Unfortunately with work and life and all it's a slow process. But hopefully though this place will be back in some fashion before too long. Once we've decided on a format things should liven up again. We'll still be posting, of course, just not up to the minute headlines.

Tired of its staid image, the 106-strong group has spent £25,000 printing 40,000 copies of Operation Red Dragon, a cartoon storybook depicting the glamorous and daring life of "Elisa Correr", the personification of the "new breed" of "exciting" Liberal Euro-MP. While real parliamentarians fret about whether an amendment to the latest European Union directive might offend the committee chairman, the fictitious Miss Correr is ready to torpedo inter-continental trade deals or take on hit men for the sake of her principles.

Cosy compromises are just not her style, especially when her boyfriend Tony, a British photo-journalist, is being held prisoner by a renegade oriental general.

In one sequence of the 38-page giveaway, a scantily-clad Elisa is taken aback to find her boyfriend hiding in the wardrobe of her hotel room during a trade mission to "Dong Fang", a country easily recognisable as China. "I had to see you, Elisa, but in private," he says, passing her photographs proving that an EU arms embargo is being flouted.

"Come back with me!" she pleads. "They won't let me leave," he replies, "I'll have to chance my luck." The two depart after a lingering kiss.

After threatening to scupper the trade deal - and fighting off an assassination attempt - she forces her boyfriend's release, winning the praise of a Dong Fang counterpart who marvels at her courage. "It's not courage, Mr Li. Just a few principles," she responds.

Yet, in real life, who is the real "villain" the EU is persuing?

The closest the Liberal group has to a real-life Elisa Correr is said to be Sophia in t'Veld, the glamorous 43-year-old Dutch Euro-MP known for her tenacious pursuit of a civil liberties agenda.

But how do the 12 British members of the group match up to the new James Bond image? Group leader Graham Watson says that Baroness Ludford, "while not quite as young", is probably the most dynamic. The 55-year-old has been a key mover in the parliament's fight for the US to recognise its CIA "rendition" flights over Europe.

In a nutshell, that was Super Bowl XLI. Right?

Ah, wait a second. The New York Times's "purple monkey dishwasher" somehow got onto the end there, pay it no mind.

No word yet on show times, or if this is really just some type of Alliance MySpace deception.

TODAY is set to be the most miserable day of the year, a psychologist has claimed.

January 22 emerged as the worst date when common reasons for the blues were totted up.

Dr Cliff Arnalls’ formula takes into account things like Christmas debt, fading memories of holidays, failing New Year resolutions and lack of daylight.

And last night GPs’ spokesman Dr Alan Cohen agreed.

He said: “We see lots of people with depression and anxiety in winter but they do get better.”

In any event, should you choose to partake in today's depression, they have provided everyone with an actual math formula that, in addition to explaining your behavior, may also be used to ward off concerned friends, employers, or any responsibilities for the rest of the day.

Should that formula not work, you might try using this as a last resort. But, you didn't get that from us.

Bullfighters, and the bulls they were supposed to be fighting, have been banned from a bull-taming festival in India for being drunk.

The animals and their human opponents were breath tested – as a safety precaution.

'Seven bulls and four men were disqualified during tests to detect consumption of alcohol or other banned substances,' said district collector T. Udayachandran.

"The president knows that because the troops are in harm's way, that we won't cut off the resources. That's why he's moving so quickly to put them in harm's way," Pelosi said on ABC's "Good Morning America."

When asked whether she thought the president manipulated the deployments to avoid congressional action, Pelosi said she hoped he did not but thought "he could have told us about it sooner. ... We found out about it as the troops were going in."

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino retorted that lawmakers are involved in a "sound bite war" against Bush, counter to Democrats' promises of bipartisanship.

"Those particular comments were poisonous," Perino said. "I think questioning the president's motivations and suggesting that he, for some political reason, is rushing troops into harm's way, is not appropriate, it is not correct, and it is unfortunate because we do have troops in harm's way."

For whatever the military merits of the plan, it is a plan, which is a site more than any Democrat could put forward. And this sad display of "non-binding" resolutions, where they can make all the noise and take none of the responsibility (especially after each and every one of them who voted for the war suddenly decided to cry foul so they could save their political ass), is really quite a sickening display.

It seems the annual White House Correspondence Association dinner is about to roll around again, and the comedy entertainment (this time Rich Little) this year has been put on notice by the Association that they're drawing the line at Iraq and "knocking" the President.

Lots of bloggers on the left side of the sphere are going ballistic over this decision, as they're still peeing themselves watching Stephen Colbert's performance from last year. Yet the same man who chose Colbert last year made the choice for the entertainment this year.

Sound like a reactionary pick after Colbert's edginess? Sort of the Beltway version of booking ex-Beatle Paul McCartney to play the Super Bowl halftime show the year after Janet Jackson flashed the breast that inspired a thousand letter-writing campaigns?

Decidedly not, said Correspondents Association President Steve Scully, who booked both Colbert and Little.

"I thought Colbert was great. I loved him," Scully said, adding that he didn't field any complaints from the White House, Bush included, about Colbert's performance. "Those who didn't like him, didn't get his brand of humor because they don't see his show."

Scully's mantra for booking the annual event: "Somebody who singes, but doesn't burn. Somebody who is funny and will make fun of the White House, but won't cross the line."

Radio DJ Don Imus crossed the line 13 years ago when he mocked President Bill Clinton and first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, said Scully, a senior executive producer at C-SPAN.

"You have 3,000 people in the room, and what my approach on this was, you want to have somebody who can cut across generational lines and who is funny," Scully said. "And Rich Little is funny."

Little said organizers of the event made it clear they don't want a repeat of last year's controversial appearance by Stephen Colbert, whose searing satire of President Bush and the White House press corps fell flat and apparently touched too many nerves.

"They got a lot of letters," Little said Tuesday.

The left seems obsessed with making Bush pay for "his war" in Iraq, and as the Democrats in office have revealed that they're not going to throw their majority away for a chance at an impeachment hearing, it seems that this and every other public event is supposed to be some kind of opportunity to put the President on trial. The Association appears to have decided that this is not their objective for the evening.

But so far we have to say we've been pleasantly surprised that they're following through so strongly. First was the raid just hours after the President's speech, and now this:

The U.S. military has launched a special operations task force to break up Iranian influence in Iraq, according to U.S. News sources. The special operations mission, known as Task Force 16, was created late last year to target Iranians trafficking arms and training Shiite militia forces. The operation is modeled on Task Force 15, a clandestine cadre of Navy SEALs, Army Delta Force soldiers, and CIA operatives with a mission to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives and Baathist insurgents in Iraq.

Task Force 15 killed al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi, last June.

The new classified directive is part of an escalation of military countermeasures against Iran, authorized by President Bush, to strike back at what military officials describe as a widespread web of Iranian influence in Iraq that includes providing weapons, training, and money to Shiite militias.

"It's present, and the issue is how do you deal with it," says a senior U.S. military official. "That's the question of the day. Those networks are something you've got to deal with. You've got to figure out, bottom line, who plans them, who finances them, who brings stuff across the borders."

U.S. military officials have been tracing the growth of Iranian influence through the increased use of Iranian-made explosively formed projectiles (or EFPs) as roadside bombs. When this particularly deadly and distinct variation on the improvised explosive device detonates, it melts and reshapes metal, turning it into what is essentially a deadly dart that punches through a humvee's armor plates.

"When the EFPs start popping up, we know, oh, that's Iran, that's Shia," says one U.S. special operations officer who served in Iraq. A senior American commander in Baghdad adds that the military has been able to trace numbers and manufacture dates back to Iran.

And the use of weapons like EFPs, say soldiers on the ground in Iraq, is spreading.

"They were initially used just down south, where Iran has a lot of influence," says the officer. Now they are moving into Baghdad and areas north of the city as well. "That is a change. If you follow the track of them, it also follows the track of Iranian influence."

In the restive province of Diyala, what has long been a transit point for goods and trafficked arms flowing across the border with Iran, U.S. military operatives have intercepted donkeys carrying Russian antitank mines and other weapons. Iran uses "a certain type of mortar," adds the special operations officer. "We can look at it and say, 'This comes from Iran.' "

The myth persists in some media circles that the federal budget deficit is "surging" or ballooning or something terrible -- all of which is served up as ammunition for those in Congress who want a tax increase. At the risk of being drummed out of the guild, we thought you'd rather have the real story.

The deficit has in fact declined by some $165 billion over the past two fiscal years, and according to the most recent data has continued to fall in the first quarter of fiscal 2007. The latest Treasury estimates for January show that tax receipts in December were $18 billion higher than a year earlier, helping to boost the budget surplus for the month to $40 billion, up from $11 billion a year ago. December is typically a good month for revenues due to year-end tax payments.

Meanwhile, for the first three months of fiscal 2007 through December, revenues climbed 8.1%, building on double-digit revenue increases in the previous two years. Corporate income taxes were up a remarkable 22.2% in the first fiscal quarter, showing that the government continues to grab a nice chunk of the rising business profits that so many of our politicians like to deplore. Individual income taxes rose 8.8%, thanks to strong wage and salary growth. Much of this revenue comes from "the rich," believe it or not.

In the most surprising budget news, federal spending was nearly flat in the first fiscal quarter. This was despite a 22.1% increase in Medicare spending due largely to the new prescription drug benefit, and a 10.7% increase in defense.