"KOPPEL: Oh, I thought we'd have people who would question our motives. They always do. But, I mean, the fact that the Sinclair Broadcasting Group, for example, would charge me with being unpatriotic, would say I was doing this to undermine the war effort, I think is beneath contempt, quite frankly." - CNN

"L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator in Iraq, said in a speech six months before the Sept. 11 attacks that the Bush administration was 'paying no attention' to terrorism.

'What they will do is stagger along until there's a major incident and then suddenly say, 'Oh my God, shouldn't we be organized to deal with this,'' Bremer said at a McCormick Tribune Foundation conference on terrorism on Feb. 26, 2001." - AP via Yahoo

"ABC's Ted Koppel is being accused of trivializing the deaths of American soldiers in Iraq."

"A conservative Christian activist says a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court is proof that many of this nation's judges are on a quest for a religion-free America. Earlier this week, the high court refused to consider the appeal of a judicial ban on cadet-led mealtime prayers at Virginia Military Institute.... Vision America president Rick Scarborough says the effects of the VMI ruling will be far-reaching. For one thing, he fears the nation is in danger of raising up a generation of military officers without religious values. And he believes by such rulings, the United States is pitting itself against God."

"The schedule includes an 'anti-war concert by Barbara Streisand' (misspelling her first name), 'posting the Iraqi Colors by Sean Penn and Tim Robbins' (the Oscar-winning actors and anti-war activists), tributes to France and Germany, and ceremonies for gay marriages featuring 'threesomes, mixed, same sex, farm animals.' " - AP

"American citizens were left to listen at the keyhole Thursday as President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney closed the Oval Office door for a privileged private session before the commission investigating the 9/11 terrorist attacks. There was no press coverage allowed, no recording, no transcript to be made available later, no testimony given under oath - and no good reason for any of it....

"Demanding special treatment and hiding from the public on a matter of such vital national concern and grief is to play the imperial president and put politics ahead of statesmanship." - Boston Globe editorial via IHT

"Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, has been pegged as a possible leaker of the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame to a syndicated columnist, according to a new book by former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, Plame's husband.

In 'The Politics of Truth,' to be published Friday, Wilson says Libby is 'quite possibly the person who exposed my wife's identity,' according to The Washington Post, which obtained an early copy....

'The other name that has most often been repeated to me in connection with the inquiry and disclosure into my background and Valerie's is that of Elliott Abrams, who gained infamy in the Iran-Contra scandal,' he writes. Abrams is currently a Mideast specialist on the National Security Council.

Another suspect named in Wilson's book: White House chief political adviser Karl Rove." - AP

Asked how many American troops have died in Iraq, [Paul Wolfowitz] the Pentagon's No. 2 civilian estimated Thursday the total was about 500 -- more than 200 soldiers short. - AP

"Judges have become too much like politicians, with the unfortunate result that picking new ones has become needlessly partisan and time-consuming, Justice Antonin Scalia said Thursday.

As long as judges tinker with the Constitution to 'do what the people want,' instead of what the document actually commands, politicians who pick and confirm new federal judges will naturally want only those who agree with them politically, Scalia said. " - AP

"The most that can fairly be said is that by implication she was likening abortionists to terrorists, and supporters of abortion to supporters of terrorism. But the comparison is an extremely limited one: At most, she was saying that abortionists are like terrorists in that both groups violate the right to life and that supporters of abortion are like supporters of terrorism in that both fail to respect the right to life." - National Review Online

"Unborn children should be welcomed in life and protected in law. On September 11, we saw clearly that evil exists in this world, and that it does not value life. The terrible events of that fateful day have given us, as a Nation, a greater understanding about the value and wonder of life. Every innocent life taken that day was the most important person on earth to somebody; and every death extinguished a world. Now we are engaged in a fight against evil and tyranny to preserve and protect life. In so doing, we are standing again for those core principles upon which our Nation was founded."

"The Bush administration is bracing itself for the latest memoir by a former insider. Joe Wilson, a former ambassador, will this week reveal the name of the government official who 'outed' his wife - revealing her identity as a CIA operative in apparent revenge for his role in proving the White House made false claims about Iraq's efforts to develop nuclear weapons." - The Independent

Amazon.com:

"The Bush administration has stripped information on a range of women's issues from government Web sites, apparently in pursuit of a political agenda, researchers reported on Wednesday." - Reuters

"The Senate cannot allow its members and staff to use their official positions to interfere in the impartial administration of justice." - AP