Libby was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice. Patrick Fitz went after Libby because Libby prevented Patrick from prosecuting the real criminals. The day after Libby's appeal to avoid jail was rejected, Bush commutes the sentence to Libby out of jail.

It should be obvious what happened there. Libby would only lie so long as he didn't end up in jail. The day after Libby and Bush know Libby is going to jail, Bush commutes the sentence. This was purely a self defense move to prevent Libby from singing like a canary.

Can you please post some evidence that America was still highly regarded during the Vietnam era? Or ... during Reagan's Iran-Contra stuff? Or ... during Reagan's south American invasions? How do you know for certain that the goodwill towards America wasn't due to Clinton's popularity abroad? The data you posted is interesting, but only goes back to 2000. There is no doubt that Bush tanked our popularity abroad, and squandered the PR gift that was 9/11, but that does not rule out the possibility that global opinion of America fluctuates based on our foreign occupation de jour.

So I am about to take out a lot of student loans for law school. Lets pretend that the subprime market tanks, and many of the hedge funds that were filled with toxic sludge investments eat it, ala bear stearns. Could this lead to the fed upping inflation to counter the surge of debt our country is going to eat? And further, does inflation make it easier for me to pay student loans?

If the republicans are going to filibuster an amendment to protect our troops, let them. The democratic leadership needs to show some spine and sit through that filibuster. They only needed 4 more votes, a week long filibuster maintain the military family only draft we have running right now would devastate Republican approval ratings. Harry Reid blew an excellent shot at making the repubs look ridiculous.

... the war ends. Once they run out of money, he has to bring the troops home. The democrats needs to show some backbone and send him bills when democratic input. He can't veto them all and have his war. In addition, this only makes a republican filibuster even better. Since the filibuster DELAYS each spending bill, which is what the president says "doesn't support our troops." The republican filibuster would have the republicans eating their own presidents talking points.

Seriously. Bush and his buddies have ZERO reason to kill off Bin Laden and his Pakistani suicide buddies. They preach the same crap, and when UBL blows something up, people rally around Bush's science hating regime. If you watched the hearings of the surgeon general's, this kind of anti science behavior goes all the way to the top.

Religious reactionaries are selected for in religious reactionary societies. Let's take the Taliban for example. Once you institute religious law, only the religiously devout survive to reproduction. Dissenters and those who raise dissenting children, end up either dead, or their children are dead. But this is changed substantially under a democratic socialist society. Religious nutballs and non sex before marriage types reproduce quite poorly in Norway. Over time Norway's social system reinforces democratic socialist norms.

The desire to see your world view crammed onto your respective government is almost a natural selection pressure from this perspective. These nut asses that yelled at the Indian guy represent the group of people in our country that wants to implement their version of religious law, which would outlaw marriages that aren't protestant Jesus based god sanctioned. The "protect marriage" acts are clearly reproductive control. The jump between reproductive control and directing evolution is pretty small.

Separation != freedom from checks and balances.

This is craziness. The founders are rolling in their graves. The idea that the executive is not responsible to the congress is MADNESS. This flies in the face of everything the founders wanted for the executive.

Prosecute! Even if prostitution laws aren't fair, failing to prosecute this guy just because he is a senator erodes our justice system even further. And his rank hypocrisy should not be tolerated. A society can only give a pass to rank hypocrisy for so long before it totally corrodes from the inside out. Ask Rome how that turned out.

The Dems are doing exactly what they should. Let the Repubs filibuster. Just keep letting them filibuster, over and over again. It will take a while, but the people will get it. The best move the Dems can make is force the hypocrisy out in the open. Give the Repubs enough rope to hang themselves with.

The government needs honest people right now. Go back to work for the government, please.

Remember that if we didn't have lawyers, cops could throw your butt in jail and never have to tell anyone about it. Lawyers are the only thing standing between you and government power. Lawyers are the cogs that make the due process machine work. And it is due process that defines our liberty.

Newt is an outed moral hypocrite, but I see him hob-nobbing with the dominionist evangelical leadership. So, who keeps him in the news? I don't get it. The media collectively stopped listening to Tom Delay, why not Newt? Tom released that book, "No Retreat, No Surrender" shortly after retreating and surrendering from politics.

For 10 billion dollars a month, we could seize most of the above ground African oil wells, and buy out every tin pot coastal dictator in the continent. The whole "Darfur is genocide" thing is just us complaining that China bought out the Darfur government before we could. Coastal and inland African nations have plenty of corrupt officials, and populations that borderline like us. Iraq is not the best place to go for oil. Buying >> Bombing.