Just about every government in the Middle East has been ticked off at the reporting by Al-Jazeera. This fact, more than anything else, indicates that Al-Jazeera is doing a lot right. I have made no secret of my respect for Al-Jazeera and its ability to dominate the Middle East media market with its reporting.

If I happened to be in charge of the Pulitzer Prizes for journalism, I’d award one to neocon-friendly Claudia Rosett for her work on the U.N. oil-for-food scandal and the other to Dana Priest for her writing on America’s secret intelligence institutions and her recent revelations about secret Eastern European detention centers.

Yesterday evening, I went to another in a series of dinners and movies hosted by Margaret Carlson, Washington political commentator and Editor-at-Large of The Week Magazine, and this relatively new newsy weekly, The Week. The last of these was hosted by Margaret Carlson and Senator Lindsey Graham.

Would you buy a used car from this man? That’s what one of the covers of a high school book I had on Machiavelli asked. Machiavelli, of course, is one of the patron saints of high octane realism.

Bob Woodward should have recused himself from any public commentary about the Plame case given that he knew all along that he was a material witness to the investigation.

There is a high level official in the Bush administration who helped give the “inside scoop” on the earliest moves by the White House in the Valerie Plame investigation — but who is it? On September 28, 2003, Washington Post writers Dana Priest and Mike Allen clearly note the existence of a source with knowledge…

It’s a coldish, overcast day in Washington, D.C. — and for local blog friends — I’m over at the Starbucks at Connecticut & R Streets if you want to grab a latte and talk about the big issues of the day.

Former State Department Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson, who spoke at the New America Foundation several weeks ago, deepened his commitment to truth-telling about the administration’s role in promoting torture and abuse of detainees under American control.

Democratic hawk John Murtha is sort of like a living version of John Wayne in Congress. He was a marine. He put his life on the line for his country in time of war. He’s a guy of few words. He doesn’t really like reporters or spinning stories.

I traveled out to the heartland yesterday — to Dubuque, Iowa. Just got back to Washington minutes ago. It was impressive to meet so many deeply interested in the great debates of the day, in America’s foreign policy, in the scandals in the White House, and in American politics in general.