* "Congressman John Conyers today called on president Bush to make publicly available a memo submitted to him by Stephen Hadley in October 2002. This memo clearly explained to the president that the Departments of State and Energy both rejected White House claims that Iraq was seeking materials to build a nuclear weapon. This is a very important document revealing the administration's efforts to build a case for war based on Iraq's nuclear threat to our country when overwhelming evidence disputed this claim."
the good folk at rawstory have the letter.

* chris nelson: "Sources also confirm that the President has absorbed the fact that the professional military has completely given up on Rumsfeld...admittedly a process which began for some “uniforms” even before 9/11, but which has continued to affect...or infect...virtually the whole military establishment today."
laura has more. armitage to replace rummy?

* josh: "Earlier this evening, the Associated Press ran a clarification to their story about Rep. Jim Ryun and his house purchase from the now-defunct U.S. Family Network.
"The Associated Press," they wrote, "should have credited the blog TPMmuckraker.com, which first reported the sale."
The reporting in question was by TPMmuckraker.com's Paul Kiel.
That was classy and we appreciate it."
wow. will larisa get same?

* josh:

"Here's what I can add to (waas') story.

We saw this and the cover-up it spawned first hand. While I and reporters from CBS were working on this story through 2004 it was clear that folks on the Hill would agree to talk and then suddenly un-agree when they got the call from the White House. The White House worked doggedly at almost every turn to get the story killed or delayed beyond the election, which they of course did.

That's not all.

Various arms of the US government actually have been trying or at least been interested in trying to get to the bottom of the story. But that would require the cooperation of the Italian government. And that, of course, is not likely to be forthcoming since at least some elements in the Italian government are responsible for or participated in the scam. The problem? The Bush administration has not lifted a finger to get the Italians to cooperate. That's the hang-up. Why wouldn't the White House want the Italian government to cooperate with US law enforcement and intelligence agencies on getting to the bottom of this? Go back and read Waas's description of Rove's analysis -- the Niger case was kryptonite for the president.

The cover-up on this one is deep. Really deep. And much of it has yet to be uncovered."

let's not forget that 60 mins' niger story was bumped for the rathergate story. i've often called it rove's finest hour - a brilliant double-play. here's a list of my references to that story. bastards.