Well, not really. But Mrs. O'Toole and I will be in the mountains until Friday. Expect blogging to be sporadic at best until we get back.

--------

Columnist Robert Novak recently told his readers that the authors of Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry are "real patriots." He didn't tell them that his son is in charge of marketing the book....

--------

TNR's Michelle Cottle isn't impressed by Vice President Dick Cheney's recent decision to seek a family hardship deferment from The War on Sodomy:

No one doubts that the Vice President's apostasy on this issue is entirely personal. If Mary [Cheney] weren't a lesbian, Cheney would at this very minute be somewhere deep in the red states, warning voters in that scowling, brook-no-arguments way of his that gay marriage is exactly the sort of fuzzy-headed liberal nonsense that gives aid and comfort to Al Qaeda. (Lynne would be right there beside him, blaming the whole mess on those perverted, Mapplethorpe-loving bastards over at the National Endowment for the Arts.) But because one of his kids happens to bat for the other team, suddenly Dick's a free-to-be-you-and-me, "freedom for everyone" kind of guy....

I understand that all politics are personal. But are we really supposed to applaud a man who strays from his pinched ideological worldview only when it serves to benefit himself or someone in his circle of intimates? That's not compassionate conservativism; that's political cronyism (or, in Mary's case, nepotism).

Of course, if having personal ties to an issue is what it takes to get the Vice President in touch with his softer side, we should probably all be rooting for Cheney to discover that, in addition to having a gay daughter, he also has a couple of black grandkids, an illegal immigrant cousin, an aunt with a drug habit, a transsexual brother, a sister who just got laid off from a textile mill in North Carolina, and a long-lost son who's been getting his butt shot at in Najaf.

With enough rabble-rousers, poor folk, and minorities in the family, the Vice President might actually be forced to become a tolerant, compassionate kind of guy. Barring that, we can only hope that enough swing-voters see through Dick's freedom-for-everyone b.s. to send the dark-hearted, autocratic jerk back to Wyoming come November.

That's right. And the rest is here.

--------

Back Friday.

--------

In 1992, Sidney Blumenthal wrote a piece for The New Republic recounting a non-story from Bush the Elder's 1988 race -- an allegation by one veteran, Chester Mierzejewski (with no publishing houses or paid media behind him, one should add), that George H.W. Bush wasn't telling the entire truth about his record during WWII.

Yesterday, Glenn Reynolds linked to an extended excerpt from Blumenthal's article with these words: "TRASHING A CANDIDATE'S WAR RECORD: In 1992."

So, what does the 12-year-old Blumenthal piece say that's actually relevant to Campaign 2004? Well, not a lot. But there is this:

On August 12, 1988, the first day of the GOP convention in New Orleans, the [New York Post] newspaper published a front-page story, THE DAY BUSH BAILED OUT, by Allan Wolper and Al Ellenberg, which laid out Mierzejewski's claims. Some of the other crewmen substantiated a number of his details, including that he had the best view. The article noted that Mierzejewski was upset that though he was interviewed by the officer who wrote the intelligence report [on the incident], his account was not included in it.

The Bush campaign responded to the story by circulating the intelligence report to the press. A spokesman called Mierzejewski's version "absurd." ... Then the coup de grace was delivered by [Democratic presidential nominee] Michael Dukakis, who remarked: "I don't think that kind of thing has any place in the campaign." Bush's wish was his command. Never again during the presidential race was the story raised.

"I don't think that kind of thing has any place in the campaign."

Indeed.

--------

PRESIDENT BUSH PRAISES PORTER GOSS: "He knows the CIA inside and out. He's the right man to lead this important agency at this critical moment in our nation's history."

PRESIDENT BUSH CRITICIZES JOHN KERRY: "During eight years on the Senate Intelligence Committee, he voted to cut the intelligence budget..."

REALITY REARS ITS UGLY HEAD:

Goss Backed '95 Bill To Slash Intelligence President Bush's nominee to be the director of central intelligence, Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), sponsored legislation that would have cut intelligence personnel by 20 percent in the late 1990s.

Goss, who has been chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence for the past eight years, was one of six original co-sponsors of legislation in 1995 that called for cuts of at least 4 percent per year between 1996 and 2000 in the total number of people employed throughout the intelligence community.

The Bush reelection campaign has been blasting Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry as deeply irresponsible for proposing intelligence cuts at the same time. A Bush campaign ad released on Aug. 13 carried a headline: "John Kerry . . . proposed slashing Intelligence Budget 6 Billion Dollars."

But the cuts Goss supported are larger than those proposed by Kerry and specifically targeted the "human intelligence" that has recently been found lacking. The recent report by the commission probing the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks called for more spending on human intelligence.

--------

NOAM SCHEIBER: "Matt Dowd is full of sh**."

--------

Matt's right. And, on an unrelated matter, so is Ogged; Atrios should leave the nasty cheap shots about other peoples' motives to the folks who specialize in that sort of thing.

POSTSCRIPT, RE: ATRIOS: Does Dr. Black really believe for a moment that people like me -- people who've spent our lives fighting for the same progressive ideals that he holds dear -- could possibly think that way? Or is he just so damned angry about the whole situation that he's completely lost his sense of perspective? I honestly don't know. But I do know this: When demagogues like Andrew Sullivan challenge the motives (i.e., the patriotism) of the liberal wing of the Democratic party, I stand shoulder to shoulder with my friends. And I'm not about to stop just because one those friends appears to have (temporarily, one hopes) lost his way.

UPDATE (8/23): Two quick points.

1) As is his wont (at least in my experience), Atrios couldn't have been any more civil in his response. After offering a spirited recap of his original argument, he closed his reply with these words: "Yes, I am angry that otherwise intelligent people climbed aboard this twisted and nakedly cynical endeavor which was clearly a fraud from start to finish. But, no, I don't question the motives of all who did - just the ones who believe that by being wrong they were proven right."

2) To the vanishingly small percentage of Atrios' readers who felt the need to point out that I'm a F***ING IDIOT (and not just a run-of-the-mill F***ING IDIOT, either, but apparently the kind who could benefit from a little, uh, enhancement, as well), I can only say this: As long as you're voting for John Kerry this fall, have at it, folks. The URL is jackotoole.net, and comments are open 24/7.

--------

NEW YORK TIMES: "Mr. Bush's advisers said they were girding for the most extensive street demonstrations at any political convention since the Democrats nominated Hubert H. Humphrey in Chicago in 1968. But in contrast to that convention, which was severely undermined by televised displays of street rioting, Republicans said they would seek to turn any disruptions to their advantage, by portraying protests by even independent activists as Democratic-sanctioned displays of disrespect for a sitting president." [Emph. added.]

--------

Over at TOPDOG04, the blogger known simply as "Mike" proposes a thought experiment:

Pretend the Pope is out of town for surgery in London, and the Americans are assaulting Saint Peter's Cathedral while he is gone, to attack IRA radicals holed up there. If you were a Catholic, you might understand how the Shia feel today.

Read it all here.

POSTSCRIPT: Via Kevin Drum, Juan Cole discusses Najaf's place in the hierarchy of Islamic holy cities.

UPDATE (7:41am): According to the AP, followers of the "radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said Friday they were preparing to hand control of the revered Imam Ali Shrine to top Shiite religious authorities in a bid to end a two-week-old uprising in the holy city of Najaf."

--------

BOB HERBERT: "The smell of voter suppression coming out of Florida is getting stronger. It turns out that a Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigation, in which state troopers have gone into the homes of elderly black voters in Orlando in a bizarre hunt for evidence of election fraud, is being conducted despite a finding by the department last May 'that there was no basis to support the allegations of election fraud.'"

--------

I'm trying to remember. What's that mocking formulation that Glenn Reynolds is so fond of? Something about dissembling and death, right? ... Oh, yeah, that's it:

SWIFTIES LIED, TREES DIED.

--------

WHAT GEORGEWBUSH.COM SAYS:

Setting the Record Straight: President Bush's Tax Cuts Reduce Burden on the Middle Class

Kerry Claim: President Bush's tax breaks have forced middle class families to pay a bigger share of America’s tax burden.

The Truth: Today’s Democrat-requested report from the Congressional Budget Office confirms what the Treasury Department reported earlier this year and what the Joint Committee on Taxation reported in 2001: All income taxpayers benefit from President Bush's tax cuts. The reality is that President Bush's tax cuts have made the income tax more progressive.

• Top One Percent of Earners: The percentage of income taxes paid by the top one percent of earners will be higher this year under the tax cuts (32.3 percent) than without the tax cuts (31.6 percent).
• Middle Class: Under President Bush's tax cuts, the middle 20 percent of earners will pay just 5.4 percent of all income taxes this year. Without the tax cuts they would pay a higher 6.4 percent of all income taxes.
• Bottom 80 Percent of Earners: Under President Bush's tax cuts, the bottom 80 percent of earners will pay just 17.8 percent of all income taxes this year. Without the tax cuts they would pay a higher 21.6 percent of all income taxes.

John Kerry's attack is misleading in light of the fact that his budget numbers don’t add up, and he'll raise taxes to pay for his spending. Kerry has voted 98 times for higher taxes totaling more than $2.3 trillion during his 19 year Senate career. Kerry has made 133 campaign promises. According to a recent American Enterprise Institute study, Kerry's plans for new spending add up to between $2 trillion and $2.1 trillion over the next ten years. Kerry has even referred to his 1993 vote for the largest tax increase in U.S. history as an economic blueprint for his presidency.

RT IN QUESTION SAYS:

UPDATE: Oops. In the comments, Max Sawicky points out that I shouldn't have reproduced the CBO table using 2014, because it "reflects the reversion to old tax law." (He suggests that I could and should have used 2004 in order to make the same point, and he's absolutely right.) Sorry for the early morning carelessness, and, as always, I'll try to do better next time.

UPDATE POSTSCRIPT: And if you haven't read Max's posts on this subject, you'll find them here, here, and here.

--------

When it comes to the environment, the Bush administration has apparently decided that you just can't handle the truth.

About a dozen journalist organizations complained Monday that a proposed Homeland Security Department policy would impede the public release of information on environmental hazards.

In comments filed with the department, the groups said the agency is ditching some routine environmental oversight in the name of security....

Their complaint involves the 1970 National Environmental Policy Act, which requires lengthy environmental studies and public comments to detail the effects a proposed project would have on the environment and ways to minimize that impact.

Homeland Security said it will still conduct its environmental assessments in accordance with federal standards as defined by the 1970 act. But the department added it would not release such assessments to the public if key material is deemed classified or protected.

"In such cases, other appropriate security and environmental officials will ensure that the consideration of environmental effects will be consistent with the letter and intent of NEPA," the department wrote in its notice in June.

But the coalition said the range of information Homeland Security could withhold is too broad, and the new policy could give the agency "a blank-check authority to declare information secret."

Homeland Security did not return calls seeking comment Monday....

The signatories to the coalition's comments include the Society of Environmental Journalists, the Associated Press Managing Editors, the American Society of Newspaper Editors and the National Press Club.

The rest is .
[Link redacted in the interests of national security.]

UPDATE: Oh, all right. It's here.

--------

FROM THE GEORGEWBUSH.COM JOBS AND THE ECONOMY FAQ:

Does the President support another Unemployment Insurance extension?

• The Administration has extended Federal unemployment benefits three times, providing over $23 billion to help 7.8 million American workers. Over the last 10 months, we have seen over 1.5 million jobs created, and the unemployment rate has fallen from its peak of 6.3 percent last June to 5.6 percent this year, and we expect that trend to continue. The Administration will continue to work with Congress on this issue.

Does the President support a minimum wage increase?

• New jobs are being created. The economy has added over 1.5 million jobs since August. The President is focused on policies that will keep the economy growing.
• The Administration will continue to work with Congress to study the various minimum wage proposals.

--------

Iraqi Conference on Election Plan Sinks Into Chaos

Crude Hits Record $46.90

Bush Economy, Viewed by Stock Market, Loses Investor Confidence

Fall in job growth clouds economy

Federal budget deficit hits record $395.8 billion

Dollar Drops Versus Euro; US Trade Deficit Widens to Record

POSTSCRIPT: The strange mania that has infected this administration's policy team from the get-go (Tax cuts pay for themselves! Deficits don't matter! Flowers and candy!) has now somehow found its way into the political side of the operation (We've turned the corner! Kerry's...French! Swift boats, that's the ticket!) -- and unless these guys start working their way back into the world the rest of us are living in (and I mean soon), they're in real danger of finding themselves on the wrong end of one of the most improbable electoral drubbings in US history.

--------

If you're interested (and you should be, despite the subject's inherently MEGO nature), here's a solid AP backgrounder on the Bush administration's other war -- the War on Science.

--------

A significantly diminished (though still powerful enough) Charley is expected to arrive in our neck of the woods in the next few hours, so blogging will probably be light to nonexistent for the next day or so. Hope to see you soon.

POSTSCRIPT: Good luck and godspeed to all the good people of Florida, who appear to have taken a real hit this time. We're thinking of you.

--------

According to the Associated Press, "President Bush is refusing to condemn an ad that criticizes rival John Kerry's Vietnam war record, even though the president's campaign partner this week, Sen. John McCain, urged the White House to do so.

"'I haven't seen the ad, but what I do condemn is these regulated, soft-money expenditures' by outside groups that have filled the airwaves with attacks on both candidates, the president said Thursday night on CNN's Larry King Live."

In a separate development, President Bush also refused to condemn the fact that 45 million Americans lack basic healthcare coverage, but called the average fifty-two minute delay in most doctors' waiting rooms "an affront to busy people everywhere."

--------

In a web only (read "free") piece over at TNR today, Michelle Cottle argues that state and local governments have too many conflicts of interest to be allowed to make their own decisions about whether and when to issue terror warnings.

The story Cottle uses to illustrate her point is pretty compelling. In 2002, federal officials informed California and Nevada that raids on Al Qaeda cells in Spain and Detroit had turned up evidence of a threat to several high-profile targets in their states. California's response, as you may recall, was swift, certain and public, while Nevada's was, well, not -- primarily due to Las Vegas' concerns about tourists and torts. Which leads Cottle to the heart of her argument:

Now, one could argue that Vegas officials would never be so stupid as to sit on information that, in the event of an attack, would come back to destroy them. But life in Vegas is all about playing the odds. And since tourism is what keeps Vegas from sinking back into the sand, it's not hard to imagine a scenario in which local officials would consider almost any risk worth protecting the city's economic lifeblood.

But for a moment let's set aside the question of whether Vegas authorities have been treating blissfully ignorant tourists (and residents) like so many poker chips. What I want to know is why the federal government didn't issue any sort of warning on its own. If the threat was credible enough to send the state of California into a tizzy, why on earth was the decision about whether to alert the fine folks of Vegas left to a bunch of local yokels with an obvious economic conflict of interest?

More importantly, is this delegation of responsibility happening elsewhere, and if so, how often? How clear and present does a danger need to be before the federal government takes matters into its own hands? Certainly, Las Vegas isn't the only town whose officials are more concerned about economic ruin than the admittedly slim chance of a terrorist attack.

She's right. National defense is Uncle Sam's job. And the Bush administration needs to be willing to set aside its states' rights rhetoric long enough to forcefully assert this uniquely federal prerogative.

--------

Has this administration ever met a no-bid contract it didn't like?

Stretched thin by troop deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan and security needs at home, the Army has resorted to hiring private security guards to help protect dozens of American military bases.

To date, more than 4,300 private security officers have been put to work at 50 Army installations in the United States, according to Army documents obtained by The Times.

The work was awarded to four firms — two of which got the contracts without having to bid competitively. The contracts are worth as much as $1.24 billion....

[T]he Army's action has drawn criticism on two grounds: that it compromises domestic military security, and that it amounts to abuse of a law intended to aid impoverished Alaska Natives.

Two five-year contracts worth as much as $1 billion went to two small Alaska Native firms with little previous security experience. The firms, which operate under special contracting laws enabling them to avoid competitive bidding, subcontracted part of the work to two of the country's largest security firms: Wackenhut Services Inc. and Vance Federal Security Services....

Steven Schooner, a contracting expert at George Washington University's Law School, said the Army's actions showed a lack of planning.

"If it's true that [Alaska Native corporations] are getting contracts of staggering volumes solely for the purpose of avoiding competition or being a funnel to the same firms that should be otherwise competing for the work … it's offensive," Schooner said. "It's ridiculous." [Emph. added.]

If you're up to it, you'll find the rest of the story here.

--------

Following the NYT's lead, the WaPo has conducted a thorough review of its pre-war WMD coverage, and the results aren't pretty....

--------

"Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I'll have an investigation."

--House Intelligence Committee Chairman and DCI-designate Porter Goss, in an October 2003 interview on the Valerie Plame matter. (Via Slate.)

--------

Look for regular blogging to resume sometime this afternoon....

UPDATE (8/3/04): Well, that didn't exactly go as planned. Long story short: My doctor's appointment yesterday morning turned up a couple of those "welcome to forty"-style problems that (almost) middle-aged flesh is heir to, and I've been spending most of my time since in out-of-town waiting rooms of one kind or another. If all goes well, I should be back to blogging by tomorrow or Thursday.

Thanks as always for your patience, and I hope to see you soon.

FINAL UPDATE (8/10/04): Sorry about the long break, but, I, uh, ... well, I had my reasons, and since this ain't Oprah, I won't bore you with them. I'll probably start back slowly -- I'm almost as far behind at work as I am here -- but the blog is now officially back in business.

POSTSCRIPT: Thanks again for your patience, and for all the kind e-mails I got while I was away. I really appreciate it.

--------

I suppose she could have just stayed home and baked cookies and had teas, but her husband's reelect was in real trouble, and there was some serious (and seriously disingenuous) Kerry-bashing work to be done....

--------

Krugman: "What we've just seen is as clear a test of trickledown economics as we're ever likely to get."

--------