Today’s edition of quick hits.
* Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, announced yesterday that he no longer shares the president’s vision for a democracy in Iraq. “You’ve got a culture where democracy is not part of, ‘Let’s go there,’ ” Hoekstra said. “It was a stretch.” He insists U.S. troops should stay indefinitely, but only to create a stable Iraq, not to create a free Iraq.
* I’ve never been entirely clear on why Barack Obama’s position on attacking terrorists in Pakistan was so controversial, but the AP notes that newly uncovered “rules of engagement” show the “U.S. military gave elite units broad authority more than three years ago to pursue suspected terrorists into Pakistan, with no mention of telling the Pakistanis in advance.” In other words, the media and political world freaked out because Obama expressed his support for existing U.S. policy. Odd.
* If you haven’t heard about Matt Stoller and Open Left’s “Bush Dog” campaign, it’s garnering an increasing amount of attention.
* Congrats to Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks for launching his new “Meet the Bloggers” show, patterned after “Meet the Press.” Today was the inaugural episode, featuring a great panel: Joan McCarter, John Amato, and Lane Hudson.
* Another top Justice Department official has announced his resignation: Wan Kim, Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. Kim wasn’t nearly as controversial as some of his more ridiculous colleagues, but as Paul Kiel noted, “[T]he Division continued in the direction set by the prior Bush years under Kim’s direction, often pursuing causes favored by conservatives (such as religious discrimination and human trafficking) to the detriment of the Division’s traditional emphasis (such as protecting African-Americans from discrimination).”
* The WaPo had an interesting front-page item today, highlighting the Bush administration’s effort to have U.S. businesses purchase more Iraqi products. It’s a bit of a tough sell (literally and figuratively) given that Iraq isn’t producing a lot of goods right now. Bush has tapped an official to oversee the project who is currently under investigation by the Pentagon’s Inspector General for “erratic behavior, public drunkenness, mismanagement, waste of funds and sexual harassment.”
* Mark Foley’s reputation will never recover, but he’s not going to jail: “Former Rep. Mark Foley, the Florida Republican who resigned his seat last fall after it was revealed he sent sexually explicit e-mails to underage House pages, is unlikely to face criminal charges for his behavior, Scripps Howard News Service reports. The news agency reports federal investigators have been unable to gather enough evidence to prove Foley, 52, intended to ‘seduce, solicit, lure, entice, or attempt to seduce a child,’ with his inappropriate contacts.”
* Roger Stone can explain those awful calls from his phone to Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s father: someone broke into his house, and made the call using some sort of replication of his voice. His alibi: he was at a play the same time as the call. (The play happened to be off that night.)
* Score one for common-sense budgeting: “Millions of dollars later, Congress has effectively killed a military plane program the Pentagon repeatedly rejected, and which never had a successful flight. The $63 million Congress poured into the DP2 program over 20 years was not requested by the Department of Defense. Instead, it was mandated through obscure provisions in bills known as ‘earmarks.’ Most of those earmarks for the DP2 were inserted by Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., in whose district the plane was designed and built, in prototype.”
* With all the awful news coming out of Iraq about security and political reconciliation, let’s also not overlook the genuine refugee crisis. The U.N. migration office has labeled it the “worst human displacement in Iraq’s modern history” — and given the country’s modern history, that’s very discouraging.
* NYT: “The Bush administration is set to issue a regulation on Friday that would enshrine the coal mining practice of mountaintop removal. The technique involves blasting off the tops of mountains and dumping the rubble into valleys and streams. It has been used in Appalachian coal country for 20 years under a cloud of legal and regulatory confusion. The new rule would allow the practice to continue and expand, providing only that mine operators minimize the debris and cause the least environmental harm, although those terms are not clearly defined and to some extent merely restate existing law.”
* I knew some teenager would crack the iPhone eventually.
* Edwards vs. Coulter, Round III.
* Media Matters is launching a worthwhile pushback against Rush Limbaugh’s assertion that only black people care about the crisis in Darfur.
* Paul Krugman: “[I]f you look at the political successes of the G.O.P. since it was taken over by movement conservatives, they had very little to do with public opposition to taxes, moral values, perceived strength on national security, or any of the other explanations usually offered. To an almost embarrassing extent, they all come down to just five words: southern whites starting voting Republican.”
Anything to add? Consider this an end-of-the-day open thread.