Ed Kilgore responds to my take on Iraq/Iran priorities:

I see no particular evidence that congressional Dems are folding their tents on Iraq. . . . As for the initial question of how progressive bloggers should think about these tangled questions, I don't quite see how worrying about a new war keeps anyone from stopping the old one . . . So let a few bloggers try to walk and chew gum at the same time.

Today, the level headed blogger at TPM says:

The 'surge' and the accompanying political jousting surrounding it is important. But it pales in importance compared to the possibility of drifting or getting gamed into a shooting war with Iran. This is what Congress really needs to get on top of right now.

You were saying Ed? Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi said:

And [Pelosi] told lawmakers that "if it appears likely that Bush wants to take the country to war against Iran, the House would take up a bill to deny him the authority to do so," the Post quoted Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly as saying.

At least Tom Vilsack has his priorities straight. Because our level headed bloggers have taken the bait.

Seven hours of Scooter Libby's grand jury testimony is now being played for the jury. Swopa is live-blogging over at Firedoglake.

Fitzgerald filed transcripts of these 20 pages (pdf) of his testimony as an exhibit in May, 2006. His argument to go along with the transcripts is here.

Start with page 4 and the section, "The Annotated Wilson Op Ed is Relevant to Establish that Defendant’s Immediate Superior Was Concerned that Mr. Wilson Was Sent on a Junket by his Wife, and Communicated His Concern to Defendant."

Fitz will use this section as context for Russert being his closing witness, after the tape playing is finished. Fitz writes Libby told the grand jury

Tom Vilsack, current Presidential candidate and former Iowa Governor AND DLC Chairman has called for an immediate cutoff of Iraq war funding:

Congress has the constitutional responsibility and a moral duty to cut off funding for the status quo," said Vilsack. "Not a cap — an end. Not eventually — immediately."

Kudos to Tom Vilsack. He has earned my respect and my attention.

Actor Ryan O'Neal was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon over the weekend. He had been out with former girlfriend Farrah Fawcett, celebrating her 60th birthday and her recent diagnosis she is now cancer free.

Son Griffin and his pregnant girlfriend were home when they returned. According to Ryan, Griffin attacked with a fire poker, grazing him and hitting his girlfriend in the head. He fled upstairs and got his gun, heard Griffin approaching and fired a shot into the bannister.

So, if Ryan's version is accurate, he gets arrested for assault with a deadly weapon for aiming at a bannister (not his son) and Griffin, who assaulted his pregnant girlfriend with a fire poker, requiring brief hospitalization, doesn't get arrested?

Stay tuned.

Rudy Giuliani has taken the next step towards a presidential run.

In a sign that he's serious about running for the White House, the two-term mayor was filing a so-called "statement of candidacy" with the Federal Election Commission. In the process, he was eliminating the phrase "testing the waters" from earlier paperwork establishing his exploratory committee, said an official close to Giuliani's campaign.

Update: Kevin Drum and Atrios weigh in.

Following legal arguments this morning in the Scooter Libby trial, the Judge ruled Libby's seven hours of grand jury testimony that will be played to the jury can be released to the media. Thanks to Swopa, who is live-blogging the trial for Firedoglake and Maine Web Report which is live-blogging for Media Bloggers Association for today's trial updates.

The Washington Post reports on the arguments and ruling here.

He's also admitting the two newspaper articles from the Washington Post to show Libby's state of mind.

Update: Wells scores one on cross: FBI Agent Deborah Bond's notes do not match her testimony about what Libby said about Ari Fleischer. He did not "adamantly" deny telling him about Valerie Plame's employment. She admits that denial is not in her notes and she should have used a different word than "adamently."

Mistaken eyewitness identification is the largest cause of wrongful convictions. New Mexico has a bill pending that would greatly reduce the chances of misidentification. A hearing is scheduled today on the bill.

Under the proposed regulations, an eyewitness must provide a written description before a lineup takes place; there must be at least six individuals in a live lineup and 10 photos in a photographic line-up; and the members of the lineup must be shown sequentially rather than simultaneously.

The bill would also restrict the amount of time in which law enforcement could bring a suspect by for a physical identification by a victim or witness to within one hour after the crime was reported. Anything beyond one hour would require a lineup with multiple photos or people....

Innocence Project co-director Barry Scheck explains in this letter (pdf) why the bill is so critical to justice.

The bill is Senate Bill 5. You can read the text here.

The Bush Administration knows no bounds when it comes to violating our civil liberties. Here's the latest:

The Justice Department is completing rules to allow the collection of DNA from most people arrested or detained by federal authorities, a vast expansion of DNA gathering that will include hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, by far the largest group affected.

The new forensic DNA sampling was authorized by Congress in a little-noticed amendment to a January 2006 renewal of the Violence Against Women Act, which provides protections and assistance for victims of sexual crimes. The amendment permits DNA collecting from anyone under criminal arrest by federal authorities, and also from illegal immigrants detained by federal agents.

Arrestees who have not been convicted of a crime should not be required to have their DNA sampled and collected. It's just the latest step down the slippery slope of over-intrusion into our privacy without just cause.

As Innocence Project co-director Peter Neufeld points out:

What a tragic story. Orlando Valle, 35, who worked in the mailroom at the New York Public Libary, was celebrating his birthday with family at the trendy nightclub BED in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.

The maitre-d'/ manager is 43 year old Granville Adams, who played Muslim inmate leader Zahir Arif on HBO's prison series "Oz."

[Valle] got into a scuffle with Adams and was thrown against the elevator with such force that the doors opened and he plunged four stories to his death, cops said.

Adams was arrested and charged with criminally negligent homicide.

Sentencing Law and Policy reports on New Jersey's proposed plan to abolish the death penalty.

When a state commission recommended last month that New Jersey abolish the death penalty in favor of life imprisonment without parole, some lawmakers called it the latest example of going soft on crime. But a Star-Ledger analysis of trials since August 1982, when capital punishment was reinstated, shows scores of murderers would have been punished more harshly under the life-without-parole bill proposed by the Death Penalty Study Commission.

Here's what's wrong with the bill:

Here's the transcript from this morning's Reliable Sources on CNN in which Howard Kurtz, Slate's John Dickerson, Newsweek's Michael Isikoff and I discuss the Libby trial in the context of what it says about journalists.

On today's edition of CNN's "Reliable Sources," Howard Kurtz spoke about journalists and the Scooter Libby trial. Joining him were John Dickerson, Slate’s chief political correspondent; Michael Isikoff, Newsweek investigative correspondent; and Jeralyn Merritt, a defense attorney and blogger.

Using electronic monitoring and tight supervision, California could tackle the crisis of overcrowded prisons by returning nonviolent offenders (including nonviolent drug offenders) to to their homes. Instead, the state announced a "temporary" plan to ship inmates to other states, removing them from the families and support systems that are critical to rehabilitation.

The plan, which inmate advocates say is illegal and might be challenged in court, calls for transferring as many as 5,000 inmates to private facilities in Arizona, Oklahoma and Mississippi, beginning as early as April 2. First to go would be illegal immigrants already scheduled to be deported after serving their sentences, and low-risk offenders.

To entice prisoners to volunteer for a transfer, the state touts the comparatively luxurious conditions available in distant prisons, including access to ESPN. Reminding inmates that California prison conditions are crappy hardly seems like a sound prison management strategy. In any event, the recruitment program failed, forcing the state to transfer large numbers of inmates against their will.