Because this administration has no shame.

That’s also the answer to the final question posed by Howard Kurtz in this item about the arrest of an Al Qaeda lieutenant wanted by the United States in the 1998 bombings at U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

In fact, [The New Republic] quoted one unidentified Pakistani intelligence official as saying that a White House aide told the head of the spy agency last spring that “it would be best if the arrest or killing of [any] HVT [High-Value Target] were announced on twenty-six, twenty-seven, or twenty-eight July.” Those just happened to be the first three days of the Democratic convention.

…

And get this: The arrest was actually made Sunday, the AP reported from Islamabad. But the capture was announced Thursday. The bulletins hit the wires soon after 3 p.m., or about seven hours before John Kerry delivers his acceptance speech.

Keep your scarecrows alive by tossing them seeds from the trees. Very, very cool looking and cool playing game.

Regime change in the Middle East is working.

Iraq may be going through some growing pains (which is not an understatement – returning soilders are suprised at how negative the coverage is), but Lybia has been scared onto the straight and narrow, and now there are signs that Palestine may be free of the albatross around its neck – an albatross who at times has been embraced by the last two administrations.

Specifically, there are growing rumblings among Palistenians that Arafat must go.

According to a June poll of 1,320 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza territory conducted by the Ramallah-based Palestine Center for Policy Survey Research, 87% of Palestinians believe there is corruption in the Palestinian Authority; nine out of ten believe fundamental reform is needed.

Nabil Amar, a former Cabinet member and outspoken voice of reform in the Palestinian Legislative Council, says pressure on Arafat to enact reforms must continue. Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza “is a chance for the Palestinians to show the world that we are worthy of self rule and this can spread to the West Bank,” Amar says.

Much of the credit is being given to Israel’s plan to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza, finally giving the Palestinians land to call their own. But, with a fine eye for nuance, one can see the contagion of people who can look to their east and see another land with a dictator deposed beginning to bloom.

So I was reading through Kerry’s acceptance speech this morning (after listening to the rundown on ATC) and I was struck by how little Kerry was running on. It basically boils down to “I served in Vietnam, and George Bush is a liar.” There were throwaway references to his time as a prosecutor, and his time in the senate, but his campaign has been built on his experiences of more than 30 years ago, unfounded allegations of unilateralism (Except for the Frogs), and charges of trumped up political use of intelligence that have been dismissed by commissions on both sides of the Atlantic.

He’s held up his Vietnam record (as he should, see below. And as he should have done when he returned from the war), but when questioned on his voting in the Senate, that part of his record becomes ancient history. And wasn’t he a lieutenant governor somewhere?