Holy Joe:

In a statement, the deeply conservative Connecticut senator, who has in the past expressed his support for waterboarding, said that Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision — which already has drawn criticism for not going far enough — “will have a chilling effect on the men and women agents of our intelligence community whose uninhibited bravery and skill we depend on every day to protect our homeland from the next terrorist attack.”

From Lieberman’s statement:

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Remember Cindy Sheehan?  She was Joe the Plumber before Joe the Plumber, way back in 2005, when it was kind of a novelty for some unschooled nobody to get national attention by following the president around acting like a douche.

Anyway, she’s going to Martha’s Vineyard, for the beaches, and the publicity.  According to Sheehan, “We need to give the president the moral backbone he needs”  Well, I’m sure that sending a stalkery attention whore after him and his vacationing family will do the trick.  Of course, since it’s slow news August, this will likely corner the media market for the “unhinged asshole” story of the week.  Joe Plumber, New Hampshire Gun Nut Guy, Arizona Assault Rifle Guy, and Sarah Palin will be very envious.  But, to be safe, Sheehan should probably come armed with an IED, just to ensure she gets on the TV. Since the most visible nutcases are right wingers these days, she’s going to have to do something to appeal to that sentiment. As the Washington Examiner points out, “even the left wing of the Democratic party seems unconcerned with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan these days.” Yes, let’s talk about birth certificates, Nazi Islamosocialist health care Death Tribunals, and assault rifles instead.

Peace Activist Sheehan Targets Obama’s Vacation [The Christian Science Monitor]

“I share the President’s conviction that as a nation, we must, to the extent possible, look forward and not backward when it comes to issues such as these.”

Henceforth, the Department of Justice will cease the investigation and prosecution of past crimes, and focus exclusively on prosecuting crimes yet to be committed.

Holder: We’re Launching “Preliminary Review” Of Torture [TPM]

Now that everyone’s out of town, the CIA torture report has finally been released, and Eric Holder will apparently appoint John Durham, “a career Justice Department prosecutor from Connecticut” who’s also looking into the missing torture tapes, to hang the Bad Apples by their seeds:

Durham’s mandate, the sources added, will be relatively narrow: to look at whether there is enough evidence to launch a full-scale criminal investigation of current and former CIA personnel who may have broken the law in their dealings with detainees.

Remember, “I was only following orders” is no defense. Unless you were. Or unless you gave them.

Holder to Appoint Prosecutor to Investigate CIA Terror Interrogations [WaPo]

CIA Inspector General Report [WaPo, PDF]

Jonah Goldberg:

Jonah Goldberg, editor-at-large of National Review Online, went on Fox News today to fan the flames of the latest fabricated “death panel” controversy.

Goldberg equated a Veterans Affairs pamphlet — one that’s reportedly no longer being used — with Nazi eugenics, saying “death panels may not be too far off the horizon.”

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With the Birther Sitcom on hiatus, WorldNetDaily has turned its attention to the next authoritarian cabal that will provide a pretext for enslaving reality-dodging God-fearing Americans: Swine Flu.

The Pig Dawn scenario, in case you’ve been distracted by Project Runway, is that the Nazis subverting our Republic will use an H1N1 outbreak to declare martial law and put those reconstituted FEMA camps back into service.

Now all that’s needed is to mangle some facts to fit the fear.

Say, how about microchip implants?

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The recent release, on compassionate grounds,  of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, the Libyan agent convicted of planting the bomb on Pan AM flight 103 that claimed the lives of 270 innocent men, women and children has created something of a diplomatic furor, with U.S. commentators and public officials loudly decrying the Scottish government’s decision. Read more »