Another 'Mission Accomplished' Moment?

The Politics of Terror, Part II

Robert Block and Sarah Lueck write in the Wall Street Journal: "Following the foiled United Kingdom bomb plot, the Bush administration is expected to use the terrorist threat to regain the upper hand in congressional debates and push for government action before the November elections.

"Republicans appear to be circling around a new strategy to advocate stronger counterterrorism laws and expand domestic surveillance, while pushing back against civil libertarians."

Eric Lichtblau writes in the New York Times: "Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales on Monday ordered a side-by-side review of American and British counterterrorism laws as a first step toward determining whether further changes in American law are warranted.

"The plot to blow up airliners bound from Britain to the United States has highlighted differences in legal policies between the two allies, with American officials suggesting that their British counterparts have greater flexibility to prevent attacks."

Blogger Glenn Greenwald writes: "Bush supporters have been attempting to exploit the U.K. terrorist plot to bolster support for an array of extremist and lawless Bush policies -- from warrantless eavesdropping to torture -- even though there is not a shred of evidence that any of those policies played any role whatsoever, either in the U.S. or England, in impeding this plot."

Press Corps Follies

Dana Milbank writes in The Washington Post: "The White House press corps spent its first day in exile yesterday, banished from the White House compound for the first time since the John Adams presidency while the West Wing briefing room undergoes a renovation.

"As if to deepen the isolation, press secretary Tony Snow, stepping over some plywood and into the new digs on Jackson Place NW for his daily briefing, adopted the Borscht Belt comics' practice of answering questions with questions.

"Does President Bush think the cease-fire in Israel and Lebanon will undermine support for Hezbollah?

" 'Well, we're going to find out, aren't we?' Snow replied. . . .

"Does Bush support the Republican candidate for Senate in Connecticut, Alan Schlesinger?

" 'Why do you ask?' Snow counterquestioned. 'Is there something about the candidate that I should know about that would lead to judgments?' "

Milbank concludes: "Snow's performance. . . . fits neatly in a renewed Bush administration effort to keep the media at a safe distance."

Milbank was referring to a story in The Washington Post on Saturday in which Peter Baker wrote that "increasingly in recent months, Bush has left town without a chartered press plane, often to receptions where he talks to donors chipping in hundreds of thousands of dollars with no cameras or tapes to record his words for the public. Barred from such events, most news organizations will not pay to travel with him. And so a White House policy inclined to secrecy has combined with escalating costs for the strapped news media to let Bush fly under the radar in a way his predecessors could not. . . .

"The idea that Bush could travel across the country without a full contingent of reporters, especially in the middle of a war, highlights a major cultural shift in the presidency and the news media."

Press corps critic Eric Boehlert writes on Huffingtonpost.com that "the White House knew full well that not taking the press along whenever the president traveled was unprecedented, it knew journalists would interpret the move as insulting, and it knew the ramifications -- the organized push back -- would be non-existent. And of course, the White House was right."

Bush v. Who?

Adam Cohen writes on the New York Times editorial page: "The ruling that stopped the Florida recount and handed the presidency to George W. Bush is disappearing down the legal world's version of the memory hole, the slot where, in George Orwell's '1984,' government workers disposed of politically inconvenient records. . . .

"There are several problems with trying to airbrush Bush v. Gore from the law. It undermines the courts' legitimacy when they depart sharply from the rules of precedent, and it gives support to those who have said that Bush v. Gore was not a legal decision but a raw assertion of power. . . .

"The Supreme Court's highly partisan resolution of the 2000 election was a severe blow to American democracy, and to the court's own standing. The courts could start to undo the damage by deciding that, rather than disappearing down the memory hole, Bush v. Gore will stand for the principle that elections need to be as fair as we can possibly make them."

Karl Rove Watch

James Moore , co-author with Wayne Slater of the unauthorized Karl Rove bio "Bush's Brain," writes that "Karl is not happy" with the upcoming sequel: "The Architect: Karl Rove and the Master Plan for Absolute Power."

Writes Moore: "Just as he did with 'Bush's Brain,' Rove managed to acquire an early galley version of the new book. He is disturbed about several matters but appears most deeply troubled about how the narrative proves he has had a complex relationship with convicted felon Jack Abramoff. Information provided to us for the book by an eyewitness and participant in Rove and Abramoff meetings gives lie to Rove and the White House's claims that Abramoff was barely known by the administration. Karl has always known who has money to spend on politics and how to use those people. Our witness, who also told the same story to federal investigators, details meetings between Rove and Abramoff that show the two were using each other for their own political ends.

"After reading the galley, Rove called Slater and denied the meetings ever occurred. He wants us to believe that our source simply made up the events and also lied to federal investigators. Of course, Karl Rove is the same man who claimed he did not speak to reporters about Valerie Plame's identity until her name was published by Robert Novak and he is the same person who told the world Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. I do not believe anything he says nor should anyone in our country."

Bush Gets Cross

Randal C. Archibold writes in the New York Times: "President Bush on Monday signed a law transferring a 29-foot-tall Latin cross high on a hill in San Diego to the federal government, stepping into a long-running dispute over the separation of church and state."

Live Online

I'll be Live Online tomorrow at 1 p.m. EDT. Questions? Comments? Let me have 'em .

Cartoon Humor

Pat Oliphant on going to war with the leadership you have; Mike Luckovich on Cheney's idea of dialogue; Stuart Carlson on how a bill becomes a non-law.

Stranger and Stranger

The report that Bush read Albert Camus' existential classic "The Stranger" during his vacation has pundits mystified on many levels.

John Dickerson writes in Slate that Bush's aides "will not tell us what he made of the story of a remorseless killer of Arabs. White House spokesman Tony Snow said Bush 'found it an interesting book and a quick read' and talked about it with aides. 'I don't want to go too deep into it, but we discussed the origins of existentialism,' said Snow. . . .

"Surely someone is going to think that Bush read the book because he identifies with [the protagonist]. There's got to be another explanation. Does his experience in Iraq push him to read works replete with themes of angst, anxiety, and dread? Was the president trying to gain insight into the thinking of Europeans who are skeptical of his plan for democracy in the Middle East, founded as it is on the idea of a universal rational essence that existentialists reject? Did he just want to read something short for his truncated vacation? This may be the first time that national security demands an official version of literary criticism. We want a book report!"