The front page of the Washington Post’s web site last night carried a story about a technical mishap at Fox television that caused some votes on “American Idol” to be recorded incorrectly. As a result, Fox will air an extra hour of “American Idol,” with – darn! – more expensive ad revenue.

The top story on the Post’s site was about Terri Schiavo. A majority of the Florida Senate, including nine Republicans, refused Jeb Bush’s request to take additional steps to have Ms. Schiavo’s feeding tube reinserted, prompting howls from the masses thronging outside Ms. Schiavo’s hospice near Tampa.

The stories both have a “reality” television quality to them, with members of the general public assuming they can affect the outcome of the story line by calling in their votes.
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Hardly a week has passed since the November election without the publication of an analysis piece about the possibility of Senate Republicans invoking the “nuclear option.‿ The “nuclear option‿ refers to a showdown over the use of filibuster to stall a handful of George Bush’s nominees to the federal courts.

The filibuster is a practice peculiar and appropriate to the U.S. Senate in which one or more senators drone on and on and refuse to yield the floor until the majority of the Senate agrees to table the issue at hand and move on to other business. A filibuster can be stopped if 60 or more senators vote for it to end – and that is the fuse on the nuclear option. Republicans have 55 votes in the Senate; Democrats have 44 and Vermont’s Jim Jeffords is independent. Senate Republicans can approve any judicial candidate Mr. Bush chooses to send up, unless Democrats filibuster.

To get around the 60-vote rule, the Senate can change the rules of debate. A rule change requires only a simple majority (51 votes). Republicans say Democratic filibustering of judicial nominees is so unfair that they will change the filibuster rule (at least as it pertains to nominations). Democrats respond that if Republicans change the filibuster rule, they will bring the Senate to a standstill. For example, any senator can require that the full text of a piece of legislation be read into the record. Imagine how that would sound when a 1,300-page tax bill is up for consideration. Any single senator can put a “hold‿ on a legislative bill, which means no action can be taken on the bill until the senator removes the hold. Other, equally merry tricks are buried in the Senate rulebook.
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This week the federal government accused Ahmed Omar Abu Ali of plotting to kill George W. Bush. An American citizen, Mr. Abu Ali spent 20 months in a Saudi Arabian jail. He says he was tortured and that FBI agents watched his torture. Federal Judge John Bates said there is at least circumstantial evidence to support Mr. Abu Ali’s torture claim. No American court – at least as we have known them for the last 229 years – would allow charges to be brought based on evidence gained by torture in a foreign dungeon. Anyone tortured long enough will admit to anything. Don’t take my word for it, ask John McCain.

Last week, Mr. Bush nominated John Negroponte for the new post of national intelligence director. He too, knows something about torture. In the early 1980s, as U.S. ambassador to Honduras, Mr. Negroponte directed tens of millions of dollars in cash and CIA resources toward the Honduran military and the anti-Sandinista “contras.‿ Both groups were famous for kidnapping, raping, torturing and killing civilians on both sides of the Honduras-Nicaragua border. Although Mr. Negroponte’s atrocities are well documented, he has repeatedly lied to Congress about them and neither Congress nor the American media have done more than note that there was “some controversy‿ about his Honduran tenure.
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How many people died in the terrorist attacks of September 11th 2001? Few news reports give a specific number. Since so few bodies were found, we had to figure out who was missing and work backward. Most stories say “over 3,000.” The website september11victims.com counts 2,948 confirmed dead, 24 reported dead and 24 missing, for a total of 2,996.

How many Iraqis do we have to kill before we’ll feel like we’re even? Of course, we’re not in Iraq to “get even” for September 11th – are we? It often feels that way. Three and half years after the attacks top officials of the Bush administration constantly invoke September 11th to justify their spearpointed foreign policy. The message the rest of the world hears is: “America was attacked. That gives us the right to bully, bomb and occupy as we please until our national wound heals.” Problem is, grief is a wound that never heals, and pre-emptive invasions of random nations will not make it heal – although that grief provides wonderful political cover.
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