassination squad reporting directly to him.[...]

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http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/03/11/cheneys-assassination-squads/

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Bomber Kills 32, Wounds 60 in Abu Ghraib

post from Crooks and Liars on 11 March 2009 09:00:52 PM. © Crooks and Liars

Juan Cole gives us some useful context for this latest bombing at Abu Ghraib:

The NYT reports that a suicide bomber killed 33 persons and wounded over 60 at Abu Ghraib, striking at a meeting of tribal sheikhs accompanied by military officers. Seven of the dead were officers, including the commanding officer of the newly opened Abu Ghraib prison, according to al-Hayat writing in Arabic.
Also killed was a commander of the Iraqi military at Muthanna, who had been detailed to the Ministry of the Interior. Al-Hayat says that the meeting was called by a section of the Interior Ministry concerned with outreach to the rural clan leaders, and the sheikhs were meeting with some officers in a search for national reconciliation. It was everything that the Sunni Arab radical guerrillas would not have wanted to see.

Read The Full Article:
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/bomber-kills-32-wounds-60-abu-ghraib

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CNN's Blitzer, Keilar don't challenge latest GOP
claim that spending bills amount to "$24 billion a day, a billion dollars an hour"

post from Media Matters for America on 11 March 2009 08:56:06 PM. © Media Matters for America

During the March 11 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer did not challenge the claim by Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) that the cost of the omnibus appropriations bill and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act "amounts to $24 billion a day, a billion dollars an hour." The calculation is based on dividing the cost of the two bills over 50 days; but as Time's Michael Scherer noted, "[t]he omnibus is a spending bill to run the government over the course of an entire year. ... The[...]

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http://mediamatters.org/items/200903110035

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Najaf: 60-Year Old Suspect Detained

post from IraqSlogger.com on 11 March 2009 08:49:40 PM. © IraqSlogger.com

A sixty-year old suspect wanted on multiple charges of murder was captured in Najaf on Monday, security forces in the southern province announced.

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http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/7323

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Gallup: Satisfaction With Congress (And Overall)
Is Rising

post from Daily Kos on 11 March 2009 08:35:05 PM. © Daily Kos

Last week, Gallup noted:

Americans' satisfaction with the state of the nation remains low -- at an average of 21% for the past week, including 20% in the most recent data, from March 1-3. But this measure has shown a slight but steady improvement from 14% in early February.

We've noted the same thing in our Daily Kos Research 2000 tracking poll, with an improvement from 26% right track in early January to 38% last Friday (the new tracking poll is released every Friday morning.) In some ways, this is as important a measure of the country's view of how Obama is doing as his favorable/unfavorable tracking. The aggregate right/wrong track from all the polls (37.3/56.6) is here, and (the separate measure of) satisfaction is here, showing the same trends.

Now, Gallup adds to that with another view of Congress to supplement last week's Congressional report card:

Americans' job approval rating of Congress is up an additional 8 points this month, after a 12-point increase last month, and now stands at 39% -- the most positive assessment of Congress since February 2005.

As always, watch the independents.

Oh, and by the way, the public thinks they're doing okay on the substance:

The latest increase suggests the reason for the improved ratings of Congress in 2009 may go beyond simply the change from split control to one-party control of the federal government, to include an assessment of the work Congress has been doing with the new president on the economy and other issues.

Such an explanation seems plausible given that a majority of Democrats now approve of the job Congress is doing, and that the gap between Democratic and Republican approval of Congress is growing, as Congress passes and President Obama signs laws to deal with the economy and other issues that largely follow a Democratic philosophy of governing.

Elections have consequences. Fancy that.

On the other hand, the Party of No has a different strategy than doing the people's work:

We will lose on legislation. But we will win the message war every day, and every week, until November 2010," said Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., an outspoken conservative who has participated on the GOP message teams. "Our goal is to bring down approval numbers for [Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and for House Democrats. That will take repetition. This is a marathon, not a sprint."

How's that working for you, Patrick? According to the polls, it's certainly not working for anyone else.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/mk7q0EcnS8c/707154

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Obama Calls Himself A New Democrat

post from Open Left - Front Page on 11 March 2009 08:31:14 PM. © Open Left - Front Page

Just in case there was any doubt about which wing of the Democratic Party President Obama sides[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenLeft-FrontPage/~3/IFr0NnGYTWM/showDiary.do

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Cheney Death Squads

post from Connecting.the.Dots on 11 March 2009 08:26:00 PM. © Connecting.the.Dots

Unless Seymour Hersh has suddenly lost his senses, the question of White House lawlessness has just taken a turn that even the most paranoid Bush haters may have trouble imagining.

In an appearance at the University of Minnesota last night, the New Yorker reporter talked about "an executive assassination ring" that has "been going into countries... and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That?s been going on, in the name of all of us."

Hersh's revelation was prompted by a New York Times story yesterday about a stand-down "ordered by Vice Adm. William H. McRaven, the head of the military?s Joint Special Operations Command, which oversees the secret commando units."

The JOSC, Hersh said, is "a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently. They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. They did not report to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff or to Mr. [Robert] Gates, the secretary of defense...

"Congress has no oversight of it. It?s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it?s been going on and on and on. Just today in the Times there was a story that its leaders, a three star admiral named [William H.] McRaven, ordered a stop to it because there were so many collateral deaths.

"Under President Bush?s authority, they?ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That?s been going on, in the name of all of us."

Until now, President Obama has been discouraging retrospective investigations of Bush lawbreaking by Sen. Patrick Leahy, but Hersh has opened an ugly can of worms that can't be resealed.

Stopping the operation of American death squads, as the Commander-in-Chief has just apparently done, is one thing. But now that news about them has been made public by the most respected investigative reporter of our time, it's unthinkable that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney will not be called to answer for possible war crimes.

Read The Full Article:
http://ajliebling.blogspot.com/2009/03/cheney-death-squads.html

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Franken-Coleman Update: Franken Rests His Case

post from Firedoglake on 11 March 2009 08:20:40 PM. © Firedoglake

Franken attorney Marc Elias says that they will provisionally rest today, at least two days ahead of schedule. So why the early rest -- especially considering they took one-fifth as many days as the Coleman side did to present their case? Because they[...]

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http://campaignsilo.firedoglake.com/2009/03/11/franken-coleman-update-031109-am-e
dition-franken-rests-his-case/

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Madoff and Bail Pending Sentencing

Does anyone find it unusual that Bernard Madoff's lawyers didn't file a motion today for bail pending sentencing? I just checked the court docket and the only thing they filed were their entries of appearance. The only filing by the Government was the emails it received from victims, which it filed under seal.

Has the Government agreed to let Madoff stay out on bond pending sentencing? If not, why wouldn't Madoff's lawyers file a big brief arguing for it? The Judge said yesterday it's one of two issues he will take up tomorrow.

Here's Reuters and Bloomberg's latest articles with speculation from lawyers and sources they interviewed about why Madoff may have agreed to plead guilty, but it's still not adding up for me. I have a long post ready on other possibilities, but I'm holding off in case some real information emerges tonight or tomorrow. I don't feel like just fueling more speculation.

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TalkleftThePoliticsOfCrime/~3/HT7sBj6SaXI/162

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Wednesday Afternoon Open Thread

Late afternoon on the West Coast. For those wondering, we'll be back in the college hoops coverage business starting tomorrow night as we prepare for the start of March Madness next week.

This is an Open Thread.