Dahlia (and others similarly situated -- at editors' desks and reporters' laptops)...

I make humble request that you eschew use of the word "redacted."

It is, I agree, a nifty and lofty sounding word. But in a strict definition, it merely means "to prepare for publication," or to "edit for publication." Just what editors and writers and slot-folks and "rim folks" do/have done. I think the British argot is "subs" but I can't remember.

As the government does it to documents, it is, in physical fact, taking a black marker (someone could find out whether they use Avery "Marks-A-Lot" Chisel-tip markers, to help provide a better verisimilitude. And maybe get some "gratuitous audio" of said markers in use--real "actuality," no?) and not-too-carefully dragging it over words, phrases, etc., in whatever documents they are CENSORING, to prevent the public from learning the information contained thereunder.

So the accurate word is CENSOR

You might also try to find out if the agencies try to use only those censors who have palsy or tremors, given the shaky look of some of the black-outs.

There ought to be some way to separate the black ink of the Marks-A-Lots from the xerographic toner particles they're blacking out, as the chemical composition of each is different, but I don't know of any, offhand. It'd be more than worth taking a look-see to ascertain whether it'd be possible. Not, I'm sure, as easy as heating a document that's been written in lemon juice or milk, but you never know.

Thanks for the report, however. And to the ACLU for getting the document.

As I've long suspected, the press is entirely complicit in this process. They report what happens on the podium, when the real story is out in the crowd--watching how the propaganda operatives pervert Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Assembly and Right to Petition Government for the Redress of Grievances to a propaganda show worthy of any tin-horn, United-Fruit-Co.-banana-republ­ic, CIA-installed dictator.

Similarly, as Stephen Colbert suggested in his skewering of the White House Press Corps (Corpse?), the story is not in the press conferences, in the "gaggles" (the press are the "geese," I guess, in this, um, trope). It's out in the field, beyond the podium--where the administration has blacked out Andrews AFB so the press can't see the maimed and wounded returning from combat (not "in harm's way," it's actually COMBAT), so the press can't photograph the flag-draped coffins lowered to the tarmac at Dover AFB. I think THAT'S where the press should be. Leave Helen Thomas, though sill agile for her many years' experience, to taunt the new pretty-face-on-lies at the Liars' Lectern and give y'all a pool report. The rest of the WH Press corps, get your homo sapience out into the field and report on what's being DONE, not on what's being SAID. Words, from this administration, we all should have learned, are worthless.

And, by the way, dictatorship certainly CAN happen here, in the once-good ol' US of A, when the press finds these kinds of propaganda activities humorous, laughable, business-as-usual. As the manual shows, these are actual conspiracies (two or more people planning illegal action and taking ONE--just one--physical act in furtherance of that plan).

In this case, you've got 1) the author of the manual, maybe 2) the xeroxer of the manual, 3) the distributor of the manual, 4) the folks who herd protestors out of the way, hold up the non-tailored bedsheets (guys in the South used more tailored versions, as I recall) to block the protesters. While they're not depriving citizens of the right to life (those federal "denial of civil rights" murder cases), they certainly are depriving citizens of the right peaceably to assemble, etc., as noted supra.

I find it frightening that the press, generally, has not reported on these "out of sight, out of mind" illegal activities.

Oh yes, there's another angle: Abuse of process. To use local police to facilitate, enable, protect illegal political propaganda activities would clearly be a misuse of the cops, no? And since many, many more than "two or more" folks were engaged in the activities, they'd be ripe for a RICO-type conspiracy prosecution.

Well, that'd be true if the Justice Department weren't yet another political arm of the Administration.

So many rights to trample, so many crimes to commit. So much money in the treasury to pillage. So many Iraqi oil contracts to sew up. So many Afghani rights-of-way for the oil- and gas piplines to lease or buy or obtain by eminent domain. And so little time between now and Jan 21, 2009.

We all should read the Iraq "Hydrocarbon Law" drafts. Certainly Dahlia should. See if my read is correct that Iraq will be left with all of 12.5% royalties for their oil, while international, um, partners, will get 87.5% of the price. And the contracts for continuing to "partner" will add up to about 37 years, when you total the little 2- and 3- and 5- and 1- and 6-year little "duck-nibbles" of contract periods. "Our" draftsmen didn't quite have the courage to put the whole 37 years baldly and boldly out there.

Is anyone actually paying attention here? Dahlia? Anyone?

(Never mind 9/11/01. Or the "Federal Reserve System." Remember Marshall Ephron, was it? on the Great American Dream Machine. The piece on Mrs. Morton's Lemon Cream Pie. "No lemon. No cream. It's all PIE!" With the Federal Reserve, a private organization (privatized in 1913, well before privatization was a buzzword), it's: No Federal, No Reserve. It's all SYSTEM.)

Hoping that the

Best,

(is yet to come).