During a Fox News interview about Fred Thompson's campaign, author/blogger/radio talk-show host Tammy Bruce casually remarks, "I think I'd probably make a great president," prompting an amusing exchange with Democratic operative Bob Beckel -- here's the video via Hot Air:



More on the Fred Thompson campaign at Memeorandum, and Stephen Dinan of The Washington Times today has an exclusive report from Ames, Iowa:

Campaigning heavily here over the past two weeks, Mr. Thompson has refined his message and yesterday released a 15-minute Web video laying out his qualifications and telling voters they need to pick a Republican nominee who is willing to call out Democratic leaders for abandoning their principles.

"They're all NEA, MoveOn.org, ACLU, Michael Moore Democrats," Mr. Thompson charges in the video, which is on his campaign Web site. "They've allowed these radicals to take control of the party and dictate their course."

Maybe if Fred had some of that Ron Paul money…

UPDATE 4:40 p.m.:

Some controversy has developed over the Fox News exchange between Miss Bruce and Mr. Beckel. Remember, the context was a discussion of whether Fred Thompson has the "fire in the belly" needed to be president:

Tammy Bruce: I'm concerned about the future as well, I think I'd probably make a great president -- I'd also rather not run. . . .

Bob Beckel: By the way, running for president, Tammy -- keep your day job. I think you do a great job. . . . I can't vote for you.

I don't know where this myth of Bob Beckel being one of the "good" Democrats came from, but it's not grounded in reality. . . .

He's not one of the "good Democrats." He's a snake. I wish Tammy would have clocked him.

The second point in Mr. Beckel's defense is that he almost certainly intended the remark as a good-natured jibe, rather than as a "gratuitous personal shot." Mr. Beckel is a professional political operative, and when a non-politician muses about a potential political career, it's obligatory for the professional operative to reply, "Keep your day job."

Third, and this is probably the most relevant point, that's just Bob Beckel being Bob Beckel. It's who he is. He's a meat-and-potatoes, beer-and-a-shot, blue-collar partisan Democrat. He's been doing this shout-show routine for years -- he once co-hosted the Sunday edition of CNN's "Crossfire" -- and for him to make this kind of "keep-your-day-job" wisecrack during a back-and-forth exchange is simply the nature of the beast. It's what he gets paid to do.

Finally, if any Republican ever wants to respond in kind to a "gratuitous personal shot" from Mr. Beckel, perhaps the best way to do so is to remind him that he is a world-class loser. As campaign manager for Walter Mondale in 1984, Mr. Beckel organized the worst defeat of a Democratic presidential candidate in modern history. Ronald Reagan won 49 states -- losing Mr. Mondale's native Minnesota by fewer than 4,000 votes -- and racking up nearly 59 percent of the popular vote. With Mr. Beckel running his campaign, the Democrats lost by a record margin of nearly 17 million votes.

Any Republican could throw that fact up in Mr. Beckel's face, but that would be so . . . mean-spirited. Here's a graphic, just in case any mean-spirited Republicans want to use it (click to enlarge):

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Three days before the crucial Iowa caucuses, and the American Spectator's Phillip Klein seems to be fed up with the mythology of the place:

Every four years, politicians and the media swarm this small Midwestern state and shower its voters with attention and compliments, but very few people have the courage to admit the simple truth: Iowans are largely apathetic about politics, and they don't deserve the disproportionate influence they have in choosing the leader of the free world. …
Even though candidates in both parties will have together spent hundreds of days in the state and doled out more than $30 million to are more than 50,000 television advertisements, only one out of ten eligible Iowans is expected to participate in a caucus on Thursday.

UPDATE 2:45 p.m.:

Add John Fund of the Wall Street Journal to the anti-Iowa crowd:

[T]he Iowa caucuses are far from a Normal Rockwell exercise in small-town democracy. They may not be as bad as the "smoke-filled rooms" of yore, but give me a simple primary election any day. I can't wait for New Hampshire.

Beginning the presidential nominating process in Iowa, as will occur this week, "makes no sense," says Gov. Ted Strickland, who recently campaigned there for Sen. Hillary Clinton.
"I'd like to see both parties say, 'We're going to bring this to an end,' " he said. …
Critics complain that the current system gives a few hundred thousand voters in Iowa and New Hampshire far too much influence. They contend that the skills candidates use to connect with small groups in Iowa and New Hampshire are not necessarily those that a president needs.

Having already orchestrated more than $100 million in grants to liberal non-profits, now George Soros and his friends are ready for primetime, the Capital Research Center reports:

The Democracy Alliance (DA) is maturing. After several years of internal strife, management squabbles, a few political purges, and frustrating electoral setbacks, the group whose mission is to tilt American politics leftward has found its footing. The DA is becoming what leftist blogger Markos Moulitsas of DailyKos fame called for in 2005: "A vast, Vast Left Wing Conspiracy to rival" the conservative movement. . . . Although it is officially nonpartisan, the DA has cultivated deep and extensive ties to the Democratic Party establishment.

Senator Hillary Clinton's good friend, Kelly Craighead, runs the Alliance's day-to-day operations. Clinton brags that she has helped create what she calls "a lot of the new progressive infrastructure." Last August Clinton told the YearlyKos convention of left-wing bloggers that she "helped to start and support" Media Matters for America and the Center for American Progress (CAP), two recipients of DA grants. Media Matters is headed by conservative turncoat David Brock; CAP is headed John Podesta, Bill Clinton's White House chief of staff. (Washington Times, December 3, 2007)

Meanwhile, be sure and read the rest of the CRC report.

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Backing from an heiress to a Gilded Age fortune has put a dent in Democrat John Edwards populist image:

"His campaign simply exploited the biggest loophole in the campaign finance system in order to get public matching funds while arranging through allies to benefit from a 527. That's how they avoided the spending limits that are a condition of the public matching funds," Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said in a statement. . . .
His memo was prompted by disclosure of a $495,000 donation from philanthropist Rachel Mellon to a 527 group called the Alliance for a New America that is running ads in Iowa in support of Edwards' campaign. . . .
An FEC report showed the donation came from Oak Spring Farms LLC, the corporate entity that holds Mellon's fortune. Mellon is the 97-year-old widow of Paul Mellon, the son of industrialist Andrew Mellon.
She also contributed the maximum $4,600 allowed to Edwards' campaign earlier this year.

Last month at a town hall meeting in Bow, N.H., Edwards referenced the Mellon family as part of the Gilded Age interests and used it as an example of how he'll fight back against special interests if he's elected.
Edwards said "back in the period where, you know, the Rockefellers and the Mellons and the Carnegies, all these people, owned most of America or a big chunk of America and they used their money and power to dominate what was happening in the government and to dominate what was happening in the economy."
On Saturday, Edwards had dropped the Mellons from his remarks.
"You remember before Franklin Roosevelt was president, America was mostly owned by a few families. Rockefellers, etc.," he said.

The words "war on terror" will no longer be used by the British government to describe attacks on the public, Military.com is reporting.

According to the country's chief prosecutor, Sir Ken Macdonald, terrorist fanatics are not soldiers fighting a war but simply members of an aimless "death cult."

"We resist the language of warfare, and I think the government has moved on this. It no longer uses this sort of language," sayeth Sir Macdonald.

"The people who were murdered on July 7 were not the victims of war. The men who killed them were not soldiers. They were fantasists, narcissists, murderers and criminals and need to be responded to in that way."

The term "Islamic terrorist" will also no longer be used. Officials believe it is unhelpful because it appears to directly link the religion to terrorist atrocities.

Hat tip to Weasel Zippers.

-- Audrey Hudson, Homeland Security reporter, The Washington Times

UPDATE 5:35 p.m.:

At Hot Air, Bryan Preston is peeved at Ron Paul's reaction:

Bryan says:

In a very, very narrow sense, he has a point: I argued at the time of the emergency rule that we were pushing too hard and too soon on Musharraf, a man attempting to lead a country that is about as riven with difficulty as a country can get. . . .

But in Ron Paul's world, all problems are the result of the US taking action. Any action. Anywhere. Against anyone, doing anything. In the case of Pakistan, he says we should cut off aid to our "puppet" in Pakistan and make sure not to march in there with troops.

UPDATE 4:30 p.m.:

Video footage of the last moments before the assassination:

Video courtesy of Pamela at Atlas Shrugs, who says:

This may very well be a defining historical moment much the way the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was the match that set the world on fire and set off the outbreak of World War I.

Musharraf, or the Pakistani people or who ever is still in charge, needs to open the northwest sector of their country up to us and we can hunt the [Al Qaeda terrorists] down and kill them like rabbits running out of a fire.

UPDATE 3:30 p.m.:

In a time of crisis, exactly how does this help?

Another former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, who leads the Pakistan Muslim League -- Nawaz (PML-N), said his party would boycott the Jan. 8 election.

Just weeks earlier, Mrs. Bhutto had persuaded him to participate in the vote along with her PPP, despite fears by both that the election would be rigged.

Mr. Sharif also called for a nationwide strike tomorrow.

"Every Pakistani is shocked, even if he is a trader or a transporter or an ordinary person. Whoever joins this strike will display solidarity with the country," Mr. Sharif told reporters.

-- RSM

* * * MORE UPDATES BELOW * * *

Today's assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto generated a swift reaction from bloggers. A quick sample via Memeorandum:

• Hot Air has a series of updated reports, with Allahpundit noting a previous attack on Bhutto:

  Bhutto herself blamed jihadis for that one but her husband accused the intelligence services of complicity. Given Musharraf's unpopularity and antipathy to Bhutto, a lot of fingers are going to be pointing at him. God only knows how destabilizing this will prove to be.

• Jammie Wearing Fool has another "running update" post, capturing the confusion immediately surrounding the event:

  This is curious that she reportedly died from a bullet wound, likely meaning the suicide bomber may not have caused the wound and she was shot by someone else.

• The Atlantic Monthly's Megan McArdle highlights that magazine's October feature on "After Musharraf," by Joshua Hammer.


• Michelle Malkin captures the sheer relentlessness of those who hated Bhutto:

  They tried and failed when she returned to Pakistan in October. They tried and failed with a baby suicide bomber. Yesterday, they stopped a 15-year-old with a bomb packed full of nails trying to kill her. Today, they succeeded.

• Instapundit links to Jules Crittenden, who asks questions:

  Jihadis, ISI, or some combination?
  Does this unite them against jihadis or just further fragment Pakistan to the jihadis benefit?

  Does the election even go ahead, or is it straight to martial law? Short-term or long-term suspension, and in the event of an election, who rises? . . .

  If there's a coup, who and what ends up on top?

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

UPDATE 3:10 p.m.:

The Jawa Report links Betsy Pisik's exclusive report from Islamabad:

At least 22 supporters were killed in the attack, the Interior Ministry said. . . .

Doctors pronounced Mrs. Bhutto dead today shortly after 6 p.m. Pakistani time.

Supporters . . . rampaged through the streets of Karachi and Lahore, setting fire to cars and shops.

Several people were reported killed in the riots.

-- RSM

UPDATE 5:35 p.m.:

Meanwhile, Ace of Spades links to Andrew McCarthy at National Review:

A recent CNN poll showed that 46 percent of Pakistanis approve of Osama bin Laden.

Aspirants to the American presidency should hope to score so highly in the United States. In Pakistan, though, the al-Qaeda emir easily beat out that country's current president, Pervez Musharraf, who polled at 38 percent.

Today, Benazir Bhutto's death . . . forces me to remind us all that the world chose not to stop suicide killers when their targets were mainly Jews and Israelis. That method has proliferated globally. A suicide killer has now assassinated a westernized Muslim woman leader -- one who, wearing a headscarf, bravely returned to Pakistan with a vision of democracy.

At Townhall.com, Matt Lewis rates the Republican presidential candidates, with the headline, "One of these guys will win" -- but omits Ron Paul from his roundup.

The Paulistas will never forgive you for that one, Matt. You might as well have endorsed "fiat money" as to have dissed "Hope for America" this way.

Meanwhile, courtesy of HotAir.com, here's video of Paul's appearance Sunday on "Meet the Press":

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Ever wonder how that audit of the Federal Emergency Management Agency's security controls on its classified laptop computers turned out? Well, according to the "declassified" report released today by the Homeland Security Department's inspector general, we get to keep wondering.

Here is the report, in its entirety:

"We audited the Department of Homeland Security and its organizational components’ security programs to evaluate the security and integrity of select government-issued laptop computers. The report assesses the strengths and weaknesses of security controls over the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) classified laptop computers. Our objective was to determine whether FEMA had established and implemented adequate and effective security policies and procedures related to the physical security of and logical access to its classified government-issued laptop computers. To secure FEMA data stored on classified government-issued laptop computers, we made six recommendations to the Administrator for FEMA."

-- Audrey Hudson, Homeland Security reporter, The Washington Times

President Bush, during his fourth day at Camp David with a large gathering of family for the holidays, called two world leaders and 10 U.S. soldiers this morning, the White House said.

Mr. Bush spoke with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin, said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe.

According to Mr. Johndroe's readout, the conversation with Mr. Erdogan was quite expansive, while Mr. Bush's talk with Mr. Putin was, well, not.

"The President and the Prime Minister exchanged greetings and best wishes for the New Year. They also discussed their common efforts to fight terrorism, and the importance of the United States, Turkey and Iraq working together to confront the PKK," Mr. Johndroe said.

Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin, meanwhile, "exchanged holiday greetings," Mr. Johndroe said.

Then it was on to more cheerful matters for the president, who can rest easy at Camp David under the vigilant guard of the U.S. Marines. He called three U.S. Army service members, two Navy, two Air Force, two Marines, and one Coast Guard member.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said the president told each service member he is proud to be their commander-in-chief and thanked them for their service and for the sacrifices made by them and their families.

"He cannot thank them enough," Mrs. Perino said. "They are serving a cause that is very noble ... It is people like these that make our military so strong."

"The country is proud of them," she said.

The White House said the following family members are with the president and first lady Laura Bush for Christmas at Camp David: the president and first lady's twin daughters, Barbara and Jenna; the first lady's mother, Jenna Welch; the president's sister, Doro Bush Koch, and her family; and the president's brother, Marvin, and his family.

And finally, the menu for Christmas lunch tomorrow: roast turkey, cornbread dressing, pancetta green beans, sweet potato casserole, fresh fruit salad, parker house rolls, pumpkin and pecan pies, and red velvet.

As an addendum, here are the names of the U.S. soldiers who received presidential calls this morning: Staff Sergeant Anthony R. "Tony" Lewis, U.S. Army, Sergeant Cleveland W. "Cleve" Upton, U.S. Army, Specialist Joseph E. "Joe" Sizemore, U.S. Army, Sergeant Joseph K. "Joe" Jenkins, U.S. Marine Corps, Corporal Orlando P. Anaya, U.S. Marine Corps, Personnel Specialist First Class Claudine A. "Toni" Gayle, U.S. Navy, Construction Electrician First Class Kelly Mumm, U.S. Navy, Senior Airman LaTishia B. "Tishia" Hall, U.S. Air Force, Airman First Class Rachael R. Whitlow, U.S. Air Force, Boatswain Mate First Class Michael W. Tapp, U.S. Coast Guard.

-- Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

UPDATE 6:10 p.m.:

Mr. Limbaugh has e-mailed a response, but not to me. Not that my feelings are hurt. Like I said (see below) Rush is the hardest "get" in the world, and he doesn't know me from Adam's housecat. -- RSM

UPDATE 8:05 p.m.:

Atlas Shrugs adds "Schmuckerbie" to the dictionary. -- RSM

* * * * *

An unnamed Mike Huckabee supporter last week badmouthed Rush Limbaugh, accusing him of parroting "talking points from the DC/Manhattan chattering class." This anti-Limbaugh attitude was subsequently echoed by Huckabee adviser Ed Rollins.

As Michelle Malkin says, somebody "Hucked Up," and gave Mr. Limbaugh -- who frequently describes himself as head of the Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies -- the opportunity to teach a lesson on the dangers of dissing a man with a nationwide radio audience of 20 million listeners on more than 600 stations.

El Rushbo says:

Huckabee is using his devout Christianity to mask some other things that are distinctively not conservative. He is against free trade. He really doesn't believe in the free market.

"All I can do is hope Rush will love me as much as I love Rush. Cause I think he's terrific and he's been a very clarion voice for the conservative movement. ...
"If he'll call me, I'd love to visit with him, cause I'd certainly love to clarify if there is any issue there. I think he's a person who would probably love to see my candidacy to succeed if he knew me."

My Christmas card action was sadly lacking this holiday season. I received exactly one card signed by a public relations flak I don't recall ever having spoken to, from a company I've never heard of — I had to Google it and it's still not clear what beat incarnation inspired them to add me to their holiday card list.

Covering the environmental beat brought dozens of cards, all recycled of course. When I covered the Sunday talk shows, Fox News Channel had me on their list.

Covering Congress brought an avalanche of "holiday" and even a few Christmas cards from House and Senate members, most featured pictures of their families on the cover. I've excused some for dropping me from their list, as they are under indictment, or in jail (you know who you are ;)).

But covering homeland security is the loneliest of beats during the holiday season when it comes to seasons' greetings.

It's not like I was expecting a card postmarked "The Cave" or anything. Hopefully it's just a sign that people have their heads wrapped in the holiday season and aren't thinking about homeland security — that's certainly my goal as I take a break today to spend time with family and loved ones.

So Merry Christmas, ya'all!

If the good Lord's a-willing and the creek don't rise, you won't be hearing much from me until the new year.

— Audrey Hudson, Homeland Security reporter, The Washington Times

P.S. Thank you, Koch Industries, for the lovely card.

The former Georgia Democrat declares her Green Party candidacy:

Ten-second analysis: If McKinney wins the Green nomination, it's bad news for Democrats. Any attempt by the eventual Democratic Party presidential nominee to "move to the center," especially on defense and security issues, will be eagerly exploited by McKinney, who has a reasonably high level of national name recognition and more than a decade of liberal congressional credentials.

— Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Kentucky Democrat Attorney General Greg Stumbo today announced he wants his old state House seat back instead of challenging Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in next year's election.

Mr. Stumbo held the House seat from Prestonsburg for 24 years, and made his intentions clear to run in a special election just one day after his predecessor Brandon Spencer announced his sudden resignation. (The Floyd County Times has the details; registration required.)

This is the second expected challenger in as many weeks to announce they will not run against Mr. McConnell, a fourth-term incumbent; State Auditor Crit Luallen was also a strong contender.

Possible Democratic challengers still on the horizon are businessman Bruce Lunsford and Greg Fischer. A former congressional candidate, Andrew Horne, just tossed his hat into the ring last week.

— Audrey Hudson, Homeland Security reporter, The Washington Times

UPDATE/4:42 p.m.: "I heard now from The New York Times that they will retract that headline, and they are going to run a correction tomorrow," Mrs. Perino said at the White House press briefing.

The White House has formally and publicly requested a correction to this morning's New York Times article that said that as many as four Bush administration attorneys knew of plans to destroy videotapes of CIA interrogations.

White House press secretary Dana Perino, in a statement this morning, took issue in particular with the sub-headline on the Times' story: "White House role was wider than it said."

The sub-head is not on the Web story, but can be seen here on the image of the front page.

Mrs. Perino argues that, except for describing President Bush's knowledge of the matter, the White House has "not described — neither to highlight, nor to minimize — the role or deliberations of White House officials in this matter."

"The New York Times today implies that the White House has been misleading in publicly acknowledging or discussing details related to the CIA's decision to destroy interrogation tapes," Mrs. Perino says.

She calls the story "pernicious and troubling."

"We are formally requesting that NYT correct the sub-headline of this story," Mrs. Perino's statement reads.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

UPDATE: Mrs. Perino said at the White House press briefing that the fire caused smoke to fill much of the second through fifth floors, and that one staff member received scratches on his hands, but did not say how.

Firefighters, Mrs. Perino said, "were able to identify, isolate and pull out the fire within -- put out the fire within 30 minutes."

"The Vice President's Ceremonial Office received smoke and water damage, but there is no fire damage. The D.C. Fire Department is working at the direction of the Secret Service to determine the cause," Mrs. Perino said.

The fire is thought to have started in a second floor electrical room or phone bank, she said.

A fire in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House has been safely extinguished and the building evacuated, a White House spokeswoman said.

"Everyone was evacuated safely," said Emily Lawrimore, a spokesman for the Bush administration.

The time, cause and extent of the fire is still unkown, Ms. Lawrimore said. The blaze is thought to have ocurred around 10 a.m. on the second floor of the building, she said.

At the time of the fire, President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were in a meeting in the West Wing. The White House was not evacuated, and Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney are continuing on with their scheduled events.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

I didn't know this until a friend pointed it out to me today in a New York Times article: Monica Goodling's attorney, John Dowd, was the lawyer who got Pete Rose banned from the baseball. Goodling resigned as a senior counsel to former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales following her refusal to testify before Congress amid the federal prosecutor-firing scandal.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

This is the first in an occasional look inside the mind of President Bush's counselor, Ed Gillespie, using details gleaned from his 2006 book "Winning Right."

I picked up Ed Gillespie's book the other day by accident. I didn't know he had written one. Apparently, a lot of people don't. It's ranked pretty low on Amazon.com.

When the book was published in September 2006, Mr. Gillespie was working for his lobbying and consulting firm, Quinn and Gillespie. A little less than a year later, he was named to replace Dan Bartlett, one of the president's closest advisers.

Given Mr. Gillespie's change in status, I thought it would be interesting to examine certain portions of his book with regard to the current political landscape.

The first tidbit that sticks out is about the 2004 presidential election, when Mr. Gillespie played an advisory role to the Bush-Cheney campaign.

Mr. Gillespie says that campaigns should be disciplined enough to stick with their strategy. It makes me wonder what he thinks of reports about Hillary Clinton's campaign shifting its emphasis from the New York senator's "brainy" side to her "human" side.

In 2004, Mr. Gillespie said, "The Kerry camp allowed their tactics to define their strategy, while we maintained the discipline necessary to have our strategy define our tactics."

Mr. Gillespie says the Bush-Cheney campaign was tempted by an awful eight months, from January to August, to abandon its plans to wait until the convention to roll out policy initiatives.

The list of hard hits endured by the Bush campaign in early 2004 is long: the release of Ron Suskind's book about Bush's first Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and his "damaging claims;" David Kay's congressional testimony in late January that there were no WMD in Iraq and that pre-war intelligence had been "almost all wrong;" a report by the president's Council of Economic Advisers saying outsourcing is good for the economy, which rubbed the base wrong; February job-creation numbers, in which a "dismal" 21,000 were added; former NSC staffer Richard Clarke's attacks on TV and in his book about the administration's failure to prevent 9/11; and then in April — Abu Ghraib, combined with more U.S. deaths in Iraq that month than the previous three combined.

On it went into the summer, with retired Gen. Anthony Zinni criticizing the Iraq war, the Valerie Plame scandal, and the release of Michael Moore's antiwar film "Fahrenheit 911."

By midsummer, there were calls within the GOP for a policy rollout to "change the storyline and get us back on offense," Mr. Gillespie writes.

The Bush campaign stuck to its plan, while the Kerry campaign abandoned its plans to close out the campaign on jobs, the economy and health care. Instead they jumped on a story about missing munitions in Iraq, which focused the debate on national security.

Mr. Gillespie says he "hated" the munitions story but still saw it as a boon because "campaigns are shaped more by what you're debating than by how you're debating it."

Where do you see this dynamic happening in the current cycle?

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

The White House this morning said it is "comfortable" with Congress appropriating $70 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan, even though President Bush had requested $196 billion.

"It's not unusual for Congress to do a bridge fund at this time of the year," said White House press secretary Dana Perino.

However, Defense Secretary Robert Gates last month said a bridge fund of $50 billion would last only through February.

"It is a fact of life that, even if we received a $50 billion bridge now and the president signs it, it will fund war operations only through about the end of February. And so we would be back in this situation immediately after the Congress reconvenes in late January," Mr. Gates said at a Nov. 15 briefing.

Sean Kevelighan, spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget, said that the bridge fund is "not ideal."

"But it does ensure that our troops are funded while Congress is on their holiday vacation," Mr. Kevelighan said.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

What's a good conspiracy story without a chart?

Raw Story suggests that former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman -- convicted of corruption last year and now serving a seven-year federal sentence -- was the victim of a right-wing plot orchestrated by Karl Rove and various minions, including Republican consultant Bill Canary and his wife, Leura Canary, and former Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor, whom President Bush appointed a to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.

(Via Memeorandum)

Let's play devil's advocate for a minute:

• 1. The fact that Karl Rove associates with Republicans is not evidence of a conspiracy. Partisan politics works that way. Republicans know, work with, and assist fellow Republicans, and the same is true of Democrats. Rove is, and has been for many years, one of the top campaign operatives in the GOP. The disclosure that Rove had dealings with Alabama Republicans is, therefore, not news.


• 2. Whatever the extent of cooperation among Republicans involved in Siegelman's conviction, does that in any way exculpate Siegelman for his corruption? Siegelman wasn't convicted by Karl Rove, but by a federal jury. This is kind of like Hillary Clinton claiming that her husband's misfortunes were the result of a "vast right-wing conspiracy" -- as if President Clinton was not responsible for his Oval Office dalliances and subsequent perjury.


• 3. The great thing about accusations of conspiracy is the implicit (and impossible) requirement that critics of the conspiracy theory prove a negative. It's like the JFK assassination -- no matter how many times it is pointed out that Lee Harvey Oswald was an avowed Marxist and Castro supporter, a Marine-trained marksman who fired three shots from the Texas School Book Depository, conspiracy theorists always answer, "Yes, but what about ....?"

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

UPDATE 7 p.m.:

Linked at Hot Air Headlines and The Sundries Shack.

How cool is this? The National Guard releases a rock video -- now playing as a trailer in movie theaters nationwide -- reminding potential recruits of the role of citizen-soldiers in such historic conflicts as Concord Bridge and D-Day:

Via Hot Air and Jules Crittenden, who comments:

It was a good thing I was in a dark theater, because it brought tears to my eyes.

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Hey: Who was the light bulb who chose ... Bush ... as Ron Paul's coffer-ticker crossed the $12 million barrier?!

— Scott Galupo, reporter and "Riffologist," The Washington Times

Erick Erickson, managing editor of Red State, takes aim at a seldom-mentioned species of snobbery:

The New York-Washington Corridor of Conservative Intelligentsia(TM) loves the base when it does as it is told, but let's not actually let the Jesus Freaks run things directly. You know, we're all suppose to listen to James Dobson, but God forbid one of his ideological kin actually takes charge.

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

Attorney General Michael Mukasey today told Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy that he won't be giving up any information on the destruction of CIA's interrogation videotapes.

Mr. Leahy, Vermont Democrat, and ranking committee member Sen. Arlen Specter, Pennsylvania Republican, on Monday asked the new attorney general to share details of what the Justice Department knew and when about the tapes' destruction.

No dice, Mr. Mukasey said today, engaging in a bit of preemptive rhetorical warfare when explaining his reasons.

"The Department has a long-standing policy of declining to provide non-public information about pending matters. This policy is based in part on our interest in avoiding any perception that our law enforcement decisions are subject to political influence," Mr. Mukasey said.

Mr. Mukasey was brought in as a replacement for Alberto Gonzales, who Democrats said had allowed the Justice Department to be too influenced by the Bush administration's political preferences.

"At my confirmation hearing, I testified that I would act independently, resist political pressure and ensure that politics plays no role in cases brought by the Department of Justice. Consistent with that testimony, the facts will be followed wherever they lead in this inquiry, and the relevant law applied," said the attorney general.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

Republican pollster Frank Luntz appeared Thursday on "Hannity and Colmes," talking about his focus group of Democratic voters who watched the Iowa debate.

During the debate, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards said this:

"We have to strengthen and grow the middle class, which is struggling mightily these days. And one of the reasons ... is because corporate power and greed have literally taken over the government."

Edwards seems to have concocted a potent new brand of class-warfare rhetoric: Telling the American middle class that they are "struggling mightly" because of "corporate ... greed." What is amazing is that, at least among Democratic voters in Iowa, this rhetoric evidently works like magic. It seems that many middle-class Americans are quite willing to think of themselves as victims.

Undoubtedly, Thomas Sowell, Robert Rector and other economists will dismantle and analyze this innovative rhetorical development. But, oh, if only Ronald Reagan were here to remind America:

We have so many people who can't see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion that the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one.

-- Robert Stacy McCain, assistant national editor, The Washington Times

President Bush is losing his chief speech writer, William McGurn, and his director of legislative affairs, Candida Wolff, the White House announced this morning.

Mr. McGurn, a former Wall Street Journal columnist, replaced Michael Gerson in January 2005, and will leave after crafting the president's final State of the Union speech for late January.

Mrs. Wolff joined the president's staff three years ago after three years in Vice President Dick Cheney's legislative affairs shop, and will leave by the end of this month.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

The White House this morning said that North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has replied to President Bush's letter asking him to fully disclose all nuclear activities, but gave no details about the conversation.

Mr. Bush, in remarks to reporters in the Rose Garden, declined to go into specifics, but said that his personal letter to Mr. Kim "got his attention."

"And he can get my attention by fully disclosing his programs, including any plutonium he may have processed and converted, into whatever he's used it for," Mr. Bush said. "We just need to know."

National Security Council Spokesman Gordon Johndroe was especially vague about the response, saying in an e-mail to reporters only, "We received a verbal reply."

However, White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said that the response came "through the [United Nations] diplomatic channels."

South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported from Washington that the North "appreciates President Bush's letter, will fulfill its obligations and expects the U.S. to perform what it has to do," citing an unnamed diplomatic source there.

U.S. Envoy Christopher Hill last week delivered the personal letter from Mr. Bush to the North Korean dictator.

The North Korean government agreed in February to shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon and declare all its nuclear activities in exchange for a number of incentives, including mass shipments of fuel.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

What does it say about the debate when all anyone can talk about is Carolyn Washburn, the moderator?

Michelle Malkin hated her:

The Des Moines Register's Carolyn Washburn (a.k.a. Schoolmarm) is the moderator of the debate. She's no plant, but she sure is a stick in the mud. Her line of the debate so far: "A little snappier, gentlemen!" An hour into the debate, there's no pile-on on Huckabee. There's no time for one. Schoolmarm won't allow it! She did, however, find time to show time-wasting videos of the candidates answering questions from Register reporters -- even though the candidates are standing in front of her on the stage.

Congratulations, Schoolmarm: Washburn managed to suck all the life and color out of one of the most contested, exciting, unpredictable campaign fields in recent history. She stamped out any attempts between the candidates to engage each other. Not a single question on immigration.

But Newshogger's Libby Spencer thought the Iowa newswoman did a fine job:

Well, much to my surprise, I made it through the whole thing and found the format if not perfect, at least far improved from the circus atmosphere that usually has me reaching for the clicker. Since it's customary to do so, I'm declaring the winner to be Carolyn Washburn who did a great job on the moderation. She was unobtrusive, but asked good serious questions and kept the time hoggers gently but firmly in line.

I'm coming down on Michelle's side. I thought the prerecorded bits were an unacceptable waste of live access to the candidates.

-- David Eldridge, managing editor, WashingtonTimes.com

Add this one to the list of Bush sayings that will live forever.

"I've just come from a roundtable — or was it a square table — but either way, it was a table," Mr. Bush said during a speech in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building this morning, touting a decline in drug use among teens over the last five years.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

CNN, criticized after the most recent Republican debate for allowing an operative for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton to lecture the candidates on homosexuals in the military, has canceled a Democratic debate scheduled for next Monday.

"Due to the early scheduling of the Iowa caucuses, organizers decided to cancel the December 17th debate in Boston," CNN's Edie Emery said in a brief statement, declining to discuss factors that influenced the decision.

"There are plenty other debates that we will be having in January, along with other networks," she said.

One top staffer for a Republican candidate couldn't help but snicker.

"I guess Clinton's operatives won't get to ask their candidate a question at their own debate," the staffer said. "And that's a shame."

The most recent embarrassment on the network came last month in St. Petersburg, Fla.

In the YouTube/CNN debate, hosted by Anderson Cooper, a retired Army colonel who served as a brigadier general in the reserves asked the candidates in a video clip about their views on homosexuals in the military.

After their answers, Mr. Cooper asked Col. Keith Kerr of Santa Rosa, Calif., who was in the audience, if he was satisfied with the answers. The colonel then stood up and delivered what turned into a full two-minute rebuttal, which ended only when he was booed by the 1,500-member audience.

"American men and women in the military are professional enough to serve with gays and lesbians. For 42 years, I wore the army uniform on active duty, in the Reserve, and also for the state of California," the colonel said.

It was revealed that he is a member on a Clinton steering committee of gays and lesbians.

CNN later apologized. "We regret this, and apologize to the Republican candidates. We never would have used the general's question had we known that he was connected to any presidential candidate," said David Bohrman, a CNN senior vice president and producer of the debate.

Sen. John McCain said the next morning that CNN should have known the connection between the colonel and Mrs. Clinton.

"I think that should have been revealed," he said. "I think that should have been made public if this individual was a member of another -- any other campaign, then people would, obviously, have a better way of judging the quality of the question."

CNN has had a string of gaffes and oddities in their debates.

In a Democratic YouTube debate, a nervous snowman asks if his "son" -- a smaller snowman -- would fall victim to global warming. Republican candidates found the interlude unseemly.

"To have a question from a snowman is not frankly appropriate for a presidential debate," Mr. McCain told reporters in Boston.

And critics complained that in a CNN debate last month, host Wolf Blitzer let Mrs. Clinton off the hook far too easily. She had faltered badly in a previous by repeatedly dodging a question on whether she would support a program to allow illegal aliens to obtain driver's licenses. Mr. Blitzer asked her: "Do you support or oppose driver's licenses for illegal immigrants?" Mrs. Clinton said no, and the CNN host moved on to the next candidate.

-- Joseph Curl, senior White House correspondent, The Washington Times

One of the top architects of the Iraq war Monday night said postwar planning was hobbled by the fact that the U.S. intelligence community failed to predict that an insurgency would materialize after the invasion.

"There was not a plan for the precise type of insurgency … that we wound up seeing. And the intelligence community didn't see it," said Douglas Feith, who was undersecretary of defense for policy from 2001 to 2005.

"Centcom is relying to a large extent on the intelligence community to tell it what are the main things to worry about," Mr. Feith said at the American Enterprise Institute to promote his forthcoming book. "If the intelligence community misses that, then the planners don't plan for it."

Mr. Feith, who is now teaching at Georgetown University, also said the U.S. government poured fuel on the Iraqi insurgency by allowing its interim governing body, the Coalition Provisional Authority, to remain in place for 14 months.

"It was very unfortunate that we kept the CPA around as long as we did and ran an occupation," Mr. Feith said.

He said that his office had come up with plans to quickly establish an Iraqi-run government, similar to the way that the U.S. operated in Afghanistan after toppling the Taliban, but that CPA administrator Paul Bremer sidetracked this strategy.

"U.S. officials began to implement it, but then the CPA effectively set the plan aside over the summer of 2003. The results were highly damaging," Mr. Feith said. "The United States forfeited the status of liberator of the country and functioned instead as occupier. This fueled the insurgency."

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

Talk abouv vivid imagery — and not so flattering at that.

White House press secretary Dana Perino was asked this morning about the Bush administration's decision not to talk about the CIA videotapes of interrogations that were destroyed in 2005.

CBS News' Bill Plante asked Mrs. Perino if she could understand how it looks suspicious to the press that, every time a difficult issue arises, "a wall of silence comes down," and the White House says it can't talk about something that is under investigation.

"I can see how the cynicism that usually drips from this room could come up in this regard," Mrs. Perino said.

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times

While the Hillary-Obama showdown is getting most of the big headlines today -- and Christina Bellantoni is blogging the Democratic campaign from Iowa -- the Republican side of the presidential campaign has incited an interesting little blog-feud over Mitt Romney's speech this past week.

First, some necessary background: Townhall.com executive editor Hugh Hewitt is a popular radio talk-show host and blogger who is not so much a doctrinaire conservative as he is a Republican Party loyalist.

Hewitt served in the Reagan administration, was the first executive director of the Nixon Library, and generally adheres to the "11th Commandment" of not speaking ill of fellow Republicans. His biography and his attitude sometimes put him at odds with other bloggers on the right, most of whom pride themselves on being independent conservative voices, rather than partisan political operatives obligated to toe the party line.

This division was very clear during the 2006 mid-term election season. Hewitt had just published a book, "Painting the Map Red," that was billed as "the insider's blueprint for building a permanent Republican majority," and he was perceived by some bloggers as a Republican cheerleader who failed to anticipate the Election Day debacle for the GOP, during a time when many other conservative bloggers were openly disenchanted with the Republicans in Congress.

So, fast forward to December 2007. Having published a book about Mitt Romney, Hewitt finds himself under suspicion of being a cheerleader for the Romney campaign.

With that background in mind, then, imagine the reaction from conservative bloggers Thursday, when Hewitt wrote of Romney's speech about his religion:

Mitt Romney threw a long ball today and scored. There can be no objective argument against that conclusion. ...
Thus, objectively, the speech cannot be judged as other than an extraordinary success for Romney. (Emphasis added)

And yea, the punditocracy looked upon what Mitt hath wrought and said, "It is good." ...
It's not so much that I disagree ... but insisting repeatedly upon its success as an objective fact is a weird rhetorical ploy which reads like a transparent attempt to delegitimize critics as being, in an almost clinical sense, out of touch with reality. ... Of all the people commenting today about this, there's only one who sounds like he's coming unglued. And it ain't any of Mitt's critics.

He looks the part of a president, and today he showed he can occupy a podium and deliver a bully pulpit-style speech.