Home / thinkprogress.org rss archive / September-11-2007


Waxman agrees to investigate Clinton White House.
As part of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s investigation into the Bush White House’s potentially illegal partisan briefings at various government agencies, Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) has agreed to a request by Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA) to determine whether Clinton did it too. The Clinton White House was thoroughly investigated both during and [...]

Flynt pursues Vitter scandal.
“Hustler publisher Larry Flynt took a fresh jab on Tuesday at scandal-plagued Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), administering a lie detector test to a New Orleans prostitute who contends that she and Vitter had a relationship in 1999. Vitter has denied extramarital relations with Wendy Cortez, who appeared with Flynt in Los Angeles to address reporters. [...]

The ‘conservative advantage in syndicated op-ed columns.’
New Media Matters study finds that in newspapers around the country, conservative syndicated columnists receive more space than their progressive counterparts: – “Sixty percent of the nation’s daily newspapers print more conservative syndicated columnists every week than progressive syndicated columnists. Only 20 percent run more progressives than conservatives, while the remaining 20 percent are evenly [...]

The six months that never end.
The Democratic Caucus has a nice summary of the Petraeus and Crocker testimonies.

McCain: I was right all along.
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) “said Tuesday that he was right from the start about the war strategy in Iraq. ‘For almost four years we pursued a failed policy in Iraq. … I condemned it, I was criticized by Republicans and others for doing so, and I saw it was doomed to failure and I argued [...]

Human Rights And Advocacy Groups Blast Bush’s Torture-Approving Nominee
In a letter to the members of the Senate Intelligence Committee today, a coalition of human rights and advocacy groups urged the Senate to reject President Bush’s nominee for General Counsel of the CIA, John Rizzo. The coalition, which includes the Center for American Progress Action Fund, objects to Rizzo’s record of sanctioning the use [...]

National Review: Don’t. Ever. Leave.
In its May 9, 2005 issue, the National Review featured a cover proclaiming, “We’re Winning,” accompanied by a breathless cover story by National Review editor Rich Lowry:It is time to say it unequivocally: We are winning in Iraq. If current trends continue, our counter-insurgent campaign in Iraq will be fit to be mentioned in [...]

Hannity for President?
At Sean Hannity’s Freedom Concert in New Jersey tonight, which Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) will be attending, the headliners are country duo Montgomery Gentry. Eddie Montgomery, one half of the band, is a big Hannity fan. So big, that he thinks

Out Of Touch Elites Promulgate Partition For Iraq That 98 Percent Of Iraqis Oppose
This morning, New York Times columnist David Brooks joined a small chorus including Washington Post columnists Charles Krauthammer and Jackson Diehl, and Michael O’Hanlon in giving up on listening to what Iraqis think. Instead, Brooks wrote that the U.S. mission in Iraq is to partition Iraq:What we’re really trying to build, in other words, is [...]

McConnell Baselessly Claims New Expansive FISA Law Responsible For Preventing Terror Attack
Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell yesterday tried to claim that the new expansive FISA law adopted by Congress prior to the August recess was responsible for the foiling of a recent alleged terror attack. The New York Times reports that McConnell tried to tie the capture of three Islamic militants accused of planning bomb [...]

Petraeus: ‘I don’t know’ if Iraq war makes America safer.
At the Senate Armed Services hearing on progress in Iraq today, Sen. John Warner (R-VA) asked Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, “if we continue what you have laid before the Congress, this strategy, that if you continue, you are making America safer?” “Sir, I don’t know actually,” replied Petraeus, adding that he [...]

Is Petraeus’ Drawdown Part Of The White House’s 2008 Political Strategy?
In yesterday’s congressional hearings, Gen. David Petraeus suggested that he will withdraw 30,000 troops from Iraq next summer:Based on all this and on the further progress we believe we can achieve over the next few months, I believe that we will be able to reduce our forces to the pre-surge level of brigade combat [...]

Lieberman Decries ‘Terrible, Partisan, Political Sniping,’ Then Rocks Out With Hannity, Coulter
On Fox News this morning, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) used a moment of silence commemorating 9/11 to decry the “terrible, partisan political sniping” that he says ruined the “unity that we felt after September 11″: Let me just say in response to the moment of silence we just were part of, that that unity that [...]

Pentagon seeks ‘very rapid reduction’ of troops.
Newsweek “has learned that a separate internal report being prepared by a Pentagon working group will ‘differ substantially‘ from Petraeus’s recommendations.” An early version will “recommend a very rapid reduction in American forces: as much as two-thirds of the existing force very quickly, while keeping the remainder there.” “There is interest at senior levels [of [...]

WaPo mislabels Rep. McHenry as ‘an Iraq war veteran.’
In the Washington Post’s write up today of Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker’s second day of testimony, reporters William Branigin, Robin Wright and Peter Baker quoted Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) as saying, “Let the generals in the field dictate.” The reporters also referred to McHenry as “an Iraq war veteran“:Republicans, by contrast, seized [...]

What Petraeus and Crocker didn’t say.
McClatchy notes that while Gen. David Petraeus and Amb. Ryan Crocker yesterday repeatedly referenced declines in Baghdad’s sectarian violence, they completely ignored the city’s ethnic cleansing:A chart displayed by Army Gen. David Petraeus that purported to show the decline in sectarian violence in Baghdad between December and August made no effort to show that the [...]

Path To 9/11 Writer Complains Of ABC’s Decision To Block His DVD, Compares Network To Stalin
Cyrus Nowrasteh, the avowed conservative activist who wrote the screenplay for ABC’s infamous docudrama The Path To 9/11, complains today in the Wall Street Journal that his fictional drama is being censored. On the one-year anniversary of the release of his film, Nowrasteh writes:Left-leaning pundits, politicos and bloggers waxed hysterical about its supposed inaccuracies and [...]

SiCKO now third highest grossing documentary ever.
Michael Moore’s health care documentary SiCKO is now the third highest grossing documentary of all time, “grossing $24.2 million domestically since it debuted in theaters on June 29th.”

New ThinkProgress Fellows Program: Get Paid To Blog
Earlier this year, ThinkProgress introduced a Blog Fellows Program and solicited interested applicants. Fortunately, we received hundreds of fantastic applications. Our original plan was to pick only two fellows who would serve six-month terms. Given the high quality of applicants who applied, we found it extremely difficult to pick just two.So, we went back to [...]

Baghdadis ‘unimpressed’ with Iraq hearings.
A group of Baghdadis watching the testimony of Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker yesterday were “unimpressed.” “I don’t think this will change anything in our country because the Americans will never leave Iraq.” said Saleh Adnan, a car mechanic. “For me, the main report will be the one which announces the American departure.” [...]

ThinkFast: September 11, 2007
In New York City, “the firefighters and first responders who helped rescue New Yorkers” — and later recovered the dead — from the World Trade Center, will “‘read victims’ names for the first time Tuesday at the sixth anniversary ceremony.” Tributes are also planned in Shanksville, PA, where Flight 93 went down, and in Washington, [...]