The Wrap-up

War on Terror

The Pentagon finally releases evidence that the Gitmo detainees, like their colleagues on the outside, are hypocritical, dangerous brutes.

The Brits look for “reasonable suspicion”; Americans look for “probable cause.” But after the recently foiled airliner plot, perhaps we should look across the ocean for how to best balance liberty and security.

In her verdict enjoining the Bush administration’s warrantless surveillance program earlier this week, U.S. District Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor gratuitously and counterproductively took up issues outside those for which the plaintiff sought relief.

Conservatism

E.J. Dionne declares that the failed bill raising both the minimum wage and the death tax exemption finally removes all doubt the conservatism of the 109th Congress.

The chorus of disgruntled conservatives gets louder, especially on Iraq.

Campaigns and Elections

President Bush beware: if Democrats take back the House in November, brace yourself for impeachment proceedings, served up by John Conyers, the new chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, who recently released a 350-page report accusing you of breaking 26 laws and regulations.

Some prominent Republicans are campaigning to help former Democratic, now independent, senator Joe Lieberman win re-election in Connecticut.

Will Steve Laffey unseat Senator Lincoln Chafee in Rhode Island’s Republican primary?

John McCain is “locking up a cast of top-shelf Republican strategists, policy experts, fundraisers and donors, in a methodical effort to build a 2008 presidential campaign machine,” reports the New York Times. What the Times doesn’t mention is that McCain may have himself broken the McCain-Feingold Act.

Spending

The 2007 Labor-HHS apropos bill contains almost 2,000 pork projects. Find yours here, courtesy of the Washington Examiner.

Check out Congressman Jeff Flake’s egregious earmark of the week.

Blocking transparency via secrecy: which senator placed the anonymous hold on the bill to create a publicly searchable database of government contracts, grants, insurance, loans and financial assistance, worth $2.5 trillion last year?

NTU’s Andrew Moylan asks liberals to "unite with conservatives to rid legislation of the earmarking scourge.”

Miscellaneous

Rich Lowry, Robert Rector and Ed Feulner all hail the 10-year anniversary of welfare reform.

New statistics show that compared with their private sector counterparts, federal employees are actually better compensated.

The Washington Post profiles the president’s new domestic policy advisor, Karl Zinsmeister.

We all heard about Mel Gibson’s anti-Semitic drunken rant, yet the media ignored a similar, more disturbing event that occurred on the same day: a Muslim gunmen’s premeditated assault on a prominent Jewish institution in Seattle. Jeff Jacoby has the details.

Who are the Kurds? Michael Totten, a reporter at large, investigates.