Here's a place for all your continued thoughts on Cindy Sheehan. The movement is swelling. Will Bush relent and meet with her? Where is this headed? Who's writing great stuff? My favorite has been the Huffington Post. (Links must be in html format, instructions are in the comment box.)

[Thread now full, continued here.]

A source close to the offical proceedings involving Saddam Hussein's trial says he could be executed after the first trial.

Saddam's daughter is running the defense. Now she says his defense lawyer may boycott the trial. Does she think they would hesitate a nanosecond to try him without a lawyer? Sounds like the fastest way to the execution chamber to me.

Lawyers should be running Saddam's defense, not his daughter.

It's Cindy Sheehan day over at Huffington Post, with entries by Cindy herself, Arianna, Norman Lear, Gary Hart, Christine Lahti, Andy Stern, Sarah Jones, Rep. Jim McDermott, Tom Hayden and Jodie Evans.

Crooks and Liars has video of Cindy on Olbermann tonight.

Joe Trippi has an audio of a conference call with Cindy. And Attytood casts doubt on the e-mail critical of Cindy one of her family members reportedly sent to Drudge. [Via Atrios.]

Raw Story has an investigative piece up in which it says that Sen. Pat Roberts fixed the pre-war intelligence to help Republicans.

Via Daily Kos and Attytood we learn the story of Gennaro Pellegrini, a police officer and boxer who got caught in the Pentagon's Stop Loss program through which his tour of duty in Iraq was extended. Here's the background, from Will Bunch's article in the Philadelphia Daily News. Yesterday, Bunch (aka Attytood) brings us the unhappy ending.

"I just want to get it done, come home, and continue my life." Those were just about the last words that Gennaro Pellegrini, Jr. -- a 31-year-old Philly cop and up-and-coming boxer -- said to us when we spoke last last November. In less than 48 hours, Pellegrini was about to step onto an airplane bound for Iraq, along with the rest of his Pennsylvania National Guard unit from Northeast Philadelphia.

For anyone who's worried about the return of a military draft, Pellegrini was living proof that we already have one in George W. Bush's America. He desperately did not want to serve in the Persian Gulf. He was just two weeks away from finishing up his six-year stint in the Guard when he was told that his tour of duty was being extended and that he would serve in Iraq for at least a year, maybe longer. The news could not have come at a worse time for Pellegrini. He was training for his first pro fight, newly engaged to be married, and settling into his job as a Philadelphia police officer, just like his dad.

by TChris

Is this the kind of democracy that the Bush administration has so proudly brought to Iraq?

Armed men entered Baghdad's municipal building during a blinding dust storm on Monday, deposed the city's mayor and installed a member of Iraq's most powerful Shiite militia.

The deposed mayor says: "This is the new Iraq. They use force to achieve their goal." Gosh, where could they have learned that?

Update: There was a blogger call with Cindy Sheehan today. I missed it, but Crooks and Liars has the details.

Two San Diego area women have gone to Crawford to be with Cindy Sheehan as she waits for a meeting with President Bush. They have never met Sheehan, do not have any kids who are in Iraq or were killed there, but they oppose the war. They are prepared to stay for the length of Bush's vacation.

The Guardian has this summary today, if you are new to the story:

Casey Sheehan did not want to go to Iraq, but he did not want to let down his buddies. So despite his mother's offer to whisk him away to Canada or run his leg over with a car, off he went. Less than two weeks later, the 24-year-old from Zacaville, California, was dead, one of eight soldiers killed in an ambush near Baghdad.

Now, 16 months later, Cindy Sheehan, 48, is camped outside George Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, demanding to see the president. "I want to ask him why did my son die? What was this noble cause you talk about? And if the cause is so noble, when are you going to send your daughters over there and let somebody else's son come home?"

One more: Carol Marin has a good column in today's Chicago Sun Times on Ms. Sheehan.

How many Generals have you seen demoted over the torture abuse scandals at Abu Ghraib, Bagram, Camp Bucci or Guantanamo? What does it take for a reprimand? An extra-marital affair.

In a rare move, the Army relieved a four-star general of his command amid allegations that he had an extramarital affair with a civilian, Army officials said yesterday.

Update: Arianna has a lot to say about this.

Via Suburban Guerilla who asks, Better Off?

Reuters:

Hassan Feiraz, a 16-year-old boy, has started a desperate new life since being forced into the sex trade in Baghdad, joining a growing number of adolescents soliciting in Iraq under the threat of street gangs or the force of poverty.

"Every day I cry at night," Feiraz said. "I'm a homosexual and was forced to work as a prostitute because one of the people I had sex with took pictures of me in bed and said that, if I didn't work for him, he was going to send the pictures to my family."

"My life is a disaster today. I could be killed by my family to restore their honour," he said, explaining that homosexuality was totally unacceptable in Iraq due to religious beliefs.

Saddam Hussein's family has fired all his lawyers except one, Iraqi lawyer Khalil Dulaimi.

"There are too many people in the world who are claiming they are defending the president without the family's knowledge and we don't know who authorized them," said Abdel Haq Alani, the legal consultant of Raghd, Saddam's eldest daughter who is authorized to act on behalf of the ousted leader's family.

He told Reuters Saddam's family had revoked any right of attorney previously issued to any lawyers to represent Saddam, and had chosen Iraqi lawyer Khalil Dulaimi who attends Saddam's court hearings as the "only authorized lawyer at this moment."

Curiously, this is one of the reasons, according to Abdel Haq Alani, the legal consultant for Saddam's daughter:

by TChris

Cindy Sheehan has a question for President Bush: "Why did my son die?"

Her son, Casey, 24, was killed in Sadr City, Iraq, on April 4, 2004. He was an Army specialist, a Humvee mechanic.

Cindy is in Crawford, as close as she can get to the vacationing president. She planned to camp out until Bush answers her question, but she's having trouble getting his attention. The local police have played games with Cindy and the protestors who accompany her, preventing her from getting closer than four or five miles from the president's ranch.

Cindy decided the president needed to be held accountable after she heard him say that the troops have died for a worthy cause that must be seen to its end.

And the war marches on, taking more American lives....

• 14 Marines and Interpreter killed in bombing outside Iraq

• Freelance American journalist and art critic Steven Vincent shot dead in Basra.