just in case we all forgot

(I guess it isn't vacation time, and time for loony attack ads in that part of the globe.) Thanks and a tip of the hat to Mr. Linkins and the Washington Independent.

• Here's another one for your Stuff You'll Be Surprised No One's Talking About file, a story from the Washington Independent, "Taliban, al Qaeda Unchecked in Pakistan." Note the word Taliban! That's right people, they are getting the band back together!
• Here's the mothereffing lede!

• Al Qaeda and the Taliban are executing suspected U.S. informants in Pakistan in a campaign to terrorize potential spies and reinforce the authority of the militant organizations across the country's vast and volatile tribal belt.

• I mean: wow. If I had Robert Gates across the room from me, this is the sort of KABOOM I'd lay on the man, if i were a reporter!
• Here's a pull that Spencer Ackerman highlighted in his tout of this piece:

• CIA operatives are shackled by a Pakistan restriction requiring them to work under its ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence - the largest intelligence organization in Pakistan] directorate, according to Keller and other former agents. CIA and ISI relations have been marred by mutual distrust in recent years. U.S. intelligence is particularly concerned that ISI elements are sympathetic to the Taliban -- if not Al Qaeda.

• Brother, there is your state sponsorship of al Qaeda Nation, right there! I mean to tell you people, there are few predictions that I am willing to make in this life. I'm not a betting man by nature. But if we are ever so lucky to get some sort of final analysis done on our post 9/11 partnership with Pakistan, it is going to come out that the ISI was, at all times, LOUSY with not just al Qaeda sympathizers, but with de facto agents of al Qaeda as well. (Jason Linkins, HuffPost Reporting From DC, "TV SoundOff: Sunday Talking Heads," August 17, 2008)