Yesterday, Iraqi Security Forces continued their offensive against Shiite militias in Basra, as U.S. forces battled Mahdi Army fighters in Baghdad’s Sadr City and “tens of thousands of Shiite Muslims” protested the Iraqi government’s crackdown on militiamen. Meanwhile, President Bush asserted yesterday that “normalcy is returning back to Iraq.”
A coalition of “[m]ore than three dozen Democratic congressional candidates banded together yesterday to promise that, if elected, they will push for legislation calling for an immediate drawdown of troops in Iraq.” Their plan would “leave only a security force in place to guard the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.”
In an interview yesterday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said “that the United States still has trouble dealing with race because of a national ‘birth defect’ that denied black Americans the opportunities given to whites at the country’s very founding.” “That particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront it, hard for us to talk about it, and hard for us to realize that it has continuing relevance for who we are today,” said Rice.
“Nearly four months after the disclosure” that the CIA destroyed interrogation videotapes, “the list of legal entanglements for the C.I.A., the Defense Department and other agencies is only growing longer. In addition to criminal and Congressional investigations of the tapes’ destruction, the government is fighting off challenges in several major terrorism cases and a raft of prisoners’ legal claims that it may have destroyed evidence.”
A pair of lawyers – Republican Ted Olson and Democrat Laurence Tribe – “have concluded that John McCain’s 1936 birth outside the continental United States does not disqualify him to be president.”
Former Rep. David Bonior (D-MI) said Thursday he is “proud” of his controversial pre-war trip to Iraq. “If more people in the Congress and elsewhere had spoken out, then maybe this war could have been avoided,” he added. Without Bonior’s knowledge, the trip was secretly funded by the Iraqi Intelligence Service.
In a 60 minutes interview, Al Gore ripped Vice President Cheney’s denial of global warming. “You’re talking about Dick Cheney. I think that those people are in such a tiny, tiny minority now with their point of view, they’re almost like the ones who still believe that the moon landing was staged in a movie lot in Arizona and those who believe the world is flat. … That demeans them a little bit, but it’s not that far off.”
Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila of Puerto Rico “will surrender to the FBI today after being accused in an indictment of soliciting thousands of dollars in improper contributions in exchange for favors and government contracts.” The governor had enlisted lawyer and friend Charlie Black — an adviser to Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) — to defend his allegations of grand jury unfairness.
Today, Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey will “assume command of U.S. Central Command from Navy Adm. William J. Fallon, who announced unexpectedly on March 11 that he was quitting.” Dempsey, who has been serving as the acting commander, opposed the administration’s surge and is a “fan of transition” in Iraq.
And finally: Did you catch that large Easter Bunny wearing glasses and a pink vest at the White House’s Easter Egg Roll on Monday? (See photo here.) The Washington Post’s Al Kamen noted that President Bush and the First Lady spent a lot of time “chatting and having fun with Mr. and Mrs. Easter Bunny.” Turns out that’s because Mr. Easter Bunny was none other than White House counsel Fred Fielding.
What did we miss? Let us know in the comments section.
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