Tom DeLay's case for war with Iraq -- and nine other countries! Plus: Rumsfeld's weak war logic.

Is Tiger Woods having fun yet?

Blue Jean Curse How maquiladoras are making Mexico's "Cradle of Corn in the Americas" run dry.

The corporate system's huge incentives for bad behavior.

Following a Wall Street Journal editorial dissing Iraq dissenters, David Ignatius asks: "Have 'prudence' and 'foresight' become dirty words in conservative foreign policy circles?" Plus: Washington goes to war, over war.

Saudis issue conflicting reactions to estimates that up to $200 billion in private investments has been pulled out of the U.S. in recent months, but agree that whatever the amount, it won't be reinvested in Saudi Arabia.

Bernard Lewis on why bin Laden is still popular in the Arab world.

Kurdish officials say that Ansar al-Islam has helped al-Qaeda establish a terrorist training camp in northern Iraq and is harboring up to 150 al-Qaedaites in a string of villages it controls along the Iraq-Iran border.

The demonization of Saddam and the mother of all clients.

PR Watch takes on the PR pro who in 1990 promoted the story that Iraqi troops tossed Kuwaiti babies out of their incubators.

CNN announces that it will inform viewers when celebrity guests are shilling for drug companies. The New York Times pats itself on the back for exposing the practice, but Salon beat them by a month.

Feed the Beast Why the media loves missing children.

As Nazi filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl turns 100, a preliminary investigation is being launched into charges that she used Gypsy slave laborers as extras in her film ''Lowlands" and then let them be returned to concentration camps, where many died. More on the charges.

A controversy is brewing over "11'09"01," a French film that consists of 11 separate 11 minute submissions from prominent directors in as many countries, and contains a number of stridently anti-U.S. segments. Its North American premiere is September 11 at the Toronto Film Festival.

The U.S.' secret intelligence court has identified more than 75 cases in which it says it was misled by Justice Department and FBI officials attempting to justify their need for wiretaps and other electronic surveillance.

Following Musharraf's abrupt power grab, President Bush says the general is "still tight with us."

Portland riot police pounce as hundreds -- thousands? -- protest Bush.

Angry white men hit bestseller list with incendiary books.

Freepers react to the apparent suicide of a New York Times business editor.

Friends of former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling say that he's a portrait of despair, who can't get anyone to believe his story.

"The Friends of Enron" A phony wind farm deal highlights the role of wealthy Houstonians who were frequently tapped to invest in bogus partnerships.

Kenneth Lay's lawyer says that Lay didn't know the ex-Enron exec who pleaded guilty. Plus: Bank robber meets corporate criminal and greetings from the Cayman Islands.

The Washington Post reports on a court battle between Halliburton and Highlands Insurance, a subsidiary that Dick Cheney spun off during his first year as CEO. Highlands sued Halliburton for failing to disclose a huge potential liability for worker asbestos injuries.

Cheney works variation of Nigerian e-mail scam.

University of Texas journalism professor and antiwar activist Robert Jensen debates think-tanker and Iraq hawk Frank Gaffney. Plus: Studs speaks!

Conservative former Congressman and blogger John LeBoutillier writes that George H.W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft must suspect "that they have created a political Frankenstein. They took 'W' – always called 'Junior' inside the family –and made him into a second President Bush. And now that President Bush has become a FrankenBush – a political entity they can no longer control."

Noam Chomsky tells James Ridgeway that the current hawks are mostly recycled Reaganites, bullies who steamrolled dissent in the '80s and can be expected to do the same now: "Very few people want to be subjected to endless vicious tirades and lies. It's just unpleasant, so the question is, Why bother? So most people just back off."

Might an unintended consequence of war with Iraq be a “regime change” in Washington in 2004?

A Wall Street Journal correspondent reports from the front lines of a four-day mock battle that illustrated the high cost of urban warfare.

As President Bush pours money into the military, he's reducing money to veterans.

Was the seizure of the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin actually a Western intelligence-gathering operation?

The ACLU and two other groups have filed an expedited Freedom of Information Act request demanding that the Justice Department release data about its domestic surveillance activities.

The FBI is investigating an Internet stalker who's haunting the porn industry.

"Assuming these tapes weren't made in Studio City," writes Jeremy Sapienza, "how is what al-Qaeda did with a few dogs worse than what the United States and other governments do all the time?" Plus: Al-Qaeda Studios' greatest hits.

The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz airs Iraq hawks' criticism of the New York Times for beating the antiwar drums.

The Post reports U.S. intelligence officials' claim that a handful of ranking al-Qaeda members have taken refuge in Iraq. The Times says share the evidence.

In an interview with Dan Rather, Iraq's deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz says that members of al-Qaeda are operating in Iraq, but in the northern part of the country under the control of Kurdish opposition leader Jallal Tallabani -- "an ally of Mr. Rumsfeld."

"Abu Nidal's reported death marks the end for a form of violence that was built on a hierarchy with one clear leader," says an international terrorism analyst. "Now we face a network-type of terrorism like al-Qaeda. Because it is not controlled from one source, it is much more dangerous." Plus: Nidal group says leader is still alive.

Whosama? As Saddam takes center stage, bin Laden goes from "evil one" to unmentionable one. A historian tells Reuters that "To keep dwelling on Osama and on Afghanistan would be to dwell on futility. The President, like a great white shark, has always got to be moving forward."

But Stratfor says that the Bush administration has begun to back down from plans for a near-term attack on Iraq: "The retreat is a strategic psychological defeat for the administration, particularly in the Middle East. Washington inadvertently stumbled into exactly the trap al-Qaeda hoped to set for it."

U.S. plans PR assault to build international support among foreign opinion leaders for war against Iraq.

Take the Tour Food warehouse or biological weapons facility?

President Bush's Mideast sand trap and his 18-hole plan to invade Iraq. Plus: Who's couping who?

The Financial Times reports that individual Saudi investors have withdrawn an estimated $100 to $200 billion from the U.S. in recent months.

Americans react to Israel's claim that Yasser Arafat has amassed a $1.3 billion fortune.

In examining George W. Bush's 1998 tax return, the "Anonymous CPA" finds that ordinary income from his sale of the Texas Rangers may have been improperly reported as capital gains, thereby halving the tax rate on his $15 million share. Plus: Bush's bailout for wealthy investors.

The Memory Hole A new Web site emphasizes preserving government files and documents that "expose things that we're not supposed to know (or that we're supposed to forget)." The name is taken from "1984," in which authorities threw undesirable stories down a hole to be burned.

A CNN spokesman claims that "there was a misunderstanding" that led to the New York Times reporting that correspondent Nic Robertson and senior CNN executives said they did not pay for the al-Qaeda terror tapes.

Libertarians targeted Bob Barr because of his fierce opposition to medical marijuana. Plus: Retiring Armey lets it rip.

Indiana congressman offends breast cancer survivors with talk of abortion link.

Baffler editor and "One Market Under God" author Thomas Frank asks: "Why aren't the intellectual snake-oil salesmen following the dot-cons into oblivion? The writers of Dow-worshipping books and commentators who handed down daring pronunciamentos from the silicon heights are still cruising from one posh gig to the next."

We're living in the golden age of the hoax.

Paul Krugman on the growing gap between the image and the reality of the Bush administration's policies.

NBC reports on State Department cables and court records that reveal how U.S. foreign policy tilted towards Iraq in the 1980s and the key role that then Middle East envoy Donald Rumsfeld played in the shift. Earlier: "The Saddam in Rummy's Closet."

Sabre-rattling presidential candidates appear to be out of step with many Iowa Democrats.

President Bush says that he's reading "Supreme Command," a new book by Eliot Cohen, a hardliner on Iraq who argues that "war is too important to be left to the generals."

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Cohen criticized people in the Pentagon for their tendency "to whine to the press" about their doubts surrounding an Iraq attack.

The Guardian's Brian Whitaker reports on the closely-knit and well-financed network of hawkish think tanks whose views and TV appearances are supplanting all other experts on Middle Eastern issues.

Media Transparency follows the money from conservative philanthropies to groups that Whitaker cites, including the American Enterprise Institute, Hudson Institute, Middle East Forum, and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

See the extensive list of newspaper articles and op-ed pieces that Washington Institute members have placed during the last year, and the speakers represented by Eleana Benador, who Whitaker calls "a sort of theatrical agent for experts on the Middle East and terrorism."

In a profile of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) and the Center for Security Policy (CSP), Jason Vest writes that "For this crew, 'regime change' by any means necessary in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority is an urgent imperative."

Robert Fisk writes that the "suicide" of Abu Nidal "might come as a gift to an American administration longing to connect Saddam Hussein to 'world terror.' As for his real death, I suspect it came long ago." Plus: Nidal's trail of terror.

The Army Times reports that a retired general who commanded "enemy" forces in a recently concluded $250 million U.S. war game says the exercise was rigged so that it appeared to validate new war-fighting concepts it was supposed to test.

Speaking about the coverage of the war in Afghanistan, a CNN senior executive said that "Anyone who claims the U.S. media didn’t censor itself is kidding you. It wasn't a matter of government pressure but a reluctance to criticize anything in a war that was obviously supported by the vast majority of the people."

After telling the New York Times that it didn't pay for al-Qaeda terror tapes, CNN now acknowledges that it forked over a five-figure sum to sources in Afghanistan. The Miami Herald reports that the amount was $30,000.

Some dogs of war get more exposure than others.

Eric Boehlert asks why so many journalists have ignored the story that the New York Fire Department's "rescue effort on Sept. 11 was seriously flawed and that perhaps dozens, if not hundreds, of firefighters died unnecessarily when the twin towers collapsed."

Squatters inherit 11 New York City buildings as a long-running dispute is resolved.

Salon interviews an author of a new study to be presented at the Johannesburg environmental summit, which found that for every dollar spent on conserving the world's remaining intact natural habitats, society will get at least a 100-fold payback in nature's services.

As conservative groups praise President Bush for his apparent decision to opt out of the summit, a Friends of the Earth official follows the money and finds Exxon Mobil's cash fueling anti-summit sentiment.

Oily Diplomacy How the Bush administration is invoking the war on terrorism to lend a helping hand to Exxon Mobil.

An FBI forensic linguistics expert - who helped convict Unabomber Ted Kaczynski - tells the BBC that he has identified two suspects in the anthrax attacks, both of whom had both worked for the CIA, the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases and other classified military operations.

Newsweek follows up on Physicians for Human Rights' discovery early this year of a mass grave site in northern Afghanistan, reporting allegations that Northern Alliance forces may have killed, through suffocation in containers, as many as 2,000 to 3,000 Taliban and foreign prisoners after their surrender at Kunduz last November.

"No Big Fish" The Los Angeles Times reports that U.S. authorities have yet to identify any senior al-Qaeda leaders among the nearly 600 terrorism suspects from 43 countries in custody at Guantanamo Bay.

The U.S. is planning a secret worldwide war against remaining al-Qaeda members -- as soon as it finds out where they are!

Retired General Wesley Clark writes that "We've got a problem here: Because the Bush administration has thus far refused to engage our allies through NATO, we are fighting the war on terrorism with one hand tied behind our back."

Senior U.S. military officers tell the New York Times that during the Iran-Iraq war, a covert American program provided Iraq with critical battle planning assistance at a time when U.S. intelligence agencies knew that Iraqi commanders would employ chemical weapons against Iran.

Although U.S. officials insist that the decision to attack Iraq has not been made, the pieces are gradually being put into place for what could be a $100 billion war.

"The only mystery is when D-Day will be," writes Frank Rich. "Given the administration's history, I'd guess that it will put on the big show as soon as its political self-preservation is at stake."

A Stratfor analysis asks: "Could Iraq strike be another Bay of Pigs?" Plus: A war in search of a justification.

As "junior gets a spanking," the Bush "family feud" dominates TV pundit shows.

The Chicago Tribune reports on how the government-funded Defense Policy Board has been stacked with Iraq hawks, turning what was once an advisory panel into a virtual war council.

A new study finds that despite a threefold increase in advertising in recent years, efforts by the U.S. military to bolster its recruitment ranks are bearing little fruit.

Although international arms sales declined last year to about $26 billion compared with roughly $40 billion in 2000, the U.S. retained its position as the world's biggest arms dealer, with 45% of the market. And since 9/11, defense contractors have reported robust profits.

Palestinian officials outraged over TV report that the Israeli military has a contingency plan to expel Yasser Arafat by force.

CNN comes clean about its enabling of celebrity drug pushers.

The go-to-guy for cultural sound bites analyzes pop culture's take on terrorism.

The New York Observer interviews the man behind the virtual Ground Zero theme park. (2nd item)

A 9/11 widow tells Phil Donahue that "at this time of year, everyone is asking us, you know, what can we do to memorialize, what can we do to memorialize. And you know what? An independent investigation."

The New York Times reports on the growing number of leading Republicans who are breaking ranks with the Bush administration over its Iraq war plans, "saying the administration has neither adequately prepared for military action nor made the case that it is needed." Add Stormin' Norman to the list.

Former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft writes that this time Saddam might succeed in dragging Israel into the conflict, using weapons of mass destruction to provoke an Israeli response, "perhaps with nuclear weapons, unleashing an Armageddon in the Middle East."

A retired Israeli general downplays the likelihood of a nuclear response, but Israeli leaders tell the U.S. to attack Iraq sooner rather than later.

Japanese researchers claim that film footage discovered in Pyongyang indicates that the U.S. conducted germ warfare against China and North Korea during the Korean War.

Thomas Friedman recently wrote that he was left wondering "whether the whole Bush foreign policy team isn't just a big bunch of phonies," for its "pathetic, mealy-mouthed response" to Egypt's decision to sentence the country's leading democracy advocate to seven years in prison.

Now, in what the Washington Post calls "a notable shift in policy," the Bush administration says it will oppose any additional foreign aid for Egypt to protest the government's prosecution of Saad Eddin Ibrahim and its poor treatment of pro-democracy organizations. Plus: Post puts Bush on Mount Rushmore.

When the "new king" of fund-raisers meets with his 214 biggest backers, will there be another incident of corporate jet-lock at the Waco Regional Airport?

Sasha Polakow-Suransky profiles the revolving-door career of Department of the Interior deputy secretary J. Steven Griles, who "has alternated between getting rich working for industry and serving at high-level government posts, where he has devised industry-friendly policies to open public lands to drilling and mining."

The Defenders of Wildlife charges that Gale Norton "is compiling a record as perhaps the most anti-environmental Interior Secretary in history -- even worse, perhaps, than notorious Reagan Interior Secretary James Watt." Norton's corporate connections.

Paul Krugman explains the importance of the "output gap" as an economic indicator and why it may be difficult for the U.S. to narrow it.

Gimme Speculation Krugman references a recent analysis by economist Dean Baker, which he says "makes a particularly compelling case for a housing bubble. House prices have run well ahead of rents, suggesting that people are now buying houses for speculation rather than merely for shelter."

A short history of a long con. Plus: How much scratch is enough?

Read how an MIT blackjack team took Las Vegas' casinos for millions.

High rollers go behind closed doors for the first time since Nevada legalized gambling in 1931.

A new book charges that the Bacardi rum company has been engaged for more than 40 years in clandestine attempts to overthrow the Cuban government and re-establish its profitable empire on the island.

Hooters head mulling purchase of bankrupt Vanguard Airlines.

Media Whores Online strikes back.

Jonathan Turley writes that a little-publicized plan disclosed last week by Attorney General Ashcroft -- camps for U.S. citizens he deems to be 'enemy combatants' -- "has moved him from merely being a political embarrassment to being a constitutional menace."

Turley claims that the facts of Yaser Esam Hamdi's case, who has been held without charge, are virtually identical to those in the case of John Walker Lindh. On Tuesday a federal judge went toe-to-toe with a government lawyer, challenging the reasoning behind holding Hamdi incommunicado.

Justice Department rebuffs House Judiciary Committee efforts to check up on its use of new antiterrorism powers in the U.S.A. Patriot Act. Plus: Aschcroft plays the ratings game.

Judicial Watch Strikes Again It's suing the Justice Department official in charge of cracking down on corporate corruption, for alleged securities fraud when he was on the board of Providian Financial Corp.

Corporate Crime Time Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman argue that corporations, as well as individuals, should be prosecuted.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that President Bush's Wednesday appearance in Milwaukee "appeared to bring out more protesters than other recent presidential visits, perhaps a sign of Bush's somewhat less rosy political situation currently."

Appearing at the Iowa State Fair on the same day as Bush, Sen. Joseph Lieberman said that Bush and VP Cheney "are kind of lecturing the rest of America on the ethics of corporate America, they ought to be lecturing each other."

An International Association of Fire Fighters member comments on the group's vote to boycott a national tribute to firefighters who died on 9/11, after Bush rejected a bill that included $340 million for fire departments: "The president has merely been using firefighters and their families for one big photo opportunity. We will work actively to not grant him another photo op with us." The American Legion piles on.

President Vicente Fox protests Texas' execution of a Mexican national by canceling a late-August trip to Texas that was to include a meeting with Bush.

The execution was big news in Mexico, but routine for Texas.

Read an interview with a reporter who covered death row for the Huntsville Item, the daily newspaper in the city where Texas' executions take place.

Mexican drug and illegal-immigrant smugglers have adopted a deadly tactic to evade capture or detention at the San Diego border crossing.

Spinsanity's Brendan Nyhan unloads on Media Whores Online.

Will MWO be congratulating Nyhan next week?

Read the entire Salon Premium article speculating on who's behind MWO.

A Canadian videojournalist details the extent to which the U.S. military manages the media in Afghanistan. He was denied access for two months to the training area adjacent to the airfield where four Canadian soldiers were killed by an American bomb in April.

An open letter to Bruce Springsteen about the war on terrorism.

The Times of London quotes "senior diplomatic sources" who say that relations between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia have deteriorated so far that the Saudis are no longer considered allies.

The New York Times reports on why the most powerful Kurdish leader in northern Iraq refused an invitation to attend the White House meeting of Iraqi opposition figures.

U.S. military officials tell NBC that the Navy is under intense political pressure to change the status of a pilot who was shot down over Iraq in 1991, from missing in action to MIA-captured, and that the pressure is coming from hard-liners in the Bush administration and in Congress.

Detaining for Dollars How the rise in immigrant incarcerations is driving a prison boom.

ACLU launches anti-TIPS Web site.

Why Little Havana may be harboring more terrorists than Cuba. Plus: Former Cuban ambassador to the UN tells why he defected.

As VP Dick Cheney takes time out from fundraising to attend another carefully scripted event, Michelangelo Signorile writes that "Leaders who are afraid of what lies out there in people's minds live underground."

The White House is trying to make the most of "The President's Economic Forum," posting every word on its Web site, but William Saletan argues that it wasn't very presidential, and it certainly wasn't a forum. Plus: The inflatable White House.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney disputes the president's notion that the fundamentals of the economy are sound.

"Although it seemed that Mr. Bush wanted to go deeper into his job after 9/11, he's still riding the surface," writes Maureen Dowd, "treating photo-ops like real events and passing off fortune-cookie comments as policy pronouncements."

Michael Moore is negotiating to make an animated movie targeted for a pre-2004 presidential election release. He's working with a certain cartoonist.

Lawmaker plans to propose legislation that would allow the government to freeze and seize assets of high-level execs, placing them in escrow until their owners' innocence or guilt is determined. Plus: Former Enron execs want more.

Israeli military intelligence claims that Yasser Arafat is worth an estimated $1.3 billion.

Arafat's Fatah faction is locked in "a bloody stand-off" with al-Qaeda-linked Islamist rebels in a crowded refugee camp in Lebanon.

Relatives of American students killed in the July 31 bomb attack at Israel's Hebrew University lash out at President Bush for not phoning with condolences.

Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul accuses Saudi Arabia of trying to lead Islam to world domination.

U.S. officials are promoting the theory that bin Laden died or was killed sometime last year. Plus: Americans begin to suffer Afghan backlash.

Bullship! The U.S. Navy has retracted a denial that it was seeking a large ship to carry helicopters and arms from the U.S. to the Red Sea.

Debka reports on the doubling of U.S. forces in Jordan to 8,000 and the "peasoup of deception" surrounding an Iraq campaign that it claims has already begun.

After a guest on an Al-Jazeera talk show criticized Jordan's regional policies, Jordan blamed the Qatari government for attacking it, sparking a diplomatic crisis between the two countries.

A brand strategist reacts to recent research showing that brand names engage the emotional, right-hand side of the brain more than other words: "It supports our instinctive belief that brands are a special class of word - they are like a poem all in one word in their ability to evoke and express ideas."

Buried beneath a story about Whitney Houston, Fox News now reports that Bruce Springsteen's reps "emphatically deny" last week's charge that Tipper Gore approached them for free tickets.

Blogcritics.com launches with more than 100 writers on books, music and pop culture.

Last January, US News & World Report quoted unidentified Clinton administration officials who said that two senior Saudi princes had been paying off bin Laden since 1995. A Wall Street Journal op-ed places the amount at "hundreds of millions" of dollars and charges that "they were using Saudi official money--not their own."

The US News article details the Saudi's expertise at shaking down foreign firms. In a "Frontline" interview, Ambasador Prince Bandar bin Sultan said that "If you tell me that building this whole country, and spending $350 billion out of $400 billion, that we misused or got corrupted with $50 billion, I'll tell you, 'Yes.' But I'll take that any time."

Saudi Arabia in not included in a new program that will require foreign visitors from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan and Syria to be fingerprinted and photographed at the U.S. border.

The U.S. is mum about a Palestinian, a Syrian and an Algerian who were snatched in Pakistan and are reportedly being caged at Bagram Air Base.

Nicholas Kristof comes clean, revealing that the "Mr. Z" he had previously written about was Steven Hatfill.

If you have something to say about 9/11 and its aftermath, TomPaine.com wants you.

Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, makes the case in the National Review against war with Iraq: "There are times when Washington has no choice but to fight. Iraq is not such a place and now is not such a time." Plus: War naysayers get Bush's ear.

Christopher Hitchens writes that the Bush administration "refuses to say whether it wants a military junta in Baghdad, a monarchy, a vassal - or even an Iraqi state at all. Given the open rehearsals for invasion, there can be no 'security,' excuse for this weird silence."

The Iraqi information minister tells Al-Jazeera that UN weapons inspections "have finished in Iraq."

USA Today repeats myths on Iraq inspectors.

A Guardian reporter investigates the Middle East Media Research Institute, and finds that although MEMRI touts its independence as a translator of Arabic media, it's a group of Israelis who are trying to exploit the language barrier "for their own ends and start changing western perceptions of Arabs for the worse."

The Bradley Foundation has contributed $100,000 to MEMRI.

After a murder plot was foiled against one of the Czech Republic's top investigative journalists, a "baffled" commentator asked on Radio Prague: "Is something like this, in this day and age, possible in the Czech Republic? That a former senior government official could order the killing of a journalist? This isn't Belarus, is it?"

Venezuelan journalists are "cannon fodder" in a battle between the president and the media.

The Daily Howler's Bob Somerby responds to pundits' acknowledgement of the press corps' "contempt" for Al Gore. Eric Boehlert's "The Press vs. Al Gore" is the definitive account of how distorted the campaign coverage was. Plus: Pundits unnerved by Gore's new populism.

A Democratic challenger charges Republican Congressman -- and one-time Mujahideen enlistee -- Dana Rohrabacher with conducting secret and illegal negotiations with the Taliban.

Fox News tells oreilly-sucks.com to quit violating Bill O'Reilly's rights.

Is Fox News' Sean Hannity leading a new political movement?

Fortune unveils "The Greedy Bunch," a list of executives at 25 big companies who took out the most money via stock sales from January 1999 through May 2002, and whose stocks dropped 75% or more from their boom-time peak. Plus: Delaware, the rogue state.

Business Ethics magazine celebrates its 15th-anniversary with the stark realization that much of what the corporate social responsibility movement "has been measuring and fighting for and applauding may be colossally beside the point."

But Arianna Huffington argues that "with corporate America under siege, there has never been a more opportune moment to adopt better business practices."

Why do politicians pretend to be working stiffs?

The author of an essay charging that U.S. policymakers are overresponding to the threat of terrorism, says that "it would be useful for the press and the government to be reminded that the risks are not as gigantic as we seem to have been encouraged to believe over the last year." Download here.

As Defense Secretary Rumsfeld considers sending U.S. Special Operations forces around the globe to capture or kill al-Qaeda leaders, the Washington Times reports that morale has collapsed at the Pentagon division that churns out policy papers to run the war on terrorism.

Newsweek reports on how 1,000 or more al-Qaeda operatives managed to escape from Tora Bora.

Youssef M. Ibrahim writes that "The Bush administration must better distinguish between Islam and the real enemy," -- the Wahabi brand of radical Islamic extremism. "Otherwise we risk a collision with 1.2 billion Muslims around the word who do not appreciate being demonized just because they disagree with our policies in the Middle East or our plans to invade Iraq."

Sunni mullahs in Iraqi Kurdistan estimate that as many as 1,000 Saudi-financed mosques promoting Wahabi ideals have been established in the region since 1991.

Kurdish guerrillas are reportedly preparing to crush an Islamic fundamentalist group with suspected links to al-Qaeda, in what may be the opening battle of the war for Iraq.

Newsweek quotes a senior British official on the Bush administration's plans to overhaul the Islamic and Arab world: "Everyone wants to go to Baghdad. Real men want to go to Tehran."

A British parliamentarian who last week met with Saddam Hussein, writes that Saddam's offer to allow UN weapons inspectors back into the country and other recent "diplomatic moves by Iraq would, in a sane world, be followed up and put to the test."

"To fend off the threat of peace, determination is necessary," writes Norman Solomon. "Elected officials and high-level appointees must work effectively with reporters and pundits."

Robert Fisk pronounces Kandahar governor Gul Agha the "UN's warlord of the year" and the Observer reports that Afghan drug lords have recently renewed production of heroin, which is far easier to smuggle than opium.

Colombia's president declares a "state of internal commotion."

Clocking U.S. spending for the war on drugs and the military.

A pilot for a Delta Air Lines subsidiary reportedly refused to fly Israel's deputy foreign minister because the pilot thought that he posed a security risk, the third time an Israeli official has been pulled from a flight because of security concerns.

A new poll finds Palestinians evenly split between a democratic, pluralistic political system and one-party Islamic rule.

Dozens of Christian TV stations in the U.S. are slated to air an August 13 telethon in support of Israeli victims of terrorism.

Thomas Friedman writes that India's huge software and information technology industry, which serves as the back-room and research hub of many of the world's largest corporations, played a key role in convincing the Indian government to back down from war with Pakistan.

When people are waking up in the U.S., it's 9 p.m in Bangalore, where an army of Indian telemarketers with adopted American names begin dialing for dollars.

Scientists warn that a two-mile-high haze of human-generated soot and greenhouse gases dubbed the "Asian Brown Cloud," may be causing the premature deaths of a half-million people in India each year, deadly flooding in some areas and drought in other.

Marc Cooper on "the wholesome integrity of casino gambling" and how the stock-market crisis could be solved by turning Wall Street over to the casinos.

"Reliable Sources" examines the media's exploitation of missing children, reporters contempt for Al Gore and VP Cheney's zipped lip. Plus: Considering how primary the secondary man is.

House Majority Leader Dick Armey said that his own view is to let Saddam "bluster, let him rant and rave all he wants and let that be a matter between he and his own country. As long as he behaves himself within his own borders, we should not be addressing any attack or resources against him."

On Wednesday, Armey said that the U.S. should lift its embargo against Cuba. He is also trying to spike Operation TIPS. Molly Ivins says goodbye to fellow Texans Armey and Phil Gramm, both of whom are retiring after this term

Larry King interviews "America's Most Wanted" host John Walsh, who denies a report that TIPS callers are being routed to his show: "We don't have anything to do with Operation TIPS. We don't take the calls, we don't offer the rewards."

Walsh said the number of child abductions is up this year, but Salon's Michele Goldberg cites FBI statistics that indicate otherwise. She's referenced in an article by Howard Kurtz, who writes that "the recent outbreak of media hype over child-snatchings seems to know no bounds."

In this week's episode of "NOW with Bill Moyers," Dr. Marc Siegel reviews ads by drug companies and offers a physician's perspective on the billions of dollars a year spent to persuade consumers to "ask your doctor" about the wonders of some expensive new drug.

In a recent Nation editorial, Siegel wrote that "The major effect of this full-court press has been to raise drug prices and overall costs as patients pressure doctors to prescribe drugs that often aren't needed."

As New York Mayor Bloomberg readies legislation that would ban smoking in every bar and restaurant in the city, screenwriter Joe Eszterhas spanks Hollywood for glamorizing smoking.

The wide variation in state tobacco taxes -- $0.025 per pack in Virginia compared to $3 in New York City -- and recent sharp tax increases, has increased interest in cigarette smuggling.

Media Whores Online sends-up a Fox News report that Tipper Gore tried and failed to get the Gore staff comped for a Bruce Springsteen show, and then rejected an offer to buy four tickets. More on Tipper's ticket tangle.

Why it's not that easy to make someone laugh.

Mexican President Vicente Fox's popularity has surged in recent weeks, at the same time that a song mocking him has become a hit, despite being avoided by most of Mexico's radio stations. More on Los Tigres del Norte's "Chronicle of a Change."

Joshua Micah Marshall draws a bead on some confidence men.

Yesterday it was reported that a Merrill Lynch trading assistant had turned on Martha Stewart, today it's her friend.

Sen. Hillary Clinton is making tabloid headlines for saying that she won't return the $27,000 that ImClone chief Sam Waksal has given her.

Cooking up another storm at WorldCom.

According to an analyst quoted in a New York Times article on WorldCom's rise and fall, CEO Bernard Ebbers "was endearing, but he didn't even have a working knowledge of the business. WorldCom wasn't operated at all, it was just on auto pilot, using bubble gum and Band-Aids as solutions to its problems."

David Corn on the growing sentiment within neocon circles that a U.S.-Saudi showdown is inevitable -- and, moreover, desirable. Plus: The PowerPoint presentation that rocked the Pentagon.

Saudis deny U.S. access to bases for Iraq attack, but Kuwait and Qatar are eager hosts. Kuwait built Camp Arifijan, a new $200 million state-of-the-art facility, and Qatar's emir reportedly told U.S. officials that he would like to see as many as 10,000 American troops permanently stationed at Al Udeid Air Base.

How Saudi Arabia and Syria are drawing closer to Iraq.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution editorializes that President Bush "has yet to offer a concrete, convincing explanation why the U.S. should launch a major war against Iraq without any clear provocation," and calls pre-emptive war "essentially the rationale imperial Japan used to justify its attack on Pearl Harbor more than 60 years ago."

Bush administration officials claim that the Joint Chiefs of Staff are now all on board for an attack on Iraq.

Why the U.S. must invade Iraq now.

Current and former U.S. intelligence officials speculate on Saddam's war plan, telling the Los Angeles Times that Iraq will forego desert fighting for urban warfare, where U.S. and civilian casualties would be highest. Plus: Saddam's strategies for warding off a U.S. invasion.

Marc Herold compares his Afghan civilian casualty count to seven others in circulation, and claims that the main reason that his numbers are higher is because the other studies weren't as comprehensive.

The Washington Post reports that U.S. officials fear Afghanistan "is entering a more dangerous period and are unsure what steps to take next to prevent a spiral of factional violence." They "stress that many things have gone right in Afghanistan. But they also acknowledged that they are essentially setting policy on the fly."

Afghanistan offers UN not so prime real estate for relocation of 60,000 refugees now on the border with Pakistan.

In a review of Joseph Nye's "The Paradox of American Power: Why the World's Only Superpower Can't Go It Alone," Tony Judt writes that "Our world is divided in many ways: rich/poor; North/South; Western/non-Western. But more and more, the division that counts is the one separating America from everyone else."

Teamsters union announces support for Operation TIPS. Plus: "A Big LOL for FBI Alert."

Nevada's largest law-enforcement organization endorses state marijuana initiative.

German documentary finds yet another Hitler angle, but this one is rich.

The questions that Vice President Dick Cheney wasn't asked when he resurfaced for a California speech that was interrupted by hecklers.

The White House Web site lists 29 Cheney speeches and interviews in the seven months following 9/11, but only six during the last four months, two of which were remarks made at Republican fundraisers. Plus: Ed, Wes and Warren available to fill Cheney void.

With Republican donors ponying up $25,000-per-couple to take part in a 45-minute roundtable discussion with Cheney, Arianna Huffington writes that "If the White House Press Corps is ever going to get any face time with the vice-president, it's gonna cost them. $555 per minute."

David Ignatius reports on a business deal that President Bush doesn't like to talk about.

Feds reportedly negotiating a deal with a Merrill Lynch trading assistant in which he could receive immunity from prosecution in exchange for testimony against Martha Stewart.

In "Patio Man and the Sprawl People", David Brooks documents the mass migration to America's newest and fastest-growing suburbs, which he dubs "Sprinkler Cities."

With urban areas becoming more stratified and spread out, big-city newspaper columnists are losing their clout.

Companies doing business with Wal-Mart are opening offices in Bentonville, Arkansas, transforming the culture of what is now one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in the country. "We used to have a one-tiered system - northwest Arkansas was hillbilly country," says one observer. "Things have definitely changed."

Starbucks has filed suit to force Samantha Buck to change the name of her Oregon coffeshop from Sam Buck's, claiming that the name was sowing confusion for Starbuck's customers. Her store opened one year before, five miles from the nearest Starbucks.

Texas man close to realizing his dream of visiting every North American Starbucks.

How "content aggregators" -- film studios, publishers, record labels -- are brazenly casting a broad net of claimed ownership rights in the intangibles of the culture. Plus: Fighting the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act," a copyright law favoring corporations over creativity.

The star-making machinery looks to the future.

As Congress turns up the heat on Martha Stewart, the Washington Post reports that as the result of an unwritten detente struck five years ago by Republican and Democratic congressional leaders, lawmakers are choosing to overlook alleged transgressions by their own colleagues.

Lobbyists attempt to skirt security at U.S. Capitol.

Lou Dobbs to "Moneyline" guest Paul Krugman: "I'm getting the sense, as I'm sure many of your readers are, that you really just don't like this man, President Bush." (scroll down)

Iraq is reportedly clinging to the hope that it can drive a wedge between the U.S. and Britain, convinced that Bush is prepared to risk international criticism in a war to overthrow Saddam -- but only if he has Tony Blair at his side. Plus: "War is talk of the town in Baghdad."

Three internationally recognized experts on Iraq were not invited to testify at last week's Senate intelligence hearings.

Speed Kills? Working for Change's Bill Berkowitz follows up on a Toronto Star report that U.S. fighter pilots in Afghanistan are using amphetamines to stay awake and fly longer.

Although the U.S. Air Force Surgeon General's Office confirmed that pilots are given Dexedrine, major U.S. newspapers and TV outlets have ignored the story.

David Gelernter argues that Israel should ban TV reporters and news photographers from terrorist murder scenes, as a way to deny showing Israel's enemies what their latest attack has accomplished.

Israeli Supreme Court gives army approval to blow up without warning, the homes of 43 families related to suicide bombers.

How the myth of the generous offer continues to distort the Camp David negotiations.

The ACLU responds to the news that Operation TIPS is partnering with "America's Most Wanted."

A new Argentine game show called "Human Resources" offers winners an increasingly rare prize.

Guess Who? Pentagon advisory board gets an earful about "the kernel of evil, the prime mover, the most dangerous opponent" in the Middle East.

Neocon magazines beat the anti-Saudi drum with "The Coming Saudi Showdown" and "Our Enemies, the Saudis."

"When all the official justifications for invading Iraq collapse," writes Rahul Mahajan, "what is left is the same ugly three-letter word that has always been at the core of U.S. Middle East policy -- oil." Plus: The logic of empire.

The American Prospect's Jason Vest reports that "as the Bush administration lays its plans for Iraq, career military and intelligence officers are increasingly -- and desperately -- looking to Congress to help stave off what they fear will be a disaster."

Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and his party declare at the start of their election campaign that Germany will refuse to provide troops or money for an invasion of Iraq, even if it has UN backing.

Robert Fisk returns to Afghanistan and reports on a May raid by U.S. Special Forces that left a tribal elder and a three-year-old girl dead.

USA Today reports on the effect that life under occupation is having on Palestinian children.

Tapes released last week by the LBJ Library bolster claims that U.S. warships in the Gulf of Tonkin were never attacked. On the 30-year anniversary of the incident, Norman Solomon and Jeff Cohen examined how the media's reporting of official claims as absolute truths opened the floodgates for the Vietnam War.

The Financial Times updates a Nation article about how the U.S. State Department is trying to quash a human rights lawsuit launched by Indonesian villagers against Exxon Mobil, claiming that it could undermine the war on terrorism.

With Congress about to bar federal contracts to companies that acquired an offshore address to dodge U.S. taxes, Accenture, the consulting company that split off from Arthur Andersen in 2001, is seeking an exemption based on the fact that it originally incorporated in Bermuda, and was never an American company.

Accenture claims that it chose Bermuda because it's a neutral location. But it spelled out three taxation and legal advantages in an SEC filing: "We are not subject to tax in Bermuda on our income or capital gains. It may not be possible to enforce court judgments obtained in the U.S. against us in Bermuda. Shareholders of Bermuda companies do not generally have rights to take action against directors or officers of the company."

Next stop, Ireland?

The assistant to Martha Stewart's stockbroker has reportedly told prosecutors that the stockbroker ordered him to tell Stewart that the founder of ImClone Systems was selling large amounts of stock in late December.

An AP analysis finds that since Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives in 1994, tens of billions of dollars has shifted to GOP districts, resulting in an average of $612 million more in federal spending last year for congressional districts represented by Republicans than for those represented by Democrats.

"Lucky us," writes Paul Krugman, "we hit the trifecta."

Tabloid Justice The FBI has enlisted Fox's "America's Most Wanted" to screen Operation TIPS calls.

Value Meal How both plaintiffs and governments might benefit from making fast food truly addictive. Plus: Meth moms in the heartland.

The Gang's All Here Mark Singer joined the tens of thousands of motorcyclists who descended on a small California town over the Fourth of July weekend. Photos by Sylvia Plachy.

A New Jersey columnist blasts Bruce Springsteen and his media touts for a "gushing publicity bath that was embarrassing in its excess."

In 1983 and 1984, as Iraq was being accused of using chemical weapons in its war with Iran, President Reagan's Middle East envoy was working to forge closer ties between Saddam Hussein and Washington. Jeremy Scahill reports on "The Saddam in Rummy's Closet."

"To form Iraq, Britain knitted together three utterly disparate, mutually hostile regions," writes Eric Margolis. "The result was an unstable, artificial, Frankenstein state - a Mideast Yugoslavia."

Leaking to Conclusions The Observer's Peter Beaumont writes "the existence of deception operations is important in itself. It is, in the terminology of these things, a 'combat indicator' - one of the clues that suggest things are fast on the road to getting bloody."

Brent Scowcroft, President George H. W. Bush's National Security Adviser, says that a war with Iraq could cause "an explosion in the Middle East. It could turn the whole region into a cauldron and destroy the War on Terror."

Don't stop with Baghdad writes chess master Garry Kasparov: "We must also have plans for Tehran and Damascus, not to mention Riyadh."

A Capital Times editorial opposing an attack on Iraq quotes former U.S. weapons inspector Scott Ritter, who said that America's national security "has been hijacked by a handful of neo-conservatives who are using their position of authority to pursue their own ideologically driven political ambitions."

Thomas Friedman writes that the "pathetic, mealy-mouthed response of President Bush and his State Department to Egypt's decision to sentence the leading Egyptian democracy advocate to seven years in prison leaves one wondering whether the whole Bush foreign policy team isn't just a big bunch of phonies."

Fear and anxiety permeate America's largest Arab enclave.

Israel responds to the latest violence with a "total ban" on Palestinian traffic in most of the West Bank.

Katha Pollitt writes that "One can be overwhelmed with horror at suicide bombers, think Arafat is a corrupt and preening tinpot dictator, believe that the real agenda of the Islamists is to be the Taliban of the Middle East and still realize that the current path of the Israeli government is a disaster in the making, if not already made."

Howard Kurtz reports that a study of ABC, NBC and CBS evening newscasts by the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA), found that while evaluations of both Israel and the Palestinians were overwhelmingly negative, Yassir Arafat was blamed for the violence 30 percent of the time, the Israeli government 14 percent and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon nine percent. Who funds the CMPA?

Ha'aretz's Yoel Marcus writes that the "lunatic fringe" of Israeli politics has "managed to create an atmosphere in which anyone who has any connection to peace is a criminal or a traitor." Plus: Palestinian Lutherans face hard times and Peruvian Indians become Jewish settlers.

A spokeswoman for VP Cheney contradicts a Daily News report when she tells the AP that any suggestion that Cheney shies away from reporters because of the Halliburton matter is "absurd."

When Citizen Works released an analysis of SEC filings that showed the number of Halliburton subsidiaries incorporated in offshore tax havens rose from nine to 44 while Cheney was CEO, a Halliburton spokesperson said the subsidiaries were not created to save money on taxes.

But the Wall Street Journal reports that Halliburton's current CEO "acknowledged the company takes advantage of rules allowing the deferral of foreign income, a strategy that allows firms to use pretax money for longer periods, or to report the income only when they have deductions to offset it."

Arianna Huffington on how a decade of denial provided convenient camouflage for corrupt (psychopathic?) CEOs.

Al Gore, in a New York Times op-ed defending his 2000 campaign message, criticizes President Bush for serving "powerful interests" instead of the American people and writes that the recent wave of corporate scandals has put at risk "nothing less than the future of democratic capitalism." Plus: Who's better at using people, Republicans or Democrats?

The Consortium's Robert Parry details how Bush's recount committee financed Miami's The Consortium's Robert Parry details how Bush's recount committee financed Miami's "Brooks Brothers Riot."

Teamsters union reportedly preparing to endorse Operation TIPS.

Does the return of a talking margarine tub offer any insight into America's mood?

A U.S. Special Forces soldier tells the Fayetville Observer that based on information provided by bin Laden's captured cook at Tora Bora, "We had 'the man' and lost him. We knew the exact cave he was in and had the coordinates. It was 30 minutes away from our position. But we couldn't get orders quickly enough."

Philip Smucker, the journalist who interviewed the cook, was also one of the first to report that bin Laden had escaped from Afghanistan. Go here for an online discussion with Smucker and a link to "How bin Laden got away."

John Nichols asks: Where's the debate over continued bombing of Afghanistan?

The Bush White House is denying a Time report that the Clinton administration gave it an aggressive plan to take on al-Qaeda that languished for eight months because of the change in presidents. Josh Marshall on why the Bush administration failed to act.

The Wall Street Journal reports that before the 1998 U.S. bombing of a bin Laden camp in Afghanistan, relations between the Taliban and al-Qaeda were near a breaking point, with Mullah Omar set to oust bin Laden. But the attack changed Omar's mind and al-Qaeda's fortunes, turning the group into a magnet for international funds and recruits.

The LA Weekly's Jim Crogan, who last week reported that Zacarias Moussaoui and Mohamed Atta may have rendezvoused in Oklahoma, tells how the FBI has silenced an agent who accused it of shutting down his 1998 probe into alleged terrorist training camps in Chicago and Kansas City.

The FBI wants to administer lie detector tests to Senate and House intelligence committee members over 9/11 leaks.

One day after Iraq offered to meet with UN weapons inspectors, the Los Angeles Times reports that the White House is now backing claims that Mohammed Atta secretly met with an Iraqi agent in Prague, despite long-held doubts by the CIA and FBI that the meeting took place.

"Donahue" offers a forum for opponents of America's sleepwalk to war with Iraq.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has ordered an acceleration in covert missions because he is impatient with the pace at which al-Qaeda fighters are being captured or killed. Didn't he read this?

In 2001, Fort Bragg won the Army Times Best Post award. Now, it's rocked by violence, and the elite troops who need psychological help are afraid to get it, because counseling is seen as a sign of weakness that could damage their careers.

For Vice President Cheney, that was then, this is now.

How a slumlord in life, became a philanthropist in death.

The New Republic's Michelle Cottle sees no child abduction epidemic -- except on TV: "It's fine to alert the public when a child is missing or there's a serial killer on the loose in the neighborhood, but that's largely a job for local news. What Larry King, Bill O'Reilly, and the rest are doing is something else entirely: It's sensationalizing other people's tragedy."

A mother publicly grieves on "Larry King Live."

With September 11 now belonging to television, why are advertisers unwilling to tackle the anniversary? Plus: NPR plans 20 straight hours of coverage.

The AP reports that an Iowa man is offering to let an advertiser tattoo his head for $100,000, but the article fails to acknowledge that he has competitors.

Gary Condit reenters the media fray, first, siding with Traficant, and then telling Esquire what reporters are after: "I know what they want me to say. They want me to say that I did her."

Are you looking for a good, sturdy word to use?

The Houston Chronicle has asked a reporter who blogged under the pseudonym "Banjo Jones" to cease and desist, because he was offering commentary on issues that he covered for the paper. But Banjo writes that "The news of our demise has been greatly exaggerated."

The BBC reports on a Harvard Law School study identifying 2,000 Web sites that have been blocked by the Saudi Government.

Two new drugs are making their way to market, positioned for regulatory purposes as a skin cancer preventative and a treatment for sexual dysfunction. But put them together and you have "the Barbie drug" -- with its promise of both a fantastic tan and highly active libido. Plus: More on fantasy drugs.

How drug companies market the disease and then push the pills to treat it.

Brand-name drugmakers play the patent game to keep low-cost generics off the market.

Robert Scheer calls a credit card industry-backed bankruptcy bill, legislators' "latest offering at the temple of the money changers." A bankruptcy specialist tells TomPaine.com that the proposed bill "has a thousand paper cuts that are going to bleed debtors just a little here, and just a little there, until they can't get any relief."

The bill will be taken up in September and is almost certain to be sent to President Bush, whose top campaign contributor was MBNA, a major purveyor of credit cards. MBNA was accused of granting a sweetheart loan to Rep. Jim Moran, who raised his profile in the bankruptcy debate four days after his loan was final.

Could a debt-consolidation loan work for the U.S. government?

The New York Daily News reports that Harken Energy set up an offshore subsidiary in the Cayman Islands while President Bush sat on the company's board of directors. It was formed as part of an oil drilling venture with the government of Bahrain.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the subsidiary wasn't designed to avoid paying U.S. taxes and Bush told reporters he "opposed" the Bahrain venture while serving on Harken's board, but offered no explanation why he did so.

Citizen Works has released a report contending that the number of Halliburton's offshore subsidiaries went from nine to 44 during VP Cheney's tenure. A Halliburton spokeswoman said the purpose was not to save money on taxes.

The New York Times examines how diligently Halliburton under Cheney investigated the The New York Times examines how diligently Halliburton under Cheney investigated the 66,000 asbestos liability claims that it took on when it acquired Dresser Industries in 1998, and whether Halliburton adequately informed shareholders of the risks. that it took on when it acquired Dresser Industries in 1998, and whether Halliburton adequately informed shareholders of the risks.

The vice president has slipped back into the shadows, as the White House attempts to deflate what some aides are referring to as the "Cheney problem." Cursor's "Where's Cheney Now?" will keep tabs on the VP as he fundraises throughout the country, while avoiding reporters.

MSNBC has a handy interactive chart that details executive pay packages at companies now being investigated.

The "Barons of Bankruptcy," a special report by the Financial Times, investigates the $3.3 billion fortune made by executives and directors from the 25 largest U.S. public companies to go bankrupt since January 2001.

Big media's "Don't Know, Don't Care" approach to covering the stock market.

The Fox broadcasting network and Fox News Channel are going commercial free on September 11 and airlines are cutting back on their 9/11 flights.

In reporting on the bomb blast that killed seven people at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, the Los Angeles Times notes that the student newspaper published an account in April called "Chronicle of an Attack Foretold," in which it predicted a bombing in the same student center that was the scene of Wednesday's blast.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich debates Iraq hawk Richard Perle on "Donahue." Earlier: David Corn talks Iraq with the "Prince of Darkness."

The Washington Post airs Bush administration differences over Iraq.

Peace accord signed in war that has killed an estimated 2 million people in four years.

ABC's John Stossel joins the war on the war on drugs. One idea suggested in a National Review review of Stossel's "War on Drugs, A War On Ourselves," is to let all 50 states experiment with a variety of drug policies.

Last week, the White Houses's drug czar urged Nevadans to reject the state's upcoming marijuana referendum, saying that "I don't think Las Vegas and Nevada want to become the center for drug tourism."

Las Vegas is currently a center for drug distribution, according to Review-Journal columnist John Smith, who writes that "when it comes to narcotics trafficking, Las Vegas is a suburb of Tijuana."

Drug tourism is seen as a positive for Edinburgh, where there's a movement to make the city "the Amsterdam of the north." Says one supportive tourism official: "Amsterdam may be seedy, but that city's tourism is booming. Most people who go there don't necessarily visit cannabis cafes, but they love the flavour of that freedom."

The White House announces that it is ramping up the image wars, following the release of a Council on Foreign Relations report finding that in addition to the likely suspects, "negative attitudes about U.S. policy are also pervasive in front-line states in the war on terrorism and among close U.S. allies."

Why do U.S. battle plans for Iraq keep showing up in the New York Times and why does the Times keep putting them on the front page?

In an extensive Washington Post assessment of Iraq's arsenal of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons, Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Bob Graham says "The central reality is uncertainty, and the defectors' stories only reinforce that." Plus: Too much talk, not enough inaction.

The head of the UN's weapons inspections in Iraq from 1991-97 accuses the U.S. and other Security Council members of manipulating the inspections teams for their own political ends and says that the U.S. kept trying to find out where Saddam was.

Does the U.S. also have Tehran's theocrats in its crosshairs?

John Kerry has separated himself from the pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls by sharply criticizing President Bush's foreign policy. And Kerry's Vietnam experience, which makes it difficult to impugn his patriotism, is also a boon to organizing, as a recent trip to New Hampshire showed.

A Maryland man who hijacked an al-Qaeda Web site became frustrated after offering it to the FBI to use it for disinformation and collecting data about sympathizers: "It was like dealing with the motor vehicle administration."

U.S. officials put out the word that "some of bin Laden's bodyguards have been captured and are among the prisoners at the U.S. military base in Cuba," but that they don't know how many or when and where they were captured.

"In many Arab states there is a steady trend toward historical revisionism that promotes al-Qaeda leaders as the 'good guys' and U.S. officials as the 'bad guys,'" reports the Christian Science Monitor. The Egyptian author of a biography critical of bin Laden lieutenant, Ayman al Zawahiri, agreed to remove his book from store shelves, citing pressure from Zawahiri's supporters in Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Zawahiri's own book "Knights Under the Prophet's Banner," was published in December as a series in Al-Sharq al-Awsat, the London-based, Saudi-owned al-Qaeda mouthpiece that has once again reported the claim that bin Laden is alive and preparing an attack.

Beware the tides of August, it's not the silly month that it seems.

An Estonian early music band has recorded a tribute to Black Sabbath, played on medieval instruments and sung in Latin. Plus: Bruce Springsteen leaves no media stone unturned in promoting his new album.

Al Gore, in a New York Times op-ed defending his 2000 campaign message, criticizes President Bush for serving "powerful interests" instead of the American people and writes that the recent wave of corporate scandals has put at risk "nothing less than the future of democratic capitalism." Plus: Who's better at using people, Republicans or Democrats?

The Consortium's Robert Parry details how Bush's recount committee financed Miami's "Brooks Brothers Riot."

Teamsters union reportedly preparing to endorse Operation TIPS.

Does the return of a talking margarine tub offer any insight into America's mood?

A U.S. Special Forces soldier tells the Fayetville Observer that based on information provided by bin Laden's captured cook at Tora Bora, "We had 'the man' and lost him. We knew the exact cave he was in and had the coordinates. It was 30 minutes away from our position. But we couldn't get orders quickly enough."

Philip Smucker, the journalist who interviewed the cook, was also one of the first to report that bin Laden had escaped from Afghanistan. Go here for an online discussion with Smucker and a link to "How bin Laden got away."

John Nichols asks: Where's the debate over continued bombing of Afghanistan?

The Bush White House is denying a Time report that the Clinton administration gave it an aggressive plan to take on al-Qaeda that languished for eight months because of the change in presidents. Josh Marshall on why the Bush administration failed to act.

The Wall Street Journal reports that before the 1998 U.S. bombing of a bin Laden camp in Afghanistan, relations between the Taliban and al-Qaeda were near a breaking point, with Mullah Omar set to oust bin Laden. But the attack changed Omar's mind and al-Qaeda's fortunes, turning the group into a magnet for international funds and recruits.

The LA Weekly's Jim Crogan, who last week reported that Zacarias Moussaoui and Mohamed Atta may have rendezvoused in Oklahoma, tells how the FBI has silenced an agent who accused it of shutting down his 1998 probe into alleged terrorist training camps in Chicago and Kansas City.

The FBI wants to administer lie detector tests to Senate and House intelligence committee members over 9/11 leaks.

One day after Iraq offered to meet with UN weapons inspectors, the Los Angeles Times reports that the White House is now backing claims that Mohammed Atta secretly met with an Iraqi agent in Prague, despite long-held doubts by the CIA and FBI that the meeting took place.

"Donahue" offers a forum for opponents of America's sleepwalk to war with Iraq.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has ordered an acceleration in covert missions because he is impatient with the pace at which al-Qaeda fighters are being captured or killed. Didn't he read this?

In 2001, Fort Bragg won the Army Times Best Post award. Now, it's rocked by violence, and the elite troops who need psychological help are afraid to get it, because counseling is seen as a sign of weakness that could damage their careers.

For Vice President Cheney, that was then, this is now.

How a slumlord in life, became a philanthropist in death.

The New Republic's Michelle Cottle sees no child abduction epidemic -- except on TV: "It's fine to alert the public when a child is missing or there's a serial killer on the loose in the neighborhood, but that's largely a job for local news. What Larry King, Bill O'Reilly, and the rest are doing is something else entirely: It's sensationalizing other people's tragedy."

A mother publicly grieves on "Larry King Live."

With September 11 now belonging to television, why are advertisers unwilling to tackle the anniversary? Plus: NPR plans 20 straight hours of coverage.

The AP reports that an Iowa man is offering to let an advertiser tattoo his head for $100,000, but the article fails to acknowledge that he has competitors.

Gary Condit reenters the media fray, first, siding with Traficant, and then telling Esquire what reporters are after: "I know what they want me to say. They want me to say that I did her."

Are you looking for a good, sturdy word to use?

The Houston Chronicle has asked a reporter who blogged under the pseudonym "Banjo Jones" to cease and desist, because he was offering commentary on issues that he covered for the paper. But Banjo writes that "The news of our demise has been greatly exaggerated."

The BBC reports on a Harvard Law School study identifying 2,000 Web sites that have been blocked by the Saudi Government.

Two new drugs are making their way to market, positioned for regulatory purposes as a skin cancer preventative and a treatment for sexual dysfunction. But put them together and you have "the Barbie drug" -- with its promise of both a fantastic tan and highly active libido. Plus: More on fantasy drugs.

How drug companies market the disease and then push the pills to treat it.

Brand-name drugmakers play the patent game to keep low-cost generics off the market.

Robert Scheer calls a credit card industry-backed bankruptcy bill, legislators' "latest offering at the temple of the money changers." A bankruptcy specialist tells TomPaine.com that the proposed bill "has a thousand paper cuts that are going to bleed debtors just a little here, and just a little there, until they can't get any relief."

The bill will be taken up in September and is almost certain to be sent to President Bush, whose top campaign contributor was MBNA, a major purveyor of credit cards. MBNA was accused of granting a sweetheart loan to Rep. Jim Moran, who raised his profile in the bankruptcy debate four days after his loan was final.

Could a debt-consolidation loan work for the U.S. government?

The New York Daily News reports that Harken Energy set up an offshore subsidiary in the Cayman Islands while President Bush sat on the company's board of directors. It was formed as part of an oil drilling venture with the government of Bahrain.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said the subsidiary wasn't designed to avoid paying U.S. taxes and Bush told reporters he "opposed" the Bahrain venture while serving on Harken's board, but offered no explanation why he did so.

Citizen Works has released a report contending that the number of Halliburton's offshore subsidiaries went from nine to 44 during VP Cheney's tenure. A Halliburton spokeswoman said the purpose was not to save money on taxes.

The New York Times examines how diligently Halliburton under Cheney investigated the 66,000 asbestos liability claims that it took on when it acquired Dresser Industries in 1998, and whether Halliburton adequately informed shareholders of the risks.

The vice president has slipped back into the shadows, as the White House attempts to deflate what some aides are referring to as the "Cheney problem." Cursor's "Where's Cheney Now?" will keep tabs on the VP as he fundraises throughout the country, while avoiding reporters.

MSNBC has a handy interactive chart that details executive pay packages at companies now being investigated.

The "Barons of Bankruptcy," a special report by the Financial Times, investigates the $3.3 billion fortune made by executives and directors from the 25 largest U.S. public companies to go bankrupt since January 2001.

Big media's "Don't Know, Don't Care" approach to covering the stock market.

The Fox broadcasting network and Fox News Channel are going commercial free on September 11 and airlines are cutting back on their 9/11 flights.

In reporting on the bomb blast that killed seven people at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, the Los Angeles Times notes that the student newspaper published an account in April called "Chronicle of an Attack Foretold," in which it predicted a bombing in the same student center that was the scene of Wednesday's blast.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich debates Iraq hawk Richard Perle on "Donahue." Earlier: David Corn talks Iraq with the "Prince of Darkness."

The Washington Post airs Bush administration differences over Iraq.

Peace accord signed in war that has killed an estimated 2 million people in four years.

ABC's John Stossel joins the war on the war on drugs. One idea suggested in a National Review review of Stossel's "War on Drugs, A War On Ourselves," is to let all 50 states experiment with a variety of drug policies.

Last week, the White Houses's drug czar urged Nevadans to reject the state's upcoming marijuana referendum, saying that "I don't think Las Vegas and Nevada want to become the center for drug tourism."

Las Vegas is currently a center for drug distribution, according to Review-Journal columnist John Smith, who writes that "when it comes to narcotics trafficking, Las Vegas is a suburb of Tijuana."

Drug tourism is seen as a positive for Edinburgh, where there's a movement to make the city "the Amsterdam of the north." Says one supportive tourism official: "Amsterdam may be seedy, but that city's tourism is booming. Most people who go there don't necessarily visit cannabis cafes, but they love the flavour of that freedom."

What's the unintended consequence of people, cell phones in hand, learning that they can coordinate instantly and leaderlessly? Plus: "Smart Mobs" and "Drunken Dialing."

The White House announces that it is ramping up the image wars, following the release of a Council on Foreign Relations report finding that in addition to the likely suspects, "negative attitudes about U.S. policy are also pervasive in front-line states in the war on terrorism and among close U.S. allies."

Why do U.S. battle plans for Iraq keep showing up in the New York Times and why does the Times keep putting them on the front page?

In an extensive Washington Post assessment of Iraq's arsenal of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons, Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Bob Graham says "The central reality is uncertainty, and the defectors' stories only reinforce that." Plus: Too much talk, not enough inaction.

The head of the UN's weapons inspections in Iraq from 1991-97 accuses the U.S. and other Security Council members of manipulating the inspections teams for their own political ends and says that the U.S. kept trying to find out where Saddam was.

Does the U.S. also have Tehran's theocrats in its crosshairs?

John Kerry has separated himself from the pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls by sharply criticizing President Bush's foreign policy. And Kerry's Vietnam experience, which makes it difficult to impugn his patriotism, is also a boon to organizing, as a recent trip to New Hampshire showed.

A Maryland man who hijacked an al-Qaeda Web site became frustrated after offering it to the FBI to use it for disinformation and collecting data about sympathizers: "It was like dealing with the motor vehicle administration."

U.S. officials put out the word that "some of bin Laden's bodyguards have been captured and are among the prisoners at the U.S. military base in Cuba," but that they don't know how many or when and where they were captured.

"In many Arab states there is a steady trend toward historical revisionism that promotes al-Qaeda leaders as the 'good guys' and U.S. officials as the 'bad guys,'" reports the Christian Science Monitor. The Egyptian author of a biography critical of bin Laden lieutenant, Ayman al Zawahiri, agreed to remove his book from store shelves, citing pressure from Zawahiri's supporters in Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Zawahiri's own book "Knights Under the Prophet's Banner," was published in December as a series in Al-Sharq al-Awsat, the London-based, Saudi-owned al-Qaeda mouthpiece that has once again reported the claim that bin Laden is alive and preparing an attack.

Beware the tides of August, it's not the silly month that it seems.

An Estonian early music band has recorded a tribute to Black Sabbath, played on medieval instruments and sung in Latin. Plus: Bruce Springsteen leaves no media stone unturned in promoting his new album.

Hell to Pay U.S. allies picked up almost 80 percent of the $60 billion tab for the Persian Gulf war, but this time around the U.S. would probably have to largely go it alone, which could spell trouble for the nation's economy.

Mikhail Kalashnikov the creator of the AK-47 says that "I would prefer to have invented a machine that people could use and that would help farmers with their work -- for example a lawnmower."

General Sir Michael Rose, a former head of Britain's SAS and of UN forces in Bosnia, on "the madness of war with Iraq."

An organization campaigning to end economic sanctions against Iraq says that the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations has stacked the deck for upcoming hearings on Iraq, with none of the invited participants representing a vigorous call for negotiation and dialogue instead of war.

The vice chairman of the CIA's "Foreign Denial and Deception Committee" calls for sending SWAT teams into journalists' homes to stop leaks.

Al-Jazeera's Washington bureau chief says that al-Qaeda and bin Laden do not have the global reach necessary to coordinate another massive attack, but that splinter groups could organize isolated incidents and credit bin Laden.

Thousands of Palestinians defy the 40-day-old Israeli army curfew in Nablus. Plus: The humanitarian crisis that is threatening Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

As big-name entertainment acts take a pass on Israel for political and security reasons, could Bruce Springsteen hold the key to Palestinian statehood?

Artemis Records, whose artists include Rickie Lee Jones, Warren Zevon and Steve Earle, is waiving the royalty fee that Internet radio stations must pay the company to play its music.

An American in Bangkok searches out a Buddhist cult whose thousands of members chant and meditate in an open-air pavilion the size of 25 airplane hangars, with a giant spaceship parked nearby.

Bob Herbert revisits an infamous 1999 drug bust in a Texas panhandle town, where 46 people, mostly blacks, were arrested based on the work of a controversial undercover cop whose uncorroborated testimony was the sole basis for the round-up. Plus: "Tulia Blues" and taking drug task forces to task.

The Los Angeles Times profiles muckraking Tijuana journalist Jesus Blancornelas, who survived a 1997 assassination attempt by a drug cartel and is now protected by 13 bodyguards.

Read how The Smoking Gun negotiated with an ex-con for the purchase of John Gotti's prison uniform, which was initially offered for sale on e-Bay.

In an article adapted from the forthcoming book, "The Emerging Democratic Majority" John Judis and Ruy Teixeira argue that "From geography to demography to ideology, the structural forces in American politics -- the ones that endure the idiosyncrasies of any given election -- are trending the Democrats' way.

The Washington Post reports that at the summer meeting of the Democratic Leadership Council, "Whatever reluctance Democrats had shown to confront Bush has disappeared, with only the barest deference paid to the president for his initial handling of the war on terrorism."

Is the public more liberal than the media?

A call to slay the corporate-media beast and a 12-step program for media democracy.

U.S. News & World Report investigates a little-known practice by some of America's premier zoos: giving away old and sick animals to circuses, roadside zoos, and exotic pet auctions where they are often tortured.

Why Pay More? Wealthy older Americans are purchasing huge life insurance policies in order to exploit an IRS loophole that allows them to avoid $9 in income, gift and/or estate taxes for each dollar spent on the policy.

Ralph Nader to Citigroup: "Heal thyself."

Washington's bull market in spinning the markets.

The publication of a new essay by Ted Kaczynski, in the newsletter "Green Anarchy," has sparked debate over a U.S. federal prison's rule that prohibits "bylined" stories by inmates.

Have you read the most popular novel in America? Don't be left behind.

Popular authors farm out heavy lifting to extend brands.

Slate's Rob Walker writes that because of AOL Time Warner's troubles, "it will probably be a long time before we hear anybody boasting about 'synergy,' again," which has become "a sort of vague albatross rather than the magical creature it was supposed to be."

Although AOL Time Warner never lived up to the prediction that it would become a "Big Brother," Matt Welch finds reason to fear the "handful of drunken uncles crashing about, handing out twenties to the referees" at the merger-friendly FCC.

Is President Bush channeling Orwell? And, a better use for Operation TIPS.

Homer Simpson banned from public speaking. Listen to what he said.

War bloggers defend the Wall Street Journal's "Best of the Web" editor James Taranto after an Arab News writer slammed him for using the column "to promote a private agenda. And what an agenda it is! Taranto's passion for Israel is equaled only by his hatred of Arabs."

In a letter to Media News, Salon's Eric Boehlert wrote that the "bizarre daily log, 'Best of the Web,' once a sort of conservative crib sheet for the day's must-reads, has devolved into a hot house for Arab haters. Obsession is putting it mildly." (July 26)

"Saudi Arabia is teetering on the brink of collapse," according to an Observer article, "fueling Foreign Office fears of an extremist takeover." British officials are reportedly concerned that Prince Abdullah "could face a palace coup from elements within the royal family sympathetic to al-Qaeda."

The FBI now says that there are no more than 200 hard-core al-Qaeda members worldwide, including those in custody at Guantanamo Bay.

U.S. forces may have breached human rights and then removed evidence after the wedding party airstrike that killed more than 50 Afghan civilians this month, according to a draft of a UN report.

In an interview with Time, Bruce Springsteen says that he thinks "the invasion in Afghanistan was handled very, very smoothly."

The Bush administration is reportedly exploring a take Baghdad first policy, but many top U.S. military officials are against invading Iraq, preferring the current policy of containment.

Stock market may be best indicator of if and when an attack on Iraq is launched.

USA Today reports that the making of foreign policy has changed since the beginning of the Bush administration: "Then, Bush was seen as surrounded by four equally powerful advisers. Now, insiders say, Cheney's is clearly the dominant voice in shaping foreign policy choices for the President."

Is the media going to let the "dominant voice" get away with his new zipped-lip strategy?

Judicial Watch works the media with its attempt to serve VP Cheney and claims the Clinton White House was friendlier to process servers.

Are Bush and Cheney the Cheshire cats of corporate reform?

The Bush campaign spent almost $14 million on the Florida recount, roughly four times as much as the Gore campaign. Its expenditures included paying Enron and Halliburton for the use of their jets. Plus: "Flying High on Corporations."

Bill Clinton chastises the Bush administration for suggesting that he bears part of the blame for corporate accounting scandals: "These people ran on responsibility, but as soon as you scratch them, they go straight to blame." Plus: Bush blames lawyers.

Thomas Friedman writes that the real George Bush is "a man who trusts his CEO cronies more than the bureaucratic regulators who oversee them."

Is there egg on President Bush's Teflon armor?

New York Times reporter Kurt Eichenwald, appearing with Ralph Nader and Molly Ivins on "Donahue," said that "The most disturbing thing to me about what happened in many of these instances isn't what's illegal. The magnitude, the amount of manipulation that was done by Enron that ultimately appears to comply with the letter of the rules is astonishing."

Arianna Huffington echoes Eichenwald, writing that "In a world where the 'generally accepted accounting principles' are so generally and deliberately Byzantine -- and over 100,000 pages long -- the problem isn't what is illegal but rather what is legal."

Eichenwald talks corporate scandals with Terry Gross.

As scandals give journalists a chance to show what they think about the business world, Norman Solomon asks: "Will This Be an 'Official Scandal' -- Or Something More?"

Reuters reports on a new batch of Harken Energy documents obtained by The Center for Public Integrity, one of which shows that Bush met with Harken's CEO two weeks before the company's 1989 sale of its Aloha Petroleum subsidiary, a transaction that has been compared to the accounting irregularities at Enron.

When AOL bought Time Warner in January 2000, the New York Times asked Douglas Rushkof to write a comment piece: "What I wrote was that AOL's purchase heralded the end of the dotcom bubble. AOL was cashing in its casino chips. The Times refused to run the piece. They told me I was misreading the landscape to such an extent that for them to publish such a view would be irresponsible."

Media Hacks A House bill would allow media companies to sabotage Napster-style networks to prevent songs, movies and other copyrighted materials from being swapped over the Internet.

Attorney General Ashcroft tells senators that there will be no database with Operation TIPS.

Got Hummus? A national grocery chain handed over information from thousands of shoppers' loyalty cards to federal investigators who had never even requested it. Plus: "It's cash only for me."

Talk of TIPS brings back not-so-fond memories to an American woman who experienced snitch-happy Czechs.

Women & Children First "Enemy civilian casualties OK by me," is the headline of a column by Ben Shapiro, who writes that "One American soldier is worth far more than an Afghan civilian."

A Secret Service agent has been suspended after he admitted to scrawling "Islam is Evil, Christ is King" on a prayer calendar during the home search of a man charged with smuggling bogus checks into the U.S.

Read how the U.S. is quietly shipping key al-Qaeda suspects to the Middle East for interrogation.

LA Weekly interviews the owner of a motel near Oklahoma City who claims that Mohamed Atta showed up there last August with another 9/11 hijacker and Zacarias Moussaoui, and that the trio tried to rent a room. Thus far, prosecutors have failed to produce evidence that Atta and Moussaoui were ever in the same place at the same time.

Following up on an investigation by a former Oklahoma City TV reporter, LA Weekly reports that, seven years later, the authorities have still not fully examined Timothy McVeigh's Middle East connections, including witnesses claims that McVeigh and Iraqi's who worked in Oklahoma City were guests of that same motel in the months preceding the 1995 bombing.

"Big Brother's" latest run on British TV has, in the words of the Guardian's Esther Addley, "provoked some of the most vicious vilification ever seen of normal people who happen to be appearing in a television show." She return's to the genre's roots, recounting the story of a contestant who committed suicide four weeks after being "voted off the island" on the 1997 Swedish show that served as the model for "Survivor."

Earlier, Addley reported on how one of the "Big Brother" contestants had become the object of a "searingly vicious hate campaign."

Philip Morris, which has more than half of the U.S. tobacco market, has broken with the rest of the industry and now favors FDA regulation. The reason? A competitor tells Slate that "It will virtually eliminate our ability to communicate with adult consumers, thereby locking in Marlboro's dominant position."

Israeli government and military officials play the blame game over Gaza bombing, with military sources claiming that Prime Minister Sharon was aware that Hamas leader Sh'hadeh's wife and young daughter would be in the building.

"So why was the go-ahead for the attack given Monday night?" asks Ha'aretz's Amos Harel. "'Everyone was eager to get him,' said one senior defense official simply." Plus: Why Saddam is smiling.

State Department warns Israel of "consequences" if it misuses U.S.-provided arms.

"Israel's Defense Budget: The Business Side of War."

Israeli guns win out over Palestinian butter, and Secretary of State Powell takes incoming in the war on moderation.

War's New Face New Scientist reports that U.S. defense contractors are developing a laser weapon for fighter aircraft that may be powerful enough to blind people on the ground, even if they are miles from the target.

A BBC investigation finds that less than 10 percent of Afghanistan's opium crop has been eradicated.

Glenn Reynolds asks: "How can we trust our government to spot terrorists when it thinks that glow sticks are items of 'drug paraphernalia?'"

How truth turned to speculation when The Nation's book imprint published the U.S. edition of "Forbidden Truth."

The FAA tries to stop a newspaper from profiling one of its officials.

Senate Democrats have raised the possibility of hearings unless President Bush and VP Cheney are more forthcoming about their roles as executives at Harken Energy and Halliburton.

Although Cheney has "stepped up his heavy campaign travel schedule for Republican candidates," the Daily News reports that in keeping with his decision to avoid media, "His handlers have alerted local Republican organizers that Cheney won't be holding any 'press avails' and have instructed his advance staff to make sure his movements don't bring him near the media."

A side of President Bush that the public seldom sees.

Who's gonna save capitalism's ass this time? Plus: "I Love the Bust."

Martha Stewart tries to distance herself from Martha Stewart.

CNN news anchor Paula Zahn has invoked "celebrity status" as a reason to not to give a deposition in a lawsuit over landscaping at her Greenwich -- Connecticut, not Village -- home.

The Andrew Sullivan Chum-o-Meter makes its debut.

Online readers of Youngstown's The Vindicator, weigh-in on James Traficant's reelection chances.

The parent of a five-year-old explains the difficulty of dodging Disney at the supermarket.

The Washington Post reports on the "escalating rivalry" between Afghan President Karzai and his defense minister, who controls a secret service that reportedly has 30,000 employees. Its unchecked power being a "key obstacle to Afghan democracy that lies closer to home than either regional warlords who refuse to disarm their men or lurking remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaeda."

I'll Take Paris Although a record number of Americans have applied to join the Foreign Service since 9/11, many don't want to go to countries that are a security risk, and those who do often have insufficient language skills.

Salah Sh'hadeh, the commander of the military wing of Hamas who was killed on Monday, discussed martyrdom operations in a May 2002 interview.

In an interview with CNN, Israeli government spokesman Ra'anan Gissin repeatedly claimed that Israel had intelligence indicating that there would be no civilians around Sh'hadeh.

A Knesset member said that "I am surprised by the senior political echelon. I have no doubt that it knew of the risks of carrying out the operation using a one-ton bomb at the time that it made the decision, and despite this it took the risk."

How Likud and Hamas have benefited politically from each other's extremism.

White supremacist William Pierce, whose book "The Turner Diaries" is believed to have inspired Timothy McVeigh, has died. An official of the Simon Wiesenthal Center says that Pierce's National Alliance is one of the most sophisticated far-right groups online.

In 1999 Pierce acquired "hatecore" label Resistance Records, which the Anti-Defamation League calls "arguably the most lucrative hate enterprise in the country."

In "High-Decibel Hate," Bob Herbert wrote about the growing popularity of white power music.

A federal jury has ordered two retired Salvadoran generals, who now live in Florida, to pay $54.6 million to three torture victims for atrocities committed during El Salvador's civil war two decades ago.

How free-market policies have failed Latin America.

The New York Times reports that Attorney General Ashcroft has fallen out of favor with many of the conservatives who pushed for his appointment: "They cite his anti-terrorist positions as enhancing the kind of government power that they instinctively oppose."

Jim Hightower has a theory on what's behind the Bush Administration's obsession with secrecy.

The Toronto Star's William Walker tracks Bush's business career from his arrival in Midland Texas with $13,000 to his sale of the Texas Rangers for $15 million.

Why is George W. Bush a wealthy man today? According to University of Texas professors Bill Black and James Galbraith, it's "because his business friends were willing to stoop to fraud to make him rich."

In a recent New York Times/CBS poll, nearly 6 in 10 respondents say Bush isn't coming clean about Harken, and yet, 70 percent say they approve of the job he's doing. This has sparked a debate on Daily Pundit, over whether or not Bush has become Clintonized.

Bush comes up short on the stock market scorecard and VP Dick Cheney makes a stealth trip to Florida.

For the third consecutive year, the House has voted to ease a ban on U.S. citizen travel to Cuba. The Bush administration has pledged to veto any easing of the Cuba embargo.

Vermont Governor Howard Dean, a potential 2004 Democratic presidential contender, has called for a repeal of President Bush's $1.3 trillion tax cut to pay for universal health coverage.

The Christian Science Monitor profiles Dean, the New York Times Magazine questions him and a Vermont Web site tracks his every move.

Marc Cooper reports from Spain on the vogue for 9/11 conspiracy theories: "Nowadays in Europe it seems that the further you move up on the informational food chain, the more humidly fetid the imagination turns when it comes to Things American."

Dry Hole Did the U.S. go to war in Afghanistan over oil? Ken Silverstein says not a chance.

Ken Layne adds a personal and historical perspective to the controversy over Steve Earle's "John Walker's Blues."

Lies, lies and more lies: The Daily Howler joins the Chicago Sun Times' Richard Roeper in fact-checking Ann Coulter's "Slander."

Hamas confirms the death of its top military commander in a missile attack that flattened a Gaza City apartment building and killed at least 14 other Palestinians, including nine children. Israeli Prime Minister Sharon called the operation "one of our biggest successes ever."

The attack came just hours after the founder of Hamas had said that the group would consider stopping suicide attacks if Israeli withdrew from the West Bank and stopped the destruction of Palestinians and their homes.

For an Arab Israeli family, life's a (racist) beach. Plus: Summer in the Strip.

Afghan President Karzai and senior ministers turn to U.S. troops after losing trust in their homegrown security detail.

Robert Fisk writes that "The FBI is becoming almost as distrustful of its Pakistani counterpart as the CIA is of the warlords across the border in Afghanistan."

Wayne Madsen, who wrote an introduction to the just-published U.S. edition of "Forbidden Truth," charges that the U.S. media elite, out of "some perverted and confused quest to show its loyalty to the Bush family, has decided that linking its policies in Afghanistan and the Middle east to its past oil dealings, is somehow off the mark, 'out there,' unworthy of consideration."

"Forbidden Truth": Conspiracy theory or non?

Why is the media paying so little attention to President Bush's balls-to-the-wall-effort to aid brother Jeb's reelection campaign? Plus: Florida recount team reunites.

September, 2002 Link Archive