Monday’s Mini-Report

May 7, 2007

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* Paul Wolfowitz’s position atop the World Bank grew significantly less stable this afternoon when one of his top aides resigned, saying the current leadership crisis made progress impossible. “Given the current environment surrounding the leadership of the World Bank Group, it is very difficult to be effective in helping to advance the mission of the institution,” Kevin Kellems, who was an advisor to Wolfowitz since 2002 at the Pentagon and throughout the planning of the Iraq war, told Reuters.

* The Justice Department will reportedly clear Monica Goodling’s immunity deal with the House Judiciary Committee, giving Goodling a chance to testify about her role in the prosecutor purge. Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) said, “I believe obtaining her testimony will be a critical step in our efforts to get to the truth about the circumstances surrounding the US Attorney firings and possible politicization in the Department’s prosecutorial function. The committee will be moving expeditiously to apply for the court order so that we can schedule a hearing promptly.”

* As I’ve noted on a couple of occasions, Defense Secretary Robert Gates isn’t exactly on board with the details of the president’s war policy.

* Hate speech became such a problem whenever CBS News.com ran a news item about Barack Obama, the network has decided to turn off comments on Obama-related stories. (Maybe CBS can turn the comments back on and hire a comment monitor or two?) Dave Neiwert has some insightful analysis on the problem.

* “Congress already has run out of space on a memorial created last year to honor all of the U.S. service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. In a grim sign of the times, the “Wall of the Fallen,” set up by House Republican leaders in June, is almost full. The mounting death toll from Iraq has forced U.S. House staffers to study how to reconfigure the display in the lobby of the Rayburn Building — the largest office building for members of Congress — to squeeze in more names.”

* Officials at the Pentagon’s Mental Health Advisory Team for the Iraq War found that the existing troop rotation schedule is causing a series of problems for the troops, including marital conflict, civilian abuse, and in some cases, suicides. The panel recommended “decreas[ing] deployment length to allow additional time for Soldiers to re-set following a one-year combat tour,” while the administration does the exact opposite. (The Pentagon sat on the results of the study for four months.)

* Fascinating report from Media Matters: “This study demonstrates that at least during the period we examined, cable news remains an overwhelmingly white and male preserve. The Don Imus controversy put a momentary dent in this pattern as a result of the increase in appearances by African-Americans over that week — but only a dent, and not a particularly large one at that. When an issue involving gender and race/ethnicity dominates the news, the cable networks do bring on a more diverse lineup of guests than they ordinarily do. The question, then, is why their guest lists are so overwhelmingly white and male the rest of the time.”

* Sunday voting does wonders for turnout in national elections.

* It’s not just Iraq; we’re losing hearts and minds in Afghanistan, too.

* U.S. News: “There could be a brand of Bush 101 taught in business schools soon if James Hoopes, the Murata Professor of Ethics in Business at Babson College in Wellesley, Mass., gets his way. Just last week, he landed a publisher for Hail to the CEO: The Failure of George W. Bush and the Cult of Moral Leadership. His premise: President Bush, a Harvard University M.B.A. grad, is proof that business schools focus more on leadership than on management.”

* Remember that front-page WaPo story last week that said congressional Dems were going to give up on withdrawal timelines? The Post ran a correction over the weekend.

* As president, Bush has never visited Vermont and Rhode Island.

* How bad is it for the GOP right now? Eisenhowers, Roosevelts, and Goldwaters are joining the Dems.

* Ann Coulter saw the latest Newsweek poll, but believes the magazine “made up” the results to make Republicans look bad.

* In Newsweek’s cover story, assistant managing editor Evan Thomas argues that John McCain “is not, at heart, a politician. He is a warrior.” On a related note, articles like these are not, at heart, journalism. They are ridiculous.

*Jay Leno: “And how embarrassing is this? ‘Time’ magazine released its list of the 100 most influential people in the world. President Bush is not on the list. Isn’t that amazing? However, supermodel Kate Moss is! And here’s the scary part — Kate Moss actually has a better plan for getting us out of Iraq.”

* And finally, a housekeeping note. The site has gone down a stunning nine times in the last 28 days, including a lengthy outage today. As I understand it, we’re experiencing database trouble, which we’re doing our best to fix. My apologies for persistent inconvenience.

Anything to add? Consider this an end-of-the-day open thread.

As president, Bush has never visited Vermont and Rhode Island.

And he hasn’t been to a soldiers funeral.

  • Giving Goodling amnesty is a blunder.
    She has the fundamentalist’s mind set.

    She won’t tell the truth with immunity.
    She won’t tell the truth without immunity.

    Either way: she stonewalls with impunity.

    Prosecute her.

  • Why do I suspect the House ReThuglican Leaders will decide to take down their Wall of the Fallen [to the stupidity of fearless leader]?

    Break out the “Comfort to the Enemy” sound-bite and off you go. Either that or they will redefine “Fallen” to apply only to left-handed soldiers who were killed by a RPG under a full moon.

  • TPM is linking to a story that Monica Goodling was also the person who hung the sheet over the semi-naked statue at Justice during Ashcroft’s reign of terror!

  • Jay Leno is a Bush suckup. He had Bush on his show after the 2000 Florida ripoff and Supreme Court giveaway. Leno was thrilled to have him aboard. Oh well, he’s just a comedian.

  • Don’t know if any of you have heard? Supposedly Grover Norquist is on the DC Madam’s list. He of the 1st Bush’s “read my lips, no new taxes” fame.

  • Really, really, really appreciate this site. Read it daily and miss it when it goes offline. Read several others also but this is my favorite and “first come to “. Never understand how you post so many good reports on a daily basis consistently but I thank you. I have learned so much from the comments as well. Actually, I had just concluded I couldn’t trust the news so I just quit listening and these net posts, blogs, whatever, have renewed my faith and interest that I can find real truth news and I was lucky enough to find CB. Don’t know how you manage it but don’t stop. Now fix the f*^king access problem. Thanks.

  • “The mounting death toll from Iraq has forced U.S. House staffers to study how to reconfigure the display in the lobby of the Rayburn Building — the largest office building for members of Congress — to squeeze in more names.”

    hey, i’ve got this radical new idea. why not just stop “generating so many more names” and get the hell out.

  • “As president, Bush has never visited Vermont and Rhode Island.”

    and vermont thanks you.

  • As president, Bush has never visited Vermont and Rhode Island.

    I guess Oregon must not be trying hard enough.

  • Congress already has run out of space on a memorial created last year to honor all of the U.S. service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    They can fix it using the budget they’ve set aside for a victory celebration.

    From my listening post in Alaska, I don’t recall Bush making any visit more substantial than a refueling stop at the Air Force base, with the concomitant pep rally for the troops. That probably counts, though.

  • Well, Bush did come to Oregon for his “forest Initiative’ The irony of it was, that a wildfire had just started in the Central Orergon area, and because Bush was here, the air tankers weren’t allowed to fly, so…. the result was a massive wild fire that was out of control for several weeks.

    One way to promote your healthy forest plan, by having one burning down and then claiming that if it would have been logged, that could have been prevented.

    I wish he would have stayed in Washington.

  • * Paul Wolfowitz’s position atop the World Bank grew significantly less stable this afternoon when one of his top aides resigned,

    And the Board decided he did break the rules. But he’s another one like Gonzales and the big boob himself — will, resolutely, cling to the post, come hell or high water.

    * The Justice Department will reportedly clear Monica Goodling’s immunity deal with the House Judiciary Committee,

    According to TPMMuckraker, it already has. No objections to her testimony. I have no objections to her testifying under immunity. If she lies, she can still be “got” for *that*.

    * “Congress already has run out of space on a memorial created last year to honor all of the U.S. service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    That, despite the fact that no new names had been added since November. And December had seen an increase in death which semed terrible and unprecedented until we’ve seen the increase generated by the “splurge”.

    * Fascinating report from Media Matters: “This study demonstrates that at least during the period we examined, cable news remains an overwhelmingly white and male preserve.

    Another proof, if such were needed, that “liberal media” is a myth.

    * Sunday voting does wonders for turnout in national elections.

    Which is why we don’t want it; God forfend, people who work for a living would have the time and energy to go and vote, on their day off; weren’t the recent repub wins razor-thin enough? Not that such great participation has saved France from repeating our mistakes from ’00 and ’04; they’ve chosen a right-wing nut with charisma, over a right-thinking but somewhat wooden in public, candidate.

    * And finally, a housekeeping note. The site has gone down a stunning nine times in the last 28 days, including a lengthy outage today.

    Well, now… My smoke break coincided with down time only once, so I’ve not been aware of it. Hope you can get things straightened out.

  • Mann Coulter joins the ranks of the conspiracy theorists? Say it ain’t so!

  • “Not that such great participation has saved France from repeating our mistakes from ‘00 and ‘04; they’ve chosen a right-wing nut with charisma, over a right-thinking but somewhat wooden in public, candidate.”

    Have to correct you there, my friend. Nicolas Sarkozy might not be the best of candidates and he certainly has his flaws (actually, he is quite the nut), but to call his opponent Segolene Royal ‘right-thinking’ is just nonsense. In both meanings of the word. She isn’t even close to thinking right-wing, and her proposed policies wouldn’t be helping France much in getting out of its economic problems. In fact, it would only worsen the situation. Add to that Royal would be a disaster for finding a break through in the current EU stalemate.

    It’s a shame that the French haven’t elected the best candidate of all: centre politician Francois Bayrou. He makes more economic sense than Royal. and isn’t as controversial and populist as Sarkozy

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