brooks on lehrer

* wilkerson was on lehrer, and there was a 'discussion' afterwards between david corn and some hack - the hack said 'there's a mccarthyite smear campaign against david addington' - lol

* david brooks on lehrer, 10 mins later: 'the idea that Bush lied about going to war is like a mccarthy witch-hunt - its oliver stone territory'

* david brooks on lehrer: 'i think in the last couple of weeks we've finally got a terrific anti-insurgent strategy in iraq' - phew - just in time

* brad delong: " Rove burned McClellan by sending him out to tell the press that Rove had nothing to do with the leaking of Valerie Plame Wilson's covert CIA identity--and now that this is well-known McClellan's credibility with journalists and his career are both over unless he can get Rove fired. No press secretary can survive if people think the rest of the White House regards him as a patsy to be fed lies." (link)
this meme seems to be hardening real fast - but it seems odd to me. nobody doubts that rove would lie to scotty - so i dont know why scotty's credibility is being slammed (on this issue) - and certainly nobody doubts that scotty's replacement would be forced to continue in the same manner (or be sacked). it is most odd.

* "President Bush has ordered White House staff to attend mandatory briefings beginning next week on ethical behavior and the handling of classified material" (link)
its difficult to know how to comment about something like that. its both completely absurd and completely normal. i imagine that the following week there will be seminars about how to deal with invasions when you didnt get the flowers you expected.

* "The Bush administration's desire to keep secret the story of a 40-year-old deception (Tonkin) — a set of official lies, phony documents and trumped-up data that led the country into a debilitating, counterproductive and deceptive war — simply to protect its own misdeeds is despicable, however typical. But thanks to Hanyok's willingness to go public against the administration's wishes, we know who was lying vis-à-vis Vietnam." (link)

* E&P:

"Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, is at it again. In an interview for National Public Radio he charged that Vice President Cheney's office--and new chief aide David Addingtoon--was responsible for directives which led to U.S soldiers abusing prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Wilkerson said he had some hard evidence: a trail of memos and directives authorizing questionable detention practices up through Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's office directly to Cheney's staff. The directives, he said, contradicted a 2002 order by President Bush for the military to abide by the Geneva Convention rules against torture." (link)