The JM Times... on the road near respectable?

More days like this, and I might even consider BZ's request and drop the JM from my moniker for them. Granted, they have a LONG LONG LONG LONG LONG LONG way to go, many sins to repent for, but today's edition is probably worth reading. The Business Section along... THE BUSINESS SECTION!

Number 1: Walmart Chief Writes Off New York
Personally, I'm worried this is some kind of ploy to get New Yorkers to let up, but an amazing coalition of unions, human rights groups, community advocates, environmentalists, mom and pop stores and New Yorkers who simply don't want to see that race to the bottom shit happen here in our city, have managed something no other place in the world has done. Getting H. Lee Scott Jr, COE of Walmart, to say "I don't care if we're ever here." Well we care. We hope you're NEVER HERE!

Number 2: Earth's Climate Needs the Help of Incentives
David Leonhardt's piece on how the market needs to be utilized to help get us off fossil fuels and stop destroying the planet. I like his premise, but he doesn't seem to mention a carbon tax, which in my mind, is a big flaw. Still, a decent read, and nice to see it getting front Business section treatment.

Number 3: Burger King Shifts Policy on Animals
Doing what Starbucks has started to do for fair trade coffee, a huge fast food producer takes baby steps towards somewhat more ethical food products, beginning a switch to cage free eggs and crate free pork. Not free range, not organic, and not local, but a start of something.

Plus, the Yankees are actually featured on the front page of the sports section. Who knew?

Rome: actually built in a day.

If HBO's Rome measured time like Jack Bauer, the series would be slightly less than a day at about 22 hours. Unfortunately, due to HBO's budgetary concerns, Rome ended up being at the other end of the tv time/real time ration, covering about 24 years of history in the 22 episodes. Talking about pacing issues.

What's the difference between me and you?

The Congressional Research Service shows, finally, once and for all, that not only did Clinton not "do it too" when it comes to Attorneygate, but NO ONE has "done it too" (special knowledge to Think Progress, and of course, those hardworking folks at TPM):

– Of the 468 confirmations made by the Senate over the 25-year period, only 10 left office involuntarily for reasons other than a change in administration prior to the firings that took place in December.
– In virtually all of those 10 previous cases, serious issues of personal or professional conduct appeared to be the driving issue. Prior to December, for example, only two U.S. Attorneys were outright fired for improper, and in one case criminal, behavior. The CRS report identifies six other U.S. Attorneys who resigned during the 25-year period who were implicated in news reports of “questionable conduct.” For two others, the CRS was unable to determine the cause.

Marinate on that for a second. 10 times in 25 years, and then BOOM, 8 in one day. To axe US Attorneys for no outstanding reason in the middle of the term? NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE.

But it makes me wonder about a broader political question. It'll speak to my naivette about conservatives, perhaps, but it is bugging me. Why is it that I'm able to see when Democratic leaders are ferkakta, and yet Right Wingers don't seem to see it in their own? How can Republicans be so stuck on their talking points that they can't admit to themselves what is happening?

Look, I strongly dislike Bill Clinton. Sure, he doesn't look so bad now. But for 6 years, he pursued awful policy initiatives that helped lead this country to where we are today. He could've pushed us to look into clean energy and oil alternatives. He could've made sure there were labor and environmental provisions in NAFTA. He could have done any number of things. Instead, he took on Republican themes and made them his own. And yes, he's brilliant and a great speaker. But so what? He was the last Democratic President, but so what?!

Can these people who screamed "rule of law" until they were deaf when he was in office see the hypo-crazy in their pardon for Scooter drumbeat? Do they honestly believe obstructing justice and firing attorneys merely for not jumping as high as you want them to is okay? And as Bush sinks lower and lower, and as the curtain on the worst presidency in our illustrius history is pulled back, will they be able to question? Will they, as MM always says to me, "stop drinking the kool aid and think for themselves?" Can they see it? Will they see it? How can I see it and they not see it? It's a cliche to suggest they're mindless. Maybe this is why I've started reading Andrew Sullivan. I don't agree with him most of the time, but if we both stop drinking the koolaid, maybe we can find some common ground and make progress.

What's the difference between me and you?

Good shabbas.

That's how you do it, Rahm.

Eleanor Holmes Norton just went toe to toe with Colbert, firing back at him with the same biting humor, and making us all laugh the whole time.

That's how to be on the Colbert Report, Rahm. Think about it.

NHL asks the questions I'm starting to wonder about fighting in hockey

Thanks, Canadian Press!

Colin Campbell, former WHA tough guy, Rangers coach, and current NHL disciplinarian:
"This year we've had two players carried out on stretchers because of fair, consenting fights that had taken place. . . . It scares you," said Campbell.

"You take a Tiger Williams, you take a Dave Shultz, or even a Bob Probert of the '90s, and you pit them against our players today - our players today are much bigger and stronger and more well-conditioned," said Campbell.

Jeremy Roenick makes a good counterpoint, though:
"I worry about what would happen if there wasn't a way to let out the frustration with a fight," said Roenick. "Because let's face it, there is absolutely no respect in the game any more, with the way guys are taking runs at people and with the cheap shots and the late hits. Guys are getting hurt. If you take fighting out all of a sudden these guys are going to take even more liberties because they don't have to be accountable for themselves.

"I think somebody is going to get hurt more from a vicious hit from a guy not being worried that he has to drop his gloves and get his ass kicked."

Run, Tony, Run... again!

You can't make this stuff up. The great folks at TPM Muckraker present Constitutional Scholar Tony Snow!!! Take it away, Tony:

The executive branch is under no compulsion to testify to Congress, because Congress in fact doesn't have oversight ability.

Hopefully, all these rule of law types in the Republic party will say something about it. Guys?

Wherein I talk alot about hockey, fighting in sports, and fandom.

In part two of this week's special blue theme, I saw my beloved Rangers take on the hated flyers at the Garden tonight. And what a great game it was, a 5-0 crushing of the Flyers... First time Buddy's ever seen a Rangers victory, and Schedule1 and I lift our regular season record to 1-1-0.

First, thoughts on the Rangers team... several weeks ago, I felt it was a strong likelihood that the Rangers wouldn't make the playoffs, and that was downright disappointing. Last year's team was challenging for the number 2 seed in the playoffs until a few weeks out, then proceeded to fall off a cliff and lose the division to freaking dweevils on the last day of the season. So we went from being almost number 2 in the conference to 6th and losing home ice advantage. Honestly, the way we played Joisey in the playoffs, it wouldn't have mattered. We were slow, we had lost the fantastic momentum we had built up, and while getting blown out of game 1, Coach Tom Renney decided it would be a good idea to send Jaromir Jagr out to penalty kill (I'm sure something he hadn't done in a while). To Schedule1's and my horror. And of course, as if on cue, Jagr promptly injures himself, and after years of no playoffs, the Rangers are eliminated in one round.

We started this year off well, but the effort has been spotty. Momma K's reviews of the games always note how many periods the Rangers actually show up for, and for a good portion of the season, it has not been all three. Letdowns, disappoitnments, comebacks that fall painfully short, the first half of this year was not that great. But a few things have happened recently. The injuries piled on, but instead of going crazy and mortgaging half of the Hartford team for a rental, Sather made a couple of smaller trades and has been bringing up youth to fill the gaps (maybe taking a page out of Brian Cashman's playbook). I wasn't happy with the Jason Ward for Avery trade. I didn't really know much about Avery, but knew that Ward was one of the only guys that seemed to be playing all game. So far, I've turned out to be wrong about that. Avery reminds me of Theo Fleury in his heyday- feisty, not afraid to hit or make a nuisance of himself, and more dangerous offensively than you expect of him. He also seems to be one of those rare players that instantly takes to New York, building a great repoire with the Garden faithful. And the kids? The kids look awesome. Jarkko Immonen, Brad Isbister, Brandon Dubinsky, Ryan Callahan, David Liffiton and Daniel Girardi have all added something pretty awesome to this team. Energy, fire, speed, urgency, and assertiveness. The best line tonight was Avery, Shannahan and Callahan. Girardi also had an excellent game tonight. Building the team around Henrik, Prucha, Avery, Cullen, and these kids gives me hope for the future. There may not be a Sid the Kid in there, but there's a lot of promise. My hope is that in two years, Tom Pyatt, currently tearing up the OHL, will join this impressive group.

Something else happened at the beginning of the game that was kinda troubling. 21 seconds in, two heavyweights, Colton Orr of the Rangers and I wasn't sure who at the time for the Flyers dropped their gloves. It turned out to be Todd Fedoruk, who's name rang a bell. They mixed it up early, and Orr knocked Fedoruk out cold. In my years of seeing hockey games, I've never seen someone knocked out by a punch. At first, thinking maybe he was just stunned, I made a joke about counting him out for the knockout. But man, then, he still wasn't moving. Eventually, he was taken off the ice on a stretcher, with his head immobilized. The Garden faithful, at first exuberant about the fight, became quiet when they realized it could be more serious.

When I got back to Knucklehead's place- i told her about the game being great, and then about the fight. Her response was, "wow, I hope the guy is okay." And mine was a gingerly "me too. mostly" she seemed confused about my hesitation. "Well, I mean, I hope the guy is okay and isn't permanently injured. But by the same token, he got into that fight because he was playing dirty and could have hurt someone the last time the Rangers played."

For those that don't know hockey, it's actually not so weird for a fight to happen early. In cases without history, it's merely the tough guys on the teams getting it out of their system (see Domi v. Probert). Actually, once the Flyers saw that the Betts/Hollweg/Orr line was on the ice, they sent Fedoruk out there... maybe to get the fight out of the way, because sometimes you just know its coming. Sometimes, a fight like this happens because of very recent history. Hockey is a very physical game, and one of the reasons for tough guys or enforcers on a team is to protect your teammates from being intimidated or roughed up. Seems that Renney didn't dress Colton Orr the last time the Rangers played the Flyers, and this happened:

Blue Notes-
Both Gagne and Upshall scored in that 5-3 Flyers win on Feb. 17, which was notable not only for the Shanahan injury, but the cheap and rough shots that some Flyers (Fedoruk, Eager, Richards, Picard) laid on Rangers starting soon after the puck dropped.

AP-
New York coach Tom Renney left Orr out of the lineup when the teams last met on Feb. 17 and said he regretted it after Fedoruk and Eager combined for four roughing penalties and a misconduct in the first period. Sean Avery fought Philadelphia's Mike Richards midway through the period of that game.

While the officiating this year has been spotty at best, four penalties and a misconduct in one period- that's a lot of cheap shots. And those are only the ones they were penalized for. Maybe he wasn't swinging a fist, but Fedoruk was no angel in that game. Some would say he earned his beat down.

There is no other non-fight based sport that I can think of that only penalizes five minutes for throwing several punches over the course of the game. The rules have been made a little more strict (the addition of the instigator penalty, the three fights in a game and you're suspended for a game policy) but it's not a multi game suspension the way it is in the other major sports. I think this in part due to the rough nature of the game, and the fact that these guys all have large sticks. Seriously. I think we'd see more heinous Chris Simon two handed chops if we didn't have fighting in the NHL. But then I think of the family sitting behind us who took their kids to their first hockey game, and took their daughter out while Fedoruk was still out cold. I feel like Ruby as hockey fan understands why fighting is alright for the game, but Ruby the more generally interested person is not sure if the fighting should continue. The bone crunching body checks and the fisticuffs are the some of the things that make the sport what it is here in North America, but people get suspended for several games in other sports for throwing two or more punches.

Lastly, some thoughts on fandom (that might develop into a longer post). For me, and for many folks, attending sporting events is about heckling, about going back and forth with people about the game. I get loud and rowdy, but I don't get violent, and I don't get personal with other fans. I may mock their team like crazy, reminding them of their team's old failures, their city's general sports misconduct (throwing batteries, for example), but to me, it doesn't go beyond that. If I walk into Nassau Colliseum in my Rangers attire, I expect to get heckled, and I expect to give some back. Same with Yankee gear in Fenway. Maybe it's just my own life experiences growing up, but I just don't feel the need to get personal. However, there was a guy near us in a Flyers jersey as we were walking out last night who was itching to fight somebody. I was chanting "We Want Hextall" (a former Flyers goalie who the Rangers beat pretty consistantly and destroyed when he was with the Islanders on the way to the 94 Cup), and he starts saying all kinds of personal shit, and starts babbling to a friend of his about he "wants to fight somebody tonight," that he's proud that "it wouldn't be the first time he spent the night in jail" and so forth. Clearly drunk and foolish. And while I wasn't going for the bait, there are certainly enough drunk New Yorkers that he could get his fight if he really tried, and he nearly did. The one thing that was kinda sad was he seemed to actually know about sports and about the Flyers. How can a seemingly intelligent hockey fan be so intent on picking a fight with someone just for being heckled? I think a "rules of fandom" should be established. Don't be an asshole and try to ruin stuff just because your team lost. Rioting is not justified by either winning or losing. Neither is throwing batteries. And so forth. Like I said, this may develop into a bigger one.

"I'm sorry this has bubbled to the surface the way it has"

Probably the only honest thing Chimpy McFuckface has said all day.

What your momma saw...

Talking Points Memo and TMP Muckraker are leading a grassroots combing of the latest attorneygate docudump. 3000 pages. Go help out if you have a moment. Some of the things people are citing are things we already know, but there's more and more stuff coming to the surface.

BZ, EAR and I were talking over the weekend about the crimes that were committed in Attorneygate. The right has been spinning that there was no crime here in the forceouts of these 8 attorneys, that clinton did this, that poppabush did this, and so forth. Neither of these Presidents did this kind of thing during their second term, no matter what the right says. But I posited to BZ the following crimes: Misleading Congress, Obstruction of Justice (influencing investigations, and also doubles as an ethics violation for at least two members of Congress), and a second Obstruction of Justice (the firing of Carol Lam). Turns out maybe I should've gone for that law degree after all. At least, according to the JM Times' Adam Cohen.

Buried at the bottom of the docudump avalanche? Check out this nugget in the AP wire:

In other trouble for the administration, the Justice Department's inspector general is to testify Tuesday and Wednesday before House and Senate committees on what he says was Justice's misuse of its power to secretly go through people's financial, Internet and other records in terrorism cases.

O RLY?! Color me surprised.

dating myself.

Yesterday, after services, I noticed a yellow-capped bottle of Coke. I'm doing my best to eradicate my own purchase of coke products, but was intrigued by the yellow cap, because that means it's KP Coke with honest to goodness real sugar in it.

I was kinda excited, remembering how "new coke" taked just like pepsi and that coke had been an actual variant that even I as an 8 year old could taste. We didn't have soda a lot growing up, but the difference between Coke and Pepsi was substantial. Then, along came "new coke" which lead the way to the switch to High Fructose Corn Syrup's domination in, well, nearly everything. So, in my excitement, I said, "kp coke!" and the following exchange ensued:

MMM: oh, did I buy that by mistake?
RK: mistake? Oh no, my friend, that was no mistake. Or if it was, it's a delicious one.
MMM: why?
RK: that's real coke.
MMM: What?
RK: that's real coke, with actual sugar, the way it used to be.
MMM: Huh?
RK: don't you remember the switch to new coke, the syrupy sweetness? There's a reason Coke is called "coca cola classic" and it's because they tried to tell people they switched back to the original formula after the disaster of Coke II.
MMM: (confused, not quite understanding why I was so excited... slowly says): No, but coke classic is the real coke.
RK: (me, now realizing MMM was quite possibly a toddler when the whole Coke II thing happened, hence his non excitement) hmm. alright... can you just pass the KP coke this way?

I realized ahavatcafe was prepping her bas mitzvah during either my senior year of high school or my freshman year of college.

Yikes.

infuriation.

sometimes, people anger me. trying to let go of that before shabbas starts is a challenge.

Well, Tony, where would YOU drop it?

Having changed directions with their leak to ABC, the junta has of course sent Tony Snow out for damage control to slow the Sunday headlines. With these winners:

“It has been described as her idea but ... I don’t want to try to vouch for origination,” said White House press secretary Tony Snow, who previously had asserted Miers was the person who came up with the idea. “At this juncture, people have hazy memories.”

snip

We don’t know motivations. ... I don’t think it’s safe to go any further than that.”

snip

Asked if Bush himself might have suggested the firings, Snow said, “Anything’s possible ... but I don’t think so.” He said Bush “certainly has no recollection of any such thing. I can’t speak for the attorney general.

“I want you to be clear here: don’t be dropping it at the president’s door,” Snow said.

Wow, subtle, Tony. Really subtle. First, notice a few things- the party line has constantly shifted. And maybe Tony, knowing full well that this thing is turning into an avalanche, has dropped the staunch denail of Chimpy McFuckface's involvement for a "no recollection" and "memories are hazy" defense. Especially since the emails released last night, clearly show that Gonzales was involved at the beginning and that "loyalty to Bush" was a part of the criteria. Here's where things get messy: what is loyalty to Bush? Is it prosecuting people who take bribes and ferretting out a network of bribers and illegal contributors? Because that's the only thing we can find on Carol Lam. Was it resistance to ethical breaches by lawmakers and staffers? Because that's what we've got on Iglesias and McKay.

A couple other subtleties in Tony's two step:

1) He says he can't speak for AG Gonzales. That, to me, is part of the subtle separation that's happening between Gonzalez and the Junta. It shifts the discussion back to AG Gonzales and gently shoves from the sidewalk towards the oncoming bus.

2) Well, this isn't really that subtle, but the idea that this story shouldn't end up at Chucklenutz's doorstep? That is laughable. This administration has a 6 year track record of shielding and rewarding the folks that are caught with their hands in the cookie jar. This was a sure-fire plan to make sure anyone investigating damaging activity and failing to adhere to administration pushes for questionable indictments was fired- hatched and put forward by his closest advisors. Who else has culpability on this but the President? He believes, even now, that the firings are fine, that he's only upset with how telling people about it was handled. But this was a coverup of politically motivated firings to use a provision "snuck" into the (un)Patriot(ic) act to replace decent lawyers with more loyal syncophants. This was deliberate and came from on high. And since Gonzales doesn't wipe his ass without Chucklenutz's say so, who do YOU think is responsible?

Who does the buck stop with, Tony?

Someone at the White House is singing...

..because ABC is breaking news on our good buddies Karl and Alberto (h/t: talkingpointsmemo):

March 15, 2007 — New unreleased e-mails from top administration officials show that the idea of firing all 93 U.S. attorneys was raised by White House adviser Karl Rove in early January 2005, indicating Rove was more involved in the plan than the White House previously acknowledged.

The e-mails also show that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales discussed the idea of firing the attorneys en masse weeks before he was confirmed as attorney general.

The e-mails directly contradict White House assertions that the notion originated with recently departed White House counsel Harriet Miers, and was her idea alone.

Wow, talk about long knives. Given the Mouse's serious right turn (see: bogus 9/11 movie that has earned someone a beatdown if I ever meet them), there's only one possible reason for the leakers to go to ABC. My guess is someone wants either Karl or Alberto out. But man, this administration is gangsta. Waits for Alberto to go all "mistakes were made", the President has "confidence in Al" and then BAM! the coup de grace'. No wonder he looked like he was about to piss himself the other day. Deliberately misleading Congress, eh? Let's see how far this goes. If Gonzales is smart, he'll resign before candlelighting tomorrow. But as MK was pointing out, resignation is not enough. INDICTMENT!

Dance, Varmit!

More from TPMMuckraker and Tony Snow's tapdancing... nice to see the gaggle showing a little spine today:

Q The President said, "I've heard those allegations about political decision-making; it's just not true." How can he say that when he hasn't seen all the emails, emails continue to come out, and of those that have already come out, some of them clearly seem to show that at some level, at least, there was political decision-making?

MR. SNOW: I'm not -- how would you define "political decision-making"?

Q Well, decision-making that involves politics.

Q How would you define it, Tony?

go to tpm for the rest of this insightful exchange.

Tony doesn't know!

For the record, Josh Marshall and the fine folks at Talking Points Memo and their sibling site, tpmmuckraker, have done the yeoman's work behind pushing Attorneygate to the forefront, going into their vast archives to explain how the Republican claims of "voter fraud" is code for republic voter suppression, and garnering apologies from members of the mainstream media who suggested, " in this case some liberals are seeing broad partisan conspiracies where none likely exist." This story is on the radar primarily because of their work. So in it, we see yet another example of bloggers doing a better job finding and presenting the stories than the MSM.

As part of their non-stop coverage, Paul Kiel at tpmmuckraker put up the text from this morning's press gaggle with Tony Snow, who doesn't know anything, doesn't believe loyalty should be the criteria for US Attorneys, and continues the canard that poor reviews and not loyalty to the White House is what is being referred to in the volumes of emails of the docu-dump Monday. If you have a moment and want to see just how many lies, half truths, and weasel words Snow uses, take a gander.

Tony Doesn't Know!

How can such smart people be so stupid?

I have personal reasons for making that my title that maybe I'll go into another time. Thankfully, Representative Rahm Emanuel gives me another reason:

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), the Democratic Caucus chairman, has told new Democratic members of Congress to steer clear of Stephen Colbert, or at least his satirical Comedy Central program, “The Colbert Report.”

“He said don’t do it … it’s a risk and it’s probably safer not to do it,” said Rep. Steve Cohen. But the freshman lawmaker from Tennessee taped a segment that last week was featured in the 32nd installment of the “Better Know a District” series. Colbert asked Cohen whether he was a black woman. He isn’t.

I don't believe I'm hearing this... wait, actually, I do. But it was my favorite Representative's appearance on the Colbert Report that helped make his profile more national, helped raise awareness about his campaign and helped get more support to the campaign. And this happened, may I add, at a time when the DCCC was all but ignoring us.

Colbert's over the top sarcasm is a joke. Most people get it now. Most people, that is, because apparently Rep. Rahmbo thinks it is politically risky to be on there. The sign of a true Clinton acolyte. How can someone so smart be so dumb?

fools.

I hate to have this take the top spot from the AG story which we're ferociously following here at the riot act, but I had to point this out. Starbucks has its bad (forcing out mom and pop coffeehouses, no free wi-fi, not nearly enough fair trade coffee beans) and its good (bordering on decent health benefits for its workers, a substantial amount of fair trade coffee). But what they've also done is manage to put about 4 of themselves within a short walking distance of Knucklehead's apartment. Well, my lack of sleep has gotten me back on coffee, and GUESS WHAT TOMORROW IS?!

that's right, from 10 to 12 noon, get a free cup of Starbucks coffee (i'm guessing it's a small, but it's free) from those clowns. If you like them, drink their coffee. If you hate them, drink their free coffee. And if you're on the upper west, take a walk, bring your mug and get 3 or 4. BONG!

California Senator knows her algebra...

Tell us, Senator Feinstein, is "lawyers who serve at the pleasure of the president" really what this thing is all about? Show us the math:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Wednesday she believes the ouster of San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam was connected to Lam's prosecution of former Republican congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham, even though the Bush administration has denied it.

"In my heart of hearts I do, no matter what they say," Feinstein, D-Calif., a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in an interview with The Associated Press.

"The fact is there are additional investigations that have come from that. The fact is that the day before she left office she filed two additional indictments," Feinstein said, referring to charges Lam filed last month against an ex-CIA official and a defense contractor tied to Cunningham.

"Now they weren't of members of Congress," Feinstein added. "But whether this has had a chilling effect over that investigation I don't know. But I'm concerned about it."

Oh, I get it. They knew they couldn't fire Fitzgerald, so they fired Carol Lam instead. But what about the insistance by the AG that she was too focused on corruption and not on other issues, like immigration?

Feinstein wrote to Gonzales last June questioning border prosecution guidelines in Lam's district, but received a reply from Moschella in which he described Lam's immigration smuggling caseload as rising "favorably" in 2006.

Rising favorably. Does that sound like a negative work review to you?!

Let me get this straight...

Tucker Carlson was bleating yesterday that the attorney firing story wasn't a big deal, that isn't it fair to push attorneys to examine "voter fraud" and political corruption? Well, Attorney General Gonzales doesn't think so:

"We advised Ms. Lam of these other priorities — that she needed to focus on other issues as well. A U.S. attorney can't just focus on one particular problem," Gonzales said. "A U.S. Attorney has to focus on all the needs of the community."

The title of the CBS piece is even better:

Fired U.S. Attorney Led Cunningham Probe
Attorney General Gonzales Says Prosecutor Focused Office's Efforts Too Much On Public Corruption

Rich, ain't it.

Alberto Gonzales Demoted!

... by the Yankees to the minor league complex for the rest of spring training.

But don't worry, I think this headline may be coming again soon.

Smashing the "Clinton did it too" defense...

... thanks to the great folks at Think Progress, I don't even have to:

But in an e-mail to Harriet Miers on Jan. 9, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’s chief of staff Kyle Sampson (who resigned yesterday) admitted that the Clinton administration never purged its U.S. attorneys in the middle of their terms, explicitly stating, “In recent memory, during the Reagan and Clinton Administrations, Presidents Reagan and Clinton did not seek to remove and replace U.S. Attorneys to serve indefinitely under the holdover provision”:

Oh snap!

It always comes down to sports and politics...

because I follow both to near obsession...

first, the US Attorney scandal goes straight to the top. And this is no longer figurative. Josh Marshall at talking points memo puts together the key citations from the new JM Times and Wapo pieces. TPM Muckraker helped expose this story in the first place, and now it seems it really does go all the way to the top. Literally. As in, when I said the USA story was far more important than the Libby verdict, I wasn't kidding.

second, let me get all Colbertian for a second... it seems my beloved Rangers must be reading this blog, or how else could you explain THIS?!?!:

New York Rangers President and General Manager Glen Sather announced today that the club has signed center Tom Pyatt to a professional contract.

Pyatt, 20, has skated in 56 games with the Saginaw Spirit of the Ontario Hockey League (OHL) this season, registering 42 goals and 38 assists for 80 points, along with a plus-32 rating and 18 penalty minutes. Among league leaders, the OHL Western Conference All-Star is currently tied for first in game-winning goals (nine), tied for third in shorthanded goals (six), tied for sixth in goals (42), and tied for 11th in plus/minus (+32).

See what positive thinking can do, feygele?

Last week, Andrew Sullivan, this week...

... It's Reverend Al Sharpton:

"Why shouldn't the black community ask questions? Are we now being told, 'You all just shut up?'" Sharpton told CBS 2's Marcia Kramer Monday. "Senator Obama and I agree that the war is wrong, but then I want to know why he went to Connecticut and helped [Sen. Joseph] Lieberman, the biggest supporter of the war."

Sharpton also questioned why Obama supports "tort reform, which hurts police brutality victims."

This is what I'm talking about when I talk about my hesitation about Senator Obama. And of all people, it's Rev. Sharpton putting it out there.

Republican on Republican crime

I don't want to get into too much of a habit of linking Andrew Sullivan's page (though it's nice to be able to read a conservative who's actually a conservative and not one of these breying idiots) but he put up an awesome letter from one of his readers, who notes that, for all the bullshitting of the far reich idiots, everyone having just about anything to do with the Libby case IS A REPUBLICAN.

No, seriously.

Words cannot describe...

The Yankees need Carl Pavano to produce something. And I want him to succeed. But then I hear stories like this:

Team sources say Pavano may have to testify in Tampa later this month in a hearing over his non-payment of the commission on his $39.95 million Yankees deal. The commission should amount to close to $2 million, assuming the standard agents' fee of five percent. Get a load of this. Apparently, Pavano's contention is the agent should have gotten at least $40 million, not just a mere $39.95 million (for a lifetime losing pitcher, no less). So Pavano is handling it by paying nothing.

Holy shit. What an asshole. I hope this is just the Jon Heyman getting it wrong, but since he doesn't do that all that often... well, we could make that strange but true sports stories book and trade him for a case of baseballs.

When sports and politics collide

No, not taking anything as serious on as the steroids stuff or even that Bush has probably spent more time with sports teams the last two weeks than he has taking care of the health of our nation's veterans, but I'll leave that for another time. Just two sports/politics tidbits, one great, one disturbing:

The good one:
While the Rangers are stalling out a little bit and need a few big wins to make the playoffs, there are some really talented kids in the system that give me hope. One of them is a 20 year old center named Tom Pyatt... who happens to be the leading scorer for Stephen Colbert's favorite hockey team, the Saginaw Spirit!!! BOOYAH! A new reason to get a Steagle Colbeagle the Eagle shirt!

The bad one:
I know you Yankee haters will love to bother me about this, but it freaks me out too much not to say anything. I've been looking forward to this spring training, as the Yanks have some great kids, particularly young arms, that will start to make a diference on the team starting (my guess) as early as this year. But there's one player in camp that gives me chills, and not in a good way. Now playing shortstop, number 73, Alberto Gonzales. Before anyone calls me a racist or anything like that, I OBVIOUSLY know this is not the same guy, not even related, of COURSE I KNOW. But can I tell you how disturbing it is to throw on the game to listen to while working through lunch and hear "Alberto Gonzales made a nice stop on that, helped Hughes out with that one?" That freaked me the hell out. Like, look out Joe, he's tapping the bullpen phone!

JUDGEMENT!

"We find the defendant... incredibly guilty"--- Jury in the Scooter Libby trial.

Four Guilty Verdicts, on three counts of perjury and obstruction of justice. Not guilty on the false statement count.

what's next for Fitzmas?