TV News LIES

Two Justice Department memos describing the National Security Agency’s (NSA) illegal warrantless wiretapping program were made public late Friday as part of an American Civil Liberties Union Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.

The memos, a May 2004 memo authored by the former head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel Jack Goldsmith and a November 2001 memo from John Yoo, then the deputy assistant attorney general, are most notable for what they don’t reveal. The memos are heavily redacted.

For nearly three years, the military held the key to Roger House's exoneration and didn't tell him: A forensics examiner had botched a crucial lab test used in the Navy lieutenant's court-martial. In fact, the military had begun second-guessing a decade's worth of tests conducted by its one-time star lab analyst, Phillip Mills.

Investigators discovered that Mills had cut corners and even falsified reports in one case. He found DNA where it didn't exist, and failed to find it where it did. His mistakes may have let the guilty go free while the innocent, such as House, were convicted.

David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, is arguably the most influential Jewish American journalist.

Now 50, Remnick became editor at 37 after an impressive career covering the collapse of the Soviet Union for the Washington Post. His book about that incredible period, Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire, won a Pulitzer in 1994. Remnick believes that fear is misplaced and that Obama should think big despite the pressure from the donors and White House aides mired in the status quo.

Mercury, the solar system's smallest planet, has gained a yearlong visitor from Earth - a spacecraft named Messenger that mission controllers guided successfully into a long, looping orbit around the planet Thursday night after a six-year flight across 4.9 billion miles of space.

For the first time, Messenger's polar orbit will enable Earth-bound scientists to see and analyze the planet's entire surface continuously, from distances as close as 124 miles and as far off as 9,420 miles.

Despite evidence that menthol cigarettes are a significant factor in the rise of smoking among adolescents, a federal advisory panel on Friday stopped short of recommending a ban on the cigarettes.

Instead, it urged further study of the issue, which suggested that the Food and Drug Administration would ultimately pursue more modest action, such as marketing restrictions aimed at reducing access for the young.

Conservative maverick Ann Coulter has poured scorn on growing fears over the fallout from Japan’s nuclear crisis by claiming that ‘radiation is good for you.’

The right wing commentator was attempting to quell concern that a radiation plume was due to hit America’s West Coast today after travelling 5,000 miles across the Pacific Ocean from the damaged reactor at Fukishima.

Helen Thomas, former dean of the White House Press Corps, reportedly told Playboy in an interview for their April issue that Jews have power over the White House and Congress, who are in the pockets of the Israeli lobbies.

Thomas left her post at the White House after she publicly made anti-Israel comments last May, telling the Jews they should "get the hell out of Palestine."  The former reporter told Playboy that the Israeli lobbies "are funded by wealthy supporters, including those from Hollywood. Same thing with the financial markets. There’s total control."

With a new round of Guantanamo prosecutions on the horizon, a senior Pentagon official has ordered war court defense lawyers to sign freshly minted ground rules that not only gag what they can say to their alleged terrorist clients but also to the public.

Retired Vice Adm. Bruce MacDonald issued the 26-page "protective order and procedures" for military and civilian lawyers who already have obtained special security clearances to work at the war court called Camp Justice.