Another Broken Record

via Think Progress

Another record was broken this year - the number of serious international terrorist attacks in a single year more than tripled, from a record of 175 in 2003 to 655 last year, according to recently released U.S. government figures.

This data, however, will no longer be in the annual report on international terrorism submitted to Congress by the State Department. Just over ten days ago the State Department decided to eliminate the report, “Patterns of Global Terrorism,” entirely.

All this comes not even a year after then-Secretary of State Colin Powell had to publicly apologize for the first edition of the 2003 report - which severely undercounted the number of terrorist attacks. “The numbers were off,” Powell said, and “we have identified how we have to do this in the future.”

Apparently Condoleezza Rice doesn’t agree - her office had suggested an alternative method for counting attacks, and when the National Counterterrorism Center decided not to use this new method, the State Department eliminated the terrorism statistics in the congressionally mandated report altogether.

DeLay Threat Potentially Illegal

via Think Progress

Sen. Frank Launtenberg (D-NJ) has sent a letter to Tom Delay advising him that his threat may have violated federal law:

You should be aware that your comments yesterday may violate a Federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. 115 (a)(1)(B). That law states:

“Whoever threatens to assault…. or murder, a United States judge… with intent to retaliate against such… judge…. on account of the performance of official duties, shall be punished [by up to six years in prison]”

Threats against specific Federal judges are not only a serious crime, but also beneath a Member of Congress. In my view, the true measure of democracy is how it dispenses justice. Your attempt to intimidate judges in America not only threatens our courts, but our fundamental democracy as well.

Read the full text of the letter here.

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You'd think that, now that the public is growing increasingly aware that his camera crew stalked a woman blogger from Think Progress on her private vacation to harass her with phony accusations that she had harmed rape victims -- thereby raising serious ethical issues about the behavior of his ambush news crews -- Bill O'Reilly would kind of ease up on that particular story.

But no. He's the biggest inflatable clown in town, by gawd. Nothing he can't blowhard his way around. So he returned to the subject tonight, focusing especially on John Podesta and Think Progress, tying it all in to his favorite new meme about the "liberal smear machine." Much hilarity -- including a segment with Dick "Suck On These" Morris.

Faiz at Think Progress gives the definitive response, and you really should go read it. But I couldn't help noticing a couple of outstanding lines. To wit:

"Alone, they're insects. OK? But they have a relationship within the National Broadcasting Corporation."

Besides the eliminationist quality of referring to other people as insects, O'Reilly produces zero evidence -- beyond Amanda Terkel's appearance on Countdown the night before, which is evidence of nothing other than Amanda's availability to be interviewed -- that there is a "relationship" with NBC. It's pure conjecture on O'Reilly's part. Meanwhile, his claim that Terkel "harmed a rape victim and her family" was flatly false.

Anyway, that was followed shortly by this:

"But I'm not going any further than the facts take me. What I told the audience and what I told you and we just discussed here? 100 percent factual. No conjecture. That's reality."

Faiz adds:

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Sweet Jesus, this guy makes me hate him more and more...

Think Progress:

On Fox News today, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) discussed the downturn in Sen. John McCain's presidential prospects, saying McCain "is behind now because of the economy." Lieberman then said that he hopes the House passes bailout legislation tomorrow because "it will be good for our country."

"But frankly, it will be good for John McCain too," added Lieberman, explaining that "it will get people back to comparing the two candidates free of a sense of crisis that may make them want to turn against Republicans."

I don't think he talked to the McCain campaign before doing the interview, because at the same time, here's John McCain on Morning Joe:

Singer pointed out a couple odd McCain moments from the last couple days, and I'd like to add one more from today's Morning Joe (via Joe at AMERICAblog):

"This bill is putting us on the brink of economic disaster."

McCain voted for it...less than 24 hours ago.

Although FOX News is crawling with them, it's pretty hard to find a bigger right-wing hack than Fred Barnes. Thursday on FOX News' "Special Report," Barnes called Gramm's insensitive and bone-headed remarks about struggling Americans "straight-talk," and reiterated Gramm's view that Americans are whiners because they acknowledge how poorly the economy is doing.

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Transcript via Think Progress:

BARNES: He wasn’t wrong to say that. You know what this was? This was straight talk that McCain always says he’s giving it, and this is exactly what Phil Gramm did. He gave straight talk…They claim about how bad the economy is–and it’s weak, no question about that. …They’re whining all the way through it.

Gosh, where would we all be without NY Times columnist David Brooks to tell us what is and isn't important? After all, John McCain's statement that he was right about Iraq was predicated on the notion that the surge was successful and that troop levels are back to pre-surge numbers. The fact that he is wrong about that (both the actual troop numbers and the definition of success, come to that) is of little matter to Brooks when considering his fitness as Commander-in-Chief. Why focus on little niggling details like actual troop numbers? You nitpickers.

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Think Progress:

Contrary to Brooks’s claim that “no one’s going to care” about McCain’s reading of troop levels in Iraq, the issue is critically important. As Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) noted, “If you don’t know the number of troops it’s very difficult to make a judgment on if they are over-extended.”

Brooks claimed that McCain has a “pretty strong case” that he has been “right” about Iraq. But McCain’s gaffes are the latest in a series of ignorant comments about Iraq that raise questions about a candidate who has staked his campaign on the war.

And yet, McSame is supposed to have more credibility on Iraq than Obama, why? Could it be because the talking heads that have been wrong time and time again--and I'm looking at you, Bobo--keep telling us that a grasp of facts isn't all that important?

Think Progress: Study concludes US media embed program a “communications victory” for the Bush administration. Just don’t tell Brian Williams that.

Huffington Post: BREAKING NEWS: McCain Resigns From His Campaign.

Democracy Now!: The Bush administration is holding 27,000 prisoners, with no legal recourse, in secret overseas jails. Where’s the media?

skippy the bush kangaroo: Cookie Jill with the latest environmental news, which includes “zones of death” spreading in our oceans and how America’s wasteful eating habits not only take food from the mouths of the hungry but increase greenhouse gases. Plus, are global warming “alarmists” losing the rhetorical war?

TPM Muckracker: The Bush administration in yet another episode of Working Tirelessly to Control the Flow of Information. Today’s story: “Controlled Unclassified Information” (CUI). Or as we call it: CYA.

Guest roundup by Brad Jacobson of MediaBloodhound. See you tomorrow, reality-basers! Until then, email those submissions and tips to mediabloodhound at yahoo dot com.

Think Progress:

John McCain accused me of taking a “cheap shot” on “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” yesterday for noting that people with preexisting conditions, such as he and I have, would not be able to get health care under his plan –- and that he perhaps was not as sensitive to this problem as he should be since he has been in government health care his whole life.

Sen. McCain noted that he was not receiving government health care for the six years he was in captivity. That is true. But it has nothing to do with my point — which is that the problem with Sen. McCain’s health care plan is not how it affects us –- but how it affects the tens of millions of Americans with preexisting conditions who, unlike Sen. McCain and myself, do not have the resources to pay for quality health care.

That is not a cheap shot, it is a potentially life and death question for tens of million of Americans. And it is a question Sen. McCain must address.

McCain’s health care plan is centered around the idea that we’d be better off if more Americans bought health coverage on their own, rather than receiving it through a job or government program. But maybe since he has never purchased insurance in the individual market, he does not know the challenge it presents for Americans with preexisting conditions. Read on...

Think Progress:

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has called CENTCOM commander Adm. William Fallon “one of the best strategic thinkers in uniform today.” Fallon opposed the “surge” in Iraq and has consistently battled the Bush administration to avoid a confrontation with Iran, calling officials’ war-mongering “not helpful.” Privately, he has vowed that an attack on Iran “will not happen on my watch.”

Unfortunately, this level-headed thinking and willingness to stand up to President Bush may cost him his job. According to a new article by Thomas P.M. Barnett in the April issue of Esquire magazine (on newsstands March 12), Fallon may be prematurely “relieved of his command” as soon as this summer:

[W]ell-placed observers now say that it will come as no surprise if Fallon is relieved of his command before his time is up next spring, maybe as early as this summer, in favor of a commander the White House considers to be more pliable. If that were to happen, it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don’t want a commander standing in their way.

Just another day in BushWorld. There's a sneaky (and admittedly tin-foil hatted) suspicion on my part that there is a calculus going on here to make sure that we're either in or on the threshold of aggression with Iran--something that Fallon has dug his heels in and fought vehemently against--as we near the November election, to help give the edge to John McCain.

I guess William the Bloody knows all too well about this tried and true campaign strategy from the GOP. Here he is with Chris Wallace giving us his best advice to Hillary.

KRISTOL: [Obama’s] riding a wave of euphoria. She [Clinton] needs to puncture it. The way you puncture euphoria is reality, or to be more blunt, fear. I recommend to Senator Clinton the politics of fear.

As Think Progress notes, Kristol very much would like to bomb the heck out of Iran.