• Cat fight: Justice Antonin Scalia revved up his “unique communications skills” by calling Chief Justice John Roberts a wimp and a hypocrite. Well, not exactly. See this Linda Greenhouse Supreme Court memo for more on Scalia's verbal mayhem.
• Subpoena Madness: The Senate Judiciary Committee has issued a slew of subpoenas to the White House, the VP’s Office, and to the Justice Department in an attempt to shed a bit of light on the administration’s wiretapping program. The committee is pushing the administration for documents that might show, as the NYT put it, “legal justification” for wiretapping without warrants. The administration has of yet made no formal response.
• Iraq: According to the Washington Post, in Iraq a car bombing killed at least 22 people in Baghdad, and residents south of the city made a gruesome discovery—at least 20 beheaded bodies piled along the Tigris River. This month 92 American soldiers have died so far.
• High School Civics Prepared No One for this Debate: Evidently, the White House is trying to back away from Vice President Dick Cheney’s assertion that his office is not, contrary to popular belief, a part of the executive branch. And though this odd statement has made for some fantastic Daily Show fodder, administration officials are now claiming that Cheney does not have to comply with national archivists for the exact opposite reason—because he is near the top of the executive branch.
• Can It Get Any Worse?: Paul Charlton, one of the nine fired prosecutors, told Congress yesterday that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was overly keen in pushing the death penalty.
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