Leaving aside that you didn't mention secrecy here may be covering up turning the Justice Department into a way to manipulate vote outcomes, you still show a pattern. A pattern that uses secrecy instead of policy as the main set of practices of this Administration. One can only wonder (and it should be a hallmark in and of itself that a Democracy has to wonder about its own damn Government!) what all the secrecy implies.

Are they protecting us?

I'm noticing how we are once again getting alerts about terroism via the CIA's claim Al-Qaeda has been rebuilt. But that coincides with war funding being debated in the Senate.

No, they are not protecting us.

Are they trying to control us?

Interestingly enough, that's what's keeping this set of drunk off their own incompetence set of fools still standing. The fact is that they aren't trying to control us. They simply want to use the Government. They simply want to take the efforts that go into making this country succesful and use them for selfish purposes. Control would be too much work for these fools. Control would require an effort that understood accomplishing goals. Goals aren't this Administration's forte.

Secrecy is now a stall tactic. Keeping oversight away from this Administration is all that matters. In that way Iraq can be left in such a mess that Bush won't be known as the worst President ever on the one hand. While on the other we'll be to busy trying to dig out from under to figure out where it all went wrong. Tearing down the Government from within is the best Bush and his followers can do. The fear they foster, the secrecy they hide behind, aren't anything you'd ever suspect. It's not a special talent they posess, it's a loser's way out, it's a virus of some sort.

Will the system vomit it up before it's too late?

Keep in mind never have indiscretions of an Attorney General gone without rebuke in this country.

Not once.

It will be definitive if this instance reverses that pattern.

Again, this article is a good start. I wish you luck on maintaining a consistent commentary.

Blumenthal is nothing if not consistent. After six plus years of pointing out exactly where this Administration lives, i.e., in a bubble born of hubris with no basis in fact, there was no way he could stay away from this, their latest act of dysfunction. While most of us cower in fear, or throw up our hands in disgust and despair, there's Blumenthal looking right into the worst. This Administration is a parasite. A multi-layered effort to "market" one incredibly shallow platitude after another.

Now they've got their hooks on the other part of the war apparatus. It's not enough to take down the entire military and break into pieces for the likes of Halliburton. No. Even those aspects of our security that don't promise direct financial rewards aren't safe. I couldn't reconcile the fact that the NIE stated facts dangerous to this Admin. While at the same time knowing that they had lost all of their independence. This article makes clear, though, what's behind the stumbled, confused, frightened attempt of a bureaucracy that has to answer to a President who has no interest in intelligence in any form!

The NIE was tasked to issue intelligence to coincide with the showdown bound to occur after the July 4th recess. Period. Facts don't matter they were told. Just say something and we'll take it from there. They stated facts and did so solely because they've no internal control. The intelligence community has been turned into a sweat shop. Its labor expropriated by the Bush virus.

Be afraid, be very afraid, is what anyone near them will ultimately parrot, and, or, believe.

But I say be Blumenthal!

Be very, very Blumenthal!

That's a bomb long needing dropping in my opinion. Let me also add, that since conventional wisdom has dropped the ball on this whole episode all along, Rove's subpeona shouldn't be seen as just a piece of paper.

Not by a long shot.

1) The political director Susan Clark cleared Bush when she stated he was never talked to with regard to firings. 2) Politics played a role in the nine firings. Ergo, I love that word, Rove was the "Mastermind."

I have felt for some time that Gonzales sans Iraq. He's indicative is why. Rove's meddling in the Justice Dept's affairs, and now being in a position where he may end up talking about them under oath, is evidence of that. If the Solicitor General appoints a Special Prosecutor it will come at a time when Bush is going to use his "My ignorance is your Bliss" appeal to extend the war in Iraq.

But a Special Prosecutor sitting on his doorstep will belie that in stark terms.

I bet that subpeona is feared by Rove.

I'll bet anybody!