Twelve U.S. soldiers are believed to have been captured in an ambush on a convoy today near the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriya, in what U.S. military officials called the toughest day of resistance in the war so far. ABC reports that

...the group, made up of maintenance workers, was part of a supply convoy that is believed to have taken a wrong turn outside Nasiriya while on a mission to carry out repair work.

They were traveling in a column of six vehicles that encountered a roadblock and came under heavy fire. A number of others were wounded in the attack and evacuated by helicopter, military officials said....

Shortly after news of the capture came, video footage of what was said to be dead and captured American soldiers was aired on the Arab al Jazeera network and Iraqi state television.

At least five American soldiers appeared in the video footage — four men and one woman, some of whom appeared to be wounded. They were asked to give their names, home states, and state whether they were Americans.

Also, a U.S. miltary plane has crashed in Afganistan killing six.

A U.S. Black Hawk helicopter crashed in Afghanistan on Sunday, killing all six military personnel on board, U.S. Central Command said. "The crash was not the result of enemy action," Central Command said in a statement. The helicopter was conducting a "medical evacuation mission," it said. The HH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashed 18 miles north of Ghazni, Afghanistan, at about 11:20 a.m. EST, Central Command said. The cause was under investigation. The names of those who died were being withheld pending notification of their families.

A big thanks to ReachM High Cowboy Network Noose for his salute to women bloggers Saturday, as part of women's history month. Go on over and read what these impressive women have to say. (Thanks to Jeanne at Body and Soul for tipping us off to it. We do read the Cowboy every day but missed that one somehow.)

Let us know in the comments if you have some more links to women bloggers covering politics and current events--but please, put them in html format so the site doesn't get skewed.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has acknowledged American soldiers are missing in Iraq.

The Arab satellite station Al-Jazeera aired footage from Iraqi television of interviews with what the station identified as captured American prisoners, and also showed bodies in uniform in an Iraqi morgue that it said were Americans. A senior defense official said Pentagon officials did not know precisely how many Americans had been captured. The official declined to identify the unit involved so as not to cause panic among soldiers' families.

Rumsfeld said there could also be captured journalists. On the Al Jazeera tape,

On the tape, one prisoner said he was from Kansas and another said he was from Texas. Asked why he was fighting Iraqis, the soldier who said he was from Kansas replied: "They don't bother me; I don't bother them."

Rumsfeld also said he personally believes saddam is dead.

"On Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on just how far Michigan can go in restricting visits to prison inmates. The court will weigh a state's ability to control its prisons against the rights of inmates, a balancing act that in the past has tilted in favor of government. For Bueno and the more than a million other inmates in the United States, its decision could mean greater access to visitors -- or more restrictions. "

SCOTUSBlog reports on Wiggins v. Smith, a Supreme Court case to be taken up this week involving ineffective assistance of counsel in a death case.

We posted our in-depth view of the case here. Thanks to SCOTUSBlog for mentioning and linking to it.

The issue is whether counsel has a duty to investigate or present mitigating evidence that could lead a sentencing jury to vote for life instead of death. The Fourth Circuit ruled against Wiggins, saying strategic choices by counsel are not ineffective--particularly when the evidence could have hurt as well as helped the defendant.

The National Associaton of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) filed this amicus brief in the case, arguing that

A. A Strong Defense Does Not Excuse Failure to Investigate Mitigating Information

B. The Mitigating Evidence of Petitioner’s Background Was Not Incompatible With a Challenge to Death Eligibility as a Principal, and

C. The Decision to Forego Mitigating Evidence to Retry Guilt Was Unreasonable

We're going to use this space to post some of the overseas war news we read for a day or so. We want to see if it's the same or different than the reporting we're getting from the embedded journalists. All descriptions are direct quotes from the articles. This is an experiment--we really don't know the outcome, and if we're wrong, we'll say so.

Marines in Firefight: US Marines and Iraqi soldiers have been involved in a fierce firefight in Umm Qasr - a day after the Allies claimed the town had been taken. The Marines were ambushed at a temporary camp set up in the strategically important port town in southern Iraq.

British TV Crew Missing: Missing British TV reporter Terry Lloyd and two of his news crew may have been hit in crossfire from coalition forces in Iraq, it has been reported. More here.

Exodus in Northern Iraq:Up to 500,000 people in northern Iraq have fled their homes ahead of the US-led invasion - and the movement is continuing, a UN aid agency has said.

Seven Die in MidAir Collision: Seven military personnel have died in a midair helicopter collision over water in the northern Gulf region. (Six Britons, One American)

Desert Rats in Fierce Fighting: Coalition forces faced fiercer opposition than expected throughout southern Iraq and their commander, the American general Tommy Franks, warned: “There may well be tough days ahead.”

You are welcome to use the comments to add more articles, but please, don't just post the urls, use the html format--otherwise the whole site gets skewed. Instructions are in the comment box.

Are we the only ones uncomfortable by the Pentagon's "embedding" of reporters to cover the war? It's censorship.

Yes, we realize that it's dangerous out there and news organizations might not get their reporters as close to the action without help from the Administration. But we're getting only what the Government allows the reporters to tell, so how is this journalism? We're getting a slanted view.

We find ourselves constantly going over the BBC, SkyNews and other international websites to read their coverage.

All night long, on every news station tonight, U.S. reporters covering the Camp Pennsylvania grenade attack were hemming and hawing--"I can't talk about that"..."I've seen more than I can say, I have to be really careful here". This Reuters article advising that one of the 13 injured soldiers is dead, nails it for us.

Time magazine correspondent Jim Lacey told CNN by telephone from Camp Pennsylvania, the Kuwait base for the 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, that the soldier had died of his injuries. "We're allowed to talk about it," he said.(emphasis supplied)

Sunday's New York Times reports that reporters are eagerly responding to the Penatgon's "welcome mat." The "embedding" policy has been in the works for many months, and is mainly the brainchild of Rumsfeld who wanted to drum up public support for the war, and decided, what better way than to get the media enthralled.

It's worked. The first night of bombing, the reporters were awestruck. They were positively gleeful about finally experiencing "shock and awe" and that it more than met their expectations.

We'd rather have free news and honest news than more of it. And we have some questions. Who's paying the freight for the "embedded" journalists? Is the Pentagon throwing it in free to the news organizations as a means of sweetening the pot and getting them to go along with their restrictions on reporting? If the Government isn't footing the bill, how much cheaper is it for the media giants to warehouse their reporters with the military than to pay their way independently? We would think that by traveling and bunking with the military, the news organizations are saving big bucks.

It looks to us like we're getting a marketing campaign, not true news. Censorship is antithetical to a free democracy.

An American G.I. has been arrested in connection with the grenade attack inside a tent at Camp Pennsylvania, where the 101st Airborne is presently headquartered, in Northern Kuwait. 13 soldiers were injured, some seriously enough to require airlifting out by helicopters.

The soldier has not been identified because he was also injured in the attack and rules provide that family of injured soldiers must be notified first. CBS, Fox and SkyNews reported the soldier is an African American Muslim.

NBC had a reporter on who said the soldier had been acting strange the past few days and he was being watched. A decision had been made to leave him behind. CNN said the attack was directed at the tent commander.

The embedded reporters saw and know a lot more but are being prohibited from talking about it freely. Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon on CNN said there's a name for this, "fragging." It's a well-know technique but one that hasn't been used much with a volunteer military.

As of now, the Oscars are on. We think they will stay on. Thousands of anti-war protesters are expected. Protest organizers say they need the air-time and coverage because the networks aren't giving them enough.

We support anti-war protests but we think this will backfire on the anti-war movement, particularly in the U.S. We doubt those who tune in to watch the Oscars, ourselves included, are going to look at the protesters and say, "Gee, I should be with them tonight," or even, "I'd like to hear what they have to say." We think protesting during the Oscars will weaken the message and hurt the cause.

There's a time and a place for everything. These actors worked hard all year to create movies to entertain us and make us think. They have earned their night. For three hours of a Sunday evening, we should give them their due and leave the war out of it. Except, of course, for those of them that choose to use their 45 seconds of acceptance time to oppose the war. We think that's fine. It's their time and they can do what they want with it.

The winners are being allowed to say whatever they want on any topic, including the war. Presenters, such as noted anti-war activist Susan Sarandon, however, have to stick to the script.

Again, we are all for the participants in the Oscars expressing their opposition to the war during their speeches. But we think the protestors should pick another night--or limit their protests to the afternoon before the ceremonies begin.

Update on Oscar participants:

A small number of celebrities, including Will Smith and Angelina Jolie - both due to present awards - and Cate Blanchett and Tom Hanks, have pulled out of the ceremony, voicing disgust that America's annual parade of self-congratulation is going ahead despite the war. Designers Giorgio Armani and Collette Dinnigan have cancelled trips to Hollywood to dress the stars and left it to their US-based associates to do the pampering instead.

Donning an anti-war totem is also popular. Among the actors who have said that they will wear anti-war badges are nominees Day-Lewis, Adrien Brody, Pedro Almodóvar Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore as well as veteran star Dustin Hoffman.

Ben Affleck is among those who has apparently not yet made up his mind. Instead he has announced that the final decision will rest with his stylist.

The 500 photographers, TV cameramen and reporters who normally work the carpet have been told that this year the stars do not want to talk and have undergone FBI background checks before they were issued with their credentials.

The owner of the internet domain name "Felons.Com" is auctioning it off on Ebay. Details here. We hope it's bought by someone with a progressive agenda who wants to use it for something like helping former inmates get jobs or regain the right to vote, rather than by some right-wing group that wants to make money off it by using it as some kind of offender registry. If you know of someone who might be interested, please forward them the ebay link.

Lisa English of Ruminate This asks a key question:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but we've been led to understand that Iraq presented such a clear and present danger to American interests an ocean away, that George Bush felt compelled to attack without UN authorization. We needed to rid Iraq of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

That is why we are leveling Baghdad, isn't it? It's why we are destroying families and turning formerly parented children into orphans. It's why we've thumbed our nose at the international community and walked away from diplomacy. It's why we continue, as I type, to chance fear in the hearts of all sensible people, the world over....

All because we know there are weapons of mass destruction that sit ...silently...waiting to do us harm.

Right? Well, if that be the case, then please explain why it is that Iraq has yet to use these weapons. They've yet to meet devastating American force in kind.

Why not? What are they waiting for? Could it be that George Bush was wrong?

Technorati bring us the news bloggers have written about in the last two hours. It's a new feature called Current Events .

Here's how its creator describes it:

It is a list of the top links to "professional" news sites by bloggers in the last two hours, along with comments and analysis. I created it because, like most people, I've been following the progress of the war, watching and reading the mass media, and I wanted to know what people out there were saying about the news. What are the most important stories? What is real, and what is propaganda? What is not being reported, or is being underreported? These were the questions on my mind when I created Technorati's Current Events.

Very cool.