3 co-equal branches

* xymphora:

"The only decent thing for Rice to do to prove she is not a liar, or worse, is to authorize Tenet to release the full contents of the briefing.

It appears that the Establishment – you know, the group that Chomsky claims rules the world – has finally decided to stop playing polo and sipping champagne long enough to get around to reining in the Bush Administration. Talk of another war, one that would put a big dent in their trust funds by collapsing the international economy, was the last straw. Suddenly, buggergate comes out, known to the mainstream media for months if not years but carefully covered up until it was time for a rare Democrat October Surprise, and Woodward receives his new marching orders, this time not to make George out to be some kind of new Churchill but to strike right at the heart of the Republican message that they are the only party capable of looking after American domestic security. They are forcing Rove to rely on computer vote fraud to win the upcoming elections, fraud that will be so obvious that they won’t be able to keep their lovely machines through to the next presidential election.."

* did anyone notice that Tony Snow kept referring to 3 co-equal branches today? Addington must be horrified.

* emptywheel, between flights:

"So for my part, until someone can answer how the civil case will affect the possibility of a (Libby) pardon, I'll just confess that I don't know whether he'll pardon Libby. Sure, they want to keep Dick off the stand. But Dick also believes he can bully his way through anything. He probably believes he's a latter day Ollie North, that he can ace his appearance, so why bother with a premature pardon?"

* atrios:

"Aside from a fervent belief in The Green Lantern School of Foreign Policy, the only other part of the Bush Doctrine seems to be the belief that if you send Karen Hughes and Condi Rice out to give stern lectures to people that you'll accomplish something."

* yglesias:

"It was brought to my attention recently that Reps. De Fazio and and Hinchey offered an amendment to the 2007 Pentagon appropriations bill that would have specifically barred the administration from launching a military attack on Iran without congressional authorization. 158 members of the House voted for it, but 262 voted against and it failed. In other words, a majority of the House seems to have gone on record in favor of letting the president start wars illegally, a fairly discouraging development."

* newsweek:

"House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Peter Hoekstra is still pressing U.S. intelligence agencies to look for possible weapons of mass destruction in Iraq—even though intelligence officials say further work is unlikely to reveal anything new about Saddam's WMD programs.

In recent weeks, congressional and intelligence sources say, Hoekstra has prodded the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency to follow up on new leads about possible WMD sites in the country."

* froomkin:

"Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) told his colleagues last Thursday during the debate on military commissions legislation: "We punished people with 15 years of hard labor when waterboarding was used against Americans in World War II.""