In other news....

News stories that have caught my attention lately, but about which I can't add much more than other sources:

The Bush administration's politically-motivated firing of highly-regarded US attorneys in order to replace them with its own partisan hacks. This was, naturally, done through yet another sneaky provision packed into the so-called "Patriot" Act, which, it's increasingly obvious, was never intended to have anything to do with preventing terrorism at all. One of the fired attorneys, Carol Lam, is receiving Bush-style payback for investigating a corrupt Republican congressman. Several are in districts that are home to prominent Democrats (Arkansas, Nevada, New Mexico....). Hence the push to dump the well-regarded attorneys in those jobs and replace them with Republican cronies who can be depended upon to gin up "investigations" of Hillary Clinton, Harold Reid, Bill Richardson, et al, just in time for the 2008 election.

Elsewhere on the frontlines of the war against fascism, the forces of freedom were defeated when a US Circuit Court of Appeals renounced the doctrine of habeas corpus, disregarding the plain language of the Constitution. ("The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it." -- Article One, Section Nine). The government's case amounts to the assertion that the right protected by this portion of the Constitution doesn't exist, and that it may unilaterally sieze anyone, at any time, and imprison and torture them indefinitely without ever filing charges or showing cause. The case now goes to the Supreme Court -- if that body, dominated by Bush appointees, deigns to hear it.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down a somewhat milder law that prescribed indefinite detention without cause. (The Canadians, unlike the US, have let torture remain the domain of third world hellholes.)

And, hey, does everybody know that Britney shaved her head? Yes? Yes? Okay, just checking. Gotta keep up with the important stuff.