By DOUG THOMPSON
I’m a longtime gun-owner, a lifelong hunter and a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment that protects the right of Americans to own and bear arms.
I also was, until recently, a member of the National Rifle Association. I turned in my membership card after the midterm elections because of the organization’s unabashed support of crooked Congressman Tom DeLay (R-TX) and racist Senator George Allen (R-VA).
Returning to campaign mode, President Bush on Monday began his fundraising drive to help Republicans regain the power they lost less than four months ago.
“My political agenda is this: more Republican governors, take back control of the House and the Senate and make sure we keep the White House in 2008,” Bush told cheering donors at a private reception for the Republican Governors Association.
The annual event raised a record $10.4 million for GOP gubernatorial candidates.
After the judge dismissed one of its members, the jury finished a fourth day of deliberations Monday without a verdict in the perjury trial of former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby.
Most of the morning was consumed by deciding what to do about an art historian on the jury who saw or read something over the weekend about the trial. After interviewing her in private along with lawyers in the case, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton ruled that “what she had exposure to obviously disqualifies her.”
By ALISA TANG
A suicide bomber attacked the entrance to the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan on Tuesday during a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney, killing up to 23 people and wounding 20. Cheney was unhurt in the attack, which was claimed by the Taliban and was the closest that militants have come to a top U.S. official visiting Afghanistan. At least one U.S. soldier, an American contractor and a South Korean soldier were among the dead, NATO said.
By DALE McFEATTERS
Congress clearly didn’t take much notice of an obscure provision the Bush administration slipped into the USA Patriot Act last year. But now it seems clear that the measure is being used to conduct a political purge of U.S. attorneys’ offices.
So far, at least eight are known to have been forced out by the Justice Department, and there may be others. The departures were facilitated by a provision that allows the president to appoint interim U.S. attorneys for an indefinite period without the usual Senate confirmation.
By LESLIE KEAN
The Providence Journal
On Nov. 7, during the late-afternoon rush at Chicago’s bustling O’Hare International Airport, something truly astonishing happened. Pilots, managers and mechanics looked up from their ground positions at the United Airlines terminal and saw an odd, disc-shaped object hovering silently overhead, just below the overcast.
By JOHN CRISP
One of the great wonders of the Iraq war is the patience with which our troops have endured unanticipated extensions of their deployments and multiple deployments to the combat zone.
In some cases, they have been required to remain in Iraq or Afghanistan well beyond the date of their previously scheduled redeployments to the United States and even beyond the date of their scheduled retirements or discharges from the service.
By DAN K. THOMASSON
Don’t you just love it?
Before the race for the Democratic presidential nomination was more than a few weeks old, the candidates certified the accuracy of Will Rogers’ remark about not belonging to any organized political party– “I’m a Democrat,” he said. Now with the two leaders of the pack — Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois — having cast the first stones we can all settle back and enjoy — or not — the negative business as usual.
By TRISH CHOATE
A popular book among terrorists, “39 Ways to Serve and Participate in Jihad,” explains how wannabes who can’t fight on the front lines can still help the cause.
For instance, mothers can show children violent videos of attacks on Americans to breed enthusiasm about the jihadist movement, an al Qaeda expert with the U.S. military said.