Target Rich Environment

As we come closer to the election, more and more items of interest are crossing my screen. Not only are the facts conspiring against the administration, the press, perhaps smelling blood in the water, has suddenly started publishing articles that wouldn't have seen the light of day during the extended Bush honeymoon, and officials trying to rescue their reputations have turned the info-tight Bush administration into a leaky sieve. For your notice:

• LA Times - "An exhaustive report released last week by Charles Duelfer, the CIA's chief weapons investigator in Iraq, concluded that deposed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein destroyed his stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons in the early 1990s and never tried to rebuild them. But a little-noticed section of the 960-page report warns that the danger of a "devastating" attack with unconventional weapons has grown since the U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Iraq last year." (emphasis mine)
  
  I guess that perhaps the world is NOT a safer place with Saddam in jail.
  
  
• Guess the speaker - "Our hope is that as we build up Iraqi forces, we will be able to relieve the stress on our forces and see a reduction in coalition forces over some period of time, probably post-Iraqi elections." John Kerry?
  
  No, Donald Rumsfeld. Why is he sending these mixed messages?
  
  
• Yet another right-wing Republican deserts the Bush camp. Bob Barr objects to profligate spending, failure on border security, and loss of personal liberties: "Those are but three tips of the iceberg that signal the deep dissatisfaction many conservatives harbor against the president. Thus far, however, with Bush's political gurus telling him he's ahead and to just lay low and not make any major gaffes, he seems unwilling to recognize the problems on his right flank."
  
  
• WASHINGTON, Oct. 9 (AP) - The United States Commission on Civil Rights voted on Friday to wait until after next month's election to discuss a report critical of the Bush administration's civil rights record. Republican members had objected to the report's timing.
  
  The report remains posted on the commission's Web site (http://www.usccr.gov/), despite objections from Republican commissioners.
  
  The report says Mr. Bush "has neither exhibited leadership on pressing civil rights issues, nor taken actions that matched his words" on the subject. It finds fault with Mr. Bush's funding requests for civil rights enforcement; his positions on voting rights, educational opportunity and affirmative action; and his actions against hate crimes.