Luckily, John Kerry is not Al Gore. Kerry (Berger has had to bow out as acampaign adviser) has gone public charging a leak, for the purpose of diverting attention from negatives in the final report by the 9/11 Commission—which just so happens to have been previewed today. The White House initially issued denials, saying the White Housedidn't even know about the Berger investigation. But now (1505 PDT) CNN reportsthat Scott McClellan admits some people at the White House did know.

Time to connect the dots. Go back to the original story: who told the AP about the investigation? TheNational Archives? No, let's dissect the story. The quote is

"Three government officials who have been briefed on the investigation said [that Archives staff witnessed Berger's actions.]"

"the officials said Berger was reportedly seen stuffingsome of the material into his clothing."

It wasn't the Archives, or investigators—it was"officials." Who were the officials? We don't know:

The officials declined to be identified because of the sensitivity ofthe investigation.

In other words, they were "informed sources," and it was aleak. Then Fox and the Post juiced it up with pants and socks.

Wolf Blitzer is on CNN right now (1440 PDT), interviewing Senators Saxby Chambliss (R) and Ron Wyden (D). Wyden maintainedthat Berger's actions were inadvertent and, most importantly, that there was nothreat to national security. Chambliss characterized Berger's explanation as"returned most of them, and the dog ate the rest," as well as "odd and bizarre."While praising Berger's past service (yeah, right), Chambliss raised a popularspecter, Unanswered Questions, to keep the scandal (that's what CNN is callingit now in their screencrawl) going. This is how the sides are forming. Stay tuned.

Sidebar: White House Tap Dance (5:50 pm). I highly recommend the following report from Democracy Now!, containing audio of Scott McClellan evading questions from Helen Thomas. All she wanted to know was, would Bush follow Tony Blair's example, and take full responsibility for leading the nation to war based on false pretenses? Listen (Realaudio).

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I've always read the comics in the newspaper. But in our internet era Iusually check the newspapers online during the week, so I don't see the funnies.Therefore on Sundays I get a Times/P-I delivered so I can get a weekly fix ofDilbert and Doonesbury. The new Opus strip is still inshakedown mode. Sherman's Lagoon also makes me chuckle, I don't know why.

I skip over most of the strips. Cathy is tiresome; Gas Alley iscrotchety; Family Circus is just plain nauseating. But the one Icurrently find hateful is Mallard Fillmore, scrawled by a Bruce Tinsley.It is, to put it charitably, a conservative strip. It is the kind ofconservative strip that was chosen because the editors no doubt had thefollowing meeting:

"Say there Gus."
"G'morning Sam."
"Gus, the right-wingers have been sending us letters complaining about Doonesbury."
"Again? What's their beef this time?"
"The usual: 'it's too liberal; it's biased; the comics page isn't balanced'."
"But we have B.C."
"I think Johnny Hart is too moderate for them."
"OK. So contact King Features and get the most idiotically ultra-right comic they have."
"You got it, Gus."

The eponymous character is a green-headed duck who usually spouts some kindof right-wing claptrap. In the July 18 strip, the duck is watching the Tour de France on TV. He is cheering for Americans in the three week race—TylerHamilton, Levi Leipheimer, Bobby Julich and, of course, Lance Armstrong. "Thisyear," thinks the duck, "there's actually a chance that the top three placescould go to Americans!"

Comics are often written weeks, if not months in advance of publication. Sothe duck's hope for an all-American podium in Paris is not coming to pass.Leipheimer is in the best position for a #2 finish, in 10th place after today'sStage 15. But Julich crashed on Sunday when his handlebars were caught by the sidemirror of a Tour car; he sits in 49th place. And Hamilton abandoned the race onSaturday. (There are also three other Americans in the Tour, two on Postal; I guess George Hincapie, Floyd Landis and Christian Vandevelde haven't captured Tinsley'simagination.)

But in the strip, the duck's reverie is spoiled not by the race results, butby a TV announcer who says:

"See?! This is why the rest of the world hates America."

What the hell??? Is Tinsley one of those neocons with a persecutioncomplex? You know the type: 'Nobody likes America! They hate us... becausethey're jealous! They want all our stuff!'

I hope Tinsley was actually watching Saturday's Stage 13 won by Armstrong.The day concluded with a 16 km, 7.8% "haute category" climb up to the Plateau deBeille. The custom is for spectators to line the route, running alongside andshouting encouragement to the racers. Hey Tinsley, did you see the throng ofSpaniards, French and Basques cheering Lance? Did you see the happy wackos decked out in American flags and longhorn helmets? Did anyone boohim or the US Postal jersey? They did not, because they don't hate America, orAmericans. They hate Bush. Neo-cons seem to get confused on this regard, as theyequate feelings for Country with feelings for the Leader. That's not the way theUSA is supposed to work. What system of government equates a country with itsleader? Yes, it's fascist dictatorship.

Perhaps the crowds know what Tinsley appears not to—that cycling is a team sport, the stars don't do it all on their own. And there are no national teams in the Tour. Sponsors are companies. US Postal is just a sponsor of Armstrong's team, his teammatesare Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, and Russian, as well as Americans. Postal is not the 'American team,' anymore than Phonak is American because Hamilton is a member, or CSC is American due to the presence of Julich.

Has the media even been anti-American? It doesn't appear so, the 2004 Tourhas verged on a love fest for Armstrong. Although the run up to the raceincluded warmed-over allegations about doping and a libel suit by Lance, theEuropean media also featured stories about the improvement in relations betweenhim and the fans, how Armstrong seemed much friendlier and relaxed, and how thepublic has responded in kind. Any pre-race controversy does not seem to havefollowed Armstrong on the race route.

This year there are no cries of "Dopé", only awe and respect for theTexan, who today beat Ivan Basso to the line to win Stage 15 and retake theyellow jersey—maybe for good. A historic sixth straight victory in Paris is his tolose. It looks like the only dopé around here is Bruce Tinsley and his strange brand of nationalistic self-pity.

Sidebar: Mork De Ork. You know who gets it? Robin Williams. Lance's second-best buddy (because Sheryl Crow is the default #1) choppered in to see Stage 15 and rode in the US Postal team car up to the finish line in Villard-de-Lans. "I was there to hand out water, and gels—or as we call it, 'Goo'," Williams said in a hilarious and enthusiastic interview on OLN.

Williams took note of the international and multilingual effort that is world-class bicycle racing. He joked that in the Postal car the

"mood was very exciting because it's a 'United Nations' car, there are peoplespeaking Flemish, 'Spanith'... French, which is necessary en France...German, which we must speak occasionally in France, every so often."

Williams seemed to be saying, It's the Tour de France, but it belongs toeveryone.

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Am I the only one left with the impression that Dubya & Co. are manipulatingterrorism warnings and the DHS color-code system for political gain? Well Idecided to investigate, and came up with the graph below.

One of my few fond memories of being a University of Washington undergraduatemajoring in Political Science was reading the works of Edward Tufte. Tufte is apolitical economist whose forte is statistics. In one of his books, PoliticalControl of the Economy, Tufte made observations about changes in economicpolicy (Fed changes in the money supply, timing of Social Security COLAs, etc.)and the electoral cycle (Election Days). What was fun was that Tufte seemed tobe saying look, these are just statistics. They don't prove the party inpower manipulates policy for electoral gain—but it sure is amazing how onefollows the other so closely.

How I did it. Thus inspired, I set out togather data. First, I perused my War AgainstError news chronology, picking out a list of the biggest things I thoughtDubya, Dick et al would want to downplay (Ken Lay indicted) or exploit (Saddamcaptured). These "News" items are the purple symbols on the graph, + for goodnews, dots for neutral or bad news:

Next, Dubya's approval ratings seemedlike a good (inverse) indicator of Bush desperation. I obtained these data(thanks, USA Today!) and plotted them as the red line (thanks, Excel!). Third, I went to the DHS web page and figured out all the times the officialalert status has been raised. Finally, I Googled several variations of the termbush|ridge|cheney warn terror|threat colorattack to find instances when the Administration made statementswarning of terror threats but didn't raise the color status. The combined listof terror warnings with and without color changes are the blue lines:

That was the process, and the order in which the steps were performed. Ididn't cherry-pick news that happened when Bush's ratings were down, or when thewarnings occurred. I leave the cherrypicking to Rumsfeld and Cheney.

The Graph. As we would expect, the News drivesBush's rating: good news usually sends the red line up (sometimes it's flat orflattish); bad news usually sends it down. What we also find is that the bluelines coincide with downturns or troughs in the red line: when Bush'sapproval level is down or climbing out of a dip, out comes a terror alert!In all but one case, the alert is followed by an upswing in the approval curve.

Remember, this doesn't prove Bush is manipulating terror warnings for electoral gain—but it sure is amazing how one follows the other so closely.

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"A trial lawyer is running for high national office.
A man with little experience in elective office.
A man with no experience in foreign affairs.
Trials lawyers are sleazy, greedy, unprincipled liberals.
They sue companies and pocket huge fees, passing the higher costs on tostockholders, customers and all of us in higher insurance premiums.
We can't afford a trial lawyer.
America can't afford... Abraham Lincoln."
I'm John C. Breckinridge, and I approve this ad

Sidebar: The mostridiculous thing I've heard in the past week is the GOP spinners who, withone side of their mouth, say that John Edwards has no foreign policy experience.Never mind that a duty of the Senate is to approve treaties and advise andconsent on ambassadorial appointments. It's in the Constitution (Article 2)—so it's not surprising the GOP's talking headsaren't familiar with it. Then out of the other side, they claim that Dubya hadsuch experience as of 2000, because Texas shares a border with Mexico.

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So the final version of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report on prewar intel has been released, and, as already previewed, the "intelligence community" is the whipping boy. It all seems persuasive, but. . .

Cast your mind back to the months before the invasion of Iraq. Remember the daily drumbeat of news stories indicating that war was inevitable? Now read just a few of the earlier accounts that reconstruct what happened:

"between Oct. 7 [2002], when President Bush made a speech laying out the case formilitary action against Hussein, and Jan. 28 [2003], when he gave his State of theUnion address, almost all the other evidence had either been undercut ordisproved by U.N. inspectors in Iraq."Source

"[T]he president did not make decisions in a methodical way: there was nofree-flow of ideas or open debate. At cabinet meetings, [Paul O'Neill] says thepresident was 'like a blind man in a roomful of deaf people. There is nodiscernible connection,' forcing top officials to act 'on little more than hunches about what the president might think.'
      '. . .From the very first instance, it was about Iraq. It was about what we can do to change this regime' " Source

"[Tenet] said the agency never described Iraq as 'an imminent threat' in the months leading up to the March 2003 invasion" Source

"Tenet told the committee he personally intervened on several occasions tocorrect public statements by President Bush and Vice President Cheney falselyclaiming 'conclusive evidence' of Iraqi efforts to obtain weapons of massdestruction. Tenet revealed he learned just last week that in August 2002,senior aides to Vice President Cheney were presented—without the CIA'sknowledge—false and misleading evidence linking Saddam and al Qaeda byPentagon officials running a separate intelligence unit. The vice presidenttrumpets this evidence today despite repeated warnings about its veracity." Source

And finally, thanks to O'Neill's book we also know that the plan (or rather PNAC's plan) to invade Iraq existed from the earliest days after Bush took (he sure did!) office.

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LOOK OUT!!!
"What? Where?"
Oh, nothing.
"Hey, aren't you..."
Bill Frist of Tennessee: physician and senator. I'm here to serve.
"You can begin by telling me why you screamed in my ear."
I guess I got carried away.
"Yeah, what's up with that?"
I noticed you might have been about to cross the street-
"Actually I was just standing here enjoying the sunshine, wonderingwhat I'm going to do this afternoon. Anyway, what were you warning meabout?"
I thought a car was going to hit you.
"Gosh! Was a car coming?"
I can't tell you that.
"Because I didn't see- you can't tell me?"
You don't have to worry or anything. Just- LOOK OUT!!!
"What now?"
Nothing.
"Would you STOP that???"
THERE'S NO NEED FOR PANIC, SIR!
"No problem there-"
JUST, JUST GO ABOUT YOUR NORMAL LIFE!
"Okay."
BUT BE WATCHFUL!
"But there's no car coming."
LOOK, IF THERE'S NO CAR IN SIGHT, THAT'S EVIDENCE THERE WILL BE A CAR SOON.
"That's very familiar logic. Who told you that?"
Rumsfeld. SO BE AFRAID! BE VERY AFRAID! BUT THERE'S NO REASON FOR CONCERN.
"Look, can you tell me how long I need to be 'watchful'?"
Until November.
"You don't have any idea at all, do you?"
Well... No.
"You should be ashamed of yourself."
Sorry. I'm sorry.
"I think I see what's going on here. Maybe this afternoon I'll see a movie."
I hear Dodgeball is very good.
"I was thinking Fahrenheit 9/11."

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After an early summer surge, the growth in job creation has slowed. The Department of Labor says only 112,000 new jobs were added last month, wellbelow expectations. The official unemployment rate, which doesn't count thosewho have given up looking for work, remains at 6.5%.

What this all means is that Bush, down anywhere from 2.2 to 2.5 million in terms of thenumbers of jobs lost during his administration, has managed to add back only 1.5 million since last fall, approximately. The latest subpar results lessen the likelihood of even getting back to 2001 levels.

Yet Bush's earnest self-delusion continues, and in a way that highlights his inability to verbalize anything remotely self-critical (for example, mangling the "fool me twice" adage, and the bewildering mispronunciations of 'Abu Ghraib'):

"We're witnessing steady growth, steady growth. And that's important. Wedon't need, uh, boom or bust type growth, we want just steady, consistent growth,so that our fellow citizens will be able to find a job."
Listen to clip (@ :02:58)

That's how he said it: with the emphasis on the indefinite article. Not a good job. Not a well-paying job. Not a career. Not even "uh fantahstick jahb", as Gov.Schwarzenpfefferincorporated promised his Californians last year.

A job. Well thank you for shopping at Wal-Mart.Excuse me, but a net job loss of a million, level jobless rate, rampant underemployment and a slowing rate of new job creation is not proof of "steady and consistent growth"—unless he means the growth in his administration's mediocrity.

Almost lost in the—OK, we'll call it 'hoopla'—over today's selection of TV psychic John Edwards as the Democratic running mate, is news of a Senate report (read it before it's archived) that before the invasion the CIA knew Iraq had abandoned its WMD programs. But they didn't tell Dubya:

The Central Intelligence Agency was told by relatives of Iraqi scientists beforethe war that Baghdad's programs to develop unconventional weapons had beenabandoned, but the C.I.A. failed to give that information to President Bush,even as he publicly warned of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's illicitweapons, according to government officials.

I can almost hear Fox News blaring the good news: It wasn't Bush's fault! It was Tenet! Four more years!But wait! Keep reading:

...analysts may havemisrepresented information, writing reports that distorted evidence in order tobolster their case that Iraq did have chemical, biological and nuclear programs,according to government officials...

Doesn't that sound familiar?

The Senate found, for example, that an Iraqidefector who supposedly provided evidence of the existence of a biologicalweapons program had actually said he did not know of any such program.
. . .Senior C.I.A. analysts became convinced that [a shipment of aluminum tubes] was strong evidence that Mr. Hussein was reconstituting his nuclear weapons program....But other government experts... argued that the tubes seemed designedfor use in conventional military rockets.
...the C.I.A. selectively sought to prove its case... C.I.A. disclosed theinitial—and successful—test results to support its assertion that thetubes could be used to help produce nuclear weapons. Only later did the C.I.A.report results that showed that the tubes ultimately failed in testing.

Gasp. CIA lied??? Now why would they do that? Maybe for the samereason that Tenet assured Bush that the case for WMD was a slam dunk. It waswhat the White House wanted to hear. They had already decided to go to war.They had the truth, from people like Clarke and Wilson, but they chose to gowith anything that would make the case for invasion stronger.

This attempt to put all the blame on CIA is a diversion. We can concludethis, not only because it is being put out by a Republican-controlled Senatecommittee, but also because before the war Bush wasn'trelying solely on CIA for its intel. Cheney and Rumsfeld had created their own intelligence group at the Pentagon to cherry-pick the best pro-invasion data, and they did itprecisely because they thought the information they were getting from theintelligence community wasn't pro-war enough. The conclusions of this "Office ofSpecial Plans" were just as rosy as CIA's, if not more so, staffed as it was bya hand-picked group of hawks; the White House was perfectly happy to snort upthe little packets of phony intel provided by Ahmed Chalabi & Co.

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Bill Clinton's book tour is going gangbusters, so it was inevitable that other Bubba-oriented books would be rushed out to capitalize on the public's appetite. First up, a biography penned by Helen Fielding as only she can. Following are excerpts from the closely guarded manuscript, courtesy of our connections at Probability Cottage Press.

Bill Clintons's Diary
by Helen Fielding

My Administration
I Will: Faithfully execute the duties of the office of President; bea better husband and father; build peace in Northern Ireland; snarl traffic inSeattle as many times as possible; party hearty!

1993
January 20. Inaugurations: 1 (awesome!); inaugural balls: 12; Big Macs: 5; Fleetwood Mac songs: innumerable.
•I took the oath of office today. It was more than I ever imagined. Itwas so moving—the shining faces of the thousands lining PennsylvaniaAvenue, so full of hope, so eager to see what lies ahead— I feel awed bythe responsibility they have placed in me, yet confident that great days are ahead for America.
•Saw another Saturday Night Live skit where Phil Hartman plays me as a fatjunk food junkie. Hillary told the Secret Service "no more McDonalds." I toldthe boys "she didn't say anything about Taco Time."
•I didn't want to go to the MTV inaugural ball. Damn network that asked methe 'boxers or brief' question. But George Stephanopolous played the StevieNicks card. "Stevie will be there," he promised. Stevie was great, but ChristineMcVie—WOW! Note to self: No more Fleetwood Mac in thisAdministration. "Don't Stop" 50 zillion times on the campaign trail wasenough for a lifetime.
•Approved hiring of Linda Tripp (v. v. homely), on recommendation of Pres.Bush. Assigned her to Vince Foster.
. . .
November17. Freeways shut down: 1; thrown fish caught: 1; la-tays: 14.
•APEC ministerial meeting, Seattle. This city fucking LOVES me! Shut down themain freeway for a motorcade anywhere else and you'd be burned in effigy, thenrecalled from office. But Seattlites just smile and scream my name like I'm theBeatles. Then they throw a salmon at you and stick a big coffee in your hand.Although here they call them "la-tays." Shook hands with the CEO of somethingcalled "Starbucks", gave him the chance to donate to the reelection fund. Turnsout Starbucks makes these la-tays in a few coffee shops around town. Joke withhim that he ought to sell franchises, he'd take over the world.
. . .
1994
July15. Big Macs: 2 (I'm trying); health care reform commissions: 1; blow jobs: 3 (v. good).
•That fucking, fucking Paula Jones. The only reason I asked herup to that room was that we were closing on the Whitewater partnership, and Ineeded the papers notarized. "I'm a notary," she piped up from behind theregistration desk. Stupid, stupid, STUPID! Those days are over; now I have JanetReno notarize all my documents.
. . .
1995
November 26.GOP-controlled branches of government: 1; Omnibus spending bills: 1; Big Macs: 4; blowjobs: 26 (v. v. good).
•First we lose the House, now Gingrich has shut down the government.Most federal employees aren't at work, even the kid whose job it is to warn mewhenever Hillary leaves the Residence.
•I have a new intern, Monica. She's great, we've really bonded duringthe shutdown. She taught me how to make dormitory phad thai on a hotplate, justramen, a can of Dinty Moore stew and Tabasco. Embarrassing moment: I spilledsome Dinty Moore on her new blue dress. To apologize, I gave her a black ArmyRangers beret that I bought at the Pentagon gift shop. It goes well with herhair.
. . .
1998
January 27.balanced budget: 1 (surplus next year); Big Macs: 3; blowjobs: 0.
•Ken Starr thinks there's something between me and Monica! I'm so sure,she's only like my best friend. And what does this have to do with real estate,anyway? Starr has been coming and going at the White House a lot, Secret Serviceasked me what his code-name should be; I suggested "Cotton Mather."
. . .
December20. Bosnian Muslims protected: 947,000; U.S. troops lost: 0; Big Macs: 3; Doritos (bags): 4.
•The bastards impeached me yesterday. ME! Afterward, Hyde came by todiscuss a tax credit rider, and I invited him to sit on the dais at the Gridirondinner. "And bring your girlfriend," I added, intending it to sound clever. But it came out sounding mean-ish.
•Chelsea and Monica talked on the phone for over an hour, those twohave really become close, like sisters. They went shopping at Tysons Cornerthis morning—I think I'm getting a Nordstrom tie for Christmas. Chelsea saidMonica is holding up OK, but misses the White House awfully. She wants me tocall, because she has an idea about China and technology transfer.
•I get the last laugh: today's polling shows my approval ratings are UP.
. . .
1999
February12. Apologies to Hillary: 36; Big Macs: 1; champagne (glasses): 2.
•We're going to Me-xi-co! We'll spend the first day talking to El Presidente about trade and immigration, but after that it's Cozumel, baby!Madeleine Albright knows this cantina where they have 8 oz. tequila shooters andfajitas puerco to die for. I only hope I can drag myself away long enough to trymy luck on a marlin boat.
•Oh, and the Senate voted to aquit me.
. . .
2000
July26. Apologies to Hillary: 46; hot dog eating championships: 1.
•Camp David. Where did it all go wrong? Maybe we didn't do enough atOslo, maybe the agenda was too ambitious.
•It got off to a good start. After their wives dropped them off at thebus station, Ehud and Yasser shared the bus ride chatting about hobbies, sportsand the Old Testament.
•The summit never really hit its stride. I should have known we were infor trouble the very first day when Yasser got into some poison oak. Then hefell and broke his glasses, and got his kaffiyeh tangled in some blackberrybushes.
•I really thought they would achieve something significant on SportsDay. Nothing builds mutual understanding like being team members in a potatosack race, but that Yasser— he's just not coordinated. And Ehud reallyneeds to work on his sportmanship, you don't taunt someone with "baby, cryingbaby, run home to mommy" and then expect to conduct serious diplomacy. Yassersaid "you'll be singing a different tune after an Intifada," and I said"whatifada?" Ehud just said "oh, something Arab," and demanded that we all gocanoeing.
•It was something of a relief when I had to leave to go to theconvention. I think Al is going to make an excellent President. He just needs todo what I told him: remember your ideals; ask yourself what Jefferson would havedone; don't pick a right wing schmuck to be your running mate. Wait, what do Ihave to worry about? I mean really—George W. Bush? LMAO.
. . .
Summary of my Administration:

Balanced budget: yes
Surplus: yes
Stock market: Through the roof
Interest rates: reeeeeally low
Inflation: what's that?
Irish accord: yes
Kosovo protected: yes
Rwanda: Oops
Interstate 5 shutdown: 1, and how, baby!
Counseling sessions: 86 (v. good)
La-tays: 126
Big Macs: 397
Blowjobs: 42 (v. v. v. good)

All in all, a successful 8 years!

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