Meanwhile...

The attempts to protect big biz and starve the government of all possible sources of revenue continue. From AP/Yahoo via CookieJill @ Skippy: Head of Gov't Tobacco Trial Team Quits:

The head of the government trial team in a landmark lawsuit against the tobacco industry pulled out of the litigation Wednesday amid a probe of whether high-level political influence was brought to bear in the case.

Sharon Eubanks, who had aggressively pursued the racketeering case against the tobacco industry, is withdrawing effective Thursday, the government said in a one-sentence filing in U.S. District Court.
...
Eubanks' withdrawal follows a stunning reversal in June in which the Justice Department disregarded the recommendations of its own witness -- Dr. Michael Fiore -- and reduced the amount it was demanding from the tobacco industry for smoking cessation to $10 billion. Fiore had proposed $130 billion.

For some financial perspective, the budget cuts passed in the House two weeks ago -- the ones that slash Medicare and other services for the poor -- would save $50 billion.

We need to keep in mind that even as we are winning the war over the Republican agenda in the public arena, they are still succeeding on a number of fronts in their quest to protect big oil, big tobacco, big media, etc. 2006 is a long way off.