[Daily Brief]

Not Actually Daily

Yes, it has been some time since I managed a daily brief. There are several reasons, none interesting--let's move on. In the mainstream press, we have some more discussion on Bush's insistence yesterday that Harriet Miers was Christian enough to be a Supreme Court justice. The WaPo has a nice piece juxtaposing Republican comment on Roberts' religious views--"I'm very uncomfortable talking about that" (Tom Coburn)--with the purity test to which Miers is being subjected. Apparently incompetence is allowable, so long as you're anti-abortion. (Also see the LA Times.) Meanwhile, the AP dug through Miers writings at SMU and found ... nothing. And how about this--when Miers replaced Alberto Gonzales as counsel to the President, there was grumbling at the time that she wasn't even qualified for that job.

Another poll finds Bush's numbers in the 30s. So far, however, Dems haven't figured out how to translate it into electoral wins. Is it possible that Dems could actually lose seats in Congress in 2006? That'd be a handy trick. (It gets worse--Broder thinks the Dems are poised to retake power, which can only spell doom for the party.) One Republican will definitely not be in the Senate in 2007--Bill Frist. He better cherish the final year of elective office because it's probably his last. Yesterday the SEC subpoenaed him in his stock-dumping case.

Finally, this news is a day old but warrants a mention. Pre-war CIA intelligence warned that the post-war reconstruction would be fraught with turmoil. This intel, which was of course based on ample and well-documented evidence, was of course eschewed by the Bushies, who were busily listening to Ahmed Chalabi's tales of Iraqi nukes.

Oh sorry, here's one more. In a bill designed to prevent kids from sex offenders is a dandy clause (no doubt added by one of the Republicans fretting mightily over Harriet Miers' religious conviction) that "could put many Hollywood movies in the same category as hard-core, X-rated films."

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Later today--