(Photo by Reuters)

Today is Alberto Gonzales' last day as Attorney General of the United States.

Who will replace him? Joe Conasen at Salon wonders whether Bush would dare to nominate Ted Olson. Reporter Matt Cooper, who hired Olson for his Supreme Court appeal in PlameGate, praises Olson.

Peter G. points out in the comments here, the valid reasons for not appointing Ted Olson are not his politics, but any lapses in his integrity, principles and competence. Criticism should be leveled at him for his own actions, opinions and choices rather than our opinion of his clients.

In my view, this is fair game:

Via atrios, Pennsylvania Democrat and ertswhile Netroots favorite Joe Sestak has caved in on Iraq:

Rep. Joe Sestak (D., Pa.) . . . said Democratic leaders should set aside their demands for immediate withdrawal "and begin to help author a comprehensive regional security plan that accepts the necessity for a deliberate redeployment."

. . . Sestak has been among those Democrats who think that setting a "date certain" for withdrawal is the best way to force Iraqis to assume more responsibility.

But he now believes the length of time needed to redeploy, and the potential for the entire Army to "unravel" unless troops are redeployed, require a compromise.

Good bargaining there Admiral. So are we going to support primarying Sestak? The Netroots/activist strategy on Iraq in 2007 has been an abject failure.

September 13, 1971 is the date the infamous New York Attica Prison Uprising ended. It began four days earlier when inmates took over the prison to demand better prison conditions. On the 13th, Gov. Nelson Rockefeller ordered authorities to retake the prison, a bloody assault ensued and in all, 43 people were killed.

At 9:46 A.M. on Monday, September 13, 1971 tear gas was dropped into the yard and State Troopers opened fire. By the time the facility was retaken, ten hostages and twenty-nine inmates had been killed. The final death toll from the riot also included the officer fatally injured at the start of the riot and four inmates killed when "inmate justice" was administered. All ten hostages died from gunfire by state troopers and guards.

The New York State Special Commission on Attica wrote, "With the exception of Indian massacres in the late 19th century, the State Police assault which ended the four-day prison uprising was the bloodiest one-day encounter between Americans since the Civil War."

Much more is available at this PBS site.

These were the prisoner's demands:

Update: Here is the text (html) of President Bush's speech.

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President Bush will be addressing the nation on Iraq tonight at 9pm ET. Here's a preview of what he is going to say.

There are 168,000 troops currently in Iraq. His plan to bring some home will leave us at about the same level as in January, before the "surge."

That's not a withdrawal plan either party should accept. As for responses by the Democratic candidates:

Hillary Clinton sent this letter to Bush.

What you are planning to tell the American people tomorrow night is that one year from now, there will be the same number of troops in Iraq as there were one year ago. Mr. President, that is simply too little too late, and unacceptable to this Congress, and to the American people who have made clear their strong desire to bring our troops home, and end this war.

John Edwards will have a two minute ad on MSNBC on the inadequacy of Bush's Iraq plan following the speech. Excerpts from the ad are here.

More...

Sex offender registration laws provide the illusion of safety while satisfying society's unfortunate urge to continue punishing offenders who have already paid their debt to society, but growing evidence suggests that the laws are actually counterproductive.

Laws requiring widespread public notification of past crimes and restricting where such sex offenders can live have not been shown to reduce the number of new sex crimes, the report says, but rather shun former sex offenders and may be driving them underground.

A new report by Human Rights Watch examines registration laws and their legislative cousins, residency restriction laws. From an HRW summary:

Kos:

There's the Dodd approach:

What was clear to me before, and what should be abundantly clear to my colleagues after today, is that this President is not going to change course unless we force him to. There is only one way to do that - we must set a clear, hard and fast deadline for redeployment and, in order to enforce it, that deadline must be tied to funding.

And then there's the Obama approach:

Despite the unpopularity of the Iraq war, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama predicted Thursday that Congress won't directly challenge President Bush's plans and will focus instead on putting a ceiling on the number of troops deployed to that country.

Which senator is showing leadership, and which one is preemptively capitulating?

I'll answer the rhetorical question - Chris Dodd is leading. Obama is preemptively capitulating.

Marcy at Next Hurrah and Looseheadprop at Firedoglake are discussing the invitation to comment on whether plea agreements should be removed from PACER and public access to them denied.

Here's the notice and comments are being accepted until October 26.

I haven’t decided how I feel about removing access to plea agreements yet. As a blogger, I’d like them to stay up. As a defense lawyer, it’s probably better that access be restricted.

But it’s important to note they are only considering limiting access to a single document, a plea agreement. All other pleadings would remain accessible.

Here's an argument for restricting access to them:

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Even before his dubious and much debated connection to the Arkansas Project and Richard Mellon Scaife, Ted Olson had issues. Big issues.

Check out David Neiwert's Salon article from May, 2001 when he ran into Judiciary Committee opposition during his confirmation process for Solicitor General.

In the mid-1980s, he became the focus of an independent counsel's investigation for much the same thing: giving misleading testimony to Congress -- some charged it was perjury -- that was intended to cover up his own misbehavior.

A careful examination of that episode raises serious questions about not merely his integrity but the legendary legal prowess to which even his critics defer. Indeed, the last time Olson served as a top presidential legal counselor, he left behind a political disaster area strewn with bad legal advice, wrecked careers and lingering scandals.

Harsh words, but read the article and decide for yourselves.

Instapundit has a podcast up of an interview with Jack Goldsmith, formerly of the Office of Legal Counsel and one of those who balked at Dick Cheney, David Addington and Alberto Gonzales' attempt to stretch the NSA wiretapping program past what he and James Comey and others believed to be the legal limits.

It was Goldsmith who was responsible for withdrawing John Yoo's torture memo.

Goldsmith's new book discusses, among other things, what went on behind the scenes with Ashcroft, Gonzales and the NSA wiretapping program.

Book details are available here.

Norman Hsu left the hospital in Grand Junction last night. He was transferred to the Mesa, CO county jail where he will be advised by video this afternoon.

There are no charges in Colorado pending against him. The only warrant is the San Mateo, California warrant on which California is seeking to extradite him. A hearing on the extradition request likely will be scheduled at the advisement.

The Mesa County District Attorney will ask that Hsu's bond be set at $4 million.

The Wall St. Journal reports that Hsu mailed a suicide note to acquaintances and some organizations before boarding the train to Grand Junction, including the Innocence Project. Hsu had been a big contributor to the Innocence Project.

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Senator Chris Dodd was interviewed by Keith Olbermann tonight and discussed his views on Iraq and his new book, Letters From Nuremberg, a collection of letters from his father, Senator Thomas Dodd, who worked with Justice Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg trials.

This is Senator Dodd at his finest. I strongly urge you to watch the interview. Of special interest is Dodd's discussion of his father's letters, which he describes as "epistles to this generation."

Denver journalist and CBS legal analyst Andrew Cohen was one of a small group of journalists permitted to tour the Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado yesterday. It was the first time journalists have been afforded the opportunity.

He didn't get to see the prison's most infamous prisoners like Terry Nichols or Richard Reid, the "shoe bomber" but he saw and heard enough to write an interesting article. Some highlights:

We saw cement desks and bed frames and stainless steel toilets and sinks. We saw cages—straight out of the circus—where inmates who are going along with the warden’s “program” are allowed to “recreate” outside for about 10 hours a week. We saw that the windows in the cells are only a few inches wide and all look inward toward the other windows of other cells. No one has a view of the beautiful Rocky Mountains which surround the facility in the southern portion of Colorado.

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