Salon.com | News Wires: "Capitol Police dropped a charge of unlawful conduct against anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan on Wednesday and apologized for ejecting her and a congressman's wife from President Bush's State of the Union address for wearing T-shirts with war messages.

'The officers made a good faith, but mistaken effort to enforce an old unwritten interpretation of the prohibitions about demonstrating in the Capitol,' Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer said in a statement late Wednesday.

'The policy and procedures were too vague,' he added. 'The failure to adequately prepare the officers is mine.'

The extraordinary statement came a day after police removed Sheehan and Beverly Young, wife of Rep. C.W. 'Bill' Young, R-Fla., from the visitors gallery Tuesday night. Sheehan was taken away in handcuffs before Bush's arrival at the Capitol and charged with a misdemeanor, while Young left the gallery and therefore was not arrested, Gainer said.

'Neither guest should have been confronted about the expressive T-shirts,' Gainer's statement said."

(Via Salon.)

Martini Republic » Reducing dependence on Middle East oil chimerical goal: "maybe his pledge to push renewable energy and cut dependence on Big Oil is just another case of Bush saying one thing, and doing the exact opposite.

The Energy Department will begin laying off researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the next week or two because of cuts to its budget.

A veteran researcher said the staff had been told that the cuts would be concentrated among researchers in wind and biomass, which includes ethanol. Those are two of the technologies that Mr. Bush cited on Tuesday night as holding the promise to replace part of the nation’s oil imports.

Ah! The great dissembler!"

(Via Martini Republic.)

Early Warning by William M. Arkin - washingtonpost.com: "In truth, NSA is aligning its growing domestic eavesdropping operations -- what the administration calls 'terrorist warning' in its current PR campaign -- with military homeland defense organizations, as well as the CIA's new domestic operations Colorado. 

Translation: Hey Congress, Colorado is now the American epicenter for national domestic spying.

...

The new NSA operation is located at Buckley Air Force Base in Aurora, at a facility commonly known as the Aerospace Data Facility. 

According to Government Executive Magazine -- thanks DP -- 'NSA is building a massive data storage facility in Colorado, which will be able to hold the electronic equivalent of the Library of Congress every two days.' This new NSA data warehouse is the hub of 'data mining' and analysis development, allowing the eavesdropping agency to develop and make better use of the unbelievabytes of data it collects but does not exploit. "

(Via Washington Post.)

Baghdad Burning: "Iraqi election results were officially announced nearly two weeks ago, but it was apparent from the day of elections which political parties would come out on top. I’m not even going to bother listing the different types of election fraud witnessed all over Iraq- it’s a tedious subject and one we’ve been discussing for well over a month.

The fact that a Shia, Iran-influenced religious list came out on top is hardly surprising. I’m surprised, however, at Iraqis who seem to be astonished at the outcome. Didn’t we, over the last three years, see this coming? Iranian influenced clerics had a strong hold right from 2003. Their militias were almost instantly incorporated into the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Defense as soon a move was made to create new Iraqi security forces. Sistani has been promoting them from day one.

Why is it so very surprising that in times of calamity people turn to religion? It happens all over the world. During tsunamis, hurricanes, earthquakes, blockades, wars- people turn to deities… It’s simple- when all else fails, there is always a higher power for most people.

After nearly three years of a failing occupation, I personally believe that many Iraqis voted for religious groups because it was counted as a vote against America and the occupation itself. No matter what American policy makers say to their own public- and no matter how many pictures Rumsfeld and Condi take with our fawning politicians- most Iraqis do not trust Americans. America as a whole is viewed as a devilish country that is, at best, full of self-serving mischief towards lesser countries and, at worst, an implementer of sanctions, and a warmongering invader."

(Via Baghdad Burning.)