that someone's gonna say "but what about ___?" And here I am. What about Dan Bern? His latest release, Breathe, is better than a lot of the stuff touted in your article. Check it out.

"Because I told them it had to."

Maybe Patreaus will be visited by Rumplestiltsken? Hope his first born is cool with that.

With less then two years left, I worry that there is not enough time for the hearings path to work. Our systems of due process have a huge drawback - they allow for nearly endless delay. As you note, an investigator typically begins with a request for voluntary submission. A reasonable time must be given for consideration and potential compliance. When the request is rejected, a subpoena can issue. The subpoena can then be challenged on various grounds. The challenge takes time, as does an action to enforce the subpoena in court. Think of how things like Cheney's energy task force meetings information went. Or how important findings in the Plame investigation matter were successfully delayed past the '04 elections. If one merely needs to run out a clock, our systems of justice and oversight routine abet those efforts.

Further, fighting through obstructionist's obstacles is tiring and and difficult. Even assuming members of Congress willing to try, I wonder whether Congressional staffs are up to the challenges. There are easier and safer ways of making a living.

Bleak House, indeed.

What we need, quite simply, is to restore people of integrity to these highest executive posts. This is the most direct route to a thorough righting of our current Constitutional list.

The "Song of the South" was considered a classic and completely acceptable movie when I was a kid only a few decades ago. The story of Brer Rabbit and the Tar Baby seemed like a sort of Aesop's fable type story to a child's eyes. No doubt if I saw the movie today I'd be bowled over by the racist overtones and stereotypes, but my point is that the metaphor "tar baby" made its way into many folks' cultural consciousness in a sort of stealth manner that did not seem overtly racist.

Your idea is intriguing if somewhat impractical. It's easy to say we should have such "true pricing" but much harder/if not impossible to determine those prices and set up a regulatory framework to impose them (such a pricing code would make the tax code look like a walk in the park). And imagine the black markets it would create. Imagine Prohibition or Communist Russia types black markets multiplied exponentially.

We are, unfortunately, running head long into the tragedy of the commons on a global scale and sweeping regulation of the planet as a commons is, for all practical purposes, impossible. Then again, maybe extraterrestrial overlords will land and take on the role of benign dictators. That might work.

As "weeds" are just a characterization of plants growing somewhere other than where we wish, I suppose "black" markets are simply markets emerging where our governing bodies do not wish. I mentioned such markets for two reasons: 1. they would undermine the regulatory pricing structure Blacksun would impose; and 2. criminal activity, including violence, often accompanies black market activities.

in the case of these journalists. What's so sad is that they don't recognize that the root problem in the US Attorneys scandal is the it's JUSTICE that is supposed to be blind.

No really, science has proven it: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3804545.stm

We stop critically assessing those we love.

These Days the Fourth Column looks more like a Fifth Column

in the header is "you know what happens when you assume . . ." which continues "you make an "ass" out of "u" and "me." It doesn't work so well with the word "assumptions" as it's hard to make an ass out of an "mption" as mptions are total losers to begin with.

Whether you're Christian or not, and I'm guess Newt ain't in any meaningful sense, the question can put a lot of things into perspective.

Violence and intimidation first, indeed. This is what passes for statesmanship with these people?

Bluffing is not a good idea. You do not threaten such things, if you do not intend to follow through or you risk looking REALLY weak. If your bluff is called, you are like the boy who cried wolf.

In addition, is there no way that gasoline could not come in overland or through pipelines to Iran? Just asking.

Sherman don't play that no more. Set the Way Back Machine for 2003.

Often in the halls of government agencies it is asked in one way or another: "it may be legal, but does it pass the Washington Post test?" Meaning that if our action was reported in WaPo, would we be embarrassed or worse? It's sad that under Mr. Hiatt, the Washington Post can now more often than not be counted upon to help agencies get over on public opinion rather than held up to scrutiny. One would have thought the Department of Justice, as a group of lawyers, would have been sensitive to the legal ethics notion of "avoiding even the appearance of impropriety." Fred might have noted that too - that even if the evidence at the end of the day is mixed as far as whether political motives were plainly behind the firings,the Administration should not have done this because it so plainly raises the appearance of impropriety and undermines faith in the fair and impartial nature of our legal system. Justice is blind for a reason.

as evidence by the fact that most of them have not changed a lick, per your Ross/ABC post.

It's just too much work to actually do idependent research and make decisions about where the truth lies. I don't think many of them know what such a story would look like. They think such judgments must be relegated to the editorial page. Choosing a "truth" is editorializing ... even on empirically provable facts it seems.