Greenpeace says an IRS auditor told it that the PIW letter triggered the audit. The IRS won't say how it decided to audit Greenpeace.

What is clear is where PIW has gotten a lot of its funding: Exxon Mobil Corp., the giant oil company that has long been a target of Greenpeace protests.

Anyone want odds on these guys taking a look at DeLay's, Santorum's or hell, even Jack Abramoff's non-profits?

WSJ.com - Did a Group Financed by Exxon Prompt IRS to Audit Greenpeace?

But in a little-noticed white paper submitted by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to Congress on January 19 justifying the legality of the NSA eavesdropping, Justice Department lawyers made a tacit case that President Bush also has the inherent authority to order such physical searches.

This wouldn't even have been in there unless they were doing it. The 4th Amendment states

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

There isn't really any ambiguity in there, and the places that have been fuzzy (Miranda, searching of vehicles on the way to impound etc.) have largely been ruled on by the courts. Where is there zero ambiguity? Houses and businesses. If there is to be a search, it is done with a warrant, period.

I have zero doubts they've been doing this. It is too consistent with everything else they've done already.

USNews.com: The White House says spying on terrorism suspects without court approval is OK. What about physical searches?

The slogan, as one Defense Department official explained, reflected an adage adopted by Task Force 6-26: "If you don't make them bleed, they can't prosecute for it." According to Pentagon specialists who worked with the unit, prisoners at Camp Nama often disappeared into a detention black hole, barred from access to lawyers or relatives, and confined for weeks without charges. "The reality is, there were no rules there," another Pentagon official said.

And people wonder why we're not thought of so highly in the rest of the world anymore.

In Secret Unit's 'Black Room,' a Grim Portrait of U.S. Abuse - New York Times

Lawyers for two airlines being sued by 9/11 victims prompted a federal attorney to coach witnesses in the Zacarias Moussaoui death penalty trial so the government's case against the al-Qaida conspirator would not undercut their defense, victims' lawyers allege.

Oh this just keeps getting better. The TSA lawyer who did this tampered with witnesses to help protect airlines in their defense against lawsuits? This isn't that classic "frivolous lawsuit" crap that the Republicans keep tossing out, The suit against the airlines is real and they bear some responsibility for what happened in the same way parents should lock up guns to keep the five year old away from them.

What Martin did here is reprehensible and at a minimum she should be disbarred. She screwed with a criminal case, sabotaging the government in order to aid a business interest.

Witness Tampering Cited in Moussaoui Case

The council, part of the National Academies of Science, said that California's "pioneering role" in setting emission standards has posed additional costs and risks. But it concluded that it has been an effective proving ground for new technologies "that benefit California and the rest of the nation."

...

Bond's office said in a statement that the study "supports Congress' continued need to ensure that California does not hurt other states" with its own requirements.

Wow. How do you get from the National Research Council saying that, to what Bond says it means? I guess black really is white.

NRC vs Bond

They acknowledge their only hope of obtaining the death penalty for the 37-year-old Frenchman of Moroccan descent is to persuade U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema she punished the government too harshly for tampering with trial witnesses and lying to defense attorneys.

We wanted to kill him so bad we tampered with witnesses and lied to the defense? Rule of law anyone? Dear Justice Department, go to hell. You either play by the rules or you go to hell.

Considering the first thing that's going to happen to this guy when he enters general population is that he's going to get shanked, I don't know why they're bothering. Getting the death penalty means in 6 years and after spending god only knows how much more money, they'll fry this guy. Stick him in general pop and he'll be dead in under six months.

U.S. Try to Revise Moussaoui Ruling - Yahoo! News

This is a great game, classic March Madness.

So good, I’ll order another beer.

Yahoo's sports guy blogging day one of the tournament from a bar. Great stuff.

Monitoring the Madness - NCAAB - Yahoo! Sports

The inventor of ctrl-alt-delete explains how it happened... and then how it became famous... Short, nice story, then ZING!

The Story of Ctrl Alt Delete - Google Video

The House voted 96-59 to delete the funding for contraception and infertility treatments after Rep. Susan Phillips told lawmakers that anti-abortion groups such as Missouri Right to Life were opposed to the spending.

It's not enough that they want to retrict abortion, but at the same time they're restricting every other way out there to avoid getting pregnant, and eliminating education about it as well. They're just plain evil.

House rejects spending for birth control

Though America's trade deficit has been growing by about $100 billion annually - hitting $726 billion last year - that doesn't necessarily mean a sober day of reckoning is drawing near.

"It's clear that the US trade deficit cannot go on galloping ahead $100 billion a year indefinitely," says Daniel Griswold, a trade expert at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington. But "it's more likely the adjustments will be incremental rather than jarring."

Whoa! I don't see $726,000,000,000 looking much like $100,000,000,000. If it were still looking that way, I might agree changes would be incremental. It's not. The only similarity is that the trade defecit hasn't hit 13 digits yet. This isn't going to be incremental, at some point that bill is going to come due and we're not going to be able to pay it.

By the way, that's DEFICIT. One year. What's the total DEBT?

About 400 years ago, Polonius said "Neither a borrower nor a lender be." While the principle is reasonable, practicality says it is permissible. We aren't being borrower and lender, we just keep borrowing, and borrowing, and borrowing. At some point, we need to give back. Well we don't have that, and that means it either gets fixed real fast, or the 1930's might look like an age of prosperity.

Giant trade gap: no end in sight - Yahoo! News