Getting What They Wished For
Looks like Patrick Fitzgerald is going to go the distance and make everybody miserable on account of goddamned Joe Wilson and his wife:

WASHINGTON - Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said in court filings that the ongoing CIA leak investigation will involve proceedings before a new grand jury, a possible sign he could seek new charges in the case.

In filings obtained by Reuters on Friday, Fitzgerald said "the investigation is continuing” and that “the investigation will involve proceedings before a different grand jury than the grand jury which returned the indictment” against Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

Fitzgerald did not elaborate in the document. For two years he has been investigating the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity. The grand jury that indicted Libby expired after the charges were filed late last month.

This is Pandora's box, you know. The anti-Bush Left wants this to bring down the White House, but it isn't going to work that way. Instead, I say that Fitzgerald's investigation is going to expose Big Media like it's never been exposed before.

Let's have it.

Worth Staying Up For
Mood:  happy
It must be said that KXAN news anchor Michelle Valles' much-anticipated report on self-defense techniques was well worth the wait. Although the very idea that this woman should ever be attacked or harmed is hateful to me, it was a delight to see her in action. She is magnificence itself.

What I Said over at Jeff Goldstein's Crib
Jeff Goldstein has put a foot up Rod Dreher's kiester on the topic of John Murtha's remarks today against the War for Iraq. I added this in the comments section there:

Since it's been forgotten, let me remind certain wankers of a basic truth about the advocacy of ---or opposition to--- this war or any other issue in political life: citizens in a civil society are only obligated to know what they are talking about. They are not obligated to have personal experience of the thing they advocate or oppose, but they must be informed and have a conscience.

Anti-war Leftists (or troubled minds like Rod Dreher) have somehow convinced themselves that opposition to this war is available to anyone with a mouth or an asshole (if they can be distinguished), but that advocacy is only available to military veterans. You know that something must be wrong if anti-war liberals are deferring to the military in any way since their default setting when attacking advocates who have not served is that they should go and die in Bu$hitler's War.

Which is a suggestion made with the greatest respect for the men and women who do fight on our behalf, right?

Fuck dumbasses who can't think straight. I'm past done with them.

The Theoretical Limit of Irony
Now Playing: "Fantasy" by Aldo Nova
I found this Reuters story over at Michelle Malkin's place. It is about a man so hypocritical and full of chutzpah that he actually emits a small amount of radioactivity:

Joseph Wilson, the husband of outed CIA operative Valerie Plame, called on Thursday for an inquiry by The Washington Post into the conduct of journalist Bob Woodward, who repeatedly criticized the leak investigation without disclosing his own involvement.

"It certainly gives the appearance of a conflict of interest. He was taking an advocacy position when he was a party to it," Wilson said.

He was taking an advocacy positio--- oh, fuck it!

Ha, ha, ha...

Kean and Able
Now Playing: what else? cowboy junkies, man.
I found this Wall Street Journal op-ed via Drudge's place earlier today and was quite blown away by how angry Louis Freeh has become towards wankers like the Kean Commission. On the subject of them and the inconvenient Able Danger story, Freeh writes:

It was interesting to hear from the 9/11 Commission again on Tuesday. This self-perpetuating and privately funded group of lobbyists and lawyers has recently opined on hurricanes, nuclear weapons, the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel and even the New York subway system. Now it offers yet another "report card" on the progress of the FBI and CIA in the war against terrorism, along with its "back-seat" take and some further unsolicited narrative about how things ought to be on the "front lines."

Yet this is also a good time for the country to make some assessments of the 9/11 Commission itself. Recent revelations from the military intelligence operation code-named "Able Danger" have cast light on a missed opportunity that could have potentially prevented 9/11. Specifically, Able Danger concluded in February 2000 that military experts had identified Mohamed Atta by name (and maybe photograph) as an al Qaeda agent operating in the U.S. Subsequently, military officers assigned to Able Danger were prevented from sharing this critical information with FBI agents, even though appointments had been made to do so. Why?

Read it all, gang. This man was the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The worm-filled Left and other kinds of Clintonistas don't want you to pay him any mind because they know it reflects poorly on their man, but Freeh is in full throat.

Dig it.

Thanks, Duncan
Thanks to Duncan Black for banning me again. He must know that I could do much better work here if I would just stay away from his dive. And it's true. I mess around there too much when I should be working on my own site.

Alright. Off again to do battle. Thanks, comrade.

The Perpetual Atrocity
Did you see John Kerry on Wolf Blitzer's program tonight? I can't wait to see the transcript, but he was just fucking awful. Inexcusably stupid, dodgy, and stuck in campaign mode.

My favorite bit, though, was the threat he made to consider another run for the White House in 2008. Can you imagine? He'll get his seat at the table because he's earned it, but what's the dynamic going to be like between him and Hillary, the presumptive nominee? He'll be pulling her to the left and she's going to have to explain why she voted for the war and kept on supporting it.

The Mother Sheehan vote will balk at her, at least publicly.

But three years hence is a very long time. Kerry won't be anything to worry about at all if certain developments in the War against the Terrorists come to pass (such as Osama's or Zarqawi's death) because Hillary will just be able to say she told him (and everybody else) so.

I'll post a few excerpts of Kerry's crapola later on if I feel like it.

We Already Knew This
Have a look at this story in tomorrow's Washington Post about Bob Woodward's recent revelation to Patrick Fitzgerald that he was himself told by a CIA employee that Valerie Plame was with the Company a month before Robert Novak's infamous column was published.

Woodward's testimony appears to change key elements in the chronology Fitzgerald laid out in his investigation and announced when indicting Libby three weeks ago. It would make the unnamed official -- not Libby -- the first government employee to disclose Plame's CIA employment to a reporter. It would also make Woodward, who has been publicly critical of the investigation, the first reporter known to have learned about Plame from a government source.

Is this really any surprise? The CIA confirmed to many journalists that Plame was one of theirs. A spokesman told Novak she was ---and he told his readers. And it may have been this same person who also told certain reporters with the New York Times and the Washington Post. And just who do you think told Andrea Mitchell?

(Thanks to Duncan Black for the heads up.)

Tip
Bill Bennett responds to Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia's strange admission to Chris Wallace last Sunday that he had taken

a trip by myself in January of 2002 to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria, and I told each of the heads of state that it was my view that George Bush had already made up his mind to go to war against Iraq — that that was a predetermined set course which had taken shape shortly after 9/11.

Bennett writes:

Senators and congressmen don't have to agree with their president's policies, and they should make the president robustly defend his policies — but they should not be acting as if they are the president or secretary of state; they should not be tipping off sometimes friends and definitive enemies about war plans that not even the president has yet made as policy. This is the true mockery of prewar intelligence, and Senator Rockefeller should fully explain his actions.

If Syria — or elements in Saudi Arabia — began acting on this information before we even went to war in Iraq (more than a year later), then Senator Rockefeller may have seriously harmed, impeded, and hindered our war efforts, our troops, and the entire operation in the Middle East. This should be investigated immediately; and perhaps Senator Rockefeller should step down from the Intelligence Committee until an investigation is complete.

But just observe how this will go down. Unless the President of the United States himself steps up to a microphone this afternoon and questions in the strongest terms possible why Senator Rockefeller would have done such a thing, this admission will sink into the memory hole, never again to be shown to the public by Big Media. George W. Bush will have to actually come out and make this thing a news item if it is to ever be sufficiently appreciated just how fucked up and saboteurish the Democratic Party really is.

I mean, do you know a better adjectival form of sabotage?

The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys
This link looks like it's got a short shelf-life, so go check out this new GOP ad featuring all your favorite Democrats saying then about the need for regime change and stopping Saddam what they won't cop to now.

It's devastating, as our own words thrown back in our face usually are.

(Hat tip to Professor Reynolds.)

Never Better
Mood:  loud
I have never had better seats for anything than I had tonight: front row and center and laughing my ass off with Dave Chappelle.

Thanks, Dave.

And thanks, Dave.

Is That Gingerbreadman Humping a Test Tube?
Now Playing: "It Keeps You Running" by the Doobie Brothers
I went to read Pincus' and Milbank's steaming load in today's Washington Post ---but cannot concentrate on the column because of this extremely disturbing mortgage company advertisement moving back and forth on the left margin of the screen.

It's some sort of FlashMedia movie or a .gif file of some kind, but just look at it. What the hell is that thing doing? It's a gingerbreadman stuck in a test tube along with ---what? And why is he humping the tube like that?

Just what the hell is going on?! If you can figure out the significance of that, you must be some sort of genius or something because, to me, that ad is weird and against God's law.

Why Ron Jeremy Masturbates with His Pinky Out
Now Playing: "Because it's classy!"
With much thanks to Jeff Goldstein, here's a great essay on Sarah Silverman ---a very tasty Jewish girl who tells amazingly offensive jokes. She's been giving me a college boy boner ever since I saw her on The Larry Sanders Show.

She's perfection.

(Thanks to theatermania.com for the picture.)

Le Mot Juste
Now Playing: (Title corrected)
Mort Kondracke just called Fred Barnes' excessively Republican views on tax cuts "theology." Ha, ha, ha.

It's All Going to Voicemail
You know?

I'm Watching Mary Mapes
on Larry King's show right now and she's just delusional. Sorry. I don't mean to be a dick, but she's simply clueless.

Dead Reckonings
Robert Mayer at Publius Pundit says:

Those most affected by the riots — who had their cars torched, windows smashed, and who live among this on a daily basis — are those same blue-collar ethnic French most likely to vote for the National Front and politicians like Le Pen. Now that widespread fear of these rioters has gripped the entire ethnic French population completely, it is possible that, should the National Front moderate its rhetoric and capitalize on the situation, it could see even more improved poll results over a short period of time across the entire spectrum of the population. Even more possible than that, this crisis will force the moderate center-right, which has shown itself now to be entirely too weak, to move farther to the right, therefore culminating in a greater consensus on simply cracking down on the immigrant population instead of addressing the the fundamental problem of the lack of opportunity created by the French social model.

I know it's irrational, but I think that the Parisian Intifada of 2005 is a good thing. It has helped many in America to see what a Western European country with a full tenth of its population being Muslim looks like. It also explains why France is so careful to defend the Arab/Islamic status quo of fascist and authoritarian tyrannies.

Your hand is forced, Chirac. Don't stumble now, though: Mo is staring you down and sizing you up.

Scrambling
At this point, I'd say that the White House's best bet is to either find Osama bin Laden and parade him down the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue in the manner of an ancient Roman triumph or immediately legalize, incentivize, and promote the widespread use of marihuana in hopes that the public will just let it go, man... Just blow it off and kick back. I just got Season Six of The Simpsons on DVD and we can order in some pizzas... What are these clowns doing? Hey, are you gonna finish the ---yeah, they said they'd throw in the garlic dipping sauce for free....zzzzzz......Huh?

Megiddo
The following story reminds me of the intense interest I once had (around the age of 12) in the notion of the End Times and Biblical prophecy. I studied Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth and Countdown to Armageddon with real passion and learned to see History as emanent truth ---full of the Providence that would permit me to evolve to the next thing after God. And I'm sure I would have made much of this:

November 7, 2005—A mosaic featuring fish surrounded by geometric patterns decorates the floor of what archaeologists said on Sunday could be the oldest Christian church in Israel. The ruins of the church, which was likely built in the third or fourth century A.D., were recently discovered on the grounds of Megiddo Prison in northern Israel.

"What's clear today is that it's the oldest archaeological remains of a church in Israel, maybe even in the entire region," Yotam Tepper, the excavation's head archaeologist, told the Associated Press.

But other experts remain skeptical. Anthropologist Joe Zias, a former curator at the Israel Antiquities Authority, questions the date of the find. Zias told the Associated Press that there is no evidence that Christians built churches before the fourth century.

(Thanks to National Geographic.)

Cringe
I will happily defer to Patterico for his near-daily demolitions of the Los Angeles Times. He's kicked enough ass and taken enough names over there to be noticed. There's that. But then he'll rattle off some stuff like this that just makes you cringe (emphasis mine):

I take a backseat to no-one in my desire to see the stain of Roe removed from the Court’s set of constitutional precedents. This is primarily a concern for the integrity of constitutional jurisprudence, rather than a simple desire to see an end to abortion on demand. While I think reasonable people can disagree as to whether there should be abortion rights under some circumstances, I don’t think that rational and informed observers can deny two facts.

Well, before we get to those two facts, let's share a few moments of lit crit, which, inevitably, involves the use of pop psychology.

First, if you think that Roe is a "stain" upon the Constitution, then you have to be lying when you say that it's the integrity of the Constitution that is your primary concern, and not the issue of abortion itself. This is further evidenced by the use of the phrase "abortion on demand," which is indisputably the language of the zealot.

Second, the idea that "reasonable people can disagree as to whether there should be abortion rights under some circumstances" is one of those insincere concessions that makes the listener's buttocks clench up a little. You just know that Patterico didn't want to have to include such a superfluity, but thought he'd so so, anyway, just to mimic the tone of dispassion.

(The fact is that, if abortion is wrong, then no agency or mitigating factor can make it less wrong. "Some" circumstances? To commit your party to overturning Roe through the appointment of amenable justices is one hell of a political risk to take if you do not believe that the right to an abortion ought to absolutely be revoked. You'd better get straight on that, sir, because it makes little sense to only go half way.)

So, Patterico continues:

First, Roe was an act of pure judicial legislation by judges who were more concerned with their policy preferences than with properly interpreting the Constitution. This conclusion is supported by the structure of the decision, which created a trimester framework out of thin air, as well as by historical accounts of how individual Justices came to their decisions [...]. The Court’s jurisprudence suffers every day that it continues to defend its decision to resolve an “intensely divisive controversy” without constitutional authority to do so.

The Constitution of the United States is a remarkable document ---a moment of genius in the life of Political Man. But it is not a purposefully omniscient instrument. It has no agenda in itself. And on that non-existent agenda is this idea that the Constitution exists to be interpreted narrowly or literally at all times.

One reason we know this is that the Constitution was ratified as a document thats framers knew was incomplete even as it was submitted. It was understood then that it would have to be amended. That's what the Bill of Rights is: an acknowledgement that the structure of the Government is one thing but that the rights of the people must admit of being amended and expanded as the life of the Republic progresses.

It is absurd to think that the authority or integrity of the Supreme Court of the United States is somehow compromised by Roe. In fact, just as with Brown and Lawrence, the Supreme Court has a societal obligation to ensure the people of the United States of their most basic rights. The right of a woman to choose whether she will be a mother is unquestionably a human right. The Supreme Court has honored that ---and John Roberts has a reason to let precedent stand.

Second, the constitutionalization of abortion law by Roe and its progeny has led to a set of abortion rights far more expansive than would otherwise exist. The horror of partial-birth abortion offends the majority of Americans, who also support reasonable restrictions on abortion that have been struck down by the courts, such as spousal notification laws of the sort upheld by Judge Alito in his Casey dissent.

"Constitutionalization," as Patterico uses it, means the trumping of states' rights. Which is a rather pejorative view to take of the Constitution for someone who professes to be concerned "primarily" with its integrity. But maybe he can also explain why it's so necessary to pass a Constitutional ban on gay marriage. Does he not trust the judgement of the several states to establish their own marital law? If the Right is going to resort to the Constitution of the United States for that purpose, then how can they deny the legitimacy of the pro-choice movement obtaining its own protections through that same instrument?

So, I fully agree with Robert Bork: Roe must be overruled. The only question is how. And with the makeup of the Court we have now, my guess is that an incrementalist approach will be required.

Well. At least Patterico isn't concealing his true opinion of court-as-legislature with this! He wants it all overturned, brick by brick.

And what do you get out of this again? The guaranteed destruction of the Republican Party? Smooth move, Ex-Lax.