A man walked up to Dick Cheney, calmly told him he thought his Iraq policy was reprehensible, and walked away. A few minutes later he was arrested by the Secret Service, in front of his 8-year-old son, for "assault".

When he asked what would happen to his child, the Secret Service said, "He can be sent to Child Services." Luckily, the boy found his mother and was safe.

But the citizen who practiced his free speech spent a few hours in jail before he was released.

This is a story that was just told by Matthew Rothschild on Thom Hartmann's radio show.

Increasingly, we are being intimidated into suppressing any attempt at dissent. Rothschild wrote a book about it, documenting the above incident and more.

Add that to your mental list of infringements on our freedoms. You know, the ones that are disappearing on a sickeningly regular basis.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Voter Registration Drives: Targeted by stupid laws in some states

By the GOP no doubt, who would rather that no one voted except idol worshipers of corporate America and the crusading crack-pots of the so called Christian-right.

Actually it isn't just the GOP. Some Blue States have joined in.

If this is happening it is very bad news and the Senate should do whatever it can to stop it.

Are Voter Registration Drives Being Put Out of Business?
By Steven Rosenfeld
AlterNet

Wednesday 25 July 2007

After the wave of successes in 2004 voter registration drives by groups like ACORN, a half-dozen states passed severe laws that scared off voting activists - and now the Senate is weighing in.

In 2004, Floridians overwhelmingly voted to raise their state minimum wage after low-income advocates collected ballot petition signatures, registered thousands of new voters and turned out the vote. The following spring, Florida's Republican-majority Legislature reacted. It passed a law that so severely regulated voter registration drives that before the 2006 primary, Florida's League of Women Voters stopped registering voters for the first time in its history. The League feared mistakes on just 14 voter registration forms could result in penalties equal to its entire $70,000 budget.

Florida's actions were not unique. In Ohio, where the 2004 presidential election lingered as its Electoral College votes were challenged in Congress, Ohio's Republican-majority Legislature passed a series of election reforms including tough new rules and penalties for voter registration drives. In 2006, that law stopped the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, and community and church groups from registering voters in the state.

"In Florida, it absolutely shut down voter registration by all groups going up through the primary election of 2006," said Wendy Weiser, Deputy Director of the Brennan Center, a New York-based public-interest law firm that challenged the Florida and Ohio laws. "In Ohio, before there was an injunction in the case, voter registration was halted."

Both Florida's and Ohio's voter registration laws were challenged in court and were enjoined, or suspended, before the 2006 election allowing voter registration to resume. Federal judges found they violated First Amendment rights and were hurting efforts to sign up new voters. But the trend of regulating voter registration drives did not end there. Between the 2004 election and today, six other states adopted similar laws - Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, New Mexico, Missouri and Washington - and like-minded bills have been proposed in New Jersey, Arizona and elsewhere, according to the Brennan Center.

Not all of these laws were passed by Republican partisans seeking political revenge. But the line between ensuring an accurate registration process and intentionally suppressing voters is very thin, according to academics, opponents and supporters of these laws. On Wednesday, July 23, the Senate Rules Committee will hold a hearing on sections of an election reform bill (The Ballot Integrity Act of 2007 or S. 1487) that would ban states from passing laws that would negatively impact voter registration drives.

"I think it is a real serious concern," said Dan Tokaji, Assistant Professor of Law at Ohio State University and an election law expert. "There are constitutional rights, free speech rights and petition rights at issue. What has a lot of voting rights activists concerned is states with GOP-dominated legislatures are going to put a lot of voter registration groups out of business."

American democracy depends on private groups more than the government to register voters. As a result, registration efforts have always been sources of political friction.

"The attempts to restrict registration and attempts to smear groups that attempt to register voters comes from people who don't think those voters are likely to support them," said Kevin Whelan, ACORN communications director. "I think there is another response to people who don't like to see a lot of minority voters coming onto the rolls. They could campaign for those votes."

"It was done to address real needs," said William Todd, president of the Ohio chapter of the Republican National Lawyers Association, speaking of his state's voter registration reforms that were since found to be unconstitutional. "Ohio was not alone in not having an updated election code. People hadn't looked at some of those laws in 50 years."

"There were two stories that stuck in my mind," he said, recalling lobbying for the laws. "Certainly there were a handful of fraudulent registrations here and there. The other thing was the state organization of election officials was complaining that there were certain groups that would save registration cards of months and then dump them on the boards of election at the last minute. Because they were brought in in such an untidy manner, the boards couldn't verify them and process them and people lost the opportunity to vote."

ACORN's voter registration efforts have been criticized in more severe tones by the GOP and their allies - especially in the heat of a close election. Between 2005 and 2006, the group registered 1.6 million voters in 23 states, Whelan said. In Ohio in 2005, ACORN and other voter registration groups working in Ohio were sued by "The Free Enterprise Coalition," a GOP-funded group that promoted voter fraud concerns and disappeared after litigation began, causing the suit to be dismissed. However, in other states some problems were found with some of ACORN's voter registration forms, although the politics surrounding the most high-profile example is murky at best.

In Kansas City, Missouri, four ACORN temporary workers were indicted on felony charges of falsifying seven voter registration forms just days before the 2006 midterm election. ACORN had alerted state authorities and had been cooperating with the FBI, Whelan said, but the interim U.S. Attorney, Bradley Schlozman, went against established Justice Department procedure and announced the indictments. While the ACORN workers later pleaded guilty, Whelan said the number of voter registrations affected was "less than a fraction of a fraction of one percent" of all its registrations nationwide. Still, that did not stop the Republican Party from accusing Democrats of trying to steal the election, the very political meddling the Justice Department policy was intended to prevent.

Republicans, for their part, also had problems with submitting fraudulent voter registrations. In late October 2006, just before Election Day, 11 volunteers working for the Republican Party of Orange County, California, were charged with registration fraud after they submitted registration forms where Democratic voters were misidentified up as members of the Republican Party. And in Nevada, a firm that the Republican National Committee hired to register voters, Voters Outreach of America, was found to be throwing out registrations for Democrats while turning in forms for Republicans.

But election law experts say problems like these, whether in Kansas City, Orange County or Las Vegas are by far the exception - not the rule. Moreover, they say new state laws passed since 2004 that have already impeded hundreds of thousands of voters from registering are a much bigger concern and of an entirely different magnitude.

"The numbers are enormous," said the Brennan Center's Wendy Wieser, speaking of the voter registration restrictions that were in effect in Florida and Ohio in 2006. "But they weren't as effective as they were intended to be. They were thrown out. They were effective when they were in place."

"They got into a huge fight in Ohio on whether the regulations were onerous and punitive," the Republican National Lawyers Association's Todd said. "But if you register a person to vote, you have an obligation to turn the registration in, and make sure they are registered and can vote."

Ohio State's Dan Tokaji said the Senate Rule Committee's hearing was timely, because both political parties are now jockeying for position before the next presidential election.

"It is a perfect time to be talking about this," he said. "I expect there would be all kinds of efforts by other states and GOP-dominated legislatures to regulate voter registration between now and 2008."

----------

Steven Rosenfeld is a senior fellow at Alternet.org and co-author of What Happened in Ohio: A Documentary Record of Theft and Fraud in the 2004 Election, with Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman (The New Press, 2006).

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

....and may he have the unlimited power of Ken Starr

Like this is gonna happen? Puleeze, get a damn grip.

The Bushites are some of the worst criminals ever to inhabit the White House.

Everyone in DC is either in on the crime or scared witless of the criminals.

That leaves the rest of us......

Special Prosecutor Weighed for Gonzales
By Lara Jakes Jordan
The Associated Press

Wednesday 25 July 2007

Angry senators suggested a special prosecutor should investigate misconduct at the Justice Department, accusing Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on Tuesday of deceit on the prosecutor firings and President Bush's eavesdropping program.

Democrats and Republicans alike hammered Gonzales in four hours of testimony as he denied trying, as White House counsel in 2004, to push a hospitalized attorney general into approving a counterterror program that the Justice Department then viewed as illegal.

Gonzales, alternately appearing wearied and seething, vowed anew to remain in his job even as senators told him outright they believe he is unqualified to stay.

He would not answer numerous questions, including whether the Bush administration would bar its U.S. attorneys from pursuing contempt charges against current and former White House officials who have defied congressional subpoenas for their testimony.

"It's hard to see anything but a pattern of intentionally misleading Congress again and again," Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., told Gonzales during the often-bitter Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. "Shouldn't the attorney general of the United States meet a higher standard?"

"Obviously, there have been instances where I have not met that standard, and I've tried to correct that," Gonzales answered.

The hearing rekindled a political furor that began with last year's firings of nine U.S. attorneys and led to disclosure of a Justice Department hiring process that favored Republican loyalists. Gonzales has soldiered on with Bush's support, despite repeated calls for his resignation and questions about his role in a hospital room confrontation with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft over whether to renew a classified but potentially illegal national security program.

"Of course the president continues to have full confidence in the attorney general," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said after the hearing ended. "We have every reason to believe that the attorney general testified truthfully."

In one withering exchange, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., noted a potential need for a special prosecutor to bring contempt citations against two White House officials who have refused to testify about the U.S. attorney firings. The House Judiciary Committee will vote Wednesday on the citations against Bush chief of staff Josh Bolten and former presidential counsel Harriet Miers.

Normally, the U.S. attorney in Washington would bring such criminal contempt cases to a federal grand jury for possible indictment and prosecution. But the Justice Department, in a letter sent to lawmakers Tuesday, said criminal contempt of Congress law "does not apply" to the president or his aides when they invoke executive privilege.

Despite repeated questions, Gonzales refused to say whether he would allow a presidentially appointed prosecutor to investigate White House aides who Bush has said are covered by executive privilege and therefore exempt from talking.

That leaves open the door for presidents to shut down the checks-and-balances of congressional oversight, Specter said.

"You're asking me a question that's related to an ongoing controversy," Gonzales protested.

Specter, top Republican on the panel, said he was merely asking if Gonzales recognized the constitutional problem at hand.

"Would you focus on my question for just a minute, please?" Specter asked.

He added: "I'm not going to pursue that question, Mr. Attorney General, because I see it's hopeless.... You're the attorney general, and you're also a lawyer. And we're dealing with a very fundamental controversy."

In another flashpoint, Gonzales denied he tried to pressure the ailing Ashcroft into renewing the counterterror program in March 2004, as recounted in testimony earlier this year by former Deputy Attorney General Jim Comey. At the time, Ashcroft refused to give his OK to Gonzales and then-White House chief of staff Andy Card, saying he had delegated authority to make that decision to Comey, who questioned the program's legality.

Gonzales described the encounter at Ashcroft's hospital bedside as having come at the bidding of congressional leaders who urged the administration to continue the program. He said he and Card "didn't press him. We said, 'Thank you,' and we left."

"We went there because we thought it was important for him to know where the congressional leadership was on this," Gonzales said.

Later, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Gonzales was "untruthful" Tuesday in describing the White House meeting where the congressional leaders supposedly approved continuing the program. Former Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle, who also would have been included, said in a statement he has "no recollection of such a meeting and believe that it didn't occur."

"I am quite certain that at no time did we encourage the AG or anyone else to take such actions," Daschle said in the statement in response to reporters' questions.

Justice spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said Gonzales stands by his testimony.

Senators furiously accused Gonzales of misleading them a year ago when he testified there were no internal objections to the eavesdropping program that targeted suspected terrorists in the United States. Gonzales, however, said the hospital confrontation dealt with a different intelligence program that he would not identify.

"The disagreement that occurred, and the reason for the visit to the hospital, senator, was about other intelligence activities," Gonzales said.

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., said Gonzales' refusal to answer direct questions about the program demonstrated deceit.

"How can you say you should stay on as attorney general when we go through exercises like this?" Schumer asked. "You want to be attorney general, you should be able to clarify it yourself."

"There's a discrepancy here in sworn testimony," added committee chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. "We're going to have to ask who's telling the truth, who's not."

After numerous apologies and promises to repair the Justice Department, the normally placid Gonzales was visibly frustrated and at times angered at senators unwillingness to move past the controversy. He flinched as the hearing ended and protesters loudly heckled him as he shook lawmakers' hands.

Yet Gonzales also tried to appease senators who asked why he hasn't resigned.

"Would you please explain to us why the administration of justice and the American people would not be better served by somebody sitting in the office who does not have all of the problems that you possess with respect to believability, credibility, confidence, trust?" asked Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis.

"Ultimately I have to decide whether or not it would be better for me to leave or just stay and try to fix the problems," Gonzales said with a rueful smile. "I've decided to stay and fix the problems."

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

The Debate

What Americans Want -- A Response to the CNN/YouTube Candidate Q&A

Submitted by BuzzFlash on Tue, 07/24/2007 - 5:07pm. Analysis

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

First, kudos to CNN for its groundbreaking presentation of presidential candidates responding to citizens' questions. It was a breath of fresh air compared to most television treatment of politics.

Now, to the candidates ...

Most Americans have rejected the Bush/Cheney approach to leading our country. We are looking to the Democrats for a dramatic change, and change now, not just in 2008.

Real leadership from the Democratic presidential "hopefuls" requires a coalition and unity against the Bush administration -- real action -- whether it be to move forward on impeachment, or to stop war funding, or to find other ways to effectively block the Bush administration's efforts to extend and consolidate their grasp on power. But such positions must be taken in consultation and as a group. The Democrats must join together to choose a way forward, and not leave each other out to twist in the wind if the right-wing attacks start.

We need the top tier of Democratic leadership, in Congress and in the presidential primary race, to stop competing with each other and to effect change now. Taking action against Bush and Cheney can also include bipartisan action to preserve and reaffirm the American values that the Bush administration has trashed. Americans really do believe in due process and checks and balances. Republicans, too, understand that Bush and Cheney do not represent them.

The Democratic leadership must not be distracted by the primary season, because Bush and Cheney are not. The Executive Branch is out of control. As lame ducks, Bush and Cheney see themselves as beyond the reach of traditional checks and balances. Certainly they've shown contempt for ordinary citizens and for Congress and the Judiciary. Meanwhile, with them still in charge, America's Constitution and our international standing continue to deteriorate. Precious lives continue to be sacrificed for ill-defined reasons.

Those calling themselves Democrats must come together and show their ability to change America's course now. Our political leaders need to really hear, through YouTube and other interactions with grassroots America, that business as usual won't cut it. It simply plays into the hands of those currently in control. And if the Democratic leadership does its most important job now, the 2008 presidential election will reflect that.

Let's also hope that CNN and all the mass media corporations will come to recognize that controlled, scripted, sanitized interactions between the presidential candidates and the people they seek to represent are unacceptable.

A democracy is government by the people, is it not? The media's role is to enable the people to do a good job of governing. They can do that by digging up serious information and asking hard questions, and also by getting out of the way.

Don't give us more pundits. Don't give us critiques of dress and hairstyle. Give us investigative, probing journalism -- and continue to involve citizens, as you have done with this groundbreaking YouTube format. It's good democracy and good television.

Resources:

YouTube: The Debates

CNN: Your voice to be heard in historic debates

Most Americans see President Bush as intransigent on Iraq and prefer that the Democratic-controlled Congress make decisions about a possible withdrawal of U.S. forces, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Gonzo is in "deep doo-doo," as Poppy would say.

But is anything going to be done about any if it?

That is the $64 Billion questions.

Capitol Hill's leading daily seems to have it in for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Today's headline from yesterday's hearings? "Gonzales Digs Deeper Hole."

After finishing up his latest round of testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Gonzales may have more than his credibility to lose. Wednesday's (paid-restricted) Roll Call reports the AG "may have put himself in legal jeopardy" as senators from both parties cast doubt on the veracity of his testimony.

Republican Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) put it bluntly: "I do not find your testimony credible." He reminded Gonzales that the entire committee would review his testimony, in an apparent threat of legal consequences for lying to Congress.

Gonzales clashed with other senators over the many conflicting and shifting elements of his and others' testimony surrounding a 2004 trip Gonzales and White House chief of staff Andy Card took to visit then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in the hospital to gain approval for the President's warrantless wiretapping program.

In his testimony, Gonzales revealed for the first time a meeting with the so-called "Gang of Eight" -- the two top Republican and Democratic Congressional leaders and the chairmen and ranking members of both chambers' Intelligence committees -- on the same day as the Ashcroft hospital visit, where the members of Congress were supposedly briefed on "vitally important intelligence activities."

In revealing this meeting, Gonzales may have undercut his previous testimony in which he claimed the disagreement at the Justice Department was "not about the terrorist surveillance program that the president announced to the American people."

One "Gang of Eight" member, Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), who was present at this classified briefing took issue with Gonzales even speaking about the meeting, "'The attorney general is selectively declassifying material from a classified briefing, which I find improper.'"

Meanwhile, Harman questioned the appropriateness of Gonzales even revealing that there had been a classified Gang of Eight meeting.

"He doesn’t have the authority to do that," she added.

Another "gang member," Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), when asked if he believed Gonzales had perjured himself, responded, ""Based upon what I know about it, I'd have to say yes."

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Leahy Draws Obvious Conclsuions

They are gonna get Rover yet.... or we will.

The DOJ is in a state of crisis. I don't trust a damn thing they do, and no American should until the Bushites are gone and in prison.

Senator Leahy Accuses Rove of Firings

Tuesday, July 24, 2007 - FreeMarketNews.com

Senator Patrick Leahy kicked off an oversight hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales by accusing top White House adviser Karl Rove of playing a key role in the firing of 8 US Attorneys. "The accumulated and essentially uncontroverted evidence is that political considerations factored into the unprecedented firing of at least nine United States Attorneys last year," the committee's chairman said. "The evidence we have been able to collect points to Karl Rove and the political operatives at the White House. ." Leahy also described a Justice Department in a state of 'crisis.' He worried that most of the senior leadership in the department had resigned. -Raw Story


Click Here For The Full Story

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Leahy Draws Obvious Conclsuions

They are gonna get Rover yet.... or we will.

The DOJ is in a state of crisis. I don't trust a damn thing they do, and no American should until the Bushites are gone and in prison.

Senator Leahy Accuses Rove of Firings

Tuesday, July 24, 2007 - FreeMarketNews.com

Senator Patrick Leahy kicked off an oversight hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales by accusing top White House adviser Karl Rove of playing a key role in the firing of 8 US Attorneys. "The accumulated and essentially uncontroverted evidence is that political considerations factored into the unprecedented firing of at least nine United States Attorneys last year," the committee's chairman said. "The evidence we have been able to collect points to Karl Rove and the political operatives at the White House. ." Leahy also described a Justice Department in a state of 'crisis.' He worried that most of the senior leadership in the department had resigned. -Raw Story


Click Here For The Full Story

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

We, the people, have had it too easy for too long.

Its about to get really rough.

Are we up to it?

Are we ready for what will follow?

Time to Take Action; Depending on Congress is Not Enough by Rob Kall http://www.opednews.com

Alcoholics living the 12 steps face the fact that there are things they can't change. We progressives must face the fact that there are things the Democratic congress WON'T change. We're going to have to do it some other way.

Our faith in America's resilience is certainly being tested and has been since Bush took office. The extreme actions, policies and strategies Bush has been taking-- abusing executive privilege, the signing statements, along with the support of the judges he appointed without senate confirmation suggest that faith in the constitution is not enough. We must fight to protect it, because the congress-- our elected officials are failing to do so.

That can start NOW. It can be a people/grassroots initiated process. YOU can start. Instead of writing about what's wrong with America TODAY, with all your heart, in all your articles, you can put a half or a third or quarter of your energy into writing about your visions of what the next phase of a free, just, democratic America looks like. You can write about what it looks like at a national, international or local level. You can write about the media, about elections, about the environment, about the workplace, about rights, about research... anything. Become a futurist for democracy and the constitution. Become a warrior for the future of peace and freedom. Forget about just depending upon our legislators. Ultimately, we may be able to persuade them, but if we don't do it first, now, and if we don't get tough and determined, strong and dedicated and courageous about it, like our children's futures depend upon it, IT won't happen.

Another reason the USA is in such deep doo doo, at such great risk of losing so much, is because the media we have depended upon to play an essential role in the protection of our democracy have failed us. They have, as they've morphed from mainstream media to megacorporation controlled lamestream media, betrayed the people and the nation who provide them with their license to operate on the airways.

It has become clear, since the November '06 elections and the resultant unable and unwilling to get anything done congress-- that it is not enough to just sit back and depend upon elected legislators to fix the problems, to fight the fights that must be fought.

We-- you and I and the people you and I recruit must take on the job.

WE must build the organizational structures.

WE must recruit the warriors who take on the corporations and the weak, election money blinded and impaired members of congress who are doing nothing or getting in the way of getting done what must be done to rescue America.

WE must reach out to other nations and the people in other nations to find help-- allies, funding, advisors who will help us take our fight against the breakdown of freedoms, the encroaching fascism that is growing in America.

I am not, at least not at this time, talking about violence, armed revolution or even breaking any laws. I AM talking about getting much tougher working within the law-- using all the tools that activists and revolutionaries throughout the world have already used. We do need to support the leaders we already do have who have been willing to engage in acts of civil disobedience for the sake of our freedoms. We need to build funds for bailing them out and defending them.

The challenge, when the fight is ramped up to the next level, is leaders will be at greater risk for being attacked and picked off-- probably by many-- the power holders on the right, the weak lefties, like the DLC, the Democrat supporters who don't get it that the Democrats are also part of the problem, as long as money plays as big a role as it does in elections.

We need to learn from people who have gone all the way to full revolution and beyond, to successful change in government. Again, I'm not advocating for revolution, but that we learn about all the tools and learn about what to do when your political group wins. Currently, if we on the left did "WIN" and take back America, we'd probably lose it, almost immediately, to the centrist lefties who watched we on the further left who did the heavy lifting. We'd lose it to them because we don't have well laid out, formulated and expressed plans for what to DO when we win. It is essential that if progressives are going to ever take back America-- from the right wingers- republican and democrat alike-- we must have a lot more intellectual, visionary infrastructure already built and in place-- leaders and thinkers who are envisioning what a Renaissance constitutional America will look like and how it will operate, what changes will be made-- beyond getting rid of the bad guys and revoking and reversing the worst of the rules they've put into place or suspended.

I must confess that I wrote this after writing a review of Giocondo Belli's autobiography. Read the review, then read her book.

Rob Kall is executive editor and publisher of OpEdNews.com, President of Futurehealth, Inc, and organizer of several conferences, including StoryCon, the Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story and The Winter Brain Meeting on neurofeedback, biofeedback, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology. He is a frequent Speaker on Politics, The art, science and power of story, heroes and the hero's journey, Positive Psychology, Stress, Biofeedback and a wide range of subjects. See more of his articles here and, older ones, here.

BTW, the book Rob's holding in his photo is "HISTORY OF THE REBELLION" volume 3. by Edward, Earl of Clarendon, published 1816, describing the rebellion among the Irish and Scots, around 1656. This was a religious war between the Church of England, Catholics and Presbyterians. The Earl, writing for the Queen, calls the Irish far worse than terrorists.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

The Showdown Begins!

No big deal, just the future of this country and her people.

Report Suggests Laws Broken in Attorney Firings

By Amy Goldstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 25, 2007; A03

House Democrats, preparing for a vote today on contempt citations against President Bush's chief of staff and former counsel, produced a report yesterday that for the first time alleges specific ways that several administration officials may have broken the law during the multiple firings of U.S. attorneys.

The report says that Congress's seven-month investigation into the firings raises "serious concerns" that senior White House and Justice Department aides involved in the removal of nine U.S. attorneys last year may have obstructed justice and violated federal statutes that protect civil service employees, prohibit political retaliation against government officials and cover presidential records.

The 52-page memorandum, from House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), seeks to explain why Democrats are trying to overcome an effort by the White House to shield officials and documents from the congressional inquiry through a claim of executive privilege. The report also provides the first written account of the Democrats' interpretation of the firings and the administration's response to the controversy.

The investigation "has uncovered serious evidence of wrongdoing by the department and White House staff," Conyers says.

The memorandum says the probe has turned up evidence that some of the U.S. attorneys were improperly selected for firing because of their handling of vote fraud allegations, public corruption cases or other cases that could affect close elections. It also says that Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and senior Justice aides "appear to have made false or misleading statements to Congress, many of which sought to minimize the role of White House personnel."

In addition, the memorandum asserts repeatedly that the president's top political adviser, Karl Rove, was the first administration official to broach the idea of firing U.S. attorneys shortly after the 2004 election -- an assertion the White House has said is not true.

In one of more than 300 footnotes, the Democrats point to a Jan. 6, 2005, e-mail from an assistant White House counsel that says that Rove "stopped by to ask . . . how we planned to proceed regarding U.S. attorneys, whether we were going to allow them to stay, request resignations from all and accept only some of them, or selectively replace them, etc."

The memorandum says that lawmakers need access to White House information to determine whether laws were broken and to rewrite laws regarding U.S. attorneys.

Yesterday evening, White House deputy press secretary Tony Fratto responded to the Democrats' contentions by saying: "Repeating unsubstantiated assertions over and over again won't make them come true. After months of hearings and thousands of pages of documents, the committee appears to have now shown what little they have to show for it."

Conyers released the memorandum to Judiciary Committee members, who are set to vote on two contempt-of-Congress resolutions. One is against White House Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten, who is the custodian of the e-mails and other documents related to the firings that lawmakers have been seeking. The other is against former White House counsel Harriet E. Miers, who was subpoenaed to testify before the panel two weeks ago but did not appear.

Last week, White House officials vowed that if the full House holds the two officials in contempt, they would block lawmakers' ability to bring the charges before a federal judge by preventing any U.S. attorney from pursuing such a case. The administration cited a 1984 Justice Department legal opinion, never adjudicated in the courts, that said that a federal prosecutor cannot be compelled to bring a case seeking to override a president's executive privilege claim.

In the memorandum, the Democrats provide the first legal justification for countering the White House's view, saying that the 1984 legal opinion "does not apply here." For one thing, the Democrats contend, Bush has not invoked the privilege properly because he has not furnished a signed statement or "privilege logs" specifying the documents being withheld. In addition, the memo says, "there is not the slightest indication" the 1984 opinion would apply to a former executive branch official, such as Miers.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Have you met Karl Rove? (LOL)

Education Secretary Margaret Spellings tells us what we already know: Karl Rove has no game.


HuffPo:

The secretary of education was ready to talk student loans and No Child Left Behind when interviewed by Washington Post editors and reporters last week. So maybe she was taken aback when asked why she turned down Karl Rove when he asked her out in the early ’80s.

(Rove later joked it took his ego “decades to recover.”)

Spellings paused, then said: “Have you met Karl Rove?

“He was so inept and so inartful,” she added. “I mean, I couldn’t even understand.”

Ouch.

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So, Why Are Tourists Avoiding the U.S.?

The travel and tourist industry is one of the United State’s biggest money-makers, generating $103 billion in tax revenue every year. Without this tax revenue, every American household would pay nearly $1,000 more in taxes every a year. But while the travel business is flourishing internationally, tourism to America has been on a steep decline, dropping 36 percent between 1992 and 2005, with a loss of $43 billion in 2005 alone. The nation’s international tourism balance of trade declined more than 70 percent over the past 10 years - from $26.3 billion in 1996 to $7.4 billion in 2005.

People are simply choosing to go elsewhere. But as a follow-on to Logan Murphy’s excellent post on the increasing invasion of privacy by the soon-to-be approved Passenger Name Record for passengers entering international airports, allow me to present a personal view into why tourists are deciding not to spend their money visiting the States.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/

Or maybe they are just trying to avoid the coming lock-down, maybe they don't want to be in the same country with the evil ones in the White House or maybe everyone really does hate us. After the last 6 1/2 years, that is a distinct possibility.

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Lil' Alberto Is In Dire Need of....

...a neurologist and/or a good lawyer, because he either has Alzheimer's Disease or he is a criminal.

Either way, he must not remain in office.

His performance today at a hearing on the Hill leaves no doubt that he had been and is involved in the continuing crimes of obstruction of justice, abuse of power and perjury before congress. These are crimes against our constitution and against the American people.

Let the record show that the government of the USA continues to be run by criminals who have nothing but contempt for the majority of the Americans people.

Their interest is and always has been the amassing of unconstitutionally broad powers for the executive, while treating Congress as if they, and the decent press and news media, are simply obstacles to their agendas, to be removed at any cost.

When this White House, or any White House, shows nothing but contempt for our elected officials in congress, who are charged with oversight of the executive, and plays silly games with what honest news media we still have and who are charged with informing the American people, that White House is showing it's contempt for us.

Leahy, Specter Lay Into Gonzales
By Paul Kiel
TPM Muckraker

Tuesday 24 July 2007

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Ranking Member Arlen Specter (R-PA) failed to disguise their contempt for Alberto Gonzales in their opening statements. Leahy, after running down the laundry list of Gonzales' failures and instances of questionable testimony, said that the administration's stance on their surveillance programs was "just trust us." Well, "I don't trust you," said Leahy.

Specter was no more sparing in his criticism. Pointing out that the Justice Department suffered from a "lack of credibility, candidly, your credibility," Specter went on a tear of his own ("the list goes on and on"). On Gonzales' infamous visit to John Ashcroft's hospital bed in order to get the ill attorney general to sign off on the president's surveillance program, Specter said "It's just decimating, Mr. attorney general, to your judgment and your credibility."

Below is Leahy's opening statement as prepared.

From Leahy's written opening statement:

Three months ago, when Attorney General Gonzales last appeared before this Committee, I said that the Department of Justice was experiencing a crisis of leadership perhaps unrivaled during its history. Unfortunately, that crisis has not abated. Until there is independence, transparency and accountability, it will continue. The Attorney General has lost the confidence of the Congress and the American people. Through oversight we hope to restore balance and accountability to the Executive Branch. The Department of Justice must be restored to be worthy of its name. It should not be reduced to another political arm of the White House. The trust and confidence of the American people in federal law enforcement must be restored. With the Department shrouded in scandal, the Deputy Attorney General has announced his resignation. The nominee to become Associate Attorney General requested that his nomination be withdrawn rather than testify under oath at a confirmation hearing. The Attorney General's chief of staff, the Deputy Attorney General's chief of staff, the Department's White House liaison and the White House Political Director have all resigned, as have others. I would joke that the last one out the door should turn out the lights, but the Department of Justice is too important for that - we need to shine more light there, not less. The investigation into the firing for partisan purposes of United States Attorneys, who had been appointed by this President, along with an ever-growing series of controversies and scandals have revealed an Administration driven by a vision of an all-powerful Executive over our constitutional system of checks and balances, that values loyalty over judgment, secrecy over openness, and ideology over competence. The accumulated and essentially uncontroverted evidence is that political considerations factored into the unprecedented firing of at least nine United States Attorneys last year. Testimony and documents show that the list was compiled based on input from the highest political ranks in the White House, that senior officials were apparently focused on the political impact of federal prosecutions, on whether federal prosecutors were doing enough to bring partisan voter fraud and corruption cases, and that the reasons given for these firings were contrived as part of a cover up. What the White House stonewalling is preventing is conclusive evidence of who made the decisions to fire these federal prosecutors. We know from the testimony that it was not the President. Everyone who has testified has said that he was not involved. None of the senior officials at the Department of Justice could testify how people were added to the list or the real reasons that people were included among the federal prosecutors to be replaced. Indeed, the evidence we have been able to collect points to Karl Rove and the political operatives at the White House. The stonewalling by the White House raises the question: What is it that the White House is so desperate to hide? The White House has asserted blanket claims of executive privilege, despite officials' contentions that the President was not involved. They refuse to provide a factual basis for their blanket claims, have instructed former White House officials not to testify about what they know, and then instructed Harriet Miers to refuse even to appear as required by a House Judiciary Committee subpoena. Now, anonymous officials are claiming that the statutory mechanism to test White House assertions of Executive privilege no longer governs. In essence this White House asserts that its claim of privilege is the final word, that Congress may not review it, and that no court can review it. Here, again, this White House claims to be above the law. My oath, unlike those who have apparently sworn their allegiance to this President, is to the United States Constitution. I believe in checks and balances and in the rule of law. Despite the stonewalling and obstruction, we have learned that Todd Graves, U.S. Attorney in the Western District of Missouri was fired after he expressed reservations about a lawsuit that would have stripped many African-American voters from the rolls in Missouri. When the Attorney General replaced Mr. Graves with Bradley Schlozman, the person pushing the lawsuit, that case was filed and ultimately thrown out of court. Once in place in Missouri though, Mr. Schlozman also brought indictments on the eve of a closely contested election, despite the Justice Department policy not to do so. This is what happens when a responsible prosecutor is replaced by a "loyal Bushie" for partisan, political purposes. Mr. Schlozman also bragged about hiring ideological soulmates. Monica Goodling likewise admitted "crossing the line" when she used a political litmus test for career prosecutors and immigration judges. Rather than keep federal law enforcement above politics, this Administration is more intent on placing its actions above the law. The Attorney General admitted recently in a video for Justice employees that injecting politics into the Department's hiring is unacceptable. But is he committed to corrective action and routing out the partisanship in federal law enforcement? His lack of independence and tendency to act as if he were the President's lawyer rather than the Attorney General of the United States makes that doubtful. From the infamous torture memo, to Mr. Gonzales' attempt to prevail on a hospitalized Attorney General Ashcroft to certify an illegal eavesdropping program, to the recent opinion seeking to justify Harriet Miers' contemptuous refusal to appear before the House Judiciary Committee, the Justice Department has been reduced to the role of enabler for this Administration. What we need instead is genuine accountability and real independence. We learned earlier this year of systematic misuse and abuse of National Security Letters, a powerful tool for the Government to obtain personal information without the approval of a court or prosecutor. The Attorney General has said he had no inkling of these or other problems with vastly expanded investigative powers. Now we know otherwise. Recent documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act lawsuits and reported in The Washington Post indicate that the Attorney General was receiving reports in 2005 and 2006 of violations in connection with the PATRIOT Act and abuses of National Security Letters. Yet, when the Attorney General testified under oath before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in April 2005, he said that "[t]he track record established over the past three years has demonstrated the effectiveness of the safeguards of civil liberties put in place when the Act was passed." Earlier this month, in responses to written questions I sent to the Attorney General about when he first learned of problems with National Security Letters, he once again failed to mention these reports of problems. Only with the openness and honesty that brings true accountability will the Department begin to move forward and correct the problems of the last few years. Instead, we have leadership at the Department of Justice whose expressions of concern and admissions that mistakes were made only follow public revelations and amount to regrets that their excesses were uncovered. In the wake of growing reports of abuses of National Security Letters, the Attorney General announced a new internal program. This supposed self-examination, with no involvement by the courts, no report to Congress, and no other outside check, essentially translates to "trust us." With a history of civil liberties abuses and cover-ups, this Administration has squandered our trust. Earlier internal reviews, like the Intelligence Oversight Board and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board have been ineffective and inactive, failing to take action on the violations reported to them. Only with a real check from outside of the Executive branch can we have any confidence that abuses will be curbed and balance restored. A tragic dimension of the ongoing crisis of leadership at the Justice Department is the undermining of good people and the crucial work that it does. Thousands of honest, hard-working prosecutors, agents, and other civil servants labor every day to detect and prevent crime, uncover corruption, promote equality and justice, and keep us safe from terrorism. Sadly, prosecutions will now be questioned as politically-motivated and evidence will be suspected of having been obtained in violation of laws and civil liberties. Once the government shows a disregard for the independence of the justice system and the rule of law, it is very hard to restore the people's faith. This Committee will do its best to try to restore independence, accountability, and commitment to the rule of law to the operations of the Justice Department.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Mitt Romney Is acting like a heathen

This is truly disgusting to anyone with any sense of decency in them!

Of course it isn't the first time democrats have been compared to people like Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden.

Remember Max Clelland in Georgia and the very nauseating Senator Chambliss back in 2002? Same thing, but not on a national scale.

As my grandpa used to say, "some people should be taken out-back and horse-whipped.

Mitt Catches S**t Over Hillary-Bashing Sign

Posted Jul 21st 2007 8:02AM by TMZ Staff
Filed under: Wacky and Weird

Not everyone is a fan of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, but comparing them to one of the most dastardly pieces of human excrement of all time -- that might be bit much. Especially for a presidential candidate.

TMZ obtained photos of presidential candidate Mitt Romney trying to win over grammatically challenged South Carolinians Thursday by holding a sign that said, "No to Obama, Osama and Chelsea's Moma."

Maybe he just doesn't like modern art?


(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

No Damned Confidence!!!!

After even the last week, let alone what has gone before, can anyone have any confidence in this administration or the GOP in general.

These people are power-drunk madmen who do not seem to know the difference between right and wrong.

It's one thing for a person to say, hey I know it's against the law, but I'm going to do it anyway because I think the law is silly to begin with and/or by breaking it, I'm not going to be hurting anyone else; like the cancer patient who smokes Cannabis so they can endure chemotherapy or live with horrid diseases like MS or the man who is driving his wife to the hospital late at night, on an empty highway, and decides he is going to break the speed limit, while continuing to drive carefully and with alertness.

It is quite another for someone to argue that what they are doing is right no matter what the law says and no matter whom it hurts and says to hell with anyone who disagrees. This kind of person believes he is the law, is so superior to other human beings that he, alone, can and must be must be entrusted with knowing when and where to toss the Constitution, Habeas Corpus and every other law upon which our society is dependent for relative order, safety and freedom to pursue that which makes us happy, or at least not quite as miserable as we could be.

The Bushites do not seem to understand why every department in the executive should not be politicized and made into an extension of the Republican party.

Well, here's why?

There are many of us out here who do not wish to contribute one red cent to the GOP, or any other party for that matter, because we see the whole damn system as corrupted, probably beyond repair. But when the Bush White House, in the persons of Karl Rove, Sara Taylor, for example, gives regular political briefings to the heads of agencies, including the names of targeted democrats in 2008, tax-payers are being forced to contribute to the GOP. If that isn't against the law it sure as hell ought to be. Tax payers should not be supporting any party with their tax dollars. That's about the most anti-American idea I've heard yet.

And Ambassadors are being briefed?

WTF ?

I hate to even speculate on why Ambassadors are being briefed on political targets in 2008. What are they going to do with the information?

What's next? I don't want to think.

The head of the Peace Corps?

Well, that borders on blasphemy.

Diplomats Received Political Briefings
Bush Aides Listed Election Targets

By Paul Kane
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 24, 2007; A01

White House aides have conducted at least half a dozen political briefings for the Bush administration's top diplomats, including a PowerPoint presentation for ambassadors with senior adviser Karl Rove that named Democratic incumbents targeted for defeat in 2008 and a "general political briefing" at the Peace Corps headquarters after the 2002 midterm elections.

The briefings, mostly run by Rove's deputies at the White House political affairs office, began in early 2001 and included detailed analyses for senior officials of the political landscape surrounding critical congressional and gubernatorial races, according to documents obtained by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The documents show for the first time how the White House sought to ensure that even its appointees involved in foreign policy were kept attuned to the administration's election goals. Such briefings occurred semi-regularly over the past six years for staffers dealing with domestic policy, White House officials have previously acknowledged.

In one instance, State Department aides attended a White House meeting at which political officials examined the 55 most critical House races for 2002 and the media markets most critical to battleground states for President Bush's reelection fight in 2004, according to documents the department provided to the Senate committee.

On Jan. 4, just after the 2006 elections tossed the Republicans out of congressional power, Rove met at the White House with six U.S. ambassadors to key European missions and the consul general to Bermuda while the diplomats were in Washington for a State Department conference.

According to a department letter to the Senate panel, Rove explained the White House views on the electoral disaster while Sara M. Taylor, then the director of White House political affairs, showed a PowerPoint presentation that pinned most of the electoral blame on "corrupt" GOP lawmakers and "complacent incumbents." One chart in Taylor's presentation highlighted the GOP's top 36 targets among House Democrats for the 2008 election.

In a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), the Foreign Relations Committee chairman, asked whether the briefings inappropriately politicized the diplomatic agencies or violated prohibitions against political work by most federal employees.

"I do not understand why ambassadors, in Washington on official duty, would be briefed by White House officials on which Democratic House members are considered top targets by the Republican party for defeat in 2008. Nor do I understand why department employees would need to be briefed on 'key media markets' in states that are 'competitive' for the president," Biden wrote.

His aides said Biden plans to raise the matter at a confirmation hearing today for Henrietta Holsman Fore to be administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, whose political appointees received at least two White House briefings in the past 10 months, as well as at an oversight hearing tomorrow on the Peace Corps.

Several months ago, White House aides said that about 20 private briefings were held in 15 agencies before the 2006 midterms and that other briefings were held irregularly throughout Bush's first term.

The U.S. Office of Special Counsel found, in a May report, that General Services Administration chief Lurita Alexis Doan violated the Hatch Act when she allegedly asked GSA political appointees how they could "help our candidates" win the next election at a January briefing by White House officials. The Hatch Act insulates virtually all federal workers from partisan politics and bars the use of federal resources -- including office buildings, phones and computers -- for partisan purposes.

Doan has denied any wrongdoing.

Spokesmen for the State Department, the Peace Corps and USAID said that only political appointees were invited to the briefings and that attendance was not compulsory. They also said that no specific actions were subsequently taken to boost political campaigns.

"We believe that these briefings were entirely appropriate," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. "They conformed with all the applicable regulations."

The ambassadors included in the Rove briefing were Eduardo Aguirre Jr. of Spain, James P. Cain of Denmark, Alfred Hoffman Jr. of Portugal, Ronald Spogli of Italy, Craig Stapleton of France and Robert Tuttle of Britain. Gregory Slayton, the consul general to Bermuda, also attended.

In total, the seven diplomats donated more than $1.6 million to Republican causes from 2000 through 2006, according to a Center for Responsive Politics report on large Bush donors who were named ambassadors. The State Department, in a letter to Biden, said that Cain -- one of Bush's top fundraisers in North Carolina -- requested the meeting with Rove and did not notify department officials in advance.

The briefings struck some former ambassadors as highly unusual.

"That just didn't happen. Frankly, I am shocked to hear it," said former senator James Sasser (D-Tenn.), who served as President Bill Clinton's ambassador to China in the late 1990s. "I'm one who strongly believes that politics ought to end at the water's edge."

James Dobbins, who was an ambassador in the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, said that some senior diplomats and State Department officials come from political backgrounds and stay informed through back channels.

But Dobbins, who rose through the Foreign Service ranks, said that he never attended an organized meeting for political appointees.

"I don't know of any methodical effort to inform presidential appointees of the state of play in the domestic political arena," he said.

The Peace Corps briefing occurred in 2003 with about 15 political appointees, said Amanda Beck, a spokeswoman for the agency. The central mission of the Peace Corps is sending volunteers into Third World nations to help with development.

Beck, who said she attended the March 2003 "recap" of the 2002 elections, said the appointees who attended the briefing "did it on our free time during the day." She added: "It was a courtesy to political appointees," offered by the White House, and "there was no suggestion of getting involved in anything" campaign related.

J. Scott Jennings, the White House political director, separately led two briefings for USAID officials, one last fall before the midterm elections and another in February, with 20 to 30 aides on hand for each. One was held at the agency's headquarters, and the second was held at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, according to an agency letter to Biden.

White House spokesman Scott Stanzel dismissed Biden's notion that ambassadors and political appointees from agencies such as the Peace Corps should be walled off from partisan politics. "Why shouldn't the president's appointees have our understanding of the political landscape?" he asked.

Biden sent letters in early May to Rice and the heads of six other agencies under his committee's jurisdiction after an April 26 report in The Washington Post about briefings from Taylor and Jennings. Four of the agencies -- the Overseas Private Investment Corp., the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency and the Millennium Challenge Corp. -- reported that no political briefings were held for their top officials.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free

Poll: In Lowest Blow Yet, People favor Democrats in Congress on Iraq

Poll Finds Democrats Favored On War
But Bush, Congress Both Get Low Ratings on Iraq

By Jon Cohen and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, July 24, 2007; A01

Most Americans see President Bush as intransigent on Iraq and prefer that the Democratic-controlled Congress make decisions about a possible withdrawal of U.S. forces, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

As the president and Congress spar over war policy, both receive negative marks from the public for their handling of the situation in Iraq. But by a large margin, Americans trust Democrats rather than the president to find a solution to a conflict that remains enormously unpopular. And more than six in 10 in the new poll said Congress should have the final say on when to bring the troops home.

The president has steadfastly asserted his power as commander in chief to make decisions about the war, but his posture is now viewed by majorities of Democrats, independents and even Republicans as too inflexible. Asked whether Bush is willing enough to change policies on Iraq, nearly eight in 10 Americans said no.

Since December, the percentage seeing Bush as too rigid has increased 12 points, with the most significant change among Republicans. Just after the 2006 midterm elections and the release of the 79-point plan from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, 55 percent of Republicans thought Bush was willing enough to change course in Iraq; in this poll, 55 percent of Republicans said he is not.

Bush's overall approval rating equals its all-time low in Post-ABC News polls at 33 percent, with 65 percent disapproving. Fifty-two percent said they "strongly" disapprove of his job performance, the highest figure of his presidency and more than three times the 16 percent who strongly approve.

Three-quarters of Republicans approve of the way he is handling his job, but just one in 10 Democrats and three in 10 independents give him positive marks.

The war has been the single biggest drag on the president's approval ratings.

Thirty-one percent give him positive marks on handling the situation in Iraq, which is near his career low on the issue. The last time a majority approved of the president's handling of the war was in January 2004.

Even among those Americans who said they had served or had a close friend or relative who served in Iraq, 38 percent approve of Bush's handling of the conflict.

At the same time, Congress fares little better with the public on the war. Just 35 percent said they approve of the way congressional Democrats are handling the situation in Iraq, with 63 percent disapproving. Two-thirds of independents give the Democrats negative marks on the war.

The latest poll was conducted July 18 to 21 among a random sample of 1,125 adults, just after Senate Democrats failed to pass legislation that would set a timetable for the start of troop withdrawals from the war zone. The results have a three-percentage-point margin of sampling error.

Overall approval of Congress stands at 37 percent in the new poll, with the 60 percent disapproval rating equal to public dissatisfaction with the Republican-controlled Congress late last year. Congress's approval rating has declined over the past three months because self-identified Democrats have soured in their assessment.

Congressional Democrats still receive higher marks than their Republican counterparts for their performance, but independents give both parties equally negative reviews.

But when it comes to judging the president versus congressional Democrats on the issue of Iraq, the public stands with Congress. Fifty-five percent said they trust congressional Democrats on the war, compared with 32 percent who said they trust Bush. (Eleven percent of all respondents and 17 percent of independents said they trust "neither.") And by 2 to 1, Americans said Congress, rather than the president, should make the final decision about when to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq. Nearly three in 10 Republicans side with Congress over the president on this question.

Many would like Congress to assert itself on Iraq, and about half of poll respondents said congressional Democrats have done "too little" to get Bush to change his war policy. Democrats are especially eager for more action from their party's lawmakers: 61 percent of Democrats and 69 percent of liberal Democrats said not enough has been done to prod Bush on the issue.

The central challenge for legislators from both parties is that the deep schism in Congress over Iraq war policy mirrors a wide partisan divide on many questions about the situation there.

Overall attitudes about the conflict continue to be decidedly negative, with more than six in 10 saying that given the costs, the war was not worth fighting. Most Democrats and independents in the poll said the war was not worth fighting, but most Republicans continue to say it has been worth the costs.

And the broad disagreements between partisans are not isolated to previous decisions.

A narrow majority -- 55 percent -- support legislation that would set a deadline of next spring for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, but while that measure is backed by 72 percent of Democrats and six in 10 independents, only a quarter of Republicans are on board.

A Senate effort to append such a timeline to a defense authorization bill failed to get the requisite 60 votes in the Senate; it was defeated 52 to 47.

There is also no agreement across party lines on the timing of U.S. troop withdrawals. About six in 10 said forces should be withdrawn to avoid further casualties, even if civil order is not restored, and 56 percent want to decrease the forces in Iraq. Both figures are at new highs, but few Republicans agree with either position.

Even among Democrats, there is no consensus about the timing of any troop withdrawal. While three-quarters want to decrease the number of troops in Iraq, only a third advocate a complete, immediate withdrawal. There is even less support for that option among independents (15 percent) and Republicans (6 percent).

There is, however, more universal, bipartisan backing for several other proposals that have been floated, including changing the strategic mission from direct combat to training and support, instituting new rules on troop rest time, and reducing aid to the Iraqi government if it fails to meet certain benchmarks. Majorities across party lines support each of these potential policy shifts.

Few are confident that the Iraqi government has the ability to meet its commitments to restore civil order. But again partisan views diverge: 55 percent of Republicans are at least somewhat confident that the Iraqis will meet their benchmarks, an outlook shared by about three in 10 Democrats and independents.

And as for the new U.S. efforts to restore security in Iraq, most in the poll said the "surge" has not made much difference, and nearly two-thirds said that the additional troops will not improve the situation over the next few months.

This broad pessimism provides an early read that the public may not be as willing as some in Congress to suspend judgment about the strategy until Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, delivers his much-anticipated assessment in mid-September.

Polling analyst Jennifer Agiesta contributed to this report.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Lantern has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is The Lantern endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

....And The Truth Shall Set Us Free