by TChris

In July, the Bush administration predicted that last year's budget deficit of $412 billion would fall to a mere $331 billion this year. Today the administration admitted that the number will be closer to $427 billion, making this the fourth consecutive year in which the deficit has grown.

Although "senior administration officials insisted they were still on track to fulfill Mr. Bush's campaign promise of reducing the federal budget deficit by half by 2009," the administration has offered no convicing plan to meet that pledge while moving forward with its other costly goals: making last term's tax cuts permanent, paying for the aftermath of the war in Iraq (and maybe a war in Iran?), and privatizing social security.

The administration asked Congress for about $75 billion to cover war costs in Iraq and Afghanistan, but provided few details about how the money will be spent. It asked for another $5 billion for related purposes, including "financial aid to Palestinians as they try to build a democratic government and a heavily fortified embassy in Iraq for the State Department."

by TChris

As expected, the Senate confirmed President Bush's choice of Condoleezza Rice as Secretary of State. Thirteen senators (twelve Democrats and independent James Jeffords) voted against the confirmation. Two Republicans did not vote, producing a final tally of 85-13.

Despite the overwhelming vote, White House vote-counters were somewhat disappointed, having hoped the nominee would glean well over 90 votes.

Although Alberto Gonzales is likely to be confirmed as Attorney General next week, his confirmation vote may be a bit tighter. As TalkLeft noted earlier today, the Senate Judiciary Committee split along party lines today, sending his confirmation to the Senate by a 10-8 vote.

More egg on the Pentagon's face. Forty eight hours after four Guantanamo prisoners were returned to Britain, UK authorities freed them, declining to file charges against them.

Five other British detainees at Guantanamo who were returned in March were also set free within a day, and have never been charged with a terrorist offense.

Is Joe Lieberman vulnerable in the next election cycle? Daily Kos says it's a distinct possibility. He and Atrios say online funding for a primary challenger to Lieberman might be arranged.

We're on board. Lieberman has been Republican-lite so long that I doubt even he remembers which party he belongs to.

The ACLU sends this press release by e-mail:

WASHINGTON-The Senate Judiciary Committee today narrowly approved the nomination of Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General, sending to the full Senate an appointment made controversial by the Bush Administration's torture policies. In a sign of how controversial the nomination has become, all of the Judiciary Committee's Democratic members voted against Gonzales.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which does not take a position on cabinet nominations, said that the Senate cannot meaningfully exercise its constitutional duty of "advise and consent" on the Gonzales nomination because the Administration continues to stonewall against releasing documents on how it developed its policies on interrogation and torture, and Gonzales himself refuses to answer even basic questions on his role in those policies.

Terrible news out of Iraq today. A helicopter crash is beleived to have killed 31 Marines. Five soldiers were killed in a separate incident, believed to be an attack by insurgents.

The order of the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals reversing the conviction of Scottish citizen and Ohio death row inmate Kenneth Richey has prompted this editorial in The Herald, a British newspaper:

We should welcome yesterday's ruling. However, in an inverted version of the Biblical parable, we should not rejoice over the one who has (probably) been saved as lament the 3500 who have not. That is the number currently on death row. Since capital punishment was reinstated in the United States in 1976, nearly 1000 prisoners have been executed, including a 74-year-old so stricken by dementia that he did not know who he was, and a man with the mental age of seven. The US is up there with China, the Congo, Iran and Saudi Arabia in the global league table of executions, despite scant evidence that capital punishment is a deterrent to violent crime. Furthermore, around 3.5% of those sentenced to death in the US have subsequently been proved innocent and DNA technology is likely to increase this percentage.

As governor of Texas from 1995 to 2001, George Bush authorised a record 152 executions and granted just one of 57 appeals for clemency. In Texas, the chances are that, guilty or otherwise, Kenneth Richey would have been dead for years.

Once again, as others see us--America needs to look in the mirror.

The federal judge presiding over the terror trial of accused Yemeni sheik Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad suffered a big blow Tuesday:

The ruling, which created palpable anxiety among the prosecutors, said the prosecutors cannot show jurors an application of a mujahedeen fighter for entry into an Al Qaeda training camp. The prosecutors said the application, found in Afghanistan in 2001, listed Sheik Moayad as the fighter's sponsor. The ruling also stopped prosecutors from introducing into evidence address books taken from two Muslim fighters in Bosnia in 1996. The prosecutors said the books included entries for Sheik Moayad.

Judge Johnson said that "we don't know what the source" of the Al Qaeda application was and that the address books were from a time too remote from the alleged fund-raising by the sheik in 2003. Judge Johnson said they dated back to before Al Qaeda was listed as a terrorist organization by the United States government.

The Peace Corps has released a list (pdf)of colleges providing the most volunteers since its inception in 1961. The college with the most volunteers is the University of California at Berkeley.

Looking at the top tier brings back so many memories of the good old days, when protests ruled and war was out of vogue:

1 University of Wisconsin – Madison 129
2 University of Colorado – Boulder 104
3 University of Washington 98
4 University of California – Berkeley 94
5 University of Texas – Austin 90
6 University of Michigan – Ann Arbor 85

I can't help but wax nostalgic for those good old days. Without the Internet, cell phones, bloggers, text messaging or e-mail, we managed to bring down a war. With all the new age technology at their disposal, why can't the college kids bring it home now?

From an editorial in the Columbia Spectator, Don't Fear the Reefer:

We’re happy that the New York Legislature voted last month to reform the arcane Rockefeller Drug Laws. We look forward to seeing judges give fairer prison sentences to nonviolent men and women convicted of selling or possessing narcotics. Yet while these laws are a step in the right direction, they don’t go far enough. A key component of any rational drug policy must include the legalization of marijuana.

....Marijuana isn’t that dangerous or addictive, and enforcement falls disproportionately upon the poor. It’s time to legalize it.

[Link via Drug War Rant.]

Calling John Grisham, here's an idea for your next novel: The Government seizes oil wells in 2005 that it says it can trace to a pot smuggler convicted in the '70's.

Ouch. From the 50 Most Loathsome People in America:

#3. You.

You gaze idly at the carnage around you, sigh, and go calmly back to your coffee and your People magazine. You can't stop buying useless crap, though you're drowning in a deepening pool of debt. You think you're an activist because you bitch all day on the internet, but you reelect the same gangsters at a 99% rate. You consider yourself informed because you waste a significant portion of your life watching the same three news stories cycle over and over again on your gargantuan, aerodynamic television set while you eat processed food. You really thought everything would be okay if Kerry won. Not only do you believe in an invisible man who magically farted out the universe, you also excoriate and marginalize those who disagree. You have a poorer understanding of your country's foreign policy history than a third world peasant, but you can't wait to see what Julia Roberts will be wearing at the Oscars. You cheer as Ukrainians challenge an election based on exit poll data, but keep waiting around for someone else to fix your problems. You can't think, you can't organize and you won't act. This is all your fault.

Too funny...#2 on the list, Donald Rumsfeld:

Carries himself in press conferences like a cranky grandfather who is sick of hearing his daughters whine about how he molested them every now and then.

[link via Poor Man.]