A number of readers have written in with this link to a Raw Story teaser about a piece on the Niger forgeries set to run in tomorrow's Sunday Times of London.

It reads ...

The LONDON SUNDAY TIMES' Michael Smith -- who first broke the infamous Downing Street Memo -- will identify who is believed to have forged the documents that formed the basis for President George W. Bush's infamous 16 words this evening, RAW STORY has learned. Smith will explain the chain of events in painstaking detail.

According to Nato sources who spoke under condition of anonymity with the SUNDAY TIMES, an Italian investigation has fingered two employees of an embassy in Italy with forging the documents.

Speculation has been ripe over who forged the documents -- and the SUNDAY TIMES piece is unlikely to stem furor and speculation in the United States over the documents that helped bring the United States to war with Iraq.

Look closely. If this is an accurate representation of what the story will contain, it is about an Italian government investigation. That's all you need to know.

The Italian intelligence services were centrally involved in the clandestine distribution of the forgeries and in all likelihood the creation of the forgeries themselves. Everything the Italian government has done since then has been to impede any outside investigation into their role.

There's simply no reason to credit anything an Italian government investigation of this matter reveals. If anything, its findings are probably a good bet to be the exact opposite of what is in fact the case. And the timing of such a release is no doubt in response to indications that at least two US news organizations will release new, damaging revelations about their role in the not-too-distant future.

Is more of Iraqi reconstruction being funded off the books?

A bit more on the State Department's scouring the federal employees roster for folks willing to go to Iraq. I'm told, and it's not surprising, that the well of State Department employees willing to go for service in Iraq is pretty much dry. Apart from the inherent risks, apparently there have been other management/asignmnet issues that have led to difficulties in recruitment.

However, I've heard that at least in one agency, the agencies are expected to pick up the tab not only for the salaries of their employees that go to Iraq but also for the various hazard and bonus pay that goes along with the gig.

At least as it's been described to me the process is different from the normal 'detailee' process in which an employee can be temporarily loaned to the White House, the Hill, or other part of the government.

Can anyone tell me more about this or share more details they might know about how this is working in their agency or department?

And as a semi-unrelated question: why does the biggest demand appear to be for public affairs specialists?

The email sent out to Department of Energy employees about opportunities opening up in Iraq ...

In response to the President's directive to provide support for the reconstruction and stabilization efforts in Iraq, the Secretary of State has requested that DOE assist in finding a qualified Petroleum Industry Expert and Public Affairs Specialists willing to work at the U.S. embassy in Iraq. The job descriptions are below.

The Petroleum Industry Expert will assist the Ministry of Oil to help strengthen management and transparency, including monitoring contracting activities. The candidate should possess a strong background in the petroleum sector, from production to marketing. This detail will be for 1 year.

The Public Affairs - Global Outreach Team Member positions (8-12) are open to all Government public affairs professionals. Selectees will generally serve on a 3-month rotational basis, although some members may be detailed or assigned to Baghdad for a full year. (Candidates should identify what duration they are interested in, subject to their manager's approval.) These positions supervise all media aspects of news conferences, press events, media day trips, and media interaction with all high level US visitors; work with Iraqi Government officials at the local level to develop, plan, and implement media events showcasing progress in various regions in Iraq; and develop relationships with the American press corps, International press, Regional Arabic press, US and Coalition Military Forces, and Iraqi press to help facilitate media coverage of events throughout Iraq.

The positions are duty stationed in Baghdad, Iraq. Both offices and living quarters are in the International (Green) Zone, secured by U.S. military personnel and Department of State Diplomatic Security, although there is apt to be travel outside the International Zone under the protection of security forces.

Interested Federal employees must obtain concurrence from their Resource Manager in Headquarters or head of their field element. DOE Federal employees will be on a non-reimbursable detail to the State Department.

These vacancy announcements will remain open until filled. The hiring/deployment process is quite lengthy and includes attendance at a 7-day class on security and cultural issues in Arlington, VA prior to departing the U.S. and a medical clearance.

Benefits:

DOE Federal employees working in Iraq may be eligible for the following benefits.

Overtime pay
Pay for work at night
Pay for work on Sunday
Pay for work on a holiday
Danger pay
Foreign post (hardship) differential
Regional rest breaks
Home visits
Consultation trips (to Washington, DC to debrief DOE
and State)
Per Diem
Medical services
Travel expenses

Additional information on benefits to DOE Federal employees on detail to Iraq can be found at Appendix M of the DOE Handbook on Overseas Assignments, which is available at: http://humancapital.doe.gov/pers/overseas.htm, or at http://chris.inel.doe/payroll.

DOE Contacts

If you have questions regarding the duties of the positions, working conditions in Iraq, or the energy situation in Iraq, please contact ********.

Resumes should be sent to **********. If you have questions regarding your application or benefits issues, please contact ********.

If you're new to this story see these earlier posts about emails sent out to employees of the Departments of Housing and Urban Development and Commerce.

Which is it on Rep. Mollohan (D-WV)?

On Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported that "federal prosecutors have opened an investigation of Mr. Mollohan's finances and whether they were properly disclosed" in response to a complaint filed by the right-wing National Legal and Policy Center.

TPMmuckraker.com's Paul Kiel called the US Attorney's office in DC, the spokeswoman confirmed that there was an investigation but declined to give details.

But an article in Saturday's Times says simply that the US Attorney's office is " reviewing the [NLPC] complaint."

The AP says that the US Attorney's office refused all comment.

Bloomberg didn't get its call returned.

Given the politics involved, the difference between reviewing a complaint and launching an investigation based on a complaint is a big one.

It was on the basis of reports that an investigation has been launched that CREW called on Mollohan to temporarily step down from his post as the senior Democrat on the House ethics committee.

Which is it?

Via this blog I found this post on the New Orleans Times-Picayune blog ...

Former FEMA director Michael Brown might be joining St. Bernard Parish as a paid consultant.

Brown, who resigned his FEMA post last September in the wake of stinging criticism of the agency's response to Hurricane Katrina, is expected to visit the parish next week. During his visit, Brown and parish officials will discuss the possibility of the parish contracting with Brown as a guide to help it navigate the bureaucracy of federal storm aid.

Brown now has a consulting business.

St. Bernard Parish President Henry "Junior'' Rodriguez said prices have not been discussed to this point, nor have any contracts been entered. Rodriguez and three council members met Brown recently during a trip to Washington, D.C.

Updated Scott Fitzgerald: Second acts are for losers.

Barone: K Street Project a step forward for good government; DeLay betrayed by unscrupulous underlings.

In a late update to the post below about the HUD Iraq email, I noted that a similar email had gone out to employees in the Department of Commerce. The Commerce email mentioned two positions opening up.

The first was for a "trade development specialist." The second was ...

Public Affairs - Global Outreach (GO) Team

Commerce Employee detailed to Department of State's Iraq Reconstruction Management Office

Report to U.S. Embassy Public Affairs Officer

Open to Commerce Permanent Career and Political Public Affairs Professionals

Multiple positions available - 3 to 12 month assignments

Language: not required

Position Description: GO Team members generally will serve in Iraq on a three-month rotational basis; some members may be detailed or assigned to Baghdad for a full year. Supervises all media aspects of news conferences, press events, media day trips and media interaction with all high level U.S. visitors including Congressional Delegations. Coordinates media day trips highlighting reconstruction projects and progress in governance at the provincial level. Works with Iraqi Government officials at the local level to develop, plan and implement media events showcasing progress in various regions of Iraq. Develops relationships with American press corps, International press, Regional Arabic press, US and Coalition Military Forces, and the Iraqi press to help facilitate media coverage of events throughout Iraq.

GO Teams will consist of 8-12 persons whose focus is building a sustained capability to facilitate media coverage throughout Iraq, building upon the success of three previous iterations of Public Diplomacy "Surge Teams." Go Teams will supplement US Embassy Baghdad's Public Affairs Office, work in conjunction with MNF-I public affairs officers, and support public affairs outreach activities of Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) and Regional Embassy Offices (REOs) located outside of Baghdad.

Passed along without comment.

From an email that went out this morning to HUD employees ...

HUD employees interested in helping the Iraqi people to govern themselves and rebuild their economy may soon have an opportunity. The State Department is seeking motivated, permanent Federal employees from around the government to serve our nation at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad for one-year terms.

HUD is planning a presentation by State Department representatives for later this month, which will provide details on positions available, benefits of serving, and what life is like today in Iraq. HUD will also present an Iraq Service Recognition Package that will list additional compensation benefits.

If you have an interest in learning more about this opportunity and commitment, please notify *******.

This is a unique opportunity to serve our country and to help shape a free, more secure and prosperous Iraq. There are few such opportunities in life to make a lasting impact and contribution to history. We encourage you to consider this exciting opportunity.

Late this afternoon, I called up HUD spokesman Jerry Brown to find out more.

When I asked if this is the first time such an email for Iraq volunteers had been sent out or whether they were annual, he said "Sure, any time there's been a disaster." He went on to mention Katrina, flooding in the Dakotas, etc.

When I reiterated that I meant specifically a request for HUD volunteers to serve in Iraq, he said that this was the first time such a request had been sent out to HUD employees.

(ed.note: The contact information in the second to last graf was deleted by TPM. We contacted the person in question, who referred us to Mr. Brown.)

Late Update: Folks in the Department of Commerce seem to have received a similar email.

Sorry, David, you got spun.

Yesterday, we flagged what David Gregory said on Hardball.

Now we've got the transcript in which Gregory repeats the endlessly refuted GOP canard that Joe Wilson said Dick Cheney 'ordered' the trip to Niger ...

The point here is that Wilson alleges that the trip was set up essentially by the vice-president, that Cheney knew that he was going and knew of his findings. So the vice-president did have a personal interest in saying, Whoa, that was not the case. And in fact, that was not the case, that the vice-president ordered him to go or arranged the trip. And there`s a big controversy about whether he was ultimately briefed on the results.

If you're not familiar with the backstory, here's a detailed de-bamboozlement.

The short version is that Republicans came up with a fake version of what Wilson said so that they could refute it. Classic strawman argument.

Rep. Frelinghuysen's (R-NJ) letter defending the DeLay Rule back in the day.

In the context of McClellan's endless lies about what happened in the lead-up the Iraq war, is it time to have an actual investigation into that? Not one controlled by a senator (Sen. Roberts, R-KS) getting daily guidance from the White House. Not one by a presidential commission placed in the impossible role of investigating the president. But a real, independent investigation.

Sitting here watching the McClellan early afternoon briefing. Here's another question. The White House argument is that President made a decision that such-and-such information needed to be heard by the American people. McClellan just said it was "provided to the American people." But he didn't provide it to the American people. He provided it to Judy Miller. Legal or not, it was by definition a 'leak' since it was revealed anonymously to a single reporter. How does that wash? What is the rationale?

Also, remember how the administration earlier refused to declassify parts of the NIE that cast doubts on the president's assertions about Iraqi WMD.

This from former Sen. Graham's oped from the Post back in November ...

There were troubling aspects to this 90-page document. While slanted toward the conclusion that Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction stored or produced at 550 sites, it contained vigorous dissents on key parts of the information, especially by the departments of State and Energy. Particular skepticism was raised about aluminum tubes that were offered as evidence Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program. As to Hussein's will to use whatever weapons he might have, the estimate indicated he would not do so unless he was first attacked.

Under questioning, Tenet added that the information in the NIE had not been independently verified by an operative responsible to the United States. In fact, no such person was inside Iraq. Most of the alleged intelligence came from Iraqi exiles or third countries, all of which had an interest in the United States' removing Hussein, by force if necessary.

The American people needed to know these reservations, and I requested that an unclassified, public version of the NIE be prepared. On Oct. 4, Tenet presented a 25-page document titled "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction Programs." It represented an unqualified case that Hussein possessed them, avoided a discussion of whether he had the will to use them and omitted the dissenting opinions contained in the classified version. Its conclusions, such as "If Baghdad acquired sufficient weapons-grade fissile material from abroad, it could make a nuclear weapon within a year," underscored the White House's claim that exactly such material was being provided from Africa to Iraq.

Shorter Bush: Classification is a tool of my political strategy.

McClellan (live now on CNN): Bush's leaks of classified information in national interest, non-Bush leaks hurt America.

It's not too soon to start calling this for what it is: the Bush administration's creeping monarchism.

The Times has a piece today on some critical testimony Attorney General Al Gonzales delivered yesterday on Capitol Hill. The president, he suggested, probably does have the authority to conduct warrantless domestic wiretaps.

This comes on the heels of the president's view, summarized in today's Post by an unnamed senior administration official, that "Bush sees a distinction between leaks and what he is alleged to have done. The official said Bush authorized the release of the classified information to assure the public of his rationale for war as it was coming under increasing scrutiny."

We've already discussed the fact that the president has the authority to declassify anything, albeit through certain guidelines and procedures he appears not to have followed in this case. The fact that he seems to have done so with the Libby leaks for clearly political and thus inappropriate reasons doesn't make it illegal in itself. And I think the claim that the president didn't follow the appropriate procedures in 'declassifying' in this case would be too fine a distinction for a court to want to touch. (For an alternative view, see Juliette Kayyem's discussion of this. She says it may well be illegal.)

Setting all that aside, what is most revealing is the attitude suggested by the White House official rather than just the net outcome. Beyond the legal particulars, the president's attitude seems to be that the law just doesn't apply to him -- and that's not surprising since we see so many other instances of that perspective in practice.

Peel back all the individual arguments from Al Gonzales and the president and whomever else they put forward, the underlying idea is not so much that the president is above the law as that he is the law. He embodies it, you might say, even embodies the state itself. And thus what he does can't be illegal. What he does is simply the state cogitating and defending itself.

This is a vision that simply incompatible with any idea of separation of powers because in this view the president's prerogative always trumps the other two branches. And that makes it a grave danger to our constitutional system itself.

Preach, crook! Preach!

From this morning's Hill e-newsletter: "DeLay said Thursday that announcing his resignation has been liberating. Quoting Martin Luther King. Jr., DeLay said, 'Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, I'm free at last.'"

Here's this morning's gaggle where Scott McClellan got his first crack at dodging and bamboozling about the president's new policy of presidential leaks not being leaks. We don't have a 'below the fold' feature here at TPM. So I posted it over at TPMmuckraker.com.

The Onion, though you wouldn't know it: "In the wake of several major lobbying scandals, the Senate Select Committee on Ethics announced Tuesday that it will hold a special series of intensive sessions inside its recently completed 200-room Ethics Mansion."

Shorter Bush: I can do anything I want.

Bush: When I do it, it's not a leak.

From the Post ...

A senior administration official, speaking on background because White House policy prohibits comment on an active investigation, said Bush sees a distinction between leaks and what he is alleged to have done. The official said Bush authorized the release of the classified information to assure the public of his rationale for war as it was coming under increasing scrutiny.

Okay, then.