Teabaggers are on the move, led by the usual suspects: Michael P. Leahy, Tom Whitmore, Judson Phillips, and social media maven Christina Botteri. They even have marching orders to chant while they pack their signs, their video cameras and their astroturf before coming to Washington DC to "defeat Obamacare".

Their Take the Town Halls to Washington website is full of rile-em-up, send-em-out rhetoric fit for bluedog and teabagger alike:

The idea is to bring a tea party town hall to the 66 members of the House of Representatives whose support of Obamacare is wavering. We want to let them know there is only one vote their constituents will support: No on Obamacare. We are asking local tea party activists to travel to Washington during this period, and make sure that each of these 66 members is reminded every day that if they fail to vote against Obamacare, they will be voted out of office in November.

Except for this: There aren't 66 undecided votes in the House right now. Not even close. (AOL News' full list of undecided Democrats)

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The timely blog Teablogging has revealed its sources:

According to documents obtained by Teablogging by running a goddamned simple Nexis search on the internets, national Tea Party organizer, Top Conservatives on Twitter cofounder and TCOTReport.com publisher Michael P. Leahy has, over the past 16 years, amassed nearly $150,000 in state and federal tax liens, small claims court judgments and civil suits.

Teablogging has .pdfs of all the documentation. My own impression looking them over is that Mike thinks the rules are for everyone else. Why protest taxes if you think you're not required to pay 'em in the first place?

Not many people know that Judge Jay ByBee is a Mormon and an anti-gay supporter. As Patrick Leahy, Russ Feingold, Jerry Nadler, and Jan Schakowsky all spoke out against him, Harry Reid wasn't saying much. Even though Diane Feinstein voted against his confirmation she now either has a no comment or is trying to wrestle control of the investigation.

Russ Feingold voted against his nomination back in 2003:

On more than 20 occasions, Mr. Bybee refused to answer a question, claiming over and over again that as an attorney in the Department of Justice he could not comment on any advice that he gave at any time. This is unfortunately becoming a very familiar refrain of nominees before the Judiciary Committee.

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But the failure to make OLC opinions available to the Judiciary Committee during the consideration of a nominee for a seat on a circuit court is unacceptable... The administration should be able to agree to an acceptable procedure to allow the Judiciary Committee to review Mr. Bybee's OLC opinions. Given the recent history of many OLC opinions being made public, it is hard to believe that there are no opinions authored by Mr. Bybee that could be disclosed without damaging the deliberative process. Indeed, it is very hard to give credence to the idea that OLC's independence would be compromised by the release of some selection of the opinions of interest to members of the Judiciary Committee or the Senate.

After the release of these memos why then is Harry Reid not in line with almost every Democratic Politician?

A serious setback, however: Harry Reid, whose Senate would rule on an impeachment in the House, doesn't seem to like the idea:

"Judge Bybee has a good professional reputation in Nevada," Reid spokesman Jon Summers said in an e-mail. "While the memos that have been released are disturbing to Sen. Reid, at this point in time, he doesn't think we should be making a rush to judgment."

And as Alex Koppelman reports in Salon:

Reid has also resisted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's request to create an independent commission to investigate the interrogation tactics. In a recent statement, Reid said, "I think it would [sic] very unwise from my perspective to start having commissions, boards, tribunals until we find out what the facts are.”

Reid sponsored Bybee's judicial appointment, along with fellow Nevada Senator John Ensign. Ensign has been adamant in his support of Bybee, referring to the calls for the judge's ouster as "outrageous" and saying that "This was not torture. This is the thing we have to get away from, that this is somehow accepted that it was torture. The United States does not engage in torture. This was 'advanced interrogation techniques.'"

My question is of Harry Reid. Are you supporting Judge ByBee because he is a Mormon? I'm not against religion as I've said many times, but if Bybee was involved with any other religion, would Harry Reid have supported him? Will any reporters pose that question to Harry Reid? It just seems odd to me that Reid didn't condemn the memos he's credited with writing much more harshly and is resisting any form of inspection. This is very troubling.

Via Time:

When Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana confessed to "a very serious sin" on Monday night, Debra Jean Palfrey was not about to forgive him. Sin is one thing; but Palfrey believes Vitter — a proponent of the "sanctity of marriage" — should fess up if that sin was a crime as well. [..]"Why am I the only person being prosecuted?" she told TIME over the phone. "Sen. Vitter should be prosecuted [if he broke the law]" Read more...

Apparently, Vitter has a thing for ladies of the night. It's ok though, he's received forgiveness from his wife and God and claims he's not going to discuss the matter publicly. The problem is, he doesn't work for his wife or God, he works for the citizens of Louisiana and the entire country in the U.S. Senate...you know, the public? Howie asks when Vitter will resign, and I think it's time for Patrick Leahy and Harry Reid to look into the Senator's behavior...

(Chocolati mocha photo via ChrisB in SEA.)

The Sunday Talking Head line-up is ready for perusal.

Wonder if there will be any questions about President Bush's obstruction of justice maneuver with the Libby commutation? If nothing else, I am looking forward to the Sen. Pat Leahy interview. Bob Geiger has some great weekend cartoons for everyone -- do not miss the Handelsman animation.

What is catching your eye on the blogs or in the news this morning?

(Photo of coffee and a cinnamon vanilla sugar honey brioche donut via Chodta.)

The Sunday Talking Head line-up is ready for perusal. 

Sen. Leahy ought to be an excellent interview. Just based on his appearance at the habeas and rule of law restoration -- and his level of snarky retorts about the state of the rule of law at the moment -- that is one discussion that could get fun. Then again, it's Meet Tim Russert, so I'm not exactly getting my hopes up. It's early yet.

Also, the Zbig versus Kissinger discussion on CNN could get amusing. Last time those two were matched up on a foreign policy discussion, I got the distinct impression that Dr. Brzezenski wanted to laugh out loud at some of the things coming our of Dr. Kissinger's mouth. And, frankly, I can't say I blame him.

Michael Chertoff, the Bush Administration's head of Homeland Security is book on a number of shows to talk about, I'm certain, the at least two bombs that the British diffused. If an interviewer wanted to ask a question worth asking, how about this one: what ever happened to the nothing to fear but fear itself attitude? Because, frankly, the all fear alla time attitude of te Bush Administration wore thin a helluva long time ago with me.

I'll take this Kung Fu Monkey take on the world any day instead.  So, what's catching your eye on the blogs or in the news this morning?

I thought it was only the mean and nasty liberal bloggers that were uncivil. And yet another setback for the Bush/Cheney ticket:

NY Times:

If President Bush and Vice President Cheney can blurt out vulgar language, then the government cannot punish broadcast television stations for broadcasting the same words in similarly fleeting contexts.

But the judges said vulgar words are just as often used out of frustration or excitement, and not to convey any broader obscene meaning. “In recent times even the top leaders of our government have used variants of these expletives in a manner that no reasonable person would believe referenced sexual or excretory organs or activities.”

Adopting an argument made by lawyers for NBC, the judges then cited examples in which Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney had used the same language that would be penalized under the policy. Mr. Bush was caught on videotape last July using a common vulgarity that the commission finds objectionable in a conversation with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain. Three years ago, Mr. Cheney was widely reported to have muttered an angry obscene version of “get lost” to Senator Patrick Leahy on the floor of the United States Senate.

While there's nothing as blockbuster as Gonzales's appearance, the Senate is clearly busy this week and there's some interesting things on the agenda, including:

S. 119, the War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007, will likely make Dick Cheney come back to the Senate floor and tell Leahy to "go f***" himself again, because it sets penalties and standards for people like Cheney's buddies at Halliburton when it comes to profiteering and fraud in scamming money off the Iraq war.

Bob Geiger has the full schedule. Let us know if there are any hearings you think would be particularly clip-worthy for C&L.

Sen. Pat Leahy blasted the administration over the missing emails today on the Floor...

Download | play Download | play

Leahy: ...And they say they have not been preserved. I don't believe that. I don't believe that. You can't erase emails; not today...Those emails are there. They don't want to produce them. It's like the famous 18 minute gap in the Nixon WH tapes. They say they've been erased or misplaced. They're there. They know they're there. And we'll subpoena them if necessary and we'll have them...

He had a few other kind things to say about Alberto Gonzales and the Attorney scandal...

BREAKING: The White House lost Over FIVE MILLION e-mails in two year period

TPM Muckraker: (h/t DLBB)

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper will give a formal apology to Maher Arar, the Canadian software engineer whom the United States detained and extradited to Syria, where he was brutally tortured.

The announcement, which appears to be a public rebuke of the official U.S. position that Arar may be a terrorist, is set for 12:15, according to Harper's office. Arar will hold a separate news conference at 2 p.m.

Arar's case has caused a deepening rift between Canada and the United States, which has to date refused to apologize for their treatment of Arar and will not remove him from its terrorist watch list. Yesterday, the National Post reported that the U.S. ambassador to Canada "scolded" a top Canadian offical for insisting Arar's name be removed from the U.S. watch list.

Meanwhile, Sen Patrick Leahy demands that Gonzo explain himself on the Arar case.

Glenn Greenwald compares a tale of two governments

UPDATE: C&Ler STOP George tipped us to this new development: A Canadian Commission on the extraordinary rendition case of Maher Arar has recommended that the RCMP withold information from countries with "questionable human rights records". That's right, folks, the former shining beacon of democracy is now considered by Canada to have a questionable human rights record. How proud our Founding Fathers must be.