Michael B. Mukasey, the president’s attorney general nominee, gave senators direct answers, but his view of presidential power is perfectly aligned with that of the Bush administration.

DHS, FBI agree homemade explosive devices used in Iraq pose a threat in U.S.; critics argue Bush administration slow to devise counter strategy.

Petty bickering about patriotism and Who Loves Our Troops More has never been seen as a financial growth industry, but there's no stopping American capitalism. This is why a perfunctory bit of political grandstanding, committed to U.S. Senate letterhead this month, became worth a reported $4.2 million yesterday, instantly becoming one of the most valuable printed documents of the modern era.

The letter in question is an Oct. 2 two-pager from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to Clear Channel Communications CEO Mark Mays lambasting the syndicate's Rush Limbaugh, who had recently criticized U.S. troops who were against the war in Iraq.

Forty-one Democratic senators signed the thing, put it in the mail and, really, that should have been the end.

But Limbaugh decided he had been "smeared" by left-wing evildoers. He put the letter up for auction on eBay, with the benefits going to the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation, a New Jersey-based charity that primarily gives scholarship money to the children of service members either killed in war or in the course of public duty. Limbaugh sits on the board of directors.

The letter drew bids from more than 60 people and was bought yesterday for $2.1 million by reclusive D.C. philanthropist Betty Brown Casey, who has heretofore shown more of an interest in the Washington National Opera than Washington mudslinging. Limbaugh said yesterday on his radio show that Casey was a longtime fan, that he would match her bid (bringing the total raised by the letter to $4.2 million)...

New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer has started a major political fight over immigration by ordering state officials to issue driver's licenses to illegal aliens, prompting at least one county legislature to defy the executive order and pushing toward a showdown in court.

...this frustrating week wasn't a total bust for Beijing. Xinhua, the government news agency, reports that the 14 Chinese astronauts will establish an official branch of the Chinese Communist Party once they establish a permanent colony in space. "Like foreign astronauts having their beliefs," said Yang Liwei, spokesman for the rocket men, "we believe in communism, which is also a spiritual power."

Turkey is already massing troops near the Iraq border, threatening a campaign against Kurdish rebels that could destabilize the one stable front in Iraq. The same House of Representatives that has been complaining loudly about the lack of armored vehicles for our troops is blithely jeopardizing relations with the country through which 95 percent of the new heavily armored vehicles are now transiting on the way to saving American lives in Iraq.

And for what? To feel morally clean?

How does this work? Pelosi says: “Genocide still exists, and we saw it in Rwanda; we see it now in Darfur.” Precisely. And what exactly is she doing about Darfur? Nothing. Pronouncing yourself on a genocide committed 90 years ago by an empire that no longer exists is Pelosi’s demonstration of seriousness about existing, ongoing genocide?

Indeed, the Democratic party she’s leading in the House has been trying for months to force a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq that could very well lead to genocidal civil war. This prospect has apparently not deterred her in the least.

“Friends don’t let friends commit crimes against humanity,” explained Rep. Chris Smith (R., N.J.), a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee that passed the Armenian genocide resolution. This must rank among the most stupid statements ever uttered by a member of Congress, admittedly a very high bar. 

Now the Turks are indeed friends, giving us indispensable logistical help in our war against today’s premier perpetrators of crimes against humanity — al Qaeda in Iraq and Afghanistan. Friends don’t gratuitously antagonize friends who are helping fight the world’s foremost war criminals.

So why has Pelosi been so committed to bringing this resolution to the floor? (At least until a revolt within her party and the prospect of defeat caused her to waver.) Because she is deeply unserious about foreign policy.

Is the Armenian resolution her way of unconsciously sabotaging the U.S. war effort, after she had failed to stop it by more direct means? I leave that question to psychiatry. Instead, I fall back on Krauthammer’s razor (with apologies to Occam): In explaining any puzzling Washington phenomenon, always choose stupidity over conspiracy, incompetence over cunning. Anything else gives them too much credit.

...the facts never seem to deter the lost souls who are hell bent on raising taxes on the rich. And while they constantly talk about taxing the rich, they never suggest taxing Richie Rich, say with a wealth tax. Rather, they want to tax income — the point at which hard-working people get an opportunity to move up the standard-of-living ladder.

In the Senate, Hillary Clinton voted for a resolution declaring Iran’s Revolutionary Guards a terrorist group. And John Edwards, for one, condemned her. What he said was, “We cannot give [Bush] an inch. Not an inch.”

The White House is circulating an "update" on Iraq. Among the good news is a report on Northwest Baghdad, where the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division operates in a 93 square kilometer region with over 1 million people. It reports that in this region:

There has been an 85 percent reduction in violence since May.

58 of the 95 mahalas or neighborhoods are now considered under control, with 33 in a clearing status.

Murders are down from a peak of over 161 reported murders per week a year ago to less than five per week.

IED and small arms attacks are down from a peak of 50 per week in June to less than five per week since the end of August.

Vehicle-borne IED attacks are down nearly 85 percent.

The unit is partnered with ten Iraqi army battalions and two national police battalions deployed across the Kadhimiya and the Mansour security districts. According to Col. J.B. Burton, these areas "are commanded by highly competent, patriotic Iraqi brigadier generals who consistently demonstrate their unbreakable will to deliver security, reconciliation and reconstruction to northwest Baghdad.”

Some of the basics can be addressed. D'Souza argues that the scientific argument for atheism simply doesn't address the entire human experience. First, he reviews the history of science and argues that reason only takes one so far. It never answers the question of why, not even in the human experience. Physics can explain, for example, the motion of a glass of water when struck by a human hand and predict the outcome, but it can't answer for why the hand struck the glass.

Similarly, one can explain the Big Bang's physics, but no one can answer for the why, which creates a large problem for atheists. The Big Bang and the implications of Einsteinian physics show that the universe had a beginning. Something with a beginning has to have a causative event -- but if the universe is all that is, what caused the Big Bang? What caused it, and what lies outside of the universe that could have sparked it? Physics can explain the universe, which acts in very precise and predictable ways, but it can't explain the why.

D'Souza also addresses the difference between evolution and Darwinism, at least as he perceives it. Like the Catholic Church, he sees no conflict between evolution and Christianity. In fact, he argues that the Book of Genesis actually aligns itself well with the Big Bang theory, offering that Light came first (the Big Bang initiating event) and that Day and Night came later (the formation of the Sun and the Moon). He decries the Darwinist movement in science which has at its basis an explicit bias against religion, and which therefore rejects any evidence of God or a metaphysical reality, and has a compelling argument for this from the mouths of the scientists themselves. In doing so, they have rejected the scientific method itself, D'Souza insists, turning Darwinism into a religion rather than relying on evolution as an explanation limited to the physical reality of our universe.

In this, D'Souza attempts to point out the fact that while the physical sciences can explain the universe, it can only explain the universe. He relies heavily on Immanuel Kant in this area by reminding us that science remains bound by human perception. Humans experience the universe with their five senses, and scientific exploration -- conducted through experimentation -- has the same limits. We cannot perceive the why, and being physical creatures in the universe, cannot use our physical senses to perceive anything beyond it. These are the limits of reason and science -- certainly nearly boundless in a vast physical universe, but not limitless.

"This week, Rush Limbaugh put the original copy of that letter up for auction on e-bay. Mr. President, we didn't have time, or we could have gotten every senator to sign that letter."

AQ made a mistake. Unlike in other nations, AQ needs political support from the Pakistanis to keep Musharraf off their back, and after the Red Mosque raid, they at least had garnered some sympathy. After killing 136 Pakistanis to miss Bhutto entirely, that sympathy will not last. They may have fired up the Pakistanis enough to bolster Musharraf's upcoming war in Waziristan more than Bhutto could have done.

The massive bombing showed Pakistanis how little AQ values Muslim life. The mask has slipped, perhaps for good, and AQ's diabolical face has been exposed.