FRIDAY UPDATE. WAR CLOUDS OVER IRAN: Sam Gardiner, USAF Ret Reports:”Presentation on Iranian involvement in Iraq is supposed to be made in Baghdad this week. After that an ultimatum will be issued. According to CBS News this evening the State Department is working on the wording of the message to Iran.

UPDATE: TIM RUSSERT OF MEET THE PRESS, DEAD. NBC reports:

WASHINGTON - Tim Russert, NBC News’ Washington bureau chief and the moderator of “Meet the Press,” died Friday after a sudden heart attack at the bureau, NBC News said Friday. He was 58.

Russert was recording voiceovers for Sunday’s “Meet the Press” program when he collapsed, the network said. He and his family had recently returned from Italy, where they celebrated the graduation of Russert’s son, Luke, from Boston College.

UPDATE—-AS OF ll AM: RESULTS IN FROM IRELAND ON VOTE ON EU LISBON TREATY THAT WOULD CHANGE STRUCTURE OF EU. “NO IS THE WINNER….53,7 % NO; 46,3 % Yes…..

Scroll down—had this story last night. Seems like very few American media outlets even covered it. Now, Friday at l AP is running it:

DUBLIN, Ireland - Ireland’s voters have rejected the European Union reform treaty, a blueprint for modernizing the 27-nation bloc that cannot become law without Irish approval, electoral officials said Friday.

In a major blow to the EU, 53.4 percent of Irish voters said no to the treaty. Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen now will join other EU leaders at a summit next week to try to negotiate a new way forward.

Anti-treaty groups from the far left and right mobilized “no” voters by claiming that the treaty would empower EU chiefs in Brussels, Belgium, to force Ireland to change core policies — including its low business tax rates, its military neutrality and its ban on abortion

THE SUPREMES: YOU CAN’T HURRY TRIALS

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the Constitution to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts.

In its third rebuke of the Bush administration’s treatment of prisoners, the court ruled 5-4 that the government is violating the rights of prisoners being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. The court’s liberal justices were in the majority.

DOES THIS MEAN THE RULE OF LAW IS ALIVE AND WELL?

The International Justice Network thinks so.

June 12, 2008, New York, NY–In today’s decision in Boumediene v. Bush, No. 06-1195—-the United States Supreme Court today stated beyond all doubt that the rule of law is alive and well in this country and that the three branches of government–the executive, legislative, and judicial branches–are once again functioning as they should be in the world’s strongest democracy.

Firmly rejecting the Bush Administration’s argument that the executive branch has free reign to act as it wishes without regard to the law when it is pursuing its law enforcement actions against alleged terrorists, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, eloquently wrote for the Court that “The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.”

I doubt that present and past Guantanamo “detainees” share this congratulatory rhetoric after the last FIVE years of government-sanctioned torture. The ACLU says: “Finally, the Bush administration system of injustice is starting to fall apart.” President Bush says he disagrees with the decision and will uphold it BUT also threatens to go to Congress to pass a new law upholding his position. As for the “Decider,” see today’s Washington Post report on how Bush oked meetings on torture. The Supreme Court has not really restrained Team Bush. Guantanamo has to be closed and the land given back to Cuba from whom it was stolen.

SHH—THE D WORD IS BACK IN POLITE COMPANY
KUCINICH VOWS TO PRESS ON, TRY AGAIN & AGAIN
DISCUSSING THE MEDIA REFORM CONFERENCE

On the economic front, the position once stigmatized as “doom and gloom” seems to be attracting new advocates and adherents—but not from the places you would think.
INTERNATIONAL SUPER BANK SAYS DEPRESSION IS POSSIBLE

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the organization that fosters cooperation between central banks, has warned that the credit crisis could lead world economies into a crash on a scale not seen since the 1930s.

In its latest quarterly report, the body points out that the Great Depression of the 1930s was not foreseen and that commentators on the financial turmoil, instigated by the US sub-prime mortgage crisis, may not have grasped the level of exposure that lies at its heart.

According to the BIS, complex credit instruments, a strong appetite for risk, rising levels of household debt and long-term imbalances in the world currency system, all form part of the loose monetarist policy that could result in another Great Depression.”

IHT: BANKS ARE AT RISK

The health of banks in the United States continues to worsen, with lending to real estate developers an emerging threat and more failures in the offing. While it is too early to say that the fire fighting on Wall Street is over, there is growing evidence that the extended fall in real estate is putting stress on Main Street as well.Commercial banks in the United States face a complex and difficult situation: Profit margins are compressed, and there is increasing stress on a range of assets, including mortgages, consumer loans and debt backing commercial and residential real estate development.

On these cheery notes, we take you to Washington DC and the impeachment wars:

Jason Leopold: Kucinich Vows New Round of Impeachment; Articles Against Bush If Measure Dies

Dennis Kucinich, the Ohio Congressman and former 2008 Democratic Presidential candidate, said he would continue to introduce resolutions calling for the removal of President George W. Bush from office if the articles of impeachment against Bush that he presented to the House Monday is not taken up within 30 days.

On Monday, Kucinich introduced the articles of impeachment against President Bush in the form of a privileged resolution, a procedural maneuver requiring Congress to take up the measure within two legislative days. Kucinich spent four-hours reading 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush, accusing the commander-in-chief of a wide-range of “High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” such as lying to Congress and the public to win support for the Iraq war.

Congressman Robert Wexler, (D-Fla.), agreed to co-sponsor of the measure Tuesday.

Congress voted 251-166 Wednesday to send the articles of impeachment to a House Judiciary Committee for review where it’s expected to die.

But Kucinich said if that happens he will just introduce another resolution until lawmakers vote on the measure.

“Leadership wants to bury it, but this is one resolution that will be coming back from the dead,” Kucinich told the Washington Post Wednesday. “Thirty days from now, if there is no action, I will be bringing the resolution up again, and I won’t be the only one reading it. We’ll come back and many of us will be reading this [on the House floor], and we’ll come back with 60 articles, not 35.”

REAL NEWS: VETERANS BACK IMPEACHMENT

WP: Dana Milbank–Impeach Bush? But That Would Mean…

FIGHTING SMEARS AGAINST OBAMA

Rush Limbaugh and his fellow right-wing attack dogs have been spreading baseless rumors about a videotape that allegedly shows Michelle Obama using a racial epithet.

The truth is that no such tape exists, and that this entire smear campaign is fabricated.

Learn more about this and other anti-Obama smears:

MARK CRISPIN MILLER CIRCULATED AN EMAIL TO SHOW HOW SMEARS ARE INTRIDUCED, REINFORCED AND EVENTUALY DEBUNKED:

On May 30th, Rush Limbaugh said he had heard a rumor that a tape exists of Michelle Obama using the word “Whitey” from the pulpit of Trinity United Church of Christ. Blogger Larry Johnson wrote on May 31st that he would add “New and dramatic developments. This is a heads up. I’ll post the news Monday morning by 0900 hours. Now I know why people who have seen the videotape say it is stunning. Barack’s headaches are only starting.” Here’s the link to that claim:

GOP blogger Roger Stone said on Fox News on June 1st that “there’s a buzz, which I believe now to be credible, that some indelible record exists” of a tape of Michelle Obama using the term “whitey.” Here’s the link to his video:
Here’s where Fox Commentator Bob Beckel spreads the rumor saying the shoe is about to drop:

Here’s where Bob Stone conceded that neither he, nor anyone he knows has ever seen the tape, and that it therefore may be a hoax:

Prepare for more of this demonization strategy. Its calculated and beneath contempt.

LOBBYISTS AND THE DEMOCRATS

On Wednesday, the Campaign Finance Institute, a nonpartisan D.C. watchdog, issued a report on fundraising for both parties’ conventions. Due to a “gigantic loophole” in campaign finance laws, the report says, corporations can give unlimited amounts to the conventions’ host committees, contributions that would be illegal if given directly to the parties.

Heading up the fundraising for the Denver convention is Steve Farber, a registered federal lobbyist with the firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck. Among the dozens of corporate sponsors of the Denver convention are six of his firm’s clients (United Health Group, AT&T, Comcast, the National Association of Home Builders, Western Union and Google) and the firm itself. The CEO of the host committee is Mike Dino, a registered federal lobbyist with Patton Boggs.

Farber and other Colorado Democrats leading the fundraising effort have aimed to raise $55 million, most of which was expected to come from out-of-state contributions. Denver’s mayor John Hickenlooper told The Denver Post last December that he and the other Democrats involved in fundraising for the convention (including Sen. Ken Salazar, Gov. Bill Ritter and Rep. Diana DeGette) had already traveled 20,000 miles and spoken to people from 60 to 80 companies.

WHY IS BUSH GETTING A FREE RIDE IN THE MEDIA

David Tereshchuk writes in his media column:
YOU CAN’T REALLY BLAME the media, since the main event of the presidential contest has now started for real, and the two-horse race is certainly delineated sharply now.

Well you can blame them, but there’d be no point. Most of the political and chattering classes are at fault too, in relegating the existing Administration and its “last throes” - to use some infamous vice-presidential verbiage - to some low pilot flame way behind even the furthest back-burner.

But George W Bush is still in office, like it or not, for another seven months - and has to be reported on. His week-long trip through Europe is not exactly making big headlines, for all the usual accompaniment of White House accredited correspondents (many of whom are already lining up their next jobs). Even the Chief Executive’s own order of business has the ring of farewell about it, and even some strains of abdication.