As much as I detest short diaries that use breaking in the title, here is one.  TPMmuckraker has a new story that the ACLU has just uncovered a previously undisclosed OLC opinion torture.  

Just in time for Michael Mukasey's impending Senate vote to become attorney general, the ACLU has discovered that one of his would-be underlings, Steven Bradbury of the Office of Legal Council, penned three memoranda in 2005 on the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" by the CIA. The discovery raises the possibility that the Justice Department has penned other as-yet-unknown torture memos since 2005.

Remember the Website set up by the House Judiciary Committee to receive anonymous tips from current and former DOJ employees on "the possible politicization of the United States Department of Justice"?  The site promised that "[t]he names, titles and identities of the senders will be maintained in strictest confidence."

The Committee apparently feels it has fulfilled its purpose and has decided to shut it down.  In preparation for doing so, they sent an email to every DOJ employee who submitted "confidential" information to the Committee.  They forgot to take the email addresses out of the header.  Now, one click of a mouse outs every single one of them.

The Iraq war is George Bush's war.  No big revelation to anyone on the left, but to read those words in a Time magazine article as a quote from White House aides, is a different story.  

White House aides respond to the Republican concerns by saying: "Regardless of what the news was going to be [from Petraeus and Crocker], the President was going to speak to the nation. He's the commander in chief and it's his responsibility. It's his war."

Apparently some in the GOP were not thrilled with Bush's decision to address the nation with his progress report on the Iraq war:

McClatchy continues to be front and center on the U.S. Attorney scandal.  They are walking the story backward from Karl Rove to the national Republican strategy to use the faux voter fraud issue in the battleground states.  The story weaves back and forth between the current U.S. Attorney scandal, the White House, the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. DOJ, the Republican controled Missouri State legislature, fake non-partisan voting rights group and more.

2006 Missouri's election was ground zero for GOP is a must read.  

Did Karl not see the memo?

White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove said Thursday the removal of eight U.S. attorneys was based entirely on policy and personnel matters and was no different than dismissals in the Clinton administration.

He questioned why the Bush administration's action is drawing "super-heated rhetoric" while the dismissals during President Clinton's terms did not.

He continues to dismiss the relevance of the purge U.S. Attorneys using the tiresome and false excuse of 'the Clinton administration did it too,' despite that Clinton did not remove U.S. Attorneys during his second term in office.  Is the Executive Office of the President plagued with the same problem Gonzales recently suggested was a problem with DOJ--information wasn't adequately shared?

The January 1, 2006 memo contradicts this claim that Karl repeated again today about the Clinton Administration. (Link - pg. 16 PDF)

From this email exchange:

From: Sampson, Kyle
Sent: Tuesday, December 19, 2006 6:27 PM
To: 'Oprison, Christopher G.'
Subject: RE: Another Griffin article

My thoughts:
...

.4. The only thing really at risk here is a repeal of the AG's appointment authority. We intend to have DOJ leg affairs people on notice to work hard to preserve this (House 'members won't care about this; all we really need, is for one Senator to object to language being added to legislative vehicles that are moving through). There is some risk that we'll lose the authority, but if we don't ever exercise it then what's the point of having it? (I'm not 100 percent sure that Tim was the guy on which to test drive this authority but know that getting him appointed . . was important to Harriet, Karl, etc.)

Cross posted at ePluribus Media Community

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Features below the fold

• The main opposition to Ohio reform, Ohio First Voters Education Fund, has very strong ties to Bush Pioneer and lobbyist, Tom Whatman.
• Whatman is the owner of Whatman Associates and its public affairs affiliate, Strategic Public Partners.
• Ohio First's website ProtectYourVote.org was registered by Brandon Lyndaugh, Vice President of Strategic Public Partners.  The phone number and address for ProtectYourVote.org is the same as Strategic Public Partners.
• The Ohio First articles of incorporation name Whatman Associates President Darren Klinger as secretary.