New York Times Takes Issue With House Petraeus Hearing

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Laying Down the Law

When anti-war protesters dressed in pink costumes repeatedly disrupted the House hearing with General Petraeus on Monday, screaming that the general was a liar and resisting when po lice dragged them out, Armed Services Committee chairman Ike Skelton said they would not only be kicked out, but prosecuted.

That was too much for The New York Times, which declared in an editorial that while ordering them out of the room was, "understandable," but having them prosecuted, "seemed like an unnecessarily authoritarian response to people who just wanted to be heard."

Enemy Within?

One anti-war liberal Democrat is turning on members of her own party, calling on left-wing activists to go after moderate House Democrats, even if it costs the party the majority.

Activist Rabbi Michael Lerner has released the transcript of a private conference call with anti-war groups that included California Democratic Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey. She called on activists to go target what she called "the moderate Democrats who are holding up the whole thing."

She endorsed primary challenges and said "I'd hate to lose the majority, but I'm telling you if we don't stand up to our responsibility, maybe that's the lesson to be learned."

Sounding Off

Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich has said on Syrian TV in Syria that the U.S. presence in Iraq is an illegal occupation and that it was, "based on lies" and "dishonest and crooked from the beginning."

Kucinich is touring the Middle East, which included a stop in Syria where he told a Syrian TV interviewer that he was honored to have the chance to meet with Syrian leader Bashar Assad, whom he said should be "respected and appreciated" for his role as a peacemaker.

Dangerous Behavior

A middle school art teacher in suburban Chicago says he plans to ask the local state's attorney to file child endangerment charges against his school, because it promotes milk and other animal products as part of a healthy diet.

The Chicago Tribune reports Dave Warwak was removed from his classroom for encouraging students not to eat meat and refusing to stop discussing animal cruelty issues with the children. Now Warwak says he won't return to his job while there are posters in the cafeteria promoting milk.

He says, "I can't really see working there as long as those milk posters are up and they keep feeding poison to the kids."

—FOX News Channel's Martin Hill contributed to this report.