the alternative: "Bush unbound."

* kagan in wapo:

"Indeed, the preferred European scenario -- "Bush hobbled" -- is less likely than the alternative: "Bush unbound." Neither the president nor his vice president is running for office in 2008. That is what usually prevents high-stakes foreign policy moves in the last two years of a president's term.
[]
Americans of both parties simply have more belief in the utility and even justice of military action than do most other peoples around the world.
[]
Even today leading Democrats who oppose the Iraq war do not oppose the idea of war itself or its utility. They're not even denouncing a defense budget approaching $500 billion per year. While Europeans mostly reject the Bush administration's phrase "the war on terror," leading Democrats embrace it and accuse the administration of not pursuing it vigorously or intelligently enough.
[]Many around the world will thrill at the defeat of Republicans next week. They should enjoy the moment while they can. When the smoke clears, they will find themselves dealing with much the same America, with all its virtues and all its flaws."

* james moore was on demnow:

" I think, Amy, the thing that people need to know, as we go into next Tuesday, about Mr. Rove and the people that he leads in the Republican Party is that there is virtually nothing he will not do to continue to retain power and to win an election. Now, am I accusing Karl of being willing to do something illegal, unethical or immoral? He has done all of those things in the past. It would not be anything new. In my heart, I hope that -- I want to believe that even Karl Rove, if he got to the point where he was doing something that was to violate the sanctity of our electoral process, he would back away from it, but I think everyone should be very, very concerned, and there should be attorneys in every one of the congressional districts in this country ready to file appeals, because I believe we’re going to see a very ugly Election Day with lost data discs, voter suppression, people turned away from the polls who shouldn’t be, and it’s going to be an ugly day, I’m afraid."

* I'm surprised that we didn't get any susan ralston news yet.

* just for fun, OGM has an interview of Haggard & Richard Dawkins.

* ken:

" Of course, if the Democrats do win the House, it will be fun to watch Waxman issuing subpoenas and Conyers raising the issue of Bush's impeachment. But for those who want to see real changes in the way that Congress operates, a Democratic victory does not provide much cause to hope."

* wapo A1:

"The GOP has all but abandoned longtime Rep. Curt Weldon (Pa.), as federal investigators examine charges that he steered lobbying contracts to his daughter. Weldon went on television yesterday with an ad featuring actors pleading, "Would you give a friend the benefit of the doubt? . . . Today, Curt Weldon needs our support.""

glorious.

* tpmm: "In Theory, Cheney Logs Are Threat to America"

* ken:

"According to Drumheller, understanding the way the Bush Administration manipulated intelligence is central to determining an exit strategy from Iraq. “We can't begin to address the conflict until the pre-war period is confronted in an honest fashion,” he said. “We don't even know what we're confronting over there because we keep changing the reason that we went there in the first place.”
[]
Another lesson from Iraq has implications for U.S. policy towards Iran, Drumheller said. He noted that many of the same individuals and organizations that backed the war in Iraq are pushing a hard line on Iran. Some of them, in concert with Iranian expatriate communities, are actively promoting the idea that the Iranian people are keen for the mullahs to be overthrown (at which point, presumably, Americans would be welcomed with flowers)."