Progress.

See full survey here

BAGHDAD (AP) — His legacy forever linked to an unpopular war, President George W. Bush flew under intense security to Iraq on Sunday where he called the nearly six-year conflict hard but necessary to protect the United States and give Iraqis hope. “The war is not over,” he declared.

Bush was reminded of the intense opposition to his policies when a man threw two shoes at him — one after another — during a news conference with Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Bush ducked both throws, and neither man was hit.

“This is a farewell kiss, you dog!” shouted the protester in Arabic, later identified as Muntadar al-Zeidi, a correspondent for Al-Baghdadia television, an Iraqi-owned station based in Cairo, Egypt.

“All I can report is a size 10,” Bush joked. See full story here.

House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers has taken the highly unusual step of calling his committee back from summer recess in order to investigate allegations by Ron Suskind that the Bush administration forged a letter to buttress the links made between Saddam and 9/11, and Saddam and WMD. The congressional Authorization for the Use of Force Against Iraq, the “”War Resolution” which, as far short as it fell of a congressional declaration of war, gave the invasion its constitutional legal cover, and gave Bush the authorization to invade only after he had certified to congress the existence of these two critical links. If Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, and if he did not possess WMD, the war was off.

Something else that this writer finds a little disturbing is a Washington Post report that campaign contributions from oil industry executives to Sen. John McCain increased dramatically at the end of June, right after McCain made a high-profile split with environmentalists and flipped from his orginal position against off-shore drilling.  As for the Bush administration’s hand in the oil well, the Wall Street Journal reported that influential former Pentagon official Richard Perle is going into the oil business in Iraq and Kazakhstan according to sources close to the deals.  Perle was one of the security experts helping to make the case to the Bush Administration for taking down Saddam Hussein. 

Therefore, when the current President and John McCain continually push the idea that off-shore drilling is the best solution for the American people, I tend to suspect their motives.  I would trust their motives more if they at least had a past record of working toward energy independence and were not so inextricably linked to the oil industry.

As for the Bush-McCain plan, exactly the type of sensible solution that would be utilized by a drug addict. 

The articles of impeachment named by Rep. Kucinich were violation of the Geneva conventions, misprison of a felony, torture, war criminal, and many more.  The Ohio representative also introduced articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney last year.  The resolution didn’t go very far even though republicans voted to debate the measure.

Scott McClellan, former White House Secretary, has accepted the invitation from the Judiciary Committe to testify before Congress on the Bush Administration’s action regarding the Valerie Plame affair.

According to the Associated Press “President Bush’s former spokesman, Scott McClellan, will testify before a House committee next week about whether Vice President Dick Cheney ordered him to make misleading public statements about the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame’s identity.”  “McClellan will testify publicly and under oath before the House Judiciary Committee on June 20 about the White House’s role in the leak and its response, his attorneys, Michael and Jane Tigar, said on Monday.”

RALEIGH, N.C. — With the Democratic stage to himself for the first time, Senator Barack Obama opened a two-week tour of battleground states on Monday, attacking Senator John McCain’s economic policies and moving to focus on the ailing economy as the central theme of the general election campaign.  Read article

As Prices Soar, McCain Returns to Gas Tax Holiday Proposal  

RICHMOND — On the day that Sen. Barack Obama launched a two-week economic tour, his Republican rival reiterated his criticism for opposing a gas tax holiday this summer to take the bite out of rising prices at the pumps.  At a fundraiser here, Sen. John McCain told donors that Obama “derided” his idea for a three-month holiday from federal gas taxes at the risk of alienating low income voters and truckers.  Read article

Laura Bush Praises Clinton, Defends Michelle Obama 

LJUBLJANA, Slovenia — First Lady Laura Bush made an unusual foray into the U.S. presidential campaign here today, praising Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) for her “grit and strength” and coming to the defense of Michelle Obama, the wife of the presumptive Democratic nominee. Read article

Were African-Americans at Iwo Jima

Sixty-three years after U.S. forces vanquished the Japanese and planted their flag on Iwo Jima’s Mount Suribachi, the remote outpost in the Volcano Islands is the focus of another pitched battle. This time, acclaimed film directors Clint Eastwood and Spike Lee are engaging in verbal warfare over the verisimilitude of Eastwood’s two films about the epic clash, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima. Lee has claimed that by soft-pedaling African-American contributions to the battle, Eastwood is misrepresenting history. Read article

RUBIN: “Do you think that American diplomats should be operating the way they have in the past, working with the Palestinian government if Hamas is now in charge?”

McCAIN: “They’re the government; sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things that they not only espouse but practice, so . . . but it’s a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that.”