Sy Hersh reports in the current New Yorker that the Administration is deep in the planning phases for a possibly nuclear military campaign against Iran.

Apparently, AT&T has been routing its Internet traffic to the NSA. The EFF is suing.

So, remember a while back, when one of the new talking points from the White House was that the Vice President’s powers included the ability to declassify information? People wondered a little about why this was important, but the reason is pretty transparent: if Libby flips on Cheney and says that it was the Veep who told him to link Plame’s identity, their fallback position is that because Cheney is VP, his order to disclose Plame’s classified status means he was declassifying her status. Ergo, no classified leak exists. It’s an end run around the laws concerning classified material, but certainly par for the course with this most mendacious of administrations.

Now the story’s getting more interesting, as Libby is asserting that the order came from Bush. We can assume that the GOP noise machine will immediately start in with a variant of the “if the President does it, it’s not illegal” canard that is so dangerously close to Louis XIV’s (in)famous pronouncement in re: state-monarch unity. However, it ain’t necessarily so, and I pray that won’t fly. Bush deciding to leak Plame’s CIA identity would and should remain a crime. Surely Bush cannot simply decide to declassify her status as political payback and get away with it. At least, I’d be sure of that if we still lived in a country that enjoyed the rule of law a bit more universally; Bush’s imperial presidency has already done substantial damage to that most basic of governmental ideals. It remains to be seen how much more damage he’ll do.

(Thanks for the heads-up, Triple-F!)

Harry Taylor is my hero. Somehow, a non-ass-kisser managed to get into a Bush Q&A PR event in Charlotte. Harry rules.

They’ve killed a network neutrality measure, paving the way for folks like AT&T to rape and ultimately destroy the Internet as we know it.

Wired is running a story on the gradual disintermediation of local NPR affiliates in favor of podcasts, mp3 downloads, and online streaming of the popular shows. NPR is different than, say, the RIAA in that they’re not pretending that their business model doesn’t need to evolve, and Wired makes much of this, but they don’t make one key point quite clear enough.

Lots of affiliates suck unmitigated ass. The Heathen household is a big NPR consumer, but we don’t sponsor the local station. Why? They’re awful. Their programming choices are pedestrian, and their locally produced content is amateurish at best. We view KUHF as a necessary evil, and the only reason we ever tune in is to get the national programming. In that sense, they are indistinguishable from the television broadcast network affiliates; we’d ditch them, too, if it were convenient to just get a national feed. It’s only under very rare circumstances that local broadcast media provide anything of value to us — e.g., during Hurricane Rita — and when that happens, we’ll gladly use rabbit ears. For the other 99.9% of the time, the local stations are the people screwing up our Tivo’s attempts to capture Letterman because they’ve decided people really want a 45 minute evening news show.

But back to NPR. We’d happily pay money directly to NPR for a feed of their national programs — Morning Edition, ATC, Marketplace, Fresh Air, etc. — as long as they were blissfully free of local interruption. They’re worth at least as much as HBO. Disintermediation is happening to the KUHFs of the world now because the internet makes it possible, but also because the affiliates offer nothing of value. It’s not just the pledge drives. It’s pledge drives in service of overwhelmingly half-assed programming. Radio is easy; getting content from the Internet is orders of magnitude more difficult compared to turning on the radio. That people are opting for that despite the higher barrier is an indictment of the local affiliate system. The desire to disintermediate is, in this case, a prerequisite to the actual disintermediation. It’s a choice listeners are making consciously and deliberately; it’s the market speaking. NPR and its affiliates would do well to listen carefully, and act accordingly.

A: When it’s in Arizona, and you’re the son of the state Senate president. Holy crap.

Oh, yes, of course the politico in the picture is a Republican. Did you really have to ask?

And we love him for it. Telephonic cryptography for the masses, from the guy who gave us easy public key crypto. With the GOP content to allow George to eavesdrop on whomever he likes with no oversight, widespread unbreakable crypto is probably the only way to keep your communications private.

You’re idiots.

Diebold is trying to charge a county $40,000 for testing its voting machines. Jackasses.

From the Boston Globe:

WASHINGTON — When President Bush signed the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act this month, he included an addendum saying that he did not feel obliged to obey requirements that he inform Congress about how the FBI was using the act’s expanded police powers. The bill contained several oversight provisions intended to make sure the FBI did not abuse the special terrorism-related powers to search homes and secretly seize papers. The provisions require Justice Department officials to keep closer track of how often the FBI uses the new powers and in what type of situations. Under the law, the administration would have to provide the information to Congress by certain dates. Bush signed the bill with fanfare at a White House ceremony March 9, calling it ”a piece of legislation that’s vital to win the war on terror and to protect the American people.” But after the reporters and guests had left, the White House quietly issued a ”signing statement,” an official document in which a president lays out his interpretation of a new law. In the statement, Bush said that he did not consider himself bound to tell Congress how the Patriot Act powers were being used and that, despite the law’s requirements, he could withhold the information if he decided that disclosure would ”impair foreign relations, national security, the deliberative process of the executive, or the performance of the executive’s constitutional duties.”

We have separation of powers for a reason. When will the people wake up to what evil this administration is doing? The biggest threat to the US since 9/11 has never been Bin Laden; it’s Bush and his imperial presidency.

From security expert Bruce Schneier’s weblog, and also Wired:

It seems like every time someone tests airport security, airport security fails. In tests between November 2001 and February 2002, screeners missed 70 percent of knives, 30 percent of guns and 60 percent of (fake) bombs. And recently (see also this), testers were able to smuggle bomb-making parts through airport security in 21 of 21 attempts. It makes you wonder why we’re all putting our laptops in a separate bin and taking off our shoes. (Although we should all be glad that Richard Reid wasn’t the “underwear bomber.”)

Go read this. MM is the only source of “fair and balanced” media criticism you’ll find.

But that doesn’t make this any less funny: Franz Ferdinand Frontman Shot By Gavrilo Princip Bassist. From today’s Onion, natch:

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND — Lead singer and guitarist for pop band Franz Ferdinand, Alexander Kapranos, is in critical condition today after being shot by a man identified as the bassist for rock group Gavrilo Princip. “We ask fans to cooperate with Interpol to find the assailant, and call upon British Sea Power, Snow Patrol, and The Postal Service for help,” drummer Paul Thompson told music magazine NME Monday. “The suspect had links to The Decemberists and The Libertines, and we are following up on all leads.” It is unclear whether the shooting was linked to The Polyphonic Spree’s invasion of Belgium earlier this week.

The Post has utterly caved to the right, who keep whining about nonexistent liberal bias, by hiring a right-wing blogger. There are no progressive bloggers employed by the Post; just this guy on the right. Josh has more (see link), as does Media Matters here and here.

Cops up there made a sweep of 36 bars last week wherein they arrested about 30 people on charges of public intoxication. Inside the bars. Their rationale? These people might drive later. That one of the bars was a hotel bar, and at least some of the arrested persons were registered there, is apparently irrelevant.

What jackasses. Somebody fire these thugs. More via The Agitator<a/>.

However, it’s probably only hard because, at least in the corporate world, “PR” means “LIES.”

Someone at the Post got an amusing release from some flack somewhere about the valuable role funeral directors will play in the event of a mass fatality event. (I am not making this up.) Post reporter calls back for clarification, and transcribes conversation. Madcap hilarity ensues. (Local Copy)

Marvel and DC are asserting that they own, jointly, the rights to the term “super-hero.”