I seem to have six Gmail invites. There are no good usernames left, but if you still want one, drop me an email. Grovelling is optional.

Josh Marshall’s guest blogger, Spencer Ackerman, interviewed that anonymous intelligence official (original) I mentioned the other day. Some nice insights into the relationship between Al Qaeda and Iraq. We saw al-Qaeda execute the operation of killing one American, kidnapping another, within two days. It reinforces the idea of nearly simultaneous attacks. They posted the information about Mr. Johnson, said what they wanted, said what they were going to do, and did it. Which perhaps is the most important trademark for al-Qaeda: they tell you what they’re going to do and then they do it. ...

“Section 1. Be it enacted by the Legislature of Louisiana, that no governmental agency, including corporations with corporate authority only as approved by the President of the United States under the provisions of any law or resolution of the Congress of the United States, and no officer, agent or employee thereof, shall exercise in this state [Louisiana] any power not delegated to the United States by the Constitution of the United States, but reserved by the Constitution of the United States to the state of Louisiana. ...

Kevin Drum writes about another salvo in the CIA/Bush war (original). When a high-ranking intelligence officer accuses Bush of “an abject, even wilful failure to recognise the ideological power, lethality and growth potential of the threat personified by Bin Laden, as well as the impetus that threat has been given by the US-led invasion and occupation of Muslim Iraq,” you know someone’s pissed off. Especially since he’s got to know he’s going to get outed. Consider that this comes in the wake of the Valerie Plame leak. There’s no doubt that this guy is going to be discovered and his name is going to be published and his career is going to be over. However, he’s unhappy enough that he just doesn’t care. (So why publish anonymously if you expect to be found out anyway? Two reasons: it allows him to delay the inevitable a little while, and it focuses attention on the book.)

Hey! If I gave you a Gmail invite, I would like to request that you take a gander at this post from Wil Wheaton (original). I think it’s a good cause.

The last week has seen a couple of interesting developments in the Tenet/Bush conflict. My predictions and thoughts about these will no doubt be as accurate as my predictions and thoughts about the Iraq war. Which is to say “semi.” Most recently, the Pentagon broke the news that Tenet asked Rumsfeld to illegally hide a prisoner from the Red Cross. It is no accident that the Pentagon made this statement right now; it’s the first salvo in an attempt to reduce Tenet’s standing in the court of public opinion. ...

Six Apart took another crack at Movable Type pricing. It’s a lot simpler. For non-commercial use, you can pay $69.95 to get up to five authors and unlimited blogs, or you can pay $99.95 to get unlimited authors and unlimited blogs. They’ve also fixed most of the license issues. For me, this license and this pricing scheme work. I’ll be upgrading sometime soonish, most likely. I expect there are still people for whom it won’t work, and I think that’s a perfectly rational decision too.

Book Meme: + bold the ones you’ve read{{ double-space-with-newline }} + italicize those you started but never finished{{ double-space-with-newline }} + add three at the end My own comment: calm down all ye Terry Pratchett fans. Yeesh.

The Chronicles of Riddick was not as good as I wanted it to be, but it was also not as bad as I feared it might be. It’s the perfect Warhammer 40K movie; there’s very little pure good in the world, the antagonists have psionic powers, and there’s lots of blood and guts. If you can’t take a guilty pleasure in spiky bitz, it’s not a good movie for you. If you can, then it’s worth the viewing. ...

Ginger’s last WISH (original) is up: Tell me your favorite war story. Why is it your favorite? What does it show about your character or the game/campaign you were playing? What does it exemplify about why you like gaming? My answer (from Carl’s UN PEACE game) is over at 20’ by 20’ Room (original).