Cannibal trial concludes:

A self-confessed cannibal who killed and ate a man he had met over the internet was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison by a German court today, after being cleared of murder but found guilty of manslaughter.
The court, in the central German town of Kassel, ruled that Armin Meiwes, a 42-year-old computer expert, had no “base motives” in the crime, a decision that spared him a murder conviction.
Meiwes, from the nearby town of Rotenburg, had confessed in detail to the March 2001 killing of 43-year-old Bernd J�rgen Brandes and to eating his flesh when his trial opened last month.
Prosecutors branded Meiwes a “human butcher” who acted simply to “satisfy a sexual impulse”, and had sought a life sentence for murder.
But his lawyer, Harald Ermel, successfully argued that the death was “homicide on demand” – a form of mercy killing – because the victim had given his consent to be killed and eaten.
. . .
Meiwes’s willing cooperation during the trial had helped shed light on the murky world of online cannibals, and his case was not an isolated one, police disclosed last month. He estimated that there are at least 800 active participants in cannibal forums, and said he was in contact with at least 400 of them.

A few days after the government estimated this year’s deficit would be $477 billion, the Bush administration now says it will be $520 billion. In a related story, we are still trying to get a hold of what the Medicare reform bill costs. Just two months after it was signed, the White House now concedes the 10-year cost will be at least $134 billion more than the initial $400 billion estimate. That’s a 33% discrepancy before the first pill is dispensed. Who knows what it will be in a few years.

Administration officials would not explain the precise reason for the discrepancy. White House spokesman Trent Duffy said putting a price tag on Medicare “is a terrifically difficult area to try to predict” that hinges on “any number of unknowns,” including how many older Americans buy the drug coverage, how much pharmaceutical prices rise and how many people on Medicare switch to private health plans, as the law encourages.
“The bottom line is, President Bush made a commitment to give seniors a prescription drug benefit and modernize Medicare, and he’s delivered,” Duffy said.

This has become the standard operating method in the federal government lately–buy now, figure out the cost later. Recall that it took months for the Bush administration to come up with the first rebuilding cost estimate after we invaded Iraq. And the bills will surely keep coming.
Is this how a responsible government operates?

Military leaders promise that this year we really will catch Osama bin Forgotten:

“We have a variety of intelligence and we’re sure we’re going to catch Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar this year,” [U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Bryan] Hilferty said. “We’ve learned lessons from Iraq and we’re getting improved intelligence from the Afghan people.”

I wonder why didn’t decide to do this two years ago.
Oh, we had to go after the weapons of mass destruction . . . or whatever it was we were going after.

Jake Rosenfeld points out that the Management Labor Department’s proposed overtime reclassification scheme is so broadly written that employers have already started arguing that armed services veterans should be exempt from overtime pay.
Bush cutting overtime pay for vets? Nice.

Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen has stated that he won’t officially endorse any of the presidential candidate’s for the state’s Democratic primary.
Unsatisfied with this stance, I contacted the Governor’s Office, offering a compelling argument why he should issue a strong statement of support for Senator Edwards.
The Governor’s Constituent Service Office responded thusly:

Thank you for taking the time to contact the Governor and his office. Unfortunately, at this time the Governor has decided not to publicly endorse any one candidate. We are open and welcome to all the candidates coming to visit Tennessee.

Alas.
Come on, Governor. Tennessee Democrats want a winner on the ticket this fall!