“It’s as big as Vatican City and makes the foreign embassies dotting the tree-lined streets of Washington, D.C., look like carriage houses, but the barely-finished U.S. embassy in Baghdad is already primed for expansion.”

According to Dave Foley, spokesman at the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, more Americans are still working at the embassy than initially expected, mainly because the overarching security problem in Baghdad has slowed and complicated efforts to rebuild the country and help establish a functioning central government there. [...]

As designed now, the 619 blast-proof apartments may not be enough to accommodate some of the estimated 4,000 regular employees, contractors and local Iraqis working for the embassy, plus congressional and other diplomatic visitors who visit the capital on a regular basis.

“Wyoming Sen. Craig Thomas, a three-term conservative Republican who stayed clear of the Washington limelight and political catfights, died Monday. He was 74. The senator’s family issued a statement saying he died Monday evening at National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md. He had been receiving chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia.”

UPDATE: Michael Froomkin explains how Thomas’ seat will now be filled.

– Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, today, arguing that “it was too early to judge whether a Baghdad security crackdown was successful because the last of five extra brigades had yet to be deployed.” Apparently the additional 18,000 troops already sent to Iraq have been conducting something other than “real operations.”

Fox covers the indictment of Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) by showing images of Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), who also happens to be African American.

Last week on MSNBC’s Morning Joe radio talk show — which airs during the former time slot of Don Imus — host Joe Scarborough brought up former senator Fred Thompson’s wife, Jeri, who is significantly younger than Thompson. Without any evidence, Scarborough wondered whether “she works the pole.” Watch it:

(HT: The Palmetto Scoop)

UPDATE: Crooks and Liars has more.

“Addressing about 100 wide-eyed Wyoming high school students learning about government and the political process,” Vice President Cheney yesterday repeated one of the key fabrications that helped send the United States into war.

During the question and answer session, one student asked, “I was wondering — I’m not trying to start a debate, or anything, but do you still think that the Iraq war can be won?” Cheney immediately answered “yes,” adding, “I think we’re making significant progress now.”

He then launched into a justification of the war, citing the September 11 attacks. “The fact of the matter is Iraq is part of the global war on terror,” he told the students. “And you’ve got to go back and look at what happened on 9/11.” Cheney recounted the tale of the late al-Qaeda operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, one of the administration’s great pre-war myths:

The worst terrorist we had in Iraq was a guy named Abu Musab al Zarqawi, a Jordanian by birth; served time in a Jordanian prison as a terrorist, was let out on amnesty. … Then when we launched into Afghanistan after 9/11, he was wounded, and fled to Baghdad for medical treatment, and then set up shop in Iraq. So he operated in Jordan, he operated in Afghanistan, then he moved to Iraq.

The implication that Zarqawi helped justify the war was thoroughly debunked last year by the Senate Intelligence Committee, then chaired by Bush loyalist Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS.) It found:

Saddam Hussein attempted, unsuccessfully, to locate and capture al-Zarqawi and…the regime did not have a relationship with, harbor, or turn a blind eye toward Zarqawi. [p. 109]

Adding insult to injury, earlier in the event, Cheney was asked about the “values or philosophy” he has developed during his 40 years of government service. He answered, “I basically developed a great respect for American history.”

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