In the News - Feb. 10

Cheney Says NSA Spying Should Be an Election Issue - 10 Feb 2006 at 12:00am - Vice President Cheney suggested last night that the debate over spying on overseas communications to or from terrorism suspects should be a political issue in this year's congressional elections.


Ex-CIA Official Faults Use of Data on Iraq - 10 Feb 2006 at 12:00am - The former CIA official who coordinated U.S. intelligence on the Middle East until last year has accused the Bush administration of "cherry-picking" intelligence on Iraq to justify a decision it had already reached to go to war, and of ignoring warnings that the country could easily fall into...


Ex-FEMA Chief Blames Homeland Security (AP) - 10 Feb 2006 at 10:22am - AP - Decisions and policies by the parent Department of Homeland Security doomed FEMA to "a path to failure" that led to the government's slow response to Hurricane Katrina, former disaster chief Michael Brown said Friday.


Anger Management - 10 Feb 2006 at 7:06am - Anger can be a useful instrument in public life. Think of Truman giving 'em hell, JFK calling steel executives SOBs, Reagan demanding that Gorby tear down this wall, Bush using a bullhorn to denounce the people who knocked down those buildings.


Dad Slams Attack On Bush At King Rite - 10 Feb 2006 at 10:21am - President George H.W. Bush expressed dismay and anger at attacks on his son, President Bush, at the funeral for Coretta Scott King. He called the criticism "ugly" in a radio interview with CBS News.


Libby: White House 'Superiors' OK'd Leaks - 10 Feb 2006 at 9:37am - WASHINGTON Feb 10, 2006 (AP)— A former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney told a federal grand jury that his superiors authorized him to give secret information to reporters as part of the Bush administration's defense of intelligence used to justify invading Iraq, according to court papers.

"Superiors", plural. I guess that a list of the Vice President's Chief of Staff's "superiors" would include the Vice President, and the President, maybe the President's Chief of Staff. Whom else?

From the article: "Portions of NIEs are sometimes declassified and made public. It is unclear whether that happened in this instance." One might hope that it's clear to Fitzgerald, at least.

Bush Reveals Rationale Behind Surveillance (AP) - 10 Feb 2006 at 2:30pm - AP - President Bush defended his warrantless eavesdropping program Friday, saying during what he thought were private remarks that he concluded that spying on Americans was necessary to fill a gap in the United States' security.

LA skyscraper plot never got beyond talk: analysts - Friday February 10, 4:01 PM - An alleged Al-Qaeda plot to crash an airplane into a Los Angeles skyscraper but foiled with the help of Asian nations never got beyond the discussion stage, security analysts said..


Woman Carrying Human Head Arrested in Fla. - 10 Feb 2006 at 3:30pm - Airport baggage screeners found a human head with teeth, hair and skin in the luggage of a woman who said she intended to ward off evil spirits with it, authorities said Friday. Myrlene Severe, 30, a Haitian-born permanent U.S. resident, was charged Friday with smuggling a human head into the U.S. without proper documentation.

I hope they checked to find out whether the head belonged to Zarqawi or Bin Laden.

Private groups seek domestic spying papers - 10 Feb 2006 at 9:30pm - WASHINGTON -- A federal judge said Friday he was considering setting a deadline for the Justice Department to produce records on the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance program or to explain in court why it was refusing to do so.