Downing Street tried to muzzle the Government's top scientific adviser after he warned that global warming was a more serious threat than international terrorism.
Sir David, who is highly regarded by Mr Blair, has been primed with a list of 136 mock questions that the media could ask if they were able to get access to him, and the suggested answers he should be prepared to give. One question asks: "How do the number of deaths caused by climate change and terrorism compare?" The stated answer that Sir David is expected to give says: "The value of any comparison would be highly questionable - we are talking about threats that are intrinsically different."

Brown: California can be governed, but the executive has to take responsibility ... like Governor Schwarzenegger is doing now.
Wilson: I agree with Jerry -- I think that you need a strong executive.
Brown: I think that's the imbalance -- a weakened chief executive.
Wilson: What [Schwarzenegger] is gonna have to do is what Jerry Brown just said a governor should do: he should be an aggressive chief executive.

Why raise taxes when you can entice the economically desperate to just give the state money? Jerry Brown, who helms a city with some of the most impoverished "inner city" neighborhoods in the state, loved the idea. Oakland, he said, could sure use some casinos: "Give me a few billboards on scenic highways and a few gambling casinos, and we'll have no more fiscal challenges."

I did hear something recently about Hussein having cancer, but then that story seemed to quickly disappear as well. Wouldn't that be something if Hussein were to die of natural causes before being held accountable for his alleged war crimes? It's kind of a shame, when you think about it, that our intelligence people didn't pick up on the cancer before the war, because then they would have known that 'regime change' was coming even without the military assault.

I'm feeling generous today, so I am going to offer to save a lot of time and taxpayer money by solving the great mystery of the Iraq intelligence failure: they lied. They lied repeatedly. And when I say "they," I don't mean just a few Team Bush players. I mean that the White House lied, the State Department lied, the Pentagon lied, the intelligence community lied, countless think tank 'analysts' lied, Representatives and Senators lied, 'Republicans' and 'Democrats' lied, and last but surely not least, the entire U.S. media establishment lied. And it was painfully obvious that they all were lying because they weren't even telling good lies, but rather recycled lies that had already been thoroughly discredited.

Speaking of underreported stories in the Times, another one turned up on February 29, 2004, in the "In Brief" section on page A4. The article, concerning the airplane crash that killed Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski on February 26, is reproduced here. Pay particular attention to the first sentence:
Weather, human error or technical failure may have caused Thursday's air crash that killed Macedonian President Boris Trajkovski in Bosnia, but foul play can be ruled out, Macedonian deputy public prosecutor Roksanda Krstevska said. Officials said they would wait for investigators to finish their work before setting a date for elections to choose a successor. The government set up a panel to work on meeting a requirement that the vote be held in 40 days. Parliament Speaker Ljubco Jordanovski has been named interim acting president.

passengers and tied up by members of the flight crew," was "forcibly medicated by an injection into his abdomen of 10 mg Diazepam (Valium) and 0.4 mg Narcan ... Approximately an hour before landing, he was forcibly injected with medication a third time, by an injection into his abdomen of 25 mg of Phenegren."
Pardon me for asking, but is it normal practice for airlines to carry powerful, injectable drugs on routine flights? And why is there no mention of exactly who it was that injected Reid? Who on that airplane had the expertise, the medical supplies, and the authority to forcibly drug someone?

The American Airlines flight, bound for Miami, landed instead at Boston's Logan Airport at 12:55 PM. Reid was promptly taken into custody by Massachusetts State Police officers. While in a police cruiser awaiting transport to the State Police station at Logan, he had a brief, but interesting, conversation with an officer: "Defendant asked several times why no media were present and there was a short discussion about whether the event was a 'big deal' or not. At some point, defendant said: 'You'll see, you'll see.'"

How did Reid know that his arrest, apparently considered no "big deal" by arresting officers, would be inflated by Washington and the media into a major 'terrorist' event? Did Reid know that he was very soon to be immortalized as the "Shoe Bomber"?