Democracy Now has some great stuff up today:

• Landmark Decision Overturns Cuba 5 Convictions:
  Interview with Leonard Weinglass
  A federal appellate court in Atlanta overturned the convictions of the Cuba 5 and ordered a new trial on the basis that the men could not get a fair trial in the right-wing Cuban exile stronghold of Miami. The five were accused of spying for Cuba. We speak with Leonard Weinglass, one of the lawyers for the Cuba 5.

• Maher Arar Fights to Keep Torture Suit Against U.S. Government Alive
  Canadian torture victim Maher Arar is the first person to mount a civil suit challenging the U.S. government policy of extraordinary rendition. Now his attorneys are fighting the Justice Department's motion to dismiss the case. We speak with David Cole, the lead lawyer for Maher Arar. [includes rush transcript]

Patrick Fitzgerald's four year term as U.S. attorney in Illinois is set to expire in October. Some have wondered whether Bush would replace him. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, speaking at the American Bar Association Meeting in Chicago today, tried to lay such doubts to rest.

US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald got a vote of confidence from his boss Monday. There had been speculation Fitzgerald's aggressive investigations in Chicago and Washington might have angered important people and that Fitzgerald might not get reappointed.

The US attorney general, Alberto Gonzalez made it clear in Chicago Monday that a controversial and high-visibility justice department subordinate, US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, will probably be reappointed by President Bush when his four-year term expires in October.

by TChris

It's difficult to believe that it took this long for most people to recognize the president's dishonesty.

Less than half of Americans now say they think President Bush is honest, according to an AP-Ipsos poll taken at a time of increasing concerns about Iraq, a potential problem for a president who won re-election declaring that "people know where I stand."

Weren't folks paying attention before the election?

Ezra Klein, Kevin Drum , Matt Yglesias and Mark Schmidt discuss the new Newt Gingrich today. [hat tip to Crooks and Liars]

Let's not get fooled again. Newt Gingrich's 1994 Contract On America was a doozy of a document. Since I wrote about the proposed legislation regularly for almost two years back in 1995 and 1996, I just can't let this pass. First, an overview:

1995 began with the inauguration of the newly Republican - dominated Congress. The first order of business for the House was to promise the passage of new laws within the first 100 days of the session, lumped together in a decorative but ill-conceived package titled "Contract With America." One of the components of the "Contract" called for the passage of "tougher" crime laws, named the "Taking Back Our Streets Act" (TBOSA), bundled within a set of ten bills.

The Contract was the brainchild of Newt Gingrich, and could best be described as a Republican Nightmare:

If you thought that the new issue of Vanity Fair was going to be all Jennifer and Brangelina, here's a surprise. Raw Story reports:

Vanity Fair’s September edition, now out in New York but yet to hit national newsstands, packs a punch with an article about Sibel Edmonds, the FBI translator who has been gagged by the Bush Administration from revealing information about conversations she translated surrounding a seemingly major corruption scandal involving Turkish nationals and U.S. lawmakers, RAW STORY can reveal. RAW STORY acquired a copy of the article by David Rose this evening.

Here are the money quotes:

Who doesn't remember Katherine Harris' outrageous makeup during the 2000 Bush v. Gore election campaign? Now, she's charging the newspapers "colorized" her photos to heighten it.

On Monday, on a conservative radio talk show, Harris, now a congresswoman from Longboat Key running for the U.S. Senate, hit back, blaming newspapers for the criticism and charging that some - without saying which - altered her photographs.

``I'm actually very sensitive about those things, and it's personally painful,'' Harris said when host Sean Hannity asked about her image problems from 2000. ``But they're outrageously false, No. 1, and No. 2, you know, whenever they made fun of my makeup, it was because the newspapers colorized my photograph,'' Harris said.

She didn't explain what she meant by ``colorized.'' Asked Tuesday to point to an altered photograph, Harris and her staff could not. Her response to the question, said spokesman Adam Goodman, was, ``I haven't worn blue eye shadow since the seventh grade when I was in the Girl Scouts.'' She didn't name a newspaper that showed blue eye shadow.

Okay, who can be the first one to find a photo of Ms. Harris wearing blue eyeshadow? Never mind, I just found one.

Mincing no words, Raw Story reports the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), has blasted Bush's acceptance of teaching intelligent design, calling it a psuedo-science.

If the shoe fits.....

Update: Kevin Drum points out this isn't exactly newspeak for Bush.

More on the Sensenbrenner flap from the American Judicature Society (AJS), a national, non-partisan organization established in 1913 to promote the administration of justice. The group has condemned the attempt by the House Judiciary Committee Chair Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) to secure a change in an appellate court decision that would increase the sentence of a convicted drug conspirator.

"What bothers us is not so much that Sensenbrenner and his counsel, both lawyers, were insensitive to the spirit, if not the letter, of both House Ethics Rules and the rules of professional responsibility in privately communicating with a court about a particular case before that court....Nor are we particularly concerned that they appear to have been wrong about the legal rules governing the failure of the government to appeal from what was admittedly an unauthorized sentence," ....

"Our concern is, rather, that this incident is another in a distressingly long series of incidents that demonstrate Sensenbrenner's ignorance of the proper functions of Congress with respect to the federal judiciary and his arrogance in purporting to speak for the American people when attempting to bully federal judges."

As expected, President Bush has appointed John Bolton Ambassador to the U.N. using his recess power of appointment. Here's some initial reaction (received by e-mail):

Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid:

(WASHINGTON, DC) “At a time when we need to reassert our diplomatic power in the world, President Bush has decided to send a seriously flawed and weakened candidate to the United Nations. It’s an unnecessary result, and the latest abuse of power by the Bush White House.

“The reason Bolton is being recess appointed is because the President chose to stonewall the Senate. Mr. Bolton could have had his up or down vote had President Bush given Senators the information they needed. Instead, Bolton arrives at the United Nations with a cloud hanging over his head.”

Sen. Russ Feingold:

USA Today reports that President Bush will be going to his Crawford, Texas ranch for "several weeks" when Congress recesses this week. It will be his 50th trip in 5 years to the ranch.

From a TalkLeft Reader this morning:

I watched a good part of Hardball last night. I saw [blog]coverage [of it]on Atrios and Crooks and Liars regarding the segment with Jean Schmidt, which I thought deserved their focus. They were right in praising David Gregory for going after her as hard as he did.

However, they ignored something even more important where he did not do as good a job. During his interview with Dan Bartlett, Bartlett asserted that the White House would not be releasing all of Robert's writing while in the Solicitor General's office as they were covered by attorney-client privilege and the president needed to be able to rely on that advice. I shouted at Gregory to follow up, but sadly, he did not challenge Bartlett.

This just in via e-mail....36 Senate Democrats including all leadership just signed this letter:

Dear Mr. President:

In light of the fact that John Bolton was not truthful to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the questionnaire he swore was truthful, we ask that you do not make a recess appointment of Mr. Bolton to be the Ambassador to the United Nations and instead submit a new nomination to the Senate.

Mr. Bolton’s excuse that he “didn’t recall being interviewed by the State Department’s Inspector General” is simply not believable. How can you forget an interview about an issue so important that the United States Senate unanimously passed an amendment stating that Congress supports “the thorough and expeditious investigation by the Inspector General of the Department of State and the Inspector General of the Central Intelligence Agency into the documents . . . that the President relied on to conclude that Iraq had attempted to obtain uranium from Africa”? The amendment was cosponsored by the Chairmen of both the Foreign Relations Committee and the Intelligence Committee.

Mr. President, we know you are engaged in an effort to strengthen our relationships throughout the world. Sending someone to the United Nations who has not been confirmed by the United States Senate and now who has admitted to not being truthful on a document so important that it requires a sworn affidavit is going to set our efforts back in many ways.