Haleh Esfandiari Released

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First of all, this is excellent news. Second of all, it will be interesting to learn the back story. There are three other Iranian-Americans still being detained, so there is still room for very bad things to happen in the relationship.

Hey, That’s Not Ola Ray. . .

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This is off topic, but I enjoyed watching this YouTube video of 1,500 plus CPDRC inmates of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center, Cebu, Philippines mimic Michael Jackson’s Thriller video.

Banned Books?

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Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings — Heinrich Heine (1821) I hadn’t paid much attention to the growing "banned books" problem in American schools and libraries, but I saw an ad on a Chicago train yesterday and dug in a bit.

The Decider Still Doesn’t Know Who Disbanded Iraq’s Military

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President Bush still does not know who actually controverted his policy on keeping Saddam’s military intact and instead disbanded it.  That’s an incredible admission — unbelievable!  This from a revealing New York Times piece today on Bush biographer Robert Draper’s interviews with Bush (and in his forthcoming book Dead Certain:  The Presidency of George W….

Larry Craig Should Seek Counsel from Former Senator Alan Simpson

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Larry Craig won’t be Idaho’s Senator after September 30th.  He made his resignation announcement today. There has been a lot of ridicule of Craig in the last several days — much of which was deserved given his well-preened anti-gay persona, but now he’s out. He’s terminated one of the big contradictions in his life.