The Incredible Shrinking Agenda

At his press conference in Israel today, Bush added that "there will be serious consequences if they attack our ships, pure and simple. And my advice to them is don't do it."

The New York Times editorial board writes: "It is not clear what game the Iranians were playing or even who was giving the orders. President Bush's refusal to engage Iran diplomatically makes it even harder for American officials to deconstruct Iran's motives and increases the risk of future miscalculation on both sides."

E-Mail Watch

What some of us have long suspected turns out to be true: It takes a federal court order to get a straight answer from the White House.

Then again, I may be getting ahead of myself. The White House hasn't actually answered yet.

Pete Yost writes for the Associated Press: "A federal magistrate ordered the White House on Tuesday to reveal whether copies of possibly millions of missing e-mails are stored on computer backup tapes.

"The order by U.S. Magistrate Judge John Facciola comes amid an effort by the White House to scuttle two lawsuits that could force the Executive Office of the President to recover any e-mail that has disappeared from computer servers where electronic documents are automatically archived.

"Two federal laws require the White House to preserve all records including e-mail.

"Facciola gave the White House five business days to report whether computer backup tapes contain e-mails written between 2003 and 2005.

"The time period covers the Valerie Plame affair in which at least three presidential aides were found to have leaked Plame's CIA identity to the news media."

Here's the order. The judge writes that it is "possible that a small amount of information not currently in the record may have a large affect on the resolution of this Motion and the direction of this lawsuit. With that understanding, the court will order the defendants to provide answers to the following questions:

"1. Are the back-ups catalogued, labeled or otherwise identified to indicate the period of time they cover?

"2. Are the back-ups catalogued, labeled or otherwise identified to indicate the data contained therein?

"3. Do the back-ups contain emails written and received between 2003-2005?

"4. Do the back-ups contain the emails said to be missing that are the subject of this lawsuit?"

"To date, the White House has evaded answering questions about whether it permanently destroyed over 5 million e-mails about issues such as Hurricane Katrina, the firing of United States Attorneys, and the exposure of Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent," said Meredith Fuchs, general counsel of the National Security Archive, one of the two parties suing the White House. "This order will force the Executive Office of the President to tell the public whether it really erased key records of the nation's history or whether it has made any effort to preserve the information."

For background, see my Nov. 13 column, Where Are the E-mails? and the Web sites of the National Security Archive and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

Torture Tapes Watch

Rep. Jane Harman writes in a USA Today op-ed about the CIA's destruction of videotapes documenting the interrogation of terror suspects: "While it is suddenly difficult to find anyone at CIA, the Justice Department or the White House who believed that the tapes should have been destroyed, the fact is they were -- resulting in a breach of faith with Congress and possible criminal wrongdoing. It would be grossly unfair to make some in the agency take the fall for decisions made by others. This smells like the coverup of the coverup."

For more background, see this recently declassified 2003 exchange of letters between Harman, then the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, and the CIA's general counsel.

Tax Cut Watch

Michael M. Phillips writes in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required): "Faced with recession fears, the White House is considering tax rebates for individuals to encourage spending and tax breaks for businesses to encourage investment, according to people familiar with the matter. . . .

"The president's main options include a tax rebate of perhaps $500 for individuals to encourage spending and a change in tax laws that would allow companies to deduct from their taxes a substantial portion of investments in equipment, according to people familiar with the discussions. President Bush is expected to prepare the economic-stimulus package before his State of the Union Address on Jan. 28."

Kamen's Contest

Washington Post columnist Al Kamen writes: "The deadline is midnight tonight for the In the Loop contest to guess what the intended target was in that still-suspicious fire last month in Vice President Cheney's office in the Old Executive Office Building.

"Send your entries to hitthevault@washpost.com."

The Roots of Change

Blogger Jack Balkin writes: "If 2008 turns out to be a pivotal election, defining a new political era, it is important to give credit where credit is due." One big reason, he writes, will be "the almost complete political failure of George W. Bush and his chief political adviser, Karl Rove. . . .

"The Bush/Rove strategy of accentuating divisions along partisan lines was a bold gamble that ultimately failed, because it depended on the Bush presidency being successful. . . .

"Now add to this the President's remarkable intransigence in the face of his policy failures and his growing unpopularity since 2005. President Bush has never been more sure of himself (at least in public) than he is today, and, with the aid of his Republican allies in Congress, he has been successful in batting back almost everything the Democratic Congress has sought to do. The result makes politics appear even more hopeless than it actually is, and this only spurs on the public's desire for change and for unity."

Cartoon Watch

Mike Luckovich on what's behind all that desire for change