by Bay Fang

Although President Bush announced this morning that he would lift key sanctions against the North Korean regime and remove it from the US terrorism blacklist, the State Department and administration officials followed up by emphasizing that other sanctions against the regime once dubbed part of the "axis of evil" remained in place.

For one, bans remain against missile equipment, possible dual-use technology, and the assets of any designated proliferators. Any assets that were previously frozen under the Trading with the Enemy Act remain frozen. Furthermore, sanctions put in place due to the regime's "gross violations" of human rights continue to prohibit any development or security assistance to Pyongyang.

While traveling in Japan for the G-8 meeting of foreign ministers, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged the North Koreans to do more on resolving the issue of abductions of Japanese civilians "We're continuing to expect the North Koreans to take this issue seriously because it is a major issue for Japan and it's a major issue for the United States," Rice said.

In his remarks this morning, Bush expressed skepticism about the regime, which the Bush administration has accused of lying about its nuclear capabilities before.

"We will trust you only to the extent you fulfill your promises," Bush said in the Rose Garden. "I'm pleased with the progress. I'm under no illusions. This is the first step. This isn't the end of the process. It is the beginning of the process."

Next up in the process is a largely symbolic, made-for-TV destruction of a 65-foot-tall cooling tower, which is currently attached to its main nuclear reactor at Yongbyon - which, under the terms of the agreement, has already been largely disabled.

Rice told reporters traveling with her in Japan that she thought the declaration was verifiable. "We believe we have ... the means by which to verify the completeness and accuracy of this document," she said.

by Bay Fang

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's three-country, five-day Asia tour, which starts this week, appears to be a last-ditch attempts to salvage the legacy of the Bush administration.

She will be going first to Japan for the G8 foreign ministers' meeting Thursday before heading to South Korea and visiting quake-ravaged China, but the biggest focus of the trip will be on scoring a breakthrough on the North Korea nuclear disarmament talks, which involve China, Russia and Japan, as well as South and North Korea.

But even while raising expectations of a coming declaration by Pyongyang on its full nuclear capability, which has been the sticking point in the process, Rice revealed that new intelligence could stymie the effort. Apparently, this intelligence comes from traces of uranium found on the pages of documents that were handed over by North Korea last month, which were supposed to help US officials verify the declaration that is still awaited.

Defense Department Press Secretary Geoff Morell. (Pentagon photo.)

by Frank James

At today's Pentagon briefing, Defense Department press secretary Geoff Morrell, was asked about the preparations his agency is making to continue operating in the event Congress doesn't pass the war-spending bill.

He answered by saying that officials within the department were working now to figure out who the "essential" employees are who would have to work even if the department shutdown:

...And so we are, as you know, I think, taking some prudent planning measures just in case that money doesn't come through. Deputy Secretary Gordon England sent a memo throughout the department earlier this week asking for all the departments to begin planning for a possible shutdown, and all the departments are due to report back to him by June 30th with a plan as to what they would do to shut things down. And he's additionally, I think, asked that we figure out who sort of the essential civilian personnel is that would have to remain working even without pay in the event of a shutdown.

Morrell's use of the word "essential" would likely send shivers through some at the Pentagon and cause painful flashbacks for federal employees who lived through the government shutdowns of 1995 and 1996.

That's because all federal workers like to be regarded as essential. Otherwise, maybe federal managers will get it in their heads to start downsizing their agencies.

by Matthew Hay Brown

The Democratic House leadership is preparing to stick the articles of impeachment raised by Rep. Dennis Kucinich Monday night against President Bush on the same shelf that they stuck a similar effort the Ohio Democrat filed last year against Vice President Dick Cheney.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters today that the 35-count indictment of Bush, which took Kucinich more than four hours to read on the House floor, would be forwarded to the House Judiciary Committee. The Democratic leadership has opposed impeachment as an unhelpful distraction; the Judiciary Committee is unlikely to pursue further action.

Kucinich, using arguments similar to those he employed last year against Cheney, says Bush misled Congress and the American people into war with tales of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

House leaders were caught off-guard last year when Republicans voted to take up the Cheney impeachment in order to force a debate that could have proved awkward for Democrats. They avoided that debate by sending it to the Judiciary Committee.

Hoyer said today that Kucinich had "an absolute right" to raise the issue. But he questioned whether it made sense to spend time on it during what he called "the waning months" of the Bush administration.

Hoyer said the administration has one of the worst records of any administration in his lifetime, or maybe ever. He said Congress has conducted wide-ranging oversight since Democrats took over last year.

by Bay Fang

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice opened the 26th annual Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure this mornng with a sly joke that must have had gossip columnists momentarily salivating.

"There is a very important man in my life," she said, standing on a stage near the National Mall above a throng of tens of thousands of people wearing pink. "He is my personal trainer, Tom."

With that, she introduced Thomas Tomlo, who also acts as a fitness advisor to the Race for the Cure, who led participants in a warm-up stretch.

The cause, however, is no joke for Rice or the millions of others who run, walk or sleep in every year to raise money for breast cancer research and public health programs. Rice's mother, Angelena, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1969, and died in 1985.

Rice, who travels next week to Paris and the Middle East, shared the stage with Ambassador Nancy Brinker, a breast cancer survivor and founder of the Race for the Cure, Sex and the City star Cynthia Nixon, and DC mayor Adrian Fenty. The event in DC, which has one of the highest breast cancer mortality rates in the US, drew nearly 50,000 people.

by Frank James

One of the most interesting stories today is the Washington Post piece on a new book which states that Benazir Bhutto, the former Pakistani premier who was assassinated last year, provided nuclear secrets back in the 1990s to North Korea in exchange for missile technology.

The book, "Goodbye, Shahzadi," which was published recently in India by author Shyam Bhatia who knew Bhutto well, states that she smuggled sensitive information on nuclear technology into North Korea in 1993 during a state visit to North Korea.

Here's a snippet of the Post story:

At the time, Pakistan was in desperate need of new missile technology that would counter improvements in India's missiles. Bhutto said she was asked to carry "critical nuclear data" to hand over in Pyongyang as part of a barter deal.

Highly enriched uranium, a fuel for nuclear weapons, is produced by cascades of centrifuges that spin hot uranium gas. Albright, who has read Bhatia's account, said the CDs probably contained blueprints of the more than 100 centrifuge components as well as general assembly drawings. "It is tricky to assemble a centrifuge," he said.

This is a fairly stunning revelation especially since it implicates Bhutto, of all people, with nuclear proliferation. It was Bhutto who the Bush Administration had hoped would regain power in Pakistan to transition the government away from President Pervez Musharraf, the nation's former top Army general who has essentially kept the nation under strongman rule.

by Mark Silva

President Bush knew that Scott McClellan's book was coming, the White House says, but he was "surprised'' by the tenor of the tome that his former longtime aide has written about "the culture of deception'' in the Bush White House.

"He is puzzled, and he doesn't recognize this as the Scott McClellan that he hired and confided in and worked with for so many years,'' said Dana Perino, the sitting White House press secretary. Bush, she said, was "disappointed that if he had these concerns and these thoughts he never came to him or anyone else on the staff that we know of.''

In voicing the suggestion that this is not the same Scott McClellan "we knew,'' the president himself, through his spokeswoman, has heeded to the script that several past and present Bush aides are following, Perino and former counselor Dan Bartlett among them. Bush will not be commenting personally, Perino said, but she had a lot to say about the book and her predecessor two press secretaries back. He hired her.

"I think it's just a sad situation,'' Perino said, aboard Air Force One en route to Salt Lake City this afternoon.

"We didn't really know what was in the book until yesterday -- well, I shouldn't say that, there are some people in the White House who get -- they get on any book chances to review, like from the legal perspective, but it was not widely distributed at all,'' she said.

Will the White House offer a line-by-line rebuttal?

"I don't think it's necessary to do that for this situation,'' she said. "You know, you can go through that, look at it yourself. I don't think it's the White House's responsibility to do a fact check of someone's memoirs, where they're rewriting what we all thought was a very different history with him at the White House.''

But, yes, the president was surprised: "I think you can fairly characterize it is as surprised, as well as he thinks it's a sad situation and was disappointed.''

Asked how McClellan's contentions might affect the public's already declining confidence in the war in Iraq, Perino said: "Look, setting aside his comments about what he now thinks about the war in Iraq, people can argue back and forth as much as they want about the ultimate decision to go to war.

"I think that the questions about the intelligence being wrong have been answered by the White House. The intelligence was wrong, and we have taken measures to make sure that intelligence failures like that don't happen again. And one of the ways we've done that is by modernizing and improving coordination amongst the intelligence agencies. And by any measure, that coordination is better than it's ever been in the United States. That doesn't mean there was anyone purposefully misled.''

See more from the Q and A with Perino on the plane here:

by Mark Silva

The Bush White House has decided how to respond to the claims of the former Bush White House press secretary that President Bush has misled the nation about the war in Iraq and even misled himself about his own past personal conduct.

"Poor Scott.''

Dana Perino, who succeeded Tony Snow, who succeeded Scott McClellan as press secretary, said today that McClellan's book about the "culture of deception'' at the White House and in Washington is a sign of deep personal disgruntlement.

"Scott, we now know, is disgruntled about his experience at the White House,'' Perino said in a statement. "For those of us who fully supported him, before, during and after he was press secretary, we are puzzled. It is sad - this is not the Scott we knew.

"The book, as reported by the press, has been described to the president,'' Perino added. "I do not expect a comment from him on it - he has more pressing matters than to spend time commenting on books by former staffers."

by Mark Silva

Among the contentions in former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan's scathing new book about the "culture of deception'' in the White House is a suggestion that Karl Rove, the president's former chief political adviser, and "Scooter'' Libby, former assistant to the president and chief of staff to the vice president convicted of obstruction of justice in the CIA leak scandal, colluded to get their stories straight.

Of course, this is the McClellan who had to stand at the press podium of the West Wing and assert that Rove, the president's former deputy chief of staff, had no knowledge of the leaking of the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame to the press after her husband, Ambassador Joe Wilson, publicly accused the Bush administration of manipulating intelligence to make its case for the invasion of Iraq.

Seems like suitable cause for resentment.

Libby was convicted of lying to federal authorities in the probe of that leak, though the president has since commuted his prison sentence.

Rove has left the White House, but rose to defend himself against McClellan's allegations on FOX News's Hannity and Colmes.

Host Alan Colmes noted that McClellan "makes several criticisms of our own Karl Rove, who joins us once again tonight from Washington. And Karl, among the things that he says is that you and Scooter Libby had a secret meeting where you kind of decided how to handle this. He says, he was misled by you about your involvement in the Valerie Plame affair, went out there and told the American public and the press one thing, and said it was fatal to his ability to be able to speak on behalf of the president.''

Rove replied: "Well, first of all, I've just read the same small article you have, so I'm going to reserve my judgment on the greater book until somebody else buys it and gives me a copy.

"I will say this. It's a little irresponsible... if this is an accurate depiction of what's in the book. He says that following a meeting Scooter and I visited in 2005. Well, Scooter and I visited all the time. I don't know what the particular meeting in question was about. I know what it wasn't about, which was it was not about Plame and Wilson.

"Both of our attorneys told us not to talk to anybody else in the White House about anything connected with that and so we didn't,'' Rove said. "But look, Scooter and I, you know, came into contact every day -- every other day on things like the selection of judges or a particular policy issue or the vice-president's travel schedule or, you know -- a draft of a presidential speech that we were commenting on.

"He was the vice president's chief of staff, and as a result we had a lot of business, and I think it's frankly maybe a sign of irresponsibility for Scott to sort of suggest that because he saw the two of us meet and he didn't happen to be in the meeting he somehow knows what the meeting was about.''

See the rest of the interview here, from FOX News' Hannity and Colmes

by Mark Silva

This certainly was a good day to be debating the generous new GI Bill that the Senate wants to attach to the tens of billions of dollars in new war funding that the White House is demanding.

But, if you burned the backyard chicken, or overdid those burgers -- not a bad idea these days, in the era of the dice-rolling USDA -- you may have missed an extraordinary exchange between The New York Times and the White House.

Bush opposes the new educational benefits which the Senate wants to offer those who have served since Sept. 11, 2001. Heck of a stance, the Times says, for a president who has committed hundreds of thousands of men and women to five years of war.

"Having saddled the military with a botched, unwinnable war, having squandered soldiers' lives and failed them in so many ways, the commander in chief now resists giving the troops a chance at better futures out of uniform,'' the Times opined today. "He does this on the ground that the bill is too generous and may discourage re-enlistment, further weakening the military he has done so much to break.

"So lavish with other people's sacrifices, so reckless in pouring the national treasure into the sandy pit of Iraq,'' the Times continued, "Mr. Bush remains as cheap as ever when it comes to helping people at home. ''

Ouch. And you know the White House felt it.

Because early today, before we saw any disaster declarations about the plight of storm victims, we saw this e-missive from the press secretary's office:

"Once again, the New York Times Editorial Board doesn't let the facts get in the way of expressing its vitriolic opinions - no matter how misleading they may be,'' Dana Perino said in a written statement. "In today's editorial, 'Mr. Bush and the GI Bill,' the New York Times irresponsibly distorts President Bush's strong commitment to strengthening and expanding support for America's service members and their families.

"This editorial could not be farther from the truth about the President's record of leadership on this issue.''

Read on, when the dishes are done, for more of the White House's Memorial Day duel with the Times:

by Mark Silva

The hog-riding chief of staff to the president of the United States joined a procession of 10 heavy motorcycles rumbling up the South Lawn drive of the White House today, on a spectacular, cloudless afternoon.

The occasion: The 21st annual Rolling Thunder, the Vietnam War veterans who descend on the capital every Memorial Day Weekend to keep Washington focused on the plight of the families of soldiers still missing in action and the cause of veterans. Assembling in the parking lot of the Pentagon, they file into town and to the Vietnam Memorial, and for several years now a delegation has stopped at the White House for a reception by the commander-in-chief.

The lead rider today: former Army Sgt. Arthur "Artie" Muller, founder and national executive director of Rolling Thunder, He rode a Harley and wore a black beret and leather Rolling Thunder vest bedecked with military medals, flag and other insignia. The president had returned from Camp David in his own ride, Marine One.

"We just choppered in, Artie, and saw your brothers and sisters cranking up their machines and driving through the nation's capital -- many of them have got the flag on the back,'' Bush told him. "I am just so honored to welcome you back.  I want to thank you and all your comrades for being so patriotic and loving our country as much as you do.'' 

Four members of the Harley-riding Bush administration rode in with the thunder, including Josh Bolten, the president's chief of staff and motorcycle afficionado. The nation's most powerful Harley fan wore a black shirt and jeans.

Transportation Secretary Mary Peters wore a white shirt, and Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer a blue oxford.

But it was Edward P. "Eddie to you'' Lazear, chairman of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, who arrived in full regalia: leather Harley vest and a black bandana wrapped around his head. He did confess, however, that he had borrowed his bike from a dealer in Virginia - wonder what the float on that short-term loan looks like.

"It's been a pleasure of my presidency to get to know the leaders of Rolling Thunder,'' the president said of the riders who "pay tribute to those who have died in service, to those who sacrificed, and those who serve. It's a magnificent sight.

"You're doing a lot for the country,'' Bush told the leader," and our troops appreciate you, the veterans appreciate you and your president appreciates you.''

"Thank you, Mr. President ,'' Muller said.

With thanks to Dan Eggen of the Washington Post for his Sunday pool reporting and keen fashion eye.

by Mark Silva

Has John McCain approached Condi Rice about serving as a running mate?

"I've said many times that I don't need another job in government,'' the secretary of state replies, deftly avoiding the question. "It's time for me to move on.''

The question came up at the end of Maria Bartiromo's long talk with Rice on CNBC, as the secretary toured her old stomping grounds of the Silicon Valley with David Miliband, the British foreign secretary.

"It's where, in many ways, I grew up as a professional,'' said Rice, former provost at Stanford. "I came here as a 25-year-old first. And I have hard work to do between now and the end of the administration, but I will have -- I will have served eight years.

"I will have served in a consequential time,'' Rice said. "I will have done what I can and it'll be time to give the keys to somebody else.''

For a look at a lot of other issues, ranging from energy legislation, American competitiveness and policies toward Iran and the war in Iraq, see the interview with Rice here, courtesy of CNBC's Closing Bell with Maria Bartiromo:

Polar bear mother and her two cubs in Wapusk National Park on Hudson Bay near Churchill, Manitoba, Nov. 6, 2007. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press,Jonathan Hayward)

by Frank James

It's official. Polar bears are a federally designated endangered species.

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne made the announcement this very hour that the Bush Administration is declaring the bears endangered because the melting Arctic ice pack, courtesy of global warming, threatens their habitat.

The administration was racing the clock to beat a federal court order which directed the Interior Department to decide by Thursday, as in tomorrow.

There are about 20,000 polar bears roaming the Arctic, living off seals and anything else they can hunt down.

The Bush Administration last year had tried declare the fairly awesome creature merely "threatened" which wouldn't have required any more action on its part. That caused an environmental group to sue, leading to today's decision.

Environmentalists that the decision will force the federal government to be more aggressive in reducing greenhouse-gas emissions since the Endangered Species Act requires affirmative steps to change the conditions that place a species on the list.

But while conceding that the bears are endangered, Kempthorne was clear the administration didn't want environmentalist to try and use the new designation to force the government's hand on greenhouse emissions.

by Matthew Hay Brown

House Democrats are preparing another emergency war spending bill, and the antiwar movement is growing restive.

"In 2006, the voters of this country gave Congress a clear mandate to end the occupation of Iraq through a stunning Democratic electoral victory," Tim Carpenter, executive director of Progressive Democrats of America, said Wednesday.

"But now, in 2008, we're still waiting for the war to end, while conditions get worse both here and in Iraq," he said. "To put it bluntly, if this Congress won't stand up and put an immediate end to the occupation of Iraq, and start addressing our needs at home beginning with a national single payer healthcare system, then we'll elect Democratic candidates who will."

The $195 billion legislation, which could come to a vote this week, includes funds to pay for military options in Iraq and Afghanistan into next spring, with the requirement that the Pentagon begin removing combat troops within 30 days, starting a pullout that would be completed by the end of 2009.

It also would expand education funding for service members, extend unemployment insurance, suspend new rules that cut Medicaid funding for the poor and disabled, strengthen levees in New Orleans and restore funding for military base realignment.
Lawmakers will consider the bill in three separate parts, voting on the war funding, war policy and domestic spending.

President Bush has told Congress to give him the money for Iraq and Afghanistan without restrictions or add-ons; Republicans have accused Democrats of playing politics with the troops by loading up their legislation with other projects.

But some of the strongest opposition is coming from the antiwar left, where some oppose any additional war funding under any circumstances. Democrats.com is advising supporters to tell their representatives to "stop the Iraq sellout;" Progressive Democrats of America will be going door to door with its "Healthcare not Warfare" campaign.

(photo: Alex M. Lee.)

by Bay Fang

She calls it "yum-yum diplomacy," and when her press release first landed in my inbox, I thought it was a hoax. But Chicago-based installation artist Erin O'Brien really has built a model of the North Korean nuclear reactor at Yongbyon out of gingerbread, and really does plan to dismantle and eat it tomorrow as her Master's in Fine Arts thesis project.

What's more, her father, Pat O'Brien, really is in Pyongyang, overseeing the dismantling of the real version of this reactor. A retired foreign service officer, he has been stationed there since November, representing the State Department's Nonproliferation and Disarmament Fund. In a statement in his daughter's press release, he said, "It seems we have a little family legacy evolving here."

Yongbyon, 60 miles north of Pyongyang, contains a nuclear reactor, a fuel-rod factory and a reprocessing plant, where weapons-grade plutonium is extracted from fuel rods. It has been central to the efforts by US diplomats, under the auspices of the Six-Party Talks, to de-nuclearize the Korean peninsula, and under a landmark agreement reached last year, North Korea began dismantling it.

It was also featured prominently in briefings around Washington, DC a few weeks ago, when the Bush administration released details of an alleged nuclear site in Syria, bombed by the Israelis last September, that apparently had the same dimensions and layout as Yongbyon.

33-year-old Erin O'Brien has recreated the entire site in detail, doubtless with consultation with her father, down to the frosting trim on the 50-mw reactor and a cooling tower covered in chocolate. She has filled the inside with jellybeans and gumdrops, with the anticipation of breaking it open "like a piñata." She says the project is a combination of influences from her dad and her mom, who was once the pastry chef at such Washington, DC culinary institutions as Kinkead's and Citronelle.