The Hollywood Liberal

Russert is Dead
Meet the Press host Tim Russert has died of a heart attack, according to the NBC News. The Buffalo News has more details.

Tom Brokaw announced the news on air: “This news division will not be the same without his strong, clear voice. He’ll be missed as he was loved — greatly.”

Russert was easily the most influential political journalist of the last generation. It will be hard to follow the presidential election without him.

Bush Doesn’t Know What The Supreme Court Does
Even after 7 years, George W. Bush’s ignorance still has the ability to shock me: “We’ll abide by the court’s decision,” Mr Bush said in Rome. “That doesn’t mean I have to agree with it.” “It was a deeply divided court, and I strongly agree with those who dissented.

Even after miserably long 8 years, George W. Bush’s ignorance still has the ability to shock me:

“We’ll abide by the court’s decision,” Mr Bush said in Rome. “That doesn’t mean I have to agree with it.”

“It was a deeply divided court, and I strongly agree with those who dissented. And that dissent was based upon their serious concerns about US national security.”

Really? Doesn’t their dissent have to be based on, you know, their interpretation of the law? Isn’t this stuff written down somewhere?

I know Bush obviously doesn’t give a shit about the law, and he views the Court — the institution that awarded him the Presidency made him King — as a rubber stamp. But it’s pretty disturbing to hear someone who swore an oath to defend the Constitution continually demonstrate his total ignorance of it.

Death Sentence Tarnished By Conflict of Interest

Charles Hood will be executed on Tuesday unless a court or Texas Gov. Rick Perry acts to prevent his death. In light of allegations of a blatant conflict of interest on the part of the judge who presided over Hood's trial, the execution should be stayed or the death sentence should be commuted.

Lawyers for a Texas inmate facing execution next week filed court papers on Thursday accusing the judge at his double-murder trial of having an affair with the prosecutor. The papers, filed in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, argue that the relationship between the judge, Verla Sue Holland, and the man who was district attorney of Collin County, Tom O’Connell, should nullify the conviction of the inmate, Charles Hood, in 1990. …

The petitions include an affidavit from a former assistant district attorney, Matthew Goeller, who said that the six-year relationship between Judge Holland and Mr. O’Connell was “common knowledge” and that it raised “reasonable doubt on the judge’s capacity to act impartially.”

Even supporters of the death penalty should agree that nobody should be sentenced to death by a judge who is sleeping with the prosecutor.

Foreclosed
A lot.

WASHINGTON — The number of U.S. homeowners swept up in the housing crisis rose further last month, with foreclosure filings up nearly 50 percent compared with a year earlier, a foreclosure listing company said Friday.

Nationwide, 261,255 homes received at least one foreclosure-related filing in May, up 48 percent from 176,137 in the same month last year and up 7 percent from April, RealtyTrac Inc. said.

American Occupation at the Pump: Is $250 a Barrel Oil on Its Way?
It’s time to ask whether the U.S. military should have anything to do with American energy security.

Open Thread
What’s going on tonight?Tags: open thread (all tags)
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LeftWord: The Best Liberal Blog Posts
All The Best Liberal Blog Posts From Arond The Web.

McCain Signs on For More Bush Bamboozlement!
For those of you who remember President Bush’s 2005 crusade to phase out Social Security by privatizing the program and converting it into a system of private investment accounts, you know that one of the biggest lines of bamboozlement was…

Mugabe warns of violence if he loses
President Robert Mugabe said Friday that his supporters are ready to fight if the opposition wins an upcoming presidential runoff election, hardening the rhetoric of a campaign that already has seen widespread violence against government opponents…

Saudi Arabia plans increase in oil output
Though reaping record profits, Saudis worry about weaker demand.

CNN?s Ware: Iraqis Reject Security Agreement Draft, May ?Go It Alone? And ?Take Over This War? From U.S.
The Bush administration is currently trying to push Iraqis into accepting a indefinite long-term security agreement, with demands including nearly 60 permanent bases, immunity for foreign contractors, control over air space, and authorization for war with Iran. But Iraqis are rejecting the administration’s stubborn attempts to control Iraq’s future. Today, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki remarked, […]

The Bush administration is currently trying to push Iraqis into accepting a indefinite long-term security agreement, with demands including nearly 60 permanent bases, immunity for foreign contractors, control over air space, and authorization for war with Iran.

But Iraqis are rejecting the administration’s stubborn attempts to control Iraq’s future. Today, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki remarked, “The American version of the agreement infringes hugely on the sovereignty of Iraq and this is something that we cannot ever accept.”

Today, CNN’s Michael Ware said the U.S. presented a second draft of the agreement, but Iraqis rejected it because the draft is “the same as the first.” According to Ware, many Iraqis now want to “go it alone” and may even “take over this war”:

WARE: What we’re also hearing from the Iraqi government is they may go it alone, using a hangover snippet of law left over from the original American occupation authority of Paul Bremer.

They could create their own legislation in their own Congress or Parliament, and thereby dictate to America what U.S. troops can and cannot do in this country, where they can go, where they must stay, and how many you’re allowed to have. So you may see the Iraqis taking over this war, and you may see a lot of U.S. gains being drawn back.

Watch it:

Ware explained that in his conversations with U.S. officials, they have accepted that Iraq “going it alone, passing its own laws” is indeed a “legally viable option.”

The negotiations on the long-term agreement are going so poorly that today, a senior government official “expressed doubt an agreement could be reached before the U.S. presidential election in November,” according to the AP.

The administration and its allies are still in a state of denial, however. “We know the Iraqis want us there,” said White House Press Secretary Dana Perino this week. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) absurdly claimed the dissent in Iraq regarding the agreement is a “sign of our success.”

McCain Denounces Detainee Ruling
PEMBERTON, N.J., June 13 — Republican Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) on Friday forcefully sided with President Bush in condemning the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to grant access to federal courts for the detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, potentially muddying his reputation as a critic of the…

Countrywide Gave Special Attention To Lawmakers
In 2004, Sen. Kent Conrad was hunting for a lender for a $1.07 million mortgage on his vacation home in Bethany Beach, Del., when an old friend handed him the phone number of Angelo Mozilo.