January 11 is the International Day to Shut Down Guantanamo. There will be protests all over the world, including England, Australia and Holland. In the US major protests will take place in Washington DC and New York City, plus dozens of cities throughout the country, including outside the US Southern Command in Miami.

The biggest may be this:

On January 9-13, a first-ever international delegation of former prisoners, families of current prisoners, US lawyers and human rights activists will travel to Guantanamo, Cuba to hold a conference on prison abuses and march to the Cuban-side security gate of the US Naval Base to call for the closure of the illegal prison. The protest in Cuba is part of the January 11 International Day to Shut Down Guantanamo, the day that marks the 5-year anniversary of the first prisoners being sent to Guantanamo.

Whether the Rudy Giuliani campaign memo was misplaced or purloined, that's not the point. Nor is the point the content of the memo. Newsweek explains.

The real problem for Giuliani isn’t the missing binder itself, it’s that it went missing in the first place. Giuliani’s candidacy, after all, will be centered around his expertise in security, order and efficiency.

“It’s hard to say you’re staying up all hours thinking about every unplugged hole in the homeland-security infrastructure when you can’t even keep track of your own documents,” said one Republican strategist who asked not to be identified because he has yet to affiliate with a presidential candidate.

There's an even deeper problem developing surrounding Giuliani, one concerning his arrogance.

In honor of our incoming Democratic majority in Congress.... Democracy, written by Leonard Cohen and performed by Don Henley in 1993 at President Clinton's MTV Inaugural Ball.

You'll need to turn your audio up. I recorded this from a VHS I made back in 1993 to a dvd, then converted it on the computer and uploaded it to YouTube. They all took their toll but if you turn the volume up, it's just great.

• Digby has the latest chilling details on the Jose Padilla case.

• Jane, Christy and the Firedoglake gang got a coveted press pass (with the assistance of Arianna Huffington) to the Scooter Libby trial. They are going to rent an apartment for the duration of the trial. They need help with expenses, so if you can spare some dollars, go on over and help.

• David Neiwert at Orcinus has some thoughts on American concentration camps.

• Dan Froomkin at the Washington Post wants to know where the outrage is over Bush's plan to escalate the troop numbers in Iraq.

Our living Tower of Babel, Pat Robertson, wants us to know that a terrorist attack on the U.S. will result in "mass killing" toward the end of the year. God told him, so you'd think he'd have it on good authority.

“I’m not necessarily saying it’s going to be nuclear,” he said during his news-and-talk television show “The 700 Club” on the Christian Broadcasting Network. “The Lord didn’t say nuclear. But I do believe it will be something like that.”

Something like that? Pat, could you go on another prayer retreat and get back to us with more detail?

Fortunately, Robertson's prognostication record hasn't been much better than Jeane Dixon's. In 2005, he predicted Bush would win victory after victory on issues like Social Security reform, and in 2006 he was confident that a tsunami-strength storm would engulf a U.S. coast. (Well, to be fair, it did rain heavily in New England.)

Update: 1/4, 7:13 am MT: Denver's KOA radio reports police have found the car in the Green Valley section of Denver. It was painted over but not burned. It's on its way to the police evidence department.

Denver police have identified a "vehicle of interest" in the New Years' Eve shooting death of Denver Bronco cornerback Darrent Williams. (background here.)

Police put out a bulletin earlier today looking for a White 1994 Chevy Tahoe with Colorado license plate number 665-OBS. They didn't identify the owner, but the local news has: Brian Hicks.

It may or may not be the vehicle involved in the shooting, but if it was, Hicks couldn't have been the shooter because he's in jail awaiting trial on drug charges -- and on charges of shooting a woman who was supposed to testify against him at trial. The woman was later killed the week before his trial was supposed to begin.

Hicks has been jailed since Nov. 9 on a charge of possessing drugs with intent to distribute. He's also accused of shooting at a woman who was later killed a week before she was to testify against him. His bond was increased to $1 million after the woman was killed and his trial date was rescheduled.

The New York Times has just published a revealing article on Hillary Clinton's meeting with Democrats with whom she is discussing issues related to her possible run for the Presidency. Some of the diners are talking out of school.

Mrs. Clinton told Democrats that she viewed her two strongest potential Democratic opponents as Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina. They said that she viewed Mr. Obama as her biggest obstacle to the nomination, but that she believed the threat of his candidacy will diminish as voters learn how inexperienced he is in government and foreign affairs.

Without mentioning Mr. Obama by name, Mrs. Clinton and her camp are already asserting that experience will be a key attribute for any successful candidate during difficult times — an argument that her team will no doubt make in a more aggressive way against Mr. Obama if they both jump into the race.

Via Colorado Lib:

On The Chris Matthews Show this morning, one of the 12 regulars opined that Hillary Clinton's best choice for a runningmate would be Colorado Senator Ken Salazar.

Jason Bane provides his analysis over at 5280's Elevated Voices. The show transcript is here.

Whoops. During a lively discussion on Fox News about Barack Obama's teen use of cocaine, a Fox reporter inaccurately said President Bush admitted using cocaine in the past.

Via Raw Story which has more details.

Here's the scoop on Bush's alleged cocaine use.

Duke University has asked Reade Seligman and Collin Finnerty, charged with sexual assault, to return to Duke.

This is a stunning turnaround, since they are still charged with felonies. From Duke's letter to the boys and its public statement:

As circumstances have evolved in this extraordinary case, we have attempted to balance recognition of the gravity of legal charges with the presumption of your innocence," Duke officials wrote to the Seligmann family in a letter obtained by ABC News Law & Justice Unit.

"Now with the approach of a new term, we believe that circumstances warrant that we strike this balance differently. At this point, continued extension of the administrative leave would do unwarranted harm to your educational progress. We decided…to lift the administrative leave," the letter states.

Iraqi officials says they have made an arrest in the investigation into who recorded a video Saddam Hussein's execution on a cell phone.

The adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media, did not identify the person. But he said it was "an official who supervised the execution" and who is "now under investigation."

Cell phones were confiscated before the execution. They believe some were smuggled in by bodyguards of those present.

Munqith al-Faroon, an Iraqi prosecutor present at the execution says he witnessed two observers using their cell phones to take pictures of the execution. He didn't know them by name but says he could identify them.

The new Vanity Fair has a ten page article by Todd Purdham on John McCain in which he discusses the war in Iraq, Bush, Hillary Clinton and more.

Purdum, who spent two long stints on the road with John McCain last fall, reports that he kept up a punishing pace. According to Purdum, he is mentally sharp, verbally facile, and perpetually curious, and on one of the trips, he was rereading Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. But he is visibly older, thinner, balder—and, yes, frailer—than he was just six years ago.

On Adam Nagourney of the New York Times:

This is Adam Nagourney, New York Times. They’re a Communist paper, but he’s O.K.”

On Hillary Clinton:

“People underestimate her political intelligence and her antennae. She’s not her husband—no ones’s her husband. But she’s good. And I like her. I know you’re not supposed to say that, but I do.”