A report by the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said the Bush administration and Congress appear to have launched the first reassessment of U.S. relations with the Arab world. The report said that longtime relationship was based on the United States ignoring Arab totalitarianism and human rights violations in return for plentiful oil from the Middle East.

I haven't been able to find the report mentioned on the CEIP web page, but the Middle East Newsline brief unfortunately doesn't give the title of the report.  I'm going to keep an eye out for it however, since this could be a longer term good sign of some understanding penetrating the thick skulls of our leaders.

""Strategic Energy Policy Challenges For The 21st Century describes how America is facing the biggest energy crisis in its history. It targets Saddam as a threat to American interests because of his control of Iraqi oilfields and recommends the use of 'military intervention' as a means to fix the US energy crisis.""

Its taken me longer than I would have liked, but my read through the document does not strike me as anywhere near as sinister as alleged in this article, at least not militarily.  I don't really see this as a call to invade Iraq for its oil, rather it cites Iraq as an example of the problem over-reliance on volatile regions for our energy can cause.  In fact, here are some of the reports recommendations

• "Minimize public conflicts with OPEC and other independent oil-exporting countries."
• "Review policies toward Iraq with the aim to lowering anti-Americanism in the Middle East and elsewhere, and set the groundwork to eventually ease Iraqi oil-field investment restrictions"

I'm still a bit disturbed at its use of the energy crisis in California as a justification for all sorts of things, especially with Ken Lay's involvement in the task force, but thats a whole other mess. 

All-in-all, this may be a smoking gun of some sort, but its not about invading Iraq.

"The United States Copyright Office is launching a rare round of public comment on rules that bar people from breaking through digital copy-protection technology on works such as music, movies, software or electronic books. Regulators aren't looking to change the law, but they are looking for public suggestions on what kinds of activity should be legalized in spite of the rules."

The public gets another chance to provide comment on the types of material that should be immune from the DMCA's effects.

"This time around, the office is again asking for specific examples of cases where the law's restrictions cause "actual instances of verifiable problems occurring in the marketplace." Inconvenience or "theoretical critiques" are not enough, the office warned."