The Talk Show American

THE TALK SHOW AMERICAN: 06/19/2005 - 06/26/2005

Saturday, June 25, 2005

J.R.'s Take Returns to TheTalk Show American

this is an audio post - click to play


Hey Folks,

J.R. here, host of the Talk Show America Show. Starting Monday, June 26th, you will be able to listen to J.R.'s Take from the Talk Show American, the official blog of the Talk Show America Show.

J.R.'s Take will be my audio commentary on the latest political news as I guide you safely through the liberal and main stream news media spin and offer you a different point of view.

There's NO POLITICAL CORRECTNESS here !

And don't forget to listen to The Talk Show America Show LIVE Mon-Fri 4-5 PM EST and 24/7 (Recorded) by visiting talkshowamerica.com .

J.R.'s Take and the Talk Show America Show, it's POLITICAL CONSERVATISM at it's BEST !

Bush 'more to blame' for war than Saddam ?

A new poll asking who is more responsible for starting the war in Iraq finds more Americans now blame President Bush than Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

Forty-nine percent say Bush is more responsible for provoking the conflict, according to Rasmussen Reports, while the survey reveals 44 percent take the opposite view and believe Hussein shoulders most of the responsibility.


In late 2002, months before the fighting began, most Americans thought that Hussein was the one provoking the war. Just one-in-four thought the president was doing the provoking at that time.

The biggest change in perceptions has come among Democrats.

Three years ago, Democrats were divided on this point. By a 49-34 percent margin, liberal Democrats at the time said Bush bore most of the responsibility. Conservative Democrats placed the blame on Hussein by a 54-30 percent margin.

Now, however, 78 percent of all Democrats say Bush is more responsible for starting the war than Hussein. Just 18 percent take the opposite view.

Republicans, by a 76-17 percent margin, say Hussein is responsible.

Among those not affiliated with either major party, 52 percent name Bush and 34 percent Hussein.

The survey questioned 1,000 likely voters June 20-21, and the margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 3 percentage points.

Thirty-seven percent of survey respondents were Republican, 37 percent Democrat, and 26 percent unaffiliated.

Al-Jazeera to look at open U.S. border

Arab news network interested in lack of security

The Arab TV news network criticized by the new Iraqi government and others for its anti-American bias and willingness to carry the messages of terrorist organizations, including al-Qaida, is headed for the U.S.-Mexico border to document how easy it is to enter America illegally.


Chris Simcox

Al-Jazeera has contacted Minuteman Civil Defense Corps leader Chris Simcox to try to arrange interviews. Simcox, who rejected the request for cooperation with the TV network, says al-Jazeera, seen by millions throughout the Arab world and elsewhere, is producing an hour-long documentary news special on lack of security at the U.S. southern border.

Al-Jazeera reporter Naisser Hssaini mentioned the increase in apprehensions of illegal aliens known as OTMs � other than Mexicans. These foreigners increasingly include Arabs, Muslims and others from the Middle East. The reporter also mentioned his familiarity with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement police of catching and releasing OTMS � particularly those not specifically known to be on any terrorist watch list.

"The group has been denied requests for interviews by Minuteman Civil Defense Corps organizers but they still insist on filming the groups� activities along with the rest of the media during a July 4th weekend mission near Arivaca, Arizona," said Simcox.

Justices 'erase' key clause from Constitution

Breyer: Any seizure of private property could benefit public

Comments by liberal Justice Stephen Breyer during oral arguments in the landmark Supreme Court property-rights case appear to support Justice Clarence Thomas' assertion that the ruling essentially has erased a key clause from the Constitution's Fifth Amendment.

The 5-4 decision Thursday allows a local government to seize a home or business against the owner's will for the purpose of private development.

The debate centered on the scope of the Fifth Amendment, which allows governments to take private property through eminent domain if the land is for "public use."

Until now, that has been interpreted to mean projects such as roads, schools and urban renewal. But officials in New London, Conn., argued that private development plans served a public purpose of boosting economic growth, even though the area was not blighted.

In his addition to the dissenting opinion, Thomas wrote: "If such 'economic development' takings are for a 'public use,' any taking is, and the Court has erased the Public Use Clause from our Constitution."

Friday, June 24, 2005

Senate Approves Gas Price Gouging Amendment

The Senate Thursday approved an amendment to an energy bill that would include the requirement that the Federal Trade Commission look into allegations of gas price gouging. The amendment, sponsored by Sens. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), has received unanimous support. "At the same time that rising gas prices are causing Michigan families to think about curtailing their summer vacations, oil conglomerates are announcing all-time record profits," Stabenow said in arguing for her amendment. She noted that prices this week at one Michigan gas station climbed from $2.10 to $2.35 per gallon within two hours.

The amendment calls for the FTC to investigate whether the high gas prices are the result of reducing refinery capacity or another form of market manipulation or price gouging.

Bush Will Discuss Iraq During Prime-Time Speech

President Bush will deliver a major address regarding the war in Iraq on Tuesday night from the U.S. military base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the White House announced on Friday. The president has requested network air time at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, when he will speak before an audience of several hundred troops and outline his strategy for victory in Iraq and argue for completing the mission amid increasing public doubts about the war.

Cheney: Iraq will be 'enormous success story'

Vice President Dick Cheney on Thursday defended his recent comment that the Iraqi insurgency was in its "last throes," insisting that progress being made in setting up a new Iraqi government and establishing democracy there will indeed end the violence -- eventually.

However, in an exclusive interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Cheney said he thinks there still will be "a lot of bloodshed" in the coming months, as the insurgents try to stop the move toward democracy in Iraq.

"If you look at what the dictionary says about throes, it can still be a violent period, the throes of a revolution," he said. "The point would be that the conflict will be intense, but it's intense because the terrorists understand that if we're successful at accomplishing our objective -- standing up a democracy in Iraq -- that that's a huge defeat for them.

"We will succeed in Iraq, just like we did in Afghanistan. We will stand up a new government under an Iraqi-drafted constitution. We will defeat that insurgency, and, in fact, it will be an enormous success story."

Thursday, June 23, 2005

20,000 US troops may leave Iraq in March

US troops may start withdrawing from Iraq in March, a US general said, as the new US ambassador to the war-torn country pledged to help Iraqis crush a ruthless insurgency.

As many as four or five brigades (up to 20,000 people) could leave if the country's ethnic groups agree on a constitution and elect a government that has broad support, Lieutenant General John Vines said in Washington via video link from Iraq.

"I suspect we will probably draw down capability after the election, because Iraqi security forces are more capable," Vines said. He referred to planned elections at the end of this year that would follow hoped-for approval of a new constitution in October.

The number-two US commander in Iraq forecast that the insurgency would dwindle rapidly if the political process succeeded, but said any drawdown would depend on conditions on the ground.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Baghdad would not be surprised and would understand if the United States began to start withdrawing troops next year.

"I would not be surprised ... If there would be some withdrawal, let's say early 2006, I think it would be understandable," he said in Brussels.

"The more our forces assume responsibility, the less role the multinational force will have in Iraq," he said.

In Baghdad, the new US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad vowed to work with Iraqis to crush the tenacious insurgents.

"I will work with Iraqis to break the back of the insurgency," Khalilzad said after presenting his credentials to President Jalal Talabani in the heavily fortified Green Zone where most American and Iraqi officials live.

"Foreign terrorists and hardline Baathists want Iraq to be in a civil war," he told reporters, referring to members of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein's Baath party.

Insurgents believed to be led by Sunni Arabs and Jordanian-born extremist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi kill dozens of Iraqis almost daily, targeting members of the country's security forces in particular.

Hillary Opposes Flag Burning Amendment

New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, who insisted last year that Democrats were just as patriotic as Republicans, said Wednesday that she's against a Constitutional amendment to ban the burning of the American flag.



"I support federal legislation that would outlaw flag desecration, much like laws that currently prohibit the burning of crosses, but I don't believe a constitutional amendment is the answer," Clinton said last night, in a statement issued after the House passed the anti-flag burning amendment yesterday by an overwhelming margin of 258 to 130.

By opposing protecting the American flag with a constitutional amendment, Clinton is catering to the more radical wing of her party, whose support she'll need to win the 2008 presidential nomination.

However, by bucking the popular measure, the former first lady risks resurrecting charges about her own radical past during the 1970s, when she protested the Vietnam war and defended the Black Panthers.

In the just-released book, "The Truth About Hillary," for instance, author Ed Klein reports that Clinton was a driving force behind the radical leftwing "The Yale Review of Law and Social Action" at grad school.

Hillary "co-edited articles that focused on the violence-prone Black Panthers and the ongoing trial of several Panthers for the torture-murder of their colleague, Alex Rackley," Klein says.

Accompanying a companion article - "a cartoon depicting the police as oinking, hairy, snot-nosed pigs."

Zogby: McCain Would Trounce Hillary in '08

Arizona Senator John McCain would overwhelmingly defeat New York Senator and former First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton in a theoretical 2008 presidential match-up, a new Zogby America poll reveals.

The survey finds that both senators far outdistance their nearest competition for their parties' nominations-but in a head-to-head match-up, the Arizona Republican bests the New York Democrat by 19 points, leading her 54% to 35%. McCain would also defeat Massachusetts Senator-and former Democratic presidential candidate-John McCain by a full 20 points, 55% to 35%.

McCain has majority support in every single geographic region of the country. But more telling may be the fact that, even in the states carried by Kerry in 2004, McCain comes out comfortably on top-leading Clinton by 49 to 38% and Kerry by 50% to 40%. Among the states carried by President Bush, the margin is even wider, giving McCain a 58% to 33% lead over Clinton and 59% to 32% lead over Kerry.

McCain leads with most demographics, though Clinton would best him narrowly among Hispanic voters (45% to 38%) and would win African Americans by 80% to 19%. But that 19% would be the highest vote tally for a Republican with African Americans in decades. McCain leads Clinton with every age group except voters under 30, where the two are in a dead heat.

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

7 of 10 say Gitmo treatment not unfair

A new poll reveals seven of 10 Americans believe the terror detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp are being treated "better than they deserve" or "about right."

The poll conducted by Rasmussen Reports found 36 percent of respondents believe the prisoners are being treated "better than they deserve," while 34 percent said "about right."


Just 20 percent of Americans polled believed detainees have been treated unfairly.

The issue of prisoner management was heightened last week when Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., on the floor of the U.S. Senate, compared treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to the Nazi Gestapo, Soviet KGB, and Pol Pot's killers in Cambodia.

On June 14, Durbin read an e-mail message from an FBI agent describing alleged prisoner abuse. The senator said if he didn't identify the source of the information "you would most certainly believe this must have happened by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags or some mad regime � Pol Pot or others � that had no concern for human beings."

Yesterday, Durbin took to the Senate floor to apologize.

"Some may believe that my remarks crossed the line," the Senate's No. 2 Democrat said. "To them I extend my heartfelt apologies."

The Rasmussen poll found 14 percent agree that prisoner treatment at Gitmo is similar to Nazi tactics. Sixty-nine percent disagree with that comparison.


There were stark differences of opinion based on party affiliation with just 7 percent of Republicans saying Guantanomo prisoners are treated unfairly. Thirty percent of Democrats hold that view along with 22 percent of those not affiliated with either major party.

Among Republicans, 45 percent say the prisoners are treated better than they deserve. That view is shared by 28 percent of Democrats.

Senate allows U.S. to sue OPEC for oil price-fixing

The U.S. Senate voted on Tuesday to allow the U.S. government to sue the OPEC oil cartel on antitrust grounds in an outcry against crude oil prices that are fast approaching the $60 a barrel mark.

The measure, added to wide-sweeping energy legislation by a voice vote, would give authority to the Department of Justice or Federal Trade Commission to sue the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

U.S. crude oil futures hit a record $59.70 per barrel on Tuesday, even after OPEC boosted its production to nearly 25-year highs and U.S. crude inventories swelled to their highest level since July 1999.

OPEC's 11 members account for almost 40 percent of global crude oil production and two-thirds of proven reserves.

"Gas and oil prices are too high and it's time that we do something about it," said Republican Sen. Mike DeWine (news, bio, voting record) of Ohio, who sponsored the amendment along with Democrat Herb Kohl of Wisconsin.

"If OPEC were a group of international private companies rather than foreign governments, their action would be nothing more than an illegal price-fixing scheme," Kohl said.

Republican Sen. Pete Domenici (news, bio, voting record), the Senate's top energy bill negotiator, called the measure "nothing short of incredible," but did not act to block it.

"These are sovereign nations," Domenici said. "For us to decide here on the Senate floor that we're going to establish some new forum and litigation against the OPEC cartel is nothing short of incredible."

The measure is unlikely to survive a negotiating session when the Senate's energy legislation is reconciled with a version passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in April, Domenici said. The House energy bill contains no similar provision.


Sen. Durbin Apologizes for Gitmo Remarks

Under fire from Republicans and some fellow Democrats, Sen. Dick Durbin apologized Tuesday for comparing American interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp to Nazis and other historically infamous figures.
"Some may believe that my remarks crossed the line," the Illinois Democrat said. "To them I extend my heartfelt apologies."
His voice quaking and tears welling in his eyes, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate also apologized to any soldiers who felt insulted by his remarks.
"They're the best. I never, ever intended any disrespect for them," he said.

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Schiavo's remains interred in Florida

Parents lawyer blasts marker's wording, timing of notification

The cremated remains of Terri Schiavo, the severely brain-damaged woman who died after her feeding tube was removed in March, were buried Monday in a Clearwater cemetery.

The burial failed, however, to bring a close to the Schiavo saga. Instead, acrimony flared anew, with her parents complaining that they were not notified beforehand about the service.

Michael Schiavo, who said he promised his wife he would not keep her alive artificially and waged a long legal battle to remove her feeding tube, had the words "I kept my promise" inscribed on her bronze grave marker.

The marker also lists February 25, 1990 -- the day she collapsed and fell into what most doctors said was an irreversible vegetative state -- as the date Schiavo "departed this Earth."

Schiavo actually died March 31, nearly two weeks after her feeding tube was removed by court order. The marker lists that date as when Schiavo was "at peace."

David Gibbs, an attorney for the woman's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, decried the words on the marker.

"Obviously, that's a real shot and another unkind act toward a grieving mom and dad," Gibbs said.

Major newspaper proclaims:Durbin right about 'hellhole'

A major U.S. newspaper is voicing strong support for Dick Durbin of Illinois, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, regarding his criticism of U.S. treatment of enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay, as he likened it to treatment by the Nazi Gestapo, Soviet KGB, and Pol Pot's killers in Cambodia.

"Durbin was spot on in his assessment of Guantanamo," says today's editorial in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. "That's why he was so roundly attacked. He told the truth. And his message is of vital importance; the United States is better than this."


The editorial continues:


The issue of whether Durbin's rhetoric crossed a line is small potatoes compared with the undeniable truth that American treatment of its prisoners has crossed many, many lines -- of morality, of international law, of practical benefit.
But instead of discussing what goes on at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and other prison camps, the right would prefer to get into a senseless argument about whether "we" are better than the Nazis or Saddam Hussein or the Soviets or Pol Pot or whomever a critic of Guantanamo might raise as a comparison. It's a tactic the group running Washington now has used again and again: They're quite deliberately changing the subject -- from Guantanamo to words spoken on the Senate floor.

It's not too late, as Durbin said of Bush in his speech: The senator should stop apologizing and keep up the criticism of the hellhole America's military has created at Guantanamo. He has no reason to be defensive; he's telling the truth. It's a truth Americans need to hear, and its tellers must resist intimidation.

Iraqis Found in Torture House Tell of Brutality of Insurgents

Iraqis Found in Torture House Tell of Brutality of Insurgents
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
KARABILA, Iraq, Sunday, June 19 - Marines on an operation to eliminate insurgents that began Friday broke through the outside wall of a building in this small rural village to find a torture center equipped with electric wires, a noose, handcuffs, a 574-page jihad manual - and four beaten and shackled Iraqis.

The American military has found torture houses after invading towns heavily populated by insurgents - like Falluja, where the anti-insurgent assault last fall uncovered almost 20 such sites. But rarely have they come across victims who have lived to tell the tale.

The men said they told the marines, from Company K, Third Marines, Second Division, that they had been tortured with shocks and flogged with a strip of rubber for more than two weeks, unseen behind the windows of black glass. One of them, Ahmed Isa Fathil, 19, a former member of the new Iraqi Army, said he had been held and tortured there for 22 days. All the while, he said, his face was almost entirely taped over and his hands were cuffed.

In an interview with an embedded reporter just hours after he was freed, he said he had never seen the faces of his captors, who occasionally whispered at him, "We will kill you." He said they did not question him, and he did not know what they wanted. Nor did he ever expect to be released.

"They kill somebody every day," said Mr. Fathil, whose hands were so swollen he could not open a can of Coke offered to him by a marine. "They've killed a lot of people."

From the house on Saturday, there could be heard sounds of fighting from the large-scale offensive to eliminate strongholds of insurgents, many of whom stream across Iraq's porous border with Syria. [Page 10.]

As the marines walked through the house - a squat one-story building of sand-colored brick - the broken black window glass crunched under their boots. Light poured in, revealing walls and ceiling shredded by shrapnel from the blast they had set off to break in through a wall. Latex gloves were strewn on the floor. A kerosene lantern lay on its side, shattered.

The manual recovered - a fat, well-thumbed Arabic paperback - listed itself as the 2005 First Edition of "The Principles of Jihadist Philosophy," by Abdel Rahman al-Ali. Its chapters included "How to Select the Best Hostage," and "The Legitimacy of Cutting the Infidels' Heads."

Also recovered were several fake passports, a black hood, the painkiller Percoset, handcuffs and an explosives how-to-guide. Three cars loaded with explosives were parked in a garage outside the house. The marines blew them up.

This is Mr. Fathil's account of his ordeal.

He was having a lunch of lettuce and cucumbers in the kitchen of his home in the small desert village of Rabot with his mother and brother. An Opel sedan pulled up. Two men in masks carrying machine guns got out, seized him, and, leaving his mother sobbing, put him in the trunk of their car.

The drove to the house here. They taped his face, put cotton in his ears, and began to beat him.

The only possible explanation for the seizure he could think of was his time in the new Iraqi Army. Unemployed and illiterate, Mr. Fathil signed up after the American occupation began.

But nine months ago, when continuing working meant risking the wrath of the Jihadists, he quit. In all, 10 friends from his unit have been killed, he said. So have his uncle and his uncle's son, though neither ever worked as soldiers.

The men tended to talk in whispers, he said, telling him five times a day, in low voices in his ear, to pray, and offering him sand, instead of water, to wash himself. Just once, he asked if he could see his mother, and one of them said to him, "You won't leave until you are dead."

Mr. Fathil did not know there were other hostages. He found out only after the captors left and he was able to remove the tape from his eyes.

The routine in the house was regular. Because of the windows, it was always dark inside. Mr. Fathil said he was fed once a day, and allowed to use a bathroom as necessary in the back of the house.

When marines burst in, one of the captives was lying under a stairwell, badly beaten. At first, they thought he was dead.

The others were emaciated and battered. Mr. Fathil had fared the best. The other three were taken by medical helicopter to Balad, a base near Baghdad with a hospital.

But he still had been hurt badly. Marks from beatings criss-crossed his back, and deep pocks, apparently from electric shock burns, were gouged in his skin.

The shocks, he said, felt "like my soul is being ripped out of my body." But when he would start to scream, and his body would pull up from the shock, they would begin to beat him, he said.

Mr. Fathil has been at the Marine base south of Qaim since his release, on Saturday around noon. His mother still does not know he is alive.

When she was mentioned, he bowed and lowered his head, and began to cry softly, wiping his face with the jumpsuit given him by the marines.

He asked a reporter for help to move to another town, because it was too dangerous for his family to remain in their house. He begged not to have a photograph taken, even of the scars on his back. The captors took pictures of that, he said.

His town has always been a good place, he said, but the militants have made it hell.

"These few are destroying it," he said, his face streaked with tears. "Everybody they take, they kill. It's on a daily basis pretty much."

Monday, June 20, 2005

Downing Street Memo Originals Destroyed

The so-called Downing Street Memo - which was presumed to be authentic when Bush administration critics began touting it last month as evidence the president committed impeachable crimes - is actually a manually recreated copy - with the source of the memo now admitting he retyped the document before destroying the originals.

British reporter Michael Smith, who broke the memo story in the London Times on May 1, revealed to The Associated Press over the weekend that "he protected the identity of the source he had obtained the documents from by typing copies of them on plain paper and destroying the originals."

Smith's admission means there's now no independent way to determine the accuracy of the Downing Street Memo, i.e., whether he made any typos or transcription errors that could have changed the memo's meaning.
The revelation has conjured up memories of the CBS News forged document scandal last year, where anchorman Dan Rather argued that damaging records he obtained from President Bush's National Guard file were essentially accurate, even though they had been faked by his source.

While British officials hadn't disputed the authenticity of the Downing Street Memo, a senior member of the Blair government who reviewed the memo in light of reporter Smith's admission could say only that its contents "appeared authentic."

That official, however, requested anonymity, refusing to make an on-the-record endorsement of the memo's accuracy.

Conservatives Tout Guantanamo Bay's Cuisine

Conservatives angered by the frequent calls of congressional Democrats and anti-war activists to close down the military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, are conducting an unusual counter-attack.

Inspired by California Republican Congressman Duncan Hunter, bloggers from Dummocrats.com have created "The Gitmo Cookbook" to emphasize the high quality of life for prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay facility.

Speaking on Fox News Sunday June 11, Hunter said the criticism of how the U.S. is handling terrorist suspects prompted him to send "for the menu from Guantanamo, so that the average American could understand how we're brutalizing people" at the prison.

"For Sunday, they're going to be having -- let me see -- orange glazed chicken, fresh fruit grupe, steamed peas and mushrooms, rice pilaf -- another form of torture for the hijackers," Hunter said.

"We treat them very well," he added in response to suggestions that the detention center should be shut down.

The Dummocrats.com website picked up on Hunter's theme.

"If you're tired of all the torture allegations, of hearing the media imply that handling a Quran without gloves on is the moral equivalent of beheading someone, and of all the hysteria about enemy combatants, you'll enjoy the Gitmo Cookbook," the website states.

The book "contains the actual recipes and menus for the food served to the Gitmo detainees, along with interesting facts about how American soldiers are working every day to treat prisoners humanely while still getting the information we need to protect ourselves."

During his appearance on Fox News Sunday, Hunter pointed to what he said were exaggerations on the part of Guantanamo Bay prison critics. Giving the prisoners MREs (Meals Ready to Eat), the same food that soldiers are eating, "is considered actually to be a form of abuse," Hunter said.

Laura Curtis, contributing author for Dummocrats and the cookbook, told Cybercast News Service that "this is the exact food that our troops get. The only difference is that, for the detainees, it's halal. The Muslim-approved meat has to be prepared a certain way and the animals have to be slaughtered a certain way."

Talk radio host Rush Limbaugh has been having fun with the idea of a "Club G'itmo," implying that prisoners are staying in conditions comparable to a Caribbean resort. Limbaugh calls Club G'itmo, "Your tropical retreat from the stress of jihad."

But Democratic political operative Donna Brazile was not amused, telling CNN's Inside Politics on Wednesday "that to try to describe Gitmo Bay as some kind of spa, some kind of resort is foolish.

"It is a place that was set up and designed to hold people for an indefinite period of time, to torture them, to try to get information out of them and to keep them behind bars until the United States figures out what to do with them," Brazile said.

Curtis countered that "this is not a terrible thing that is going on. They are being treated humanely. And they are the enemy. I think we are treating them a lot better than they would treat us. The way the media is treating Gitmo is ridiculous."

Surprised? Biden's Running for President

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) said yesterday he plans to seek the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008 unless he decides later this year that he has little chance of winning.

"My intention is to seek the nomination," Biden said on CBS's "Face the Nation." "I know I'm supposed to be more coy with you. I know I'm supposed to tell you, you know, that I'm not sure. But if, in fact, I think that I have a clear shot at winning the nomination by this November or December, then I'm going to seek the nomination."

Biden said he plans to spend the year road-testing a message to see whether his views are compatible with a majority of Democrats while evaluating whether he can raise the money needed to compete in a race that is widely expected to include Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), a prodigious fundraiser.

"I've proceeded since last November as if I were going to run," he said. "I'm quite frankly going out, seeing whether I can gather the kind of support."

Gingrich Urges Senate to Censure Dick Durbin

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich -- mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2008 -- is urging the U.S. Senate to censure Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) for comparing U.S. servicemen serving at Guantanamo Bay to the Nazi Gestapo, Soviet KGB, and Pol Pot's killers in Cambodia.