Tuesday, February 26, 2008

ThinkFast: February 26, 2008

THINK PROGRESS

Over two hundred 9/11 First Responders, family members, and supporters will be rallying on Capitol Hill today. The rally is being conducted to draw attention to the health issues that the 9/11 rescue workers currently face.

Attorneys for Don Siegelman called on the Justice Department to appoint a special prosecutor after a key government witness involved in sending Siegelman to jail revealed he was told to write out his testimony to “get his story straight.” The defense was never told of the written testimony.

The Huffington Post has obtained a document showing that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) “may have taken steps to protect his Republican colleagues from the scope of his investigation” into disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

In a Washington Post op-ed, John Podesta, Ray Takeyh, and Lawrence Korb debunk the prevailing doomsday scenario that an American departure from Iraq “would lead to genocide and mayhem.” “It is entirely possible,” they write, “that in the absence of a cumbersome and clumsy American occupation, Iraqis will make their own bargains and compacts, heading off the genocide that many seem to anticipate.”

President Bush predicted yesterday that voters will replace him with a Republican president who will “keep up the fight” in Iraq. “I believe the American people understand that success in Iraq is necessary for the long-term security of the American people,” Bush said.

The Pentagon announced yesterday that when the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq ends in July, it’s expected that “there will be about 8,000 more troops on the ground than when it began in January 2007.” There were 132,000 troops in Iraq when President Bush initiated the “surge,” but Lt. Gen. Carter Ham told reporters that by July the troop total was likely to be 140,000.”

The U.N.’s climate chief Yvo de Boer welcomed statements by Bush administration officials that the U.S. would accept a binding international commitment to reduce global-warming gases. But he said their insistence that China and other developing nations do the same “is not realistic.” “If it’s a quid pro quo, then it’s a nonstarter,” he said.

And Finally: The drug czar and the hippie. In his new book, Washington super lawyer Bob Bennett reveals that his brother, conservative commentator William Bennett, once “went on a date with hippie icon Janis Joplin” in the late ’60s. Of the date, “Bob says Bill told him at the time, ‘Let me put it this way, we were both disappointed.’”

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