New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson admitted today that he was not, as his official bio has stated for many years, drafted by the Kansas City A's baseball team in 1966.

The claim was included in a brief biography released when Richardson successfully ran for Congress in 1982. A White House news release in 1997 mentioned it when he was about to be named U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. And several news organizations, including The Associated Press, have reported it as fact over the years.

How serious, if at all, is this in terms of casting doubt on his integrity as a future national political candidate?

My favorite Thanksgiving ritual is to tune in to Boulder's KBCO radio station at noon to hear the 25 minute version of Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant, about his trip down to White Hall St. in lower Manhattan to sit on the bench and wait until he was told if he was fit for induction into the Army to go fight in Vietnam.

It's a tradition not only in Boulder, but at many progressive stations from New York to San Francisco and in between. So check your local listings, but if it's not playing in your neck of the woods, you can listen live at KBCO online. Ira Chermus, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, explains why the song is so loved by 60's liberal activists -- and I might add, their progeny. [since it's Thanksgiving, I'm hoping Ira won't mind my quoting so much of his explanation]:

TalkLeft has a yearly Thanksgiving ritual of giving thanks to bloggers and others who most have helped and supported our efforts during the year. In compiling this year's list, I was surprised, because it's the first time that there are mainstream media organizations and writers to thank. It's clear that the MSM has embraced blogs this year, and that's a great thing for both blogs and the public.

I hope readers will check out every one linked below - and consider giving thanks to your favorite bloggers by putting a little something in their tip jars.

First, thanks to the bloggers who have sent the most traffic to TalkLeft:

• Crooks and Liars
• Atrios
• Daily Kos
• Raw Story
  

by TChris

This is profoundly sad:

Relatives of Tracey Dyess, a teenage girl they say was repeatedly sexually abused since age 4 by father figures, cringed at the news that she will be locked up for at least 17 years, but they hope that the long prison sentence means she'll at least get good psychiatric care.

Dyess set fire to her home in Griswold, Iowa. She told the judge that she intended to kill her stepfather so that he could no longer molest her. Instead, the fire killed her sister and nephew.

by TChris

What’s keeping the Ocean County, NJ board from passing a resolution that would permit a law enforcement officer’s death benefits to be paid to her domestic partner?

At the center of the dispute is Lt. Laurel Hester, 49, a 23-year investigator for the Ocean County Prosecutor's office who is fighting lung cancer. Hester wants the county to pass a resolution as provided for by New Jersey's 18-month-old Domestic Partners Act, which gives counties and cities the power to extend pension and health care benefits to the gay partners of employees if they so choose.

Hester, of Point Pleasant, fears that without her $13,000 death benefit, partner Stacie Andree, 30, will be forced to sell the house they now share after Hester die.

More than a hundred other governmental entities in New Jersey have adopted domestic partnership benefit resolutions. And more than a hundred supporters of Hester who attended a rally on her behalf are wondering why Ocean County hasn’t taken that step.

TChris has an excellent post on Attorney General Gonzales' comment on Jose Padilla.

How does Attorney General Gonzalez explain the administration's change of heart? He claims the administration's decision to hold Padilla for more than three years, first as a material witness and then as an uncharged "enemy combatant," as well as the administration's previous accusations of wrongdoing, are "legally irrelevant to the charges we're bringing today."

Lawyer Glenn Greenwald powerfully explains how the Padilla decision represents the true tyranny of the executive branch. He also ties the power grab into the upcoming Alito hearings.

The decision yesterday by the Administration to finally bring charges against U.S. citizen Jose Padilla -- who has been kept incarcerated in a military prison for three years solely on George Bush's order, in solitary confinement and indefinitely -- was done not in order to signal a retreat by the Administration with regard to its claimed right to imprison U.S. citizens without any judicial processes, but instead, to protect and solidify that power by ensuring that its patent unconstitutionality cannot be ruled upon by the U.S. Supreme Court in the pending Padilla case.

by TChris

McLennan County, Texas, hoping to protect the president from the negative publicity that attended Cindy Sheehan’s protest outside the grounds of his Crawford ranch, enacted new ordinances that prohibit parking and camping along roadsides within several miles of the ranch. The ordinances didn’t deter the dozen anti-war protestors who were arrested today, bringing a new wave of the very publicity that the president’s local supporters hoped to avoid.

The arrests were made by more than two dozen deputies who calmly approached the demonstrators in their tents and asked if they wanted to walk out on their own or be carried. Two chose to be carried. They were to be taken to jail for booking.

Happy Thanksgiving, courtesy of McLennan County.

The Daily Mirror (UK) reports that it has been gagged by Britain's top law chief from publishing more of the secret memo detailing a threat by President Bush to bomb al-Jazeera tv network.

The Attorney General warned that publication of any further details from the document would be a breach of the Official Secrets Act. He threatened an immediate High Court injunction unless the Mirror confirmed it would not publish further details. We have essentially agreed to comply.

The five-page memo - stamped "Top Secret" - records a threat by Bush to unleash "military action" against the TV station, which America accuses of being a mouthpiece for anti-US sentiments.

Background here. [hat tip Patriot Daily.]

by TChris

After Jose Padilla was arrested in May 2002, John Ashcroft “interrupted a trip to Moscow to announce on television that the authorities had foiled an effort by Mr. Padilla and other Qaeda operatives to detonate a radioactive or ‘dirty’ bomb on American streets.” Three-and-a-half years later, Padilla has finally been charged -- but not with attempting to detonate a bomb on American soil.

In June 2004, the Justice Department claimed Padilla had “plotted to blow up apartment buildings and hotels, perhaps in New York.” But he hasn’t been charged with conspiring to destroy property in the United States.

How does Attorney General Gonzalez explain the administration’s change of heart? He claims the administration’s decision to hold Padilla for more than three years, first as a material witness and then as an uncharged “enemy combatant,” as well as the administration’s previous accusations of wrongdoing, are “legally irrelevant to the charges we’re bringing today.”

Padilla’s lawyers disagree.

The Wall Street Journal (free link) reports on a Harris poll finding that a majority of U.S. adults believe the Bush administration generally misleads the public on current issues, while only 32% believe the information provided by the administration is generally accurate.

When asked about former Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who has been indicted on charges of perjury, obstruction of justice and making false statements, more than half of U.S. adults say the situation indicates "a larger problem in the Bush administration," while 35% say it was an "isolated incident." About 82% of Democrats say it indicates a larger problem, while 70% of Republicans feel the Libby case is an isolated incident.

David Fiderer has a play by play of NBC reporter Andrea Mitchell's various comments about the Valerie Plame leak and when she first learned from a White House official that Joseph Wilson's wife worked for the CIA. Tom Maguire of Just One Minute responds to Fiderer.

Jane at Firedog Lake continues to dig into Dick Cheney's role. Crooks and Liars shares his views on Woodward and LKL here.

Congressman Murtha blogs today over at Huffington Post. 78% of the responses he's received to his call for bringing the troops home have been positive. He's now calling for a White House meeting.