Again, they are attempting to make the "profile" fit the suspect ... this is "assumption of guilt" and why it must be avoided like the plague (no pun intended) -- imho, it's part of the danger of FISA data trawling ... the "facts" are then selectively fitted around the dominant paradigm or theory ... how did Tony Blair and company put it??? Same blinking, ER, blinkered problem ....

-- susan sunflower

With all the innocent men and women that have been convicted here in prison USA, people still want to know "what are you hiding" when you talk to them about the government spying on citizens.

Certainly they were bundled together as a unit by the neoconservatives who exploited them to drive the United States into attacking and occupying Iraq.

Bundled they were. Agreed on that point.

The question that government investigations do not want to touch is "who was the primary beneficiary" of these attacks. Perhaps the primary beneficiary did not do it, but should not all that benefited be investigated thoroughly?

I have watched government investigations since JFK/MLK/RFK and it is always the same. Pin it on a "lone nut" and go home. Only in the 9-11 towers do we see deviation from the lone nut theory of history; and we move to lone nut with small following of crazed followers ready to do anything for Mr. Nut. (or, lone Nut with Cult)

The main selling point is that everyone says a government conspiracy could not happen because they can not imagine it. I though that good detective work required following all leads and theories no matter how unbelievable to the detective the idea might be. I also thought that "trying the case in the press" was bad form if one wanted to find the truth of the matter; and that it was "unAmerican" anyway. Ah, the myths of youth.

PS: Oklahoma City was just a lone nut with a buddy; a twist on the theme to keep the rating up

Raimondo:

It sounds like a very bad made-for-television movie: a mad scientist – a violent sociopath, a "nerd with a dark side," who had already tried to kill several people, is obsessed with pornography, and is fixated on a particular college sorority – unleashes a strain of deadly anthrax through the U.S. mail, killing five, infecting 17 others, and terrorizing the country. His motive, aside from sheer antisocial vindictiveness: he holds the patent for an anthrax vaccine, and he also wants to direct the nation's attention to the supposedly overlooked and underfunded problem of bio-terrorism. That'll teach 'em!

It reads like some pretty execrable fiction, yet the FBI is peddling this farrago of shopworn clichés as the facts surrounding the alleged guilt of Bruce E. Ivins, whose suicide the other day ostensibly closes the 7-year-old anthrax terrorism case that has baffled investigators and shone a cruel light on the Bureau's methods and standards of conduct.

The real topper has got to be the "sorority obsession" supposedly nursed by Ivins – a mild-mannered family man universally liked by his co-workers and neighbors. This is the sort of B-movie script beloved by Hollywood, wherein the upstanding bourgeois father of two and devoted husband is really a psychopathic slime-ball just beneath the surface, seething with resentment and even hatred of women who rejected his advances in the past – a male version of Carrie, who rises up in his true garb as the virtual incarnation of misanthropy to wreak vengeance on the female sex, and the world.

[...]

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=13262

And yet, my local paper is telling me that is the way it is. I don't watch Fox News so this is only a guess, but I suspect they have painted him as another Hitler. They love Hitler comparisons.

I think we need an independent investigation; since the executive branch itself is suspect in this mess.

We once had an independent council investigating things in Watergate, and that was only a cheap robbery. (or so it seemed at the time)

The last couple of months have been the best here at UT that I have ever seen, but you would have to ask "old-timers" if it has been the best ever.

Glenn has been "rocking hot" and the commenters have kept up with him. Some (different ones on different treads) have been spectacular in the amount of information they "bring to the table".

Very few dust-up like the Lincoln thing a while back (yes I was on one side of that one) that forced Glenn to step in. I think Glenn writes better if he is not playing nanny in his comment section. (can't really speak for him, only guess)

So, if you see that a given commenter is always in some fuss-fight, baiting others, trying to be argumentitive, or otherwise disruptive I would suggest not writing to them. I would also suggest staying on topic as much as possible; except for news about Art or something like that.

I recommend all who can, send a card to Art James who is in the hospital. I think his woes are related to his service in Vietnam. (he was drafted)

I sent a note. I hope more will do so.

--------------------------------------------

Art James

C/O VA Medical Center

3 East, Rm. 13

50 Irving St. N.W.

Washington, DC 20422

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/64ad536a6d

Paris is damn good in this anti-McCain add. And hell, she is right --- perhaps she would be a better president than the choices we have today!