From the Sun-Times:

The prosecution finishes its rebuttal and Judge Zagel adjourns court for the day.

‘Members of the jury, you’ve heard all the evidence and the arguments,” he tells them.

He tells the jury it is especially important now that they avoid news reports and not talk about the case, and asks them to return in the morning for jury instructions.

The Sun-Times’ Blago Blog is really spectacular, providing the best coverage of the trial.

Except for my friend Cait, who actually went to the court today, and said Rod “had the most miserable depressed look ever on his face” when she saw him in the cafeteria.

Yes, Cait and a friend went to Chicago today to see Blago. And the Sox.

Enjoyed the Sox more.

Sorry, Rod.

I was so disgusted by this I just wanted to stay away. Plus, I don’t trust early news reports that attempt to sensationalize stories. Then, I read more, and finally forced myself to read Mark Williams’ letter to Abraham Lincoln, where he reveals his incredible lack of depth on race in America. To say the least.

I didn’t want to give Williams at press. He sounded juvenile, and, to tell the truth, this is the first I’ve heard of him, although apparently he has been riding the Tea Party tidal wave for a while, even perceived by some as a leader in the movement.

But all waves, tidal or otherwise, come to an end. And, while many in the Tea Party may in fact laugh secretly at his callow contribution to the national dialogue on race, they must disown Williams as the new face of the G.O.P. slouches forward with ever-vanishing credibility.

So, for posterity, here is Mark Williams’ attempt to enter the national debate on race in America, a letter to Abraham Lincoln:

Dear Mr. Lincoln

We Coloreds have taken a vote and decided that we don’t cotton to that whole emancipation thing. Freedom means having to work for real, think for ourselves, and take consequences along with the rewards. That is just far too much to ask of us Colored People and we demand that it stop!

In fact we held a big meeting and took a vote in Kansas City this week. We voted to condemn a political revival of that old abolitionist spirit called the ‘tea party movement’.

The tea party position to “end the bailouts” for example is just silly. Bailouts are just big money welfare and isn’t that what we want all Coloreds to strive for? What kind of racist would want to end big money welfare? What they need to do is start handing the bail outs directly to us coloreds! Of course, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the only responsible party that should be granted the right to disperse the funds.

And the ridiculous idea of “reduce[ing] the size and intrusiveness of government.” What kind of massa would ever not want to control my life? As Coloreds we must have somebody care for us otherwise we would be on our own, have to think for ourselves and make decisions!

The racist tea parties also demand that the government “stop the out of control spending.” Again, they directly target coloreds. That means we Coloreds would have to compete for jobs like everybody else and that is just not right.

Perhaps the most racist point of all in the tea parties is their demand that government “stop raising our taxes.” That is outrageous! How will we coloreds ever get a wide screen TV in every room if non-coloreds get to keep what they earn? Totally racist! The tea party expects coloreds to be productive members of society?

Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house. Please repeal the 13th and 14th Amendments and let us get back to where we belong.

Sincerely

Precious Ben Jealous, Tom’s Nephew NAACP Head Colored Person

The Tea Party, the group that purports to finally represent all Americans, finally expelled Williams, if that means anything.

Nowhere to go but up for Williams now, if that’s possible.

There is a hole in the world. The floor of the Gulf of Mexico is hemorrhaging oil, and no one has a clue how to stop it. When they finally do plug the hold, the damage will likely be with us for decades.

From The Nation:

How long will it take for an ecosystem this ravaged to be "restored and made whole," as Obama’s interior secretary pledged it would be? It’s not at all clear that such a thing is even possible, at least not in a time frame we can easily wrap our heads around. The Alaskan fisheries have yet to recover fully from the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill, and some species of fish never returned. Government scientists estimate that as much as a Valdez-worth of oil may be entering the Gulf Coast waters every four days. An even worse prognosis emerges from the 1991 Gulf War spill, when an estimated 11 million barrels of oil were dumped into the Persian Gulf—the largest spill ever. It’s not a perfect comparison, since so little cleanup was done, but according to a study conducted twelve years after the disaster in the Persian Gulf, nearly 90 percent of the impacted muddy salt marshes and mangroves were still profoundly damaged.

We do know this: far from being "made whole," the Gulf Coast, more than likely, will be diminished. Its rich waters and crowded skies will be less alive than they are today. The physical space many communities occupy on the map will also shrink, thanks to erosion. And the coast’s legendary culture will contract and wither. The fishing families up and down the coast do not just gather food, after all. They hold up an intricate network that includes family tradition, cuisine, music, art and endangered languages—much like the roots of grass holding up the land in the marsh. Without fishing, these unique cultures lose their root system, the very ground on which they stand. (BP, for its part, is well aware of the limits of recovery. The company’s "Gulf of Mexico Regional Oil Spill Response Plan" specifically instructs officials not to make "promises that property, ecology, or anything else will be restored to normal." Which is no doubt why its officials consistently favor folksy terms like "make it right.")

If Katrina pulled back the curtain on racism, the BP disaster pulls back the curtain on something far more hidden: how little control even the most ingenious among us have over the awesome, intricately interconnected natural forces with which we so casually meddle. BP cannot plug the hole in the Earth that it made. Obama cannot order brown pelicans not to go extinct (no matter whose ass he kicks). No amount of money—not BP’s recently pledged $20 billion, not $100 billion—can replace a culture that has lost its roots. And while our politicians and corporate leaders have yet to come to terms with these humbling truths, the people whose air, water and livelihoods have been contaminated are losing their illusions fast.

"Everything is dying," a woman said as the town hall meeting was coming to a close. "How can you honestly tell us that our gulf is resilient and will bounce back? Because not one of you up here has a hint as to what is going to happen to our gulf. You sit up here with a straight face and act like you know, when you don’t know."

"Everything is dying."

From the live feed courteously provided by BP, May 31, 2010, ca. 10:45 CST.

We need to face it: “They” have no idea what they’re doing.

“They.” You know who “they” are. “They” are the ones who are supposed to know these things. “They” are the ones who say all those neat thing, you know, as in, “They say.”

In this case, “they” are BP, British Petroleum, those responsible for what is now the greatest ecological disaster the United States has ever known.

And, yes, we can blame the government of the good ol’ US of A.

First, allow me to add my voice to the chorus of voices thanking President George W. Bush for working so hard to create such an affable relationship between the oil industry execs and those in our government responsible for regulating them. Thanks so much to President George W. Bush putting the oil industry first, over and above the health and welfare of the citizens of the United States. Thanks so much to President George W. Bush for trusting the oil industry to essentially police itself.

That is well-deserved, my friends.

I don’t know yet if President Barack Obama should have reacted more quickly, if President Obama dropped the ball in working to regulate the oil industry.

I do know that if President Obama had reacted more quickly, perhaps sent the U.S. Navy to the Gulf of Mexico to plug the leak, I doubt we would be any better off. Please, no offense at all to our men and women who serve, but the United States Armed Forces don’t train for oil recovery or oil well disaster management.

That’s supposed to be what British Petroleum and all those other wonderful oil companies do.

And get this, British Petroleum is using dispersants that are banned in the United Kingdom, and using them in quantities greater than dispersants have ever been used in the history of U.S. oil spills.

This time, the great “They” are British Petroleum, the great BP, and they haven’t got a clue what to do about this oil leak.

The latest is that BP is trying once again to use a dome to funnel some of the leaking crude to a tanker on the surface. The New York Times gives us the good news:

If successful — and after the string of failures so far, there is no guarantee it will be — the containment dome may be able to capture most of the oil, but it would not plug the leak. Its failure would mean continued environmental and economic damage to the gulf region, as well as greater public pressure on BP and the Obama administration, with few options remaining for trying to contain the spill any time soon.

If unsuccessful, that will leave the Gulf with gushing oil at least through August, which is the earliest engineers will be able to engineers “complete the drilling of a relief well, which would allow them to plug the leaking well with cement,” the NYTimes reports.

They haven’t got a clue.

Watch.

From the Southtown Star:

Jaye Morgan Williams, the county’s chief financial officer, sent letters to all 17 county commissioners Friday, explaining why Stroger boosted her pay from $176,156 to $230,000 for this year.

In the two-page letter, Williams, appointed by Stroger in August, noted that she helped deliver the county’s 2010 budget within 90 days of her start date, finished a "woefully stalled" 2008 audit just 90 days into her tenure and was earning less than two of her fellow CFOs on the county payroll.

She said she’s also taken on extra duties despite a 60-hour work week and at one point this year asked for "compensation consideration."

"As a professional with a long career in the industry, I do not want to get caught up in the current maelstrom and only ask that I be treated fairly," she wrote in a letter to the commissioners that was obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.

A defensive Stroger echoed those sentiments Friday during a radio interview, saying Williams’ salary is a "lot of money, but she actually is a chief financial officer of a $3 billion corporation."

And there’s the rub: Cook County is not a corporation. Cook County is not a business.

Are you counting the days until the November election?

I am.

I have to ask the unthinkable for a Catholic:

Is the Pope lying?

The New York Times has been relentless on their investigation of the pedophilia scandal in the Catholic Church.

Here is the latest:

The priest, convicted of tying up and abusing two young boys in a California church rectory, wanted to leave the ministry.

But in 1985, four years after the priest and his bishop first asked that he be defrocked, the future Pope Benedict XVI, then a top Vatican official, signed a letter saying that the case needed more time and that “the good of the Universal Church” had to be considered in the final decision, according to church documents released through lawsuits.

That decision did not come for two more years, the sort of delay that is fueling a renewed sexual abuse scandal in the church that has focused on whether the future pope moved quickly enough to remove known pedophiles from the priesthood, despite pleas from American bishops.

As the scandal has deepened, the pope’s defenders have said that, well before he was elected pope in 2005, he grew ever more concerned about sexual abuse and weeding out pedophile priests. But the case of the California priest, the Rev. Stephen Kiesle, and the trail of documents first reported on Friday by The Associated Press, shows, in this period at least, little urgency.

The letter that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, later pope, wrote in Latin in 1985, mentions Father Kiesle’s young age — 38 at the time — as one consideration in whether he should be forced from the priesthood. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said it was wrong to draw conclusions based on one letter, without carefully understanding the context in which it was written.

“It’s evident that it’s not an in-depth and serious use of documents,” he said. Earlier Friday, Father Lombardi suggested that the pope would be willing to meet with sexual abuse victims.

But John S. Cummins, the former bishop of Oakland who repeatedly wrote his superiors in Rome urging that the priest be defrocked, said the Vatican in that era, after the Second Vatican Council, was especially reluctant to dismiss priests because so many were abandoning the priesthood.

As a result, he said, Pope John Paul II “really slowed down the process and made it much more deliberate.”

So what really happened? The NYTimes has Cardinal Ratzinger’s signature on the document.

Look, I’m tired of Vatican priests and bishops treating the pope as if he’s the victim. And frankly, this kind of talk is insulting to all of us:

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said it was wrong to draw conclusions based on one letter, without carefully understanding the context in which it was written.

“It’s evident that it’s not an in-depth and serious use of documents,” he said. Earlier Friday, Father Lombardi suggested that the pope would be willing to meet with sexual abuse victims.

Time for Benedict to man-up and speak for himself. The Vatican double-speak has to stop.

I was originally drawn to this story because of a post on Wil Wheaton’s (Wesley Crusher from Star Trek’s) Twitter account imploring someone to run against Democratic New Hampshire State Rep. Nick Levasseur. Wheaton called him a “racist a$$hole” and provided a link to NPR.

Here’s the scoop from NPR:

It must be a relief to many that our petty indiscretions, those that appear online and seem to haunt us daily, will soon become so normal as to be irrelevant.

It must be a particular relief to Nick Levasseur, a Democratic New Hampshire state representative, who, according the Huffington Post, used Facebook to offer his rather strong views on anime. Reports failed to record why Levasseur is so pained by the rather beautiful Japanese style of animation.

However, he is reported to have written on his Facebook page these rather difficult words: “Anime is a prime example of why two nukes just wasn’t enough.”

Yes, he really said that.

The Southtown Star reported today that the Village of Matteson layed off 22 employees without warning Tuesday, the result of a reported $2.3 million budget gap. The Matteson Village Board hired financial consulting firm Theobald Associates in April at an estimated cost of over $200,000. Estimates are that the 22 layoffs will save the village $900,000 per year.

This is astounding, and the entire South Suburbs should be very concerned.

From the Southtown Star:

WHO GOT THE AX?

On Tuesday, Matteson laid off 22 village employees in efforts to trim a $2.3 million budget deficit. Those let go included two building inspectors, a building permit technician, two secretaries, a clerk, three administrative assistants, two customer service representatives, a community affairs coordinator, a community affairs assistant, a fire inspector, a community service officer, a building maintenance worker, four park maintenance workers and a park maintenance supervisor.

AFFECTING OPERATIONS

Matteson deputy village administrator Brian Mitchell said the layoffs this week of 22 employees might result in longer waits to pay village bills and the cancellation of some village-sponsored events, such as the Taste of Matteson. Additionally, he said, the firings will affect the village’s ability to plow snow. Although main thoroughfares always will be plowed no matter the time of day, “curb-to-curb” snow removal on the side streets will wait until morning if it snows overnight.

It is of interest that the mayor’s wife, Toni Ashmore, was not let go.

Morale at Matteson Village Hall is understandably low:

Matteson resident Matt Stipek said he witnessed the ugly, post-layoff scene after stopping by village hall Tuesday morning to pick up recycling bags.

“The lady there at the counter was crying, and the other ones looked like they just saw a murder,” he said. “The one lady who was trying to get recycling bags for me was catatonic.”

Matteson is a crucial business hub for surrounding communities. The intersection of Lincoln Highway and Cicero has been a long time coming back. Lincoln Mall is at a crucial juncture right now. The out lots are doing well, but the mall itself needs nurturing and attention.

Just a few years ago, Matteson hosted a “Green Day,” touting the opening of new businesses. Then U.S. Senate candidate Barack Obama was in attendance. Things looked so promising, before the Great Bush Recession.

Matteson residents should be concerned. Crisis necessitates a cohesive board which clearly has the interests of the residents at heart. Matteson’s board has been combative for far too long.

In November, Matteson fired the village administrator, an incredibly stupid move, as I’ve already noted. Haney was clearly not fired for cause.

That leaves politics.

According to some close to the village, the former village administrator would not* give his public blessing to the most recent raise the mayor intended to give his wife, the Director of Community Affairs.  If so, kudos to him.

When Andre Ashmore ran for mayor, he promised that his wife would not be employed long with the village. This week, he told the Star:

“We’re looking at all contracts, services, stuff that we contract out,” Ashmore said. “When I say everything is on the table, everything is on the table.”

Why, then, is the mayor’s wife still employed with the village?

I’m hoping groups of citizens are organizing now, preparing to put good, ethical people on the ballot.  Matteson has not completely disintegrated yet, but it is not now in a good place.

The South Suburbs need Matteson to recover.

* Errata: This posting originally said that the former village administrator would give his blessing to the most recent pay raise the mayor intended to give his wife.  That is incorrect.  We regret the error and we are grateful to a reader for bringing that error to our attention.

Karl Rove, an outspoken defender of traditional marriage and opponent of same-sex marriage, has been granted a divorce of his wife of 24 years.

From the Sun-Times:

According to Politico.com, the man famously referred to as "Bush’s Brain" for his stewardship of President George W. Bush’s successful White House bids, has divorced his wife of 24 years.

Karl Rove, former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush, was granted a divorce from his wife, Darby, in Texas according to family spokesperson Dana Perino, herself a former Bush White House staffer.

“Karl Rove and his wife, Darby, were granted a divorce last week," Politico quotes Perino as saying. "The couple came to the decision mutually and amicably, and they maintain a close relationship and a strong friendship. There will be no further comment, and the family requests that its privacy be respected.”

Privacy. That’s funny, coming from Karl Rove.

I’ll say no more, respecting Darby’s privacy.

But, Karl, we’re just getting started with you.

Thanks to a late-game rally in front of a hostile crowd, the Panthers made a strong case they’ve returned to prominence.

Lewis rushed for 159 yards and a touchdown to move up in the record book and Dan Hutchins kicked a 33-yard field goal with 52 seconds left, giving 17th-ranked Pitt a 19-17 victory over North Carolina on Saturday in the Meineke Car Care Bowl.

Winning 10 games for the first time since the Marino era in 1981, Pitt (10-3) overcame a disappointing loss to Cincinnati three weeks ago that cost it a spot in a BCS bowl.

"It’s back," Lewis said of Pitt football, moments after he was voted bowl MVP. "We’re not satisfied with just 10 wins. We want to get more next year."

The last win in 2009 required a remarkable 17-play drive that lasted nearly 9 minutes, included a key fourth-down conversion, a costly penalty against North Carolina and 13 runs by the dynamic Lewis.

Eclipsing Dorsett’s freshman rushing record of 1,686 yards in the first quarter, Lewis also moved past Craig Heyward into second on the school’s single-season list with 1,799 yards. Dorsett rushed for 2,150 yards in 1976 when he won the Heisman Trophy and Pitt won its last national title.

"It’s tough to describe what Dion has accomplished," coach Dave Wannstedt said. "He’s special."

I am so happy for the University of Pittsburgh. The Panther defense really played a tough game.

My father always reminds me that we were at Pitt Stadium and watched Tony Dorsett run for 303 yards against Notre Dame. Dad tells me I was in the 8th grade, and told him during the game, "I think I’d like to go to Notre Dame." It must have been the band, since the football team lost. Years later, head coach Gerry Faust and I arrived on campus. I played in the band. Faust should have. Thanks to Faust, we didn’t have to play the Victory Clog or the Victory March much during football games. We had more success at basketball and hockey games.

Right. This is about Pitt, right?

Way to go, Panthers! And hats off to Dave Wannstedt. I miss you in Chicago, but it’s good to see fellow guy from Baldwin do so well. Congratulations, coach!

More play-by-play analysis from ESPN.

From the Ron Reagan show on Air America Radio:

Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman has finally realized his life’s goal of becoming America’s foremost exemplar of hypocrisy and moral cowardice… and did I forget to mention dishonesty and small-minded spite? Let’s throw those in the mix as well.

A quick review: three months ago, Lieberman sat down with the Connecticut Post and reiterated his long-standing position that a Medicare buy-in should be available for people 55 to 64 years old

Again, this is something Lieberman has been saying for years: it was central to his health care platform when he was Al Gore’s running mate in 2000 and it was been his position ever since. That is, it was his position until it became part of the Senate’s proposed health care legislation. At that point, the guy who’d made a Medicare buy-in the centerpiece of his health care reform philosophy suddenly morphed into Dr. No.

On CBS last weekend, in one brief outpouring of nausea-inducing self-interest, Lieberman managed to betray assurances he had reportedly given to the Senate leadership and a number of his Senate colleagues; contradict his own oft-stated position; and, just for good measure, attempt to mislead the country about the fiscal consequences of a Medicare buy-in. Contrary to what Lieberman is currently pretending to believe, a buy-in would not, according to the Congressional Budget Office, drive up the deficit.

What’s going on here? Having heard no better explanation, I currently subscribe to what has become the conventional wisdom about the Senate’s selfish pain-in-the-ass-in-chief: Lieberman is still piqued at Democrats for not only abandoning him (for the Democratic candidate) during his near-loss in his 2006 reelection race in Connecticut, but for not backing him as the candidate of choice for the Democratic Presidential nomination back in 2004. Anyone who witnessed his cozy “debate” with Dick Cheney in 2000 will have no trouble imagining why Democrats picked someone else as their standard-bearer.

Lieberman loves campaign cash more than human lives.

Read more here.

The Secret Service is sorry.

Really, really sorry.

Michaele and Tareq Salahi, the Virginia couple who crashed President Obama’s first state dinner, met President Obama.

From the New York Times:

President Obama and his wife, Michelle, had a face-to-face encounter with the couple who sneaked into a state dinner at the White House this week, White House officials acknowledged on Friday. The revelation underscored the seriousness of the security breach and prompted an abject apology from the Secret Service.

A White House spokesman said that the couple, Michaele and Tareq Salahi of Virginia, met and shook hands with the president and the first lady in the receiving line in the Blue Room, as the Obamas greeted each of their 400 invited guests Tuesday night before moving to a tent on the South Lawn for dinner.

That disclosure coincided with a statement from the director of the Secret Service, Mark Sullivan, saying that his agency was “deeply concerned and embarrassed” by the events. Secret Service officials said the agency wanted to interview everyone connected with the episode, including the Salahis, and had not ruled out criminal charges.

“The preliminary findings of our internal investigation have determined established protocols were not followed at an initial checkpoint, verifying that two individuals were on the guest list,” Mr. Sullivan said.

“Although these individuals went through magnetometers and other levels of screening, they should have been prohibited from entering the event entirely,” Mr. Sullivan said. “That failing is ours.”

Again, in our post-9/11-security-hyped world, this just blows me away. After all, the Secret Service didn’t take office for the first time last January.

Where is the sanctimony from the right wing when Rush Limbaugh calls U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu a prostitute? Where is the outrage? Where are the calls for Limbaugh to be fired? Where are the calls for consumers to boycott Limbaugh’s sponsors?

Why the deafening silence from the right?

Related: Why is the Right Silent when Glenn Beck Calls a U.S. Senator a Prostitute?

Yes, it is significant that Glenn Beck beat Rush Limbaugh to the septic tank. Rush is number two — pun intended.

Where is the sanctimony from the right wing when Glenn Beck calls U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu a prostitute? Where is the outrage? Where are the calls for Beck to be fired? Where are the calls for consumers to boycott Beck’s few remaining sponsors?

Why the deafening silence from the right?

From the Huffington Post:

A few days ago, I wrote about Goldman Sachs’s transition from a bank holding company into a public relations disaster machine. I argued that Goldman’s CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, has been behaving like he wants to be attacked by a ferocious mob.

Now, it appears the Catholic church is determined to unseat Blankfein in the "Inexplicably Evil Organization Most Disconnected From Real People" category.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington said Wednesday that it will be unable to continue the social service programs it runs for the District if the city doesn’t change a proposed same-sex marriage law, a threat that could affect tens of thousands of people the church helps with adoption, homelessness and health care.

Yup, that’s right. If gay folk can marry, the Catholic church refuses to feed the homeless.

Well, that all seems very reasonable. After all, the state would force the Catholic church to perform gay marriages, and celebrate the beastly unions, right?

Kilkenny offers a postscript to her article, "In the original article, I wrote that Jesus condemned homosexuality. However, that’s not true. The condemning homosexuality bit is written in Leviticus. Sorry, Jesus." Acutally, Jesus said nothing at all about sex or sexuality beyond his comments regarding marriage fidelity and divorce.

The Washington Post appears to support Kilkenny’s conclusions:

Under the bill, headed for a D.C. Council vote next month, religious organizations would not be required to perform or make space available for same-sex weddings. But they would have to obey city laws prohibiting discrimination against gay men and lesbians.

Fearful that they could be forced, among other things, to extend employee benefits to same-sex married couples, church officials said they would have no choice but to abandon their contracts with the city.

"If the city requires this, we can’t do it," Susan Gibbs, spokeswoman for the archdiocese, said Wednesday. "The city is saying in order to provide social services, you need to be secular. For us, that’s really a problem."

This debate over same-sex marriage is so incredibly heated right now. I understand that the Catholic Church does not support same-sex marriage. How can they possibly use this one issue to justify turning their backs on those very people Christ calls us to serve?

According to the Post article, council members in D.C. don’t seem phased:

The church’s influence seems limited. In separate interviews Wednesday, council member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) referred to the church as "somewhat childish." Another council member, David A. Catania (I-At Large), said he would rather end the city’s relationship with the church than give in to its demands.

"They don’t represent, in my mind, an indispensable component of our social services infrastructure," said Catania, the sponsor of the same-sex marriage bill and the chairman of the Health Committee.

This from council member Phil Mendelson (D-At Large):

"The problem with the individual exemption is anybody could discriminate based on their assertion of religious principle," Mendelson said. "There were many people back in the 1950s and ’60s, during the civil rights era, that said separation of the races was ordained by God."

Allow me to quote Amos the prophet, "Thus says the LORD: For three crimes of Israel, and for four, I will not revoke my word; Because they sell the just man for silver, and the poor man for a pair of sandals. They trample the heads of the weak into the dust of the earth, and force the lowly out of the way." (Amos 2:6-7)

More here from the Washington Post.