A new CNN poll is worth paying close attention to. At first blush, the results appear to be discouraging, but they're far from it.

Americans foresee "more gridlock" in government if Democrats take over the House and/or the Senate after elections this fall, a CNN poll shows.

And while the poll shows a majority of Americans would favor probes by a Democratic Congress into Bush administration actions, most Americans oppose impeaching President Bush.

Let's take those one at a time. On the first question, 70% expect "gridlock and stalemate" while 27% believe there would be "cooperation between the two parties." But, as Josh Marshall noted, the wording of CNN's poll question "is a textbook example of the question itself dictating the answer."

On the second point, 55% said they think it would be good for the country "if the Democrats in Congress were able to conduct official investigations into what the Bush administration has done in the past six years." In contrast, 41% said such probes would be bad for the country. That's surprisingly good. Republicans have been warning voters the last few months that Congress will become some kind of radical investigating machine, bent on accountability, so we better leave the GOP in the majority. This poll suggests Americans actually want official investigations into Bush's conduct.

For that matter, 30% said Bush should face impeachment. In other words, a higher percentage of the country supports Bush impeachment now than supported Clinton impeachment at the height of the Lewinsky scandal. (You know, before he was actually impeached.) Maybe it's not such a crazy idea after all.

– Guest post by Steve Benen, The Carpetbagger Report

The Bush administration, once again demonstrating its respect for a free and independent press, has been caught paying reporters in Miami.

The Bush administration’s Office of Cuba Broadcasting paid 10 journalists here to provide commentary on Radio and TV Martí, which transmit to Cuba government broadcasts critical of Fidel Castro, a spokesman for the office said Friday.

The group included three journalists at El Nuevo Herald, the Spanish-language sister newspaper of The Miami Herald, which fired them Thursday after learning of the relationship. Pablo Alfonso, who reports on Cuba for El Nuevo Herald, received the largest payment, almost $175,000 since 2001.

The Bush gang paying journalists with public funds? That hardly ever happens, right? Oh wait....

– Guest post by Steve Benen, The Carpetbagger Report

It's not that Rumsfeld had a poor plan for post-war Iraq, it's that he intentionally failed to plan at all.

Long before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld forbade military strategists to develop plans for securing a postwar Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said.

Brig. Gen. Mark E. Scheid told the Newport News Daily Press in an interview published yesterday that Rumsfeld had said "he would fire the next person" who talked about the need for a postwar plan.

Kevin Drum and Michael Stickings have more.

-- Guest post by Steve Benen, The Carpetbagger Report

It's sad how close to reality satire like this is....

Wikipedia: Lee was the enigmatic and volatile frontman, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist of the legendary Los Angeles psychedelic band Love, best known for the critically revered 1967 album, Forever Changes. Lee was born either Arthur Lee Porter or Arthur Taylor Porter in Memphis, Tennessee...read on

Forever Changes

Steve Audio has more

Check out ABC's Evangelical wunderkind and his resume over at IMDB before1998:

No poster. no actors, no writers, no production notes, no running times..

Max Blumenthal

Cunningham is no ordinary Hollywood journeyman. He is in fact the son of Loren Cunningham, founder of the right-wing evangelical group Youth With A Mission (YWAM). The young Cunningham helped found an auxiliary of his father's group called The Film Institute (TFI), which, according to its mission statement, is "dedicated to a Godly transformation and revolution TO and THROUGH the Film and Televisionindustry." As part of TFI's long-term strategy, Cunningham helped place interns from Youth With A Mission's in film industry jobs "so that they can begin to impact and transform Hollywood from the inside out," according to a YWAM report.

read on

The Courage Campaign is organizing a protest of Disney over ABC's planned airing of the false and misleading Path To 9/11 crock-u-drama in Burbank today at 4pm...read on

Check out Cenk talking about CNN's poll which says that 43% of Americans believe Saddam was involved with 9/11.

Here's the live feed of The Young Turks if you care to tune in at 4:30 PST

(graphic via JC) I've got a copy of the full letter.

Amidst alarming reports that irresponsible theories about the events of 9/11 have begun to gain currency with the American people, you should not want to lend your personal reputation to a production which seems likely to instigate new and dangerous falsehoods. And so we ask that you use your influence to persuade ABC to withdraw the broadcast altogether. Failing that, we urge you to sever your relationship with this grossly misleading production.

Sincerely,

Madeleine Albright
Samuel R. Berger

click here for the letter

Taylor Marsh has John Kerry's reaction