Sunday, February 25, 2007

All In the Family (7:35 am)

Geneaologists have found that civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton is a descendent of a slave owned by relatives of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond.

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

Déjà Vu! U.S. Intel On a Country Against Which Bush Wants to Go to War Has Proved Wrong (7:06 am)

Quelle surprise.
Bob Drogin and Kim Murphy for the LA Times report: “U.N. calls U.S. data on Iran’s nuclear aims unreliable”

VIENNA — Although international concern is growing about Iran’s nuclear program and its regional ambitions, diplomats here say most U.S. intelligence shared with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has proved inaccurate and none has led to significant discoveries inside Iran.

The officials said the CIA and other Western spy services had provided sensitive information to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency at least since 2002, when Iran’s long-secret nuclear program was exposed. But none of the tips about supposed secret weapons sites provided clear evidence that the Islamic Republic was developing illicit weapons.

“Since 2002, pretty much all the intelligence that’s come to us has proved to be wrong,” a senior diplomat at the IAEA said. Another official here described the agency’s intelligence stream as “very cold now” because “so little panned out.”

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

Saturday, February 24, 2007

Virginia Legislators Vote to Apologize for Slavery (11:46 pm)

Larry O’Dell for AP reports:

RICHMOND, Va. — Meeting on the grounds of the former Confederate Capitol, the Virginia General Assembly voted unanimously Saturday to express “profound regret” for the state’s role in slavery.

Sponsors of the resolution say they know of no other state that has apologized for slavery, although Missouri lawmakers are considering such a measure. The resolution does not carry the weight of law but sends an important symbolic message, supporters said.

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

US Generals “Will Quit” If Bush Attacks Iran (Which Pentagon Stands Ready To Do On 24 Hour Notice) (10:33 pm)

Bush and Cheney are frightening their own military commanders.

Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter for the UK’s Times Online report:

SOME of America’s most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources.

Tension in the Gulf region has raised fears that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely before President George Bush leaves office. The Sunday Times has learnt that up to five generals and admirals are willing to resign rather than approve what they consider would be a reckless attack.

“There are four or five generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran,” a source with close ties to British intelligence said. “There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible.”

A British defence source confirmed that there were deep misgivings inside the Pentagon about a military strike. “All the generals are perfectly clear that they don’t have the military capacity to take Iran on in any meaningful fashion. Nobody wants to do it and it would be a matter of conscience for them.

Reuters reports:

Despite the Bush administration’s insistence it has no plans to go to war with Iran, a Pentagon panel has been created to plan a bombing attack that could be implemented within 24 hours of getting the go-ahead from President George W. Bush, The New Yorker magazine reported in its latest issue.

The special planning group was established within the office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in recent months, according to an unidentified former U.S. intelligence official cited in the article by investigative reporter Seymour Hersh in the March 4 issue.

via Mary at The Left Coaster and David Kurtz at TPM

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Obama’s Austin Speech (11:32 am)

Over 20,000 folks showed up in Austin, Texas, to hear Barack Obama speak.
KEYE TV has the video.

via Taegan Goddard

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Jimmy Carter on Cheney: “He’s just been almost completely wrong on just about everything” (6:18 am)

Mark Silva for the Chicago Tribune reports:

Former President Jimmy Carter, in an interview to be aired Sunday morning by ABC News, sharply criticizes Cheney’s record on the war.

“If you go back and see what Vice President Cheney has said for the last three or four years concerning Iraq, his batting average is abysmally low,” Carter says of Cheney in an interview with George Stephanopoulos that will be shown on ABC News’ This Week.

“He hasn’t been right on hardly anything, in his prediction of what was going to happen … He’s just been almost completely wrong on just about everything he’s said.”

via Josh Marshall

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Friday, February 23, 2007

Florida-13 Update (10:19 pm)

Christopher Drew for the Ny Times reports:

Florida election officials announced yesterday that an examination of voting software did not find any malfunctions that could have caused up to 18,000 votes to be lost in a disputed Congressional race in Sarasota County, and they suggested that voter confusion over a poor ballot design was mainly to blame.

A panel in Sarasota, Fla., said voter confusion over poorly designed ballots probably contributed to the loss of 18,000 votes in an election last fall. Above are the ballot’s first two screens, including the highlighting.

The finding, reached unanimously by a team of computer experts from several universities, could finally settle last fall’s closest federal election. The Republican candidate, Vern Buchanan, was declared the winner by 369 votes, but the Democrat, Christine Jennings, formally contested the results, claiming that the touch-screen voting machines must have malfunctioned.

Legal precedents make it difficult to win a lawsuit over ballot design, but a substantial error in the software might have been grounds for a new election.
(…)
But other voting experts said that because the machines used in the election have been sequestered by a court, only a portion of them have been examined closely.

The software experts said they also found several security vulnerabilities in the programming for the voting machines, made by Election Systems and Software in Omaha. But the report said there was no evidence that any of them had affected the Sarasota race.

Edward W. Felten, a Princeton University computer scientist, wrote last night that the security weaknesses need to be fixed before this type of machine is used again. He also wrote: “The study claims to have ruled out reliability problems as a cause of the undervotes, but their evidence on this point is weak, and I think the jury is still out on whether voting machine malfunctions could be a significant cause of the undervotes.”

David Dill, a Stanford University professor who has been critical of the machines, added that the study “is an admirable, but limited, piece of work” and could not rule out all possible errors.

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Obama Mocks Cheney (2:33 pm)

Kelley Shannon for AP reports:

AUSTIN, Texas - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama ridiculed Vice President Dick Cheney on Friday for saying Britain’s decision to pull troops from Iraq is a good sign that fits with the strategy for stabilizing the country.

Obama, speaking at a massive outdoor rally in Austin, Texas, said British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s decision this week to withdraw 1,600 troops is a recognition that Iraq’s problems can’t be solved militarily.

“Now if Tony Blair can understand that, then why can’t George Bush and Dick Cheney understand that?” Obama asked thousands of supporters who gathered in the rain to hear him. “In fact, Dick Cheney said this is all part of the plan (and) it was a good thing that Tony Blair was withdrawing, even as the administration is preparing to put 20,000 more of our young men and women in.

“Now, keep in mind, this is the same guy that said we’d be greeted as liberators, the same guy that said that we’re in the last throes. I’m sure he forecast sun today,” Obama said to laughter from supporters holding campaign signs over their heads to keep dry. “When Dick Cheney says it’s a good thing, you know that you’ve probably got some big problems.”