I'm off to D.C. this morning for the Scooter Libby trial. Until I get my internet access back, here's another open thread for you.

The pleadings flew hot and heavy this weekend over whether Andrea Mitchell will testify at the Scooter Libby trial. Fitzgerald's latest is here and Libby's is here.

Fitzgerald is trying to block Mitchell's testimony. He doesn't want Libby to question her about this statement that she made on Capitol Report on October 3, 2003.

MURRAY: And the second question is: Do we have any idea how widely known it was in Washington that Joe Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA?

MITCHELL: It was widely known among those of us who cover the intelligence community and who were actively engaged in trying to track down who among the foreign service community was the envoy to Niger. So a number of us began to pick up on that. But frankly I wasn’t aware of her actual role at the CIA and the fact that she had a covert role involving weapons of mass destruction, not until Bob Novak wrote it.

Andrea Mitchell has since disavowed the statement, saying she was confused, or it was taken out of context, or she was just wrong. Here's one of her explanations:

I'm leaving Sunday to go back to Washington for week one of the Defense case in the Scooter Libby trial. Thanks to Arianna and Huffington Post, I have a media room pass and will be live-blogging the testimony at Huffpo and providing analysis there and here, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

I'm excited to be going back. Covering the trial from Denver this past week just wasn't the same as being there. I'm also scheduled to return Feb. 20 - 22 for MediaBloggers, if the trial is still going on.

The only downside is the expense, particularly staying in a hotel this trip as the Plame House is full. If you passed on contributing to my first trip, but liked my coverage, it would be great if you'd throw a few dollars in the pot. Here's how.

If you'd rather donate anonymously, please use Amazon here.

T.Chris is in New York this weekend but will be back blogging on other topics next week, and Big Tent Democrat and some diarists may be around, so we won't be all Libby, all the time.

This post will stay on top for a day, but scroll down, there's lots of new posts.

The New York Times Magazine has a feature article on the death penalty, The Needle and The Damage Done.

Lethal injection challenges are now underway in almost every state with a death penalty.

As a result of those cases, about 12 of the 38 states that have the death penalty have issued temporary bans on executions, and in one, New Jersey, a legislative commission recently recommended abolishing its death penalty altogether.

A very young Neil Young.

How do you know when you visit a business' web site that glowing blog comments aren't written by the business and passed off as coming from a consumer? You don't. Britain is set to do something about it.

Hotels, restaurants and online shops that post glowing reviews about themselves under false identities could face criminal prosecution under new rules that come into force next year.

Businesses which write fake blog entries or create whole wesbites purporting to be from customers will fall foul of a European directive banning them from “falsely representing oneself as a consumer”. From December 31, when the change becomes law in the UK, they can be named and shamed by trading standards or taken to court.

Naming and shaming will also be used.

I have been extremely critical of the push from many to have the Congress concentrate on stopping the commencement of war in Iran instead of ending the war in Iraq. My basic premise is that Bush's only possible legal rationale for initiating a military conflict with Iran is by arguing that Iran is interfering in the Iraq conflict. As I have stated, the 2002 Iraq AUMF is a blank check to the President and could conceivably be argued as the basis for striking Iran based on Iran's alleged involvement in Iraq. Not surprisingly, the Bush Administration is indeed arguing that Iran is meddling in the Iraq conflict:

The most lethal weapon directed against American troops in Iraq is an explosive-packed cylinder that United States intelligence asserts is being supplied by Iran. . . . Any assertion of an Iranian contribution to attacks on Americans in Iraq is both politically and diplomatically volatile. The officials said they were willing to discuss the issue to respond to what they described as an increasingly worrisome threat to American forces in Iraq, and were not trying to lay the basis for an American attack on Iran.

Riiiiiiight. So, is it even possible to say now that a war with Iran does NOT run through Iraq? One normally would say no BUT the drive for Congressional action on Iran may actually blunder into actually declaring the President CAN attack Iran without Congressional approval, depsite the fact that this is just plain wrong.

You Tube has been on a witch hunt lately, removing copyrighted videos. To me, the real value of You Tube has been the music videos. I just checked my saved favorites list, and 10 (of 27) are no longer available. That totally devalues You Tube for me.

It's not just music either, it's also television segments they are removing.

Thank goodness for John Amato of Crooks and Liars who posts the tv videos on his own servers.

Politics TV will also be hosting their own stuff.

Thanks to Tom Maguire for pointing this out. After Judith Miller's testimony, Libby lawyer Ted Wells told the judge he would be moving for a judgment of acquittal on a count pertaining to her. He didn't explain it at the time. Neil Lewis of the New York Times writes:

The Libby defense won a victory of sorts when Judge Reggie B. Walton agreed to exclude part of one of the five felony counts against Mr. Libby. But it remained unclear whether the change, which was not contested by the prosecutors, would matter in jury deliberations.

Tom picks out the part that will be deleted:

Barack Obama's in. A crowd of 5,000 is expected in Springfield, Ill as he makes his announcement.

For Obama, the nation's only black senator, it's an opportunity to compare his political message to that of Abraham Lincoln, another former Illinois legislator who stood in the same building and warned of the dangers of national division.

Obama's website will be running live streaming coverage of the announcement.

What holds 400 illegal immigrants from 30 countries, 170 of them children? The T. Don Hutto Family Detention Center, for which the Corrections Corporation of America receives $2.8 million per month.

A jail by any other name is still a jail. A detention camp is still a detention camp. That the prisoners wear scrubs instead of orange jumpsuits or pink underwear doesn't change a thing.

The Government invited the media today. Surprise, for the first time there was pizza on the menu. How humane. They brought in plastic potted plants to warm up the place. The Government says its more like a community college than a jail.

What a farce. Can the "students" leave? Of course not. It's a jail.

More...

I haven't been following the case of Lt. Ehren Watada, the soldier who refused to deploy to Iraq because he believes the war to be illegal and immoral, who proceeded to a courts martial trial this week, only to have the judge declare a mistrial at the prosecution's request after it had presented its witnesses.

What was up with that? Here's one view. And another.

And a place to discuss it.