Looks like Scooter Libby forgot to tell the FBI and Fitzgerald about an important conversation with Ms. Judy Miller of the NYT.  oops, looks like he'd better call Martha Stewart:

      TITLE 18--CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE

                             PART I--CRIMES

                 CHAPTER 47--FRAUD AND FALSE STATEMENTS

Sec. 1001. Statements or entries generally

    (a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any
matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or
judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and
willfully--
        (1) falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or
    device a material fact;
        (2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent
    statement or representation; or
        (3) makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same
    to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement
    or entry;

shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or
both.

Looks like its hammer time!

It will be the White Sox and Cardinals in the World Series - which will prove yet again that pitching, defense, and speed still matter in the steroids era.

Karl feeling the heat:

Federal prosecutors have accepted an offer from presidential adviser Karl Rove to give 11th hour testimony in the case of a CIA officer's leaked identity but have warned they cannot guarantee he won't be indicted, according to people directly familiar with the investigation.

The persons, who spoke only on condition of anonymity because of grand jury secrecy, said Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has not made any decision yet on whether to file criminal charges against the longtime confidant of President Bush or others.

Bob Luskin promises, this time for sure, to stop leaking:

"I can say categorically that Karl has not received a target letter from the special counsel. The special counsel has confirmed that he has not made any charging decisions in respect to Karl," Luskin said.

He said that Rove "continues to be cooperative voluntarily" with the special counsel investigation and "beyond that, any communication I have or may have in the future are going to be treated as completely confidential."

As I said earlier, the Family Research Council sends me E-mails.  I can't say I didn't sign up for them.  Take a close look at what they have to say about Bill Bennett's racist outburst the other day:

When Bennett offered what he called a "noxious" hypothetical example on his Morning in America talk show saying that abortion might be used to lower crime rates in the black community--but that it would be morally reprehensible to do so--liberals pounced.

That's right, they are claiming that Bennett was talking about "lowering crime rates in the black community."  Not exactly:

"you wanted to reduce crime ... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down."

That's right--Bennett was talking about reducing crime in general, not in the "black community."

And that's where the racism is, folks.  No amount of distortion by the Family Research Council can change it.

The Family Research Council has bombarded me with daily E-mails about John Roberts for months now.  I didn't get an E-mail from them and was a bit concerned?  Food poisoning?  Bus broke down at the wingnut retreat?  Nope:

Washington D.C. - President Bush's announcement this morning of White House counsel Harriet Miers as his nominee for the Supreme Court drew a cautious response from the Family Research Council (FRC), a pro-family public policy organization.

FRC's president, Tony Perkins, commented:

"President Bush has long made it clear that his choices for the U.S. Supreme Court would be in the mold of current justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. We have no reason to believe he has abandoned that standard. However, our lack of knowledge about Harriet Miers, and the absence of a record on the bench, give us insufficient information from which to assess whether or not she is indeed in that mold.

"In the days to come, Harriet Miers will have the chance to demonstrate such a philosophy. We will be watching closely as the confirmation process begins, and we urge American families to wait and see if the confidence we have always placed in the President's commitment is justified by this selection."

I hear tell that some conservatives are thinking of filibustering her.

And they said irony was dead after September 11th!

In the White House that hero worshipped the president, Miers was distinguished by the intensity of her zeal: She once told me that the president was the most brilliant man she had ever met.

Ironmouth.  We report, you decide.

After much time spent musing about effective crime-fighting strategies, we at the Ironmouth predict that Bill Bennett will turn his attention to Iraq and recommend bringing back genocide as a time-honored strategy for breaking pesky insurgencies.  Bill is after all a man of letters and high moral certitude and hell, if the Roman, Greek, Mongol, Ottoman and British Empires could use it effectively why not us?

I meant to say something about this the other day but couldn't find the time.  One of our local state representatives from Knoxville has made a national name for himself by going after the Black Legislative Caucus in Nashville.  Now Mr. Campfield being very white, very conservative Republican and not too smart not only tried to create some sort of controversy about the Black Legislative Caucus' bylaws and finances, he pushed the envelope and became flabbergasted that he couldn't become a member and then felt the need to remark that the KKK was a more inclusive group then the Tennessee Black Legislative Caucus.    When I read it I thought that there probably wasn't anything preventing Campfield from founding a KKK caucus but I digress. 

I bring up Rep. Campfield because he typifies something I hate about politics nowadays which is the childish perpetual bomb-throwing politician less interested in representing his district or state and more interested in clownish stunts meant to prove some broader political point.  For example, while we were home in Minnesota last summer, the state legislature was deadlocked with Gov. Pawlenty on a budget and the state faced a government shut-down.  Now there were all manner of negotiations happening but for some reason Republicans in the House and Senate felt that it would be much more effective to go after the Democratic Senate Majority leader and did so by placing a small futon outside his office where a revolving cast of Republican politicians slept, ate and stood watch 24/7.  For the life of me I couldn't quite see what they were trying to accomplish nor did most Minnesotans and of course the state government shut down during the 4th of July weekend.  Mission accomplished, I guess?  

Frankly I hate it when either party resorts to stunts reminiscent of campus radical pranks from the 60's, but I must ask:  do the RNC or College Republican have seminars on this kind of thing?  I know everybody got a kick out of them when Newt Gingrich was leading the party into the majority but when do you turn it off and actually govern? 

Somebody grab Mr. Delay and tell him it doesn't look good when you're own lawyer admits that you've repeatedly lied about whether you were asked to appear before the Travis County grand jury.  Minor detail but very telling in the larger scheme of things.

Judith Miller, seen here with bloated and overrated defense attorney Bob Bennett (whose shameful handling of Bill Clinton's defense in the Paula Jones case led to the President's impeachment in the House - there's money well spent, Judy), is out of custody, and, evidently, she is now eager to sing for Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald. 

Judith Miller's sloppy propagandizing, er, reporting helped make Bush's case for invading Iraq.  Then she used (presumably) the same unreliable sources - high-ranking political hacks of the Bush Administration - to disclose a covert CIA officer's identity.  And she did so having substantial reason to know that these sources were not whistleblowers exposing corruption while risking retaliation, but hacks hell bent on undermining a critic of Bush.  Then she decides to go to jail to protect the identity of these sources who fed her a steady diet of political hogwash poorly disguised but unquestionably accepted by Miller as "fact."  And now she's a rat.

Please, fellow bloggers.  Post your comments ridiculing this halfwit with a word processor.  Regardless of one's place on the political pendulum, I can't see how anyone could view Judith Miller without utter, nauseating contempt.

The last few years have been tough ones for the New York Times.

Ed Kilgore gives us an update on Ashley Smith who supposedly used Rick Warren's super popular "A Purpose Driven Life" to talk down a fugitive-cop killer holding her hostage in her suburban Atlanta apartment.  Well, the revised story is that she used her stash of crystal meth to sweeten the deal. 

This episode reminded me of living in Atlanta where strip clubs and Baptist mega-churches seem well represented on highway billboards as you come into town on I-75.  Furthermore, I have to agree with Ed that the "sinner-saint" dichotomy that most Southerners seem to so instinctively embrace, if not celebrate, is just one more reason to love the South.