Here comes the mud: The Bush smear machine is kicking into overdrive this week as a new book comes out asserting that "Kerry earned his Silver Star by killing a lone, fleeing, teenage Viet Cong in a loincloth" and a new BushCo-directed TV ad features Vietnam Vets--none of whom actually served with Kerry--seeking to discredit Kerry's service--to John McCain's chagrin. (One of the anti-Kerry Swift Boaters has since retracted his claims that Kerry didn't deserve a Silver Star.) “Ironically, as pro-Bush figures dredge the memories of veterans for stories to attack Kerry's war record, whatever the truth of the stories they have waited 35 years to share, they confirm one thing," says The Nation's Ian Williams. "Kerry was in Vietnam, in combat. Not even the best investigators that GOP billionaire money can buy has found a veteran who can credibly assert they saw George W. Bush in any military capacity whatsoever, in Alabama let alone in Vietnam, for twelve months, let alone anyone who fought alongside him.”

Homeland Security, Bush-style: Why is the Bush administration insisting that the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, which would ban all countries from producing highly enriched uranium or plutonium for nuclear weapons, NOT include a provision requiring inspections? What's the correlation between Bush's timing for terror alerts and the president's approval ratings? And why on earth is CACI--the contracting company implicated in torture at Abu Ghraib--being granted a contract extension worth $23 million?