Valerie Wilson was covert. The 5 year limit in the law has to do with whether or not she worked in a covert capacity outside the country or not. She did not reside outside the country, a fact that Victoria Toensing is plastering all over the media as proof that the law doesn't apply. In fact, the CIA reading of the law is that if she worked outside the country in her capacity she is covered. She did do that, traveling to the Middle East to meet with contacts.

Victoria Toensing is basing her judgements on what she says was the "intent" of the law when it was passed, which she claims she is expert in because she worked on it. She was not in the Congress, she was a Congressional aide. Her intent and the intent of Congress are not the same thing. I have not seen her challenge to the CIA interpretation of the law actually come up anywhere else but in her media defense of Scooter Libby by her and others. That hardly constitutes "fact checking" or "proof" of the invalidity of the investigation.

That being the case, people with an interest in doing something about this problem, and with solutions and experience, like some of the letter writers here, could possibly do some good by contacting a Senator or Representative. It doesn't usually hurt to get some light shining in dark places.

In case you haven't noticed, the appropriate grand jury for indicting Mr. Libby's boss is the House of Representatives, and the court in which he would be tried is the Senate.

So yes, Mr.Case, a house subcommittee investigation is exactly where the case can go forward, at least under Article II of the U.S. Constitution, that document the Bush Administration and its supporters seem to think is irrelevant to their behavior.

That is the question that needs to be answered now. If there is any way to run a successful counterinsurgency, stop the sectarian violence, and result in a peaceful Iraq, Lt.Gen. David Petraeus, Ph.D. is both the correct person to find it, and the one who would be able to do it. Notice he has called for sufficient MPs to do the prisoners correctly, and is talking negotiating with the insurgency and the militias to find a way out of the spiral of violence as the highest priority. That is how you do it, if it can be done.

I personally believe that we should never have gone there (and said so on the streets before it started), and have extreme doubts whether even he can turn the clock back and pretend we didn't screw their country up for them. I think the Bush people should be prosecuted for all of this, especially the run up, when they accused Hans Blix and Mohammed El Baradei of complicity with Saddam Hussein for saying they didn't think he had WMD. I think they should be prosecuted for their transgressions of International Humanitarian Law, and for their transgressions of the Convention Against Torture, their attempts to proscribe habeas corpus, and a million other things.

But we people who want an end to this war should decide what we want most, and let people like Petraeus know, so he can carry out our vision. He asked for the extra personnel to avoid another Abu Ghraib. As someone who thinks humane treatment is the absolute bottom line, I just can't fault that.

That's why Newt resigned.

I remember the awe, I remember going across country in a TWA 707 flight, the plastic wings, the little soaps, the chewing gum for kids during take off and landing.

Up until just recently, I still booked every flight with a window seat, so I could look out the window! But now, you get told to close the blind after takeoff, and its three seats to the aisle when you need to use the lavatory.

Seriously, Patrick, the airlines need to show some study results to convince me that moving the humidity from 12% to 25%, still very desert-like, is going to have the cabin overgrown in mold and rusting away. After all, the Dead Sea Scrolls and King Tut's tomb lasted all that time, and they weren't even at reduced cabin pressure.

I still think it is beautiful to look out the window and see the tops of the clouds rushing over the wing when the plane takes off. But the business end of the airline business has made it quite clear they don't care what I think.