media outlets found Zarqawi ludicrous

* georgia10 weights in on the RFK2/Manjoo debate about the "diseased democratic process."

* pincus via ron:

"In addition to his indisputably prominent role in the Iraqi insurgency, Zarqawi was always a useful source of propaganda for the administration. Magnification of his role and of the threat he posed grew to the point that some senior intelligence officers believed it was counterproductive....

But the U.S. psychological operation appeared to backfire, according to one military study of how it played in the Arab and American media. While some media outlets found Zarqawi ludicrous, most wondered why he was so hard to capture or kill if he was so incompetent."

read ron for the all the good contexty bits

* i didnt catch the ykos plame panel. does anyone have a link to the video? emptywheel briefly dropped into TNH for a chat about it. i hear she is as brilliant in person as in bytes. i'm told that murray waas said that he is the only reporter on the plame story (ahem) - and he out-and-out said the leopold simply made shit up. and Larry Johnson said that a). plame was working on Iran, b). that there was damage done, and c). that there was an internal report. (ahem)

* The New Republic has a WorldCup blog. The NYT has it's own! I suspect not many of you will find either very interesting... only 2 hours till england joins the fray. woohoo.