She said she then got a call from New York later the same day asking her to introduce Giuliani at a rally in Cedar Rapids, also scheduled for May 4. They offered her one-on-one time with Giuliani and to have her photo taken with him.

“My feeling is that they’re trying to cover their butts,” said Jerry.

“I may go and give him a piece of my mind, but I’m not going to introduce him,” Deb included.

Rule: Don't pull things like this on people in Iowa. They find it insulting and have very long memories. I'll be surprised if Rudy gets a single vote from Anamosa that isn't at the state pen.

Giuliani Snubs Jones County - Anamosa Journal Eureka, Anamosa, Iowa

On November 7 Black informed the DOJ of his preliminary investigation of Abramoff. Days later, Guam's new Republican Governor, Felix Camacho, wrote a letter to the White House asking to keep Black on. Yet on November 19, a day after Black subpoenaed the Abramoff contract, the Administration announced that it was nominating Rapadas. Black was subsequently barred from handling any public corruption cases.

A more extensive treatment on the case of Fred Black. They did it once, and no one noticed. Then they canned Graves and no one noticed. Then they went too far and everyone noticed. And all of it goes right to the White House. This one is not going away.

Attorneygate in Guam

In fact, a Justice Department spokesperson had told the press, and senior Justice officials had told Pryor in a private meeting, that although it was the common practice when a U.S. attorney resigned to name the first assistant U.S. attorney in the office as the interim, they had not done so in the case of Cummins's departure because his first assistant, Jane Duke, was about to go on maternity leave.

But other Justice Department records show that Sampson and the White House had decided to name Griffin as a U.S. attorney in June 2006 even before Duke knew she was pregnant. And the records show that they attempted to name Griffin as an interim U.S. attorney to either enhance the possibility that he would be confirmed by the Senate or to circumvent Senate confirmation completely.

It seems that not only was their stated reason illegal, it was also false. Whoops.

NATIONAL JOURNAL: Administration Withheld E-Mails About Rove (05/10/07)

On a 6-3 vote, the board replaced the policies with one that recommends "abstinence plus" sex education programs and leaves it up to the state's 296 school districts to decide whether to get parental permission.

The "abstinence plus" program stresses abstinence before marriage, while also urging schools to give students information about birth control and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases.

It's nice to see Kansas finally starting to join the 20th century.

Kansas Board of Ed.�repeals conservative sex ed policies - CNN.com

Participants in the Tuesday meeting between Mr. Bush, senior administration officials and 11 members of a moderate bloc of House Republicans said the lawmakers were unusually candid with the president, telling him that public support for the war was crumbling in their swing districts.

One told Mr. Bush that voters back home favored a withdrawal even if it meant the war was judged a loss. Representative Tom Davis told Mr. Bush that the president’s approval rating was at 5 percent in one section of his northern Virginia district.

We saw the hints of a sea change in 2006, it's starting to look like 2008 may be a full blown tidal wave, unlike anything since 1976 or 1932.

G.O.P. Moderates Warn Bush Iraq Must Show Gains - New York Times

The former U.S. attorney in Kansas City, Mo., Todd P. Graves, said yesterday that he was asked to step down from his job by a senior Justice Department official in January 2006, months before eight other federal prosecutors would be fired by the Bush administration.

Add Mr. Black in Guam and you have ten. This is the going to be the end. The best case scenario is going to be if Bush can find someone to step in like Ford to pardon him and Cheney. The more likely scenario? Danbury. The first charge will be obstruction of justice relating to the attorney firings (Lam vs Lewis, Doolittle and Abramoff, Graves and the bogus voter fraud cases in Missouri, Black and more fun with Jack Abramoff, Iglesias vs Renzi) and it will not improve from there.

Sorry George, there is no executive privilege when you break the law.

WP: Number of fired prosecutors grows - washingtonpost.com

"The surge needs to go through the beginning of next year for sure," said Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the day-to-day commander for U.S. military operations in Iraq.

General Odierno is the former head of the 4th Infantry, and appropriately blasted for the actions of his command. If he's in charge of the ops Petraeus is writing, there is no way in hell the "surge" will do anything but make things even worse.

Petraeus is the right guy to run the show there but is probably too late. With Odierno behind him, he's screwed, and so are we.

Commanders in Iraq See 'Surge' Into '08 - washingtonpost.com

The petition, directed to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, asks that Hilton be pardoned from her sentence of 45 days in jail for violating the terms of her probation by driving with a suspended license. The punishment was handed down in Los Angeles Superior Court on Friday. An appeal has been filed.

"I urge all fans and supporters and all that are outraged by injustice to sign this petition," writes Hilton.

I only have one thing to say about this, and it's not a word.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Paris Hilton Asks for Schwarzenegger Pardon - Paris Hilton : People.com

The White House fought back Tuesday against criticism from Kansas' governor that National Guard deployments to Iraq are slowing the response to last week's devastating tornado.

White House press secretary Tony Snow said the fault was Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius'.

We've been down this road before, it's called "Heckuva job Brownie!"

White House Disputes Guard Shortages | The Huffington Post

The governor said the state's response was limited by the shifting of emergency equipment, such as tents, trucks and semitrailers, to the war in Iraq.

"Not having the National Guard equipment, which used to be positioned in various parts of the state, to bring in immediately is really going to handicap this effort to rebuild," Sebelius said.

Situations like this are one of the primary purposes of the National Guard. They don't have what they need to do the job anymore. Enough.

Kansas Families Return to Town in Ruins