Congress finally confirmed Loretta Lynch as Attorney General. Sally Yates, nominated by Obama in December for the Deputy AG slot was also confirmed. Lynch is expected to be sworn in on Monday.

Unfortunately, Lynch does not share Eric Holder's views on marijuana legalization.

She told the Senate that she did not support legalization and did not agree with Mr. Obama that marijuana may not be more dangerous than alcohol.

And she supports the Patriot Act, which once again is coming up for renewal.

It remains to be seen whether she withdraws any of Holder's positive changes to DOJ policy. [More...]

Ret. General David Petraeus was sentenced to two years probation yesterday for removing classified information and lying to the FBI about it.

Petraeus, 62, pleaded guilty Thursday to a misdemeanor count of unauthorized removal and retention of classified information. According to court documents, he shared the information with Broadwell, his biographer, then lied about doing so to the FBI.

The investigation is continuing. Will Paula Broadwell be next?

Pierce with a tour de force:

It appears that the "exclusive" ratfking arrangement entered into by The New York Times and Washington Post has brought us all back to the Mena Airport again, and that it has done so by strict application of the Clinton Rules, first devised in the mid-1990's, as the nation's elite political press turned laundering oppo research into a smoothly running machine. The very first Clinton Rule, established by most of the original reporting into the Whitewater non-scandal, is that if you can blow enough smoke, you can say there's fire.

More . . .

Busy day. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Good decision by the Supreme Court yesterday, holding police can't delay a traffic stop to bring on the dogs without reasonable suspicion.

Actual holding: Absent reasonable suspicion, police extension of a traffic stop to conduct a dog sniff violates the Constitution’s shield against unreasonable seizures.

The opinion is here. The 8th Circuit opinion is here.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has overturned Barry Bonds conviction for obstruction of justice during a grand jury appearance.

"During a grand jury proceeding, defendant gave a rambling, non-responsive answer to a simple question.

"Because there is insufficient evidence that (his statement) was material, defendant's conviction for obstruction of justice... is not supported by the record," it said, adding: "Defendant's conviction here must be reversed.

It's a sort ruling, just the above paragraphs and one more saying he can't be retried on the count because it would be double jeopardy. One judge dissented.

Here's the 36 second video of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev that was played to the jury. I don't see any anger, just boredom. Who wouldn't be bored sitting alone in a holding cell all day?

What a big to-do about nothing. The reporter who said his face showed huge anger should cover something other than criminal trials.

Good news today. Michelle Leonhart is resigning from the DEA. (I'm sure she'd prefer the word retiring.)

Now if we could only retire the DEA.

In related news, a 19 month old baby who was maimed in his crib during a a botched drug raid will get $1 million. His nose and nipple were blown off.

Billy Donovan is a top candidate for the OKC Thunder job. Very nervous bout this.

You can talk about actual things that actually matter here.

Open Thread.

Update: This may be the best season yet. (I won't give the plot details about characters for a few days to give people a chance to watch it.) Some non-spoiler details: Season three begins 4 years after season 2 ended so everyone's lives have changed. There's a more valuable commodity than cocaine -- uranium in Venezuela. As with last season, there are Venezuelan generals working with FARC in the Colombian jungle at the cocaine labs (which produce coke for the Mexican drug lords.) What's new is that the Iranians have entered the picture and are making deals with all of them to get their hands on Venezuelan uranium. The uranium is to be transported to Mexico and then the U.S. The CIA now wants to take control of Aurelio from the DEA because now it's a matter of national security.[More...]

The Government gave its opening statement today in the death penalty trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Live updates are here. At the end of her opening, the prosecutor giving the opening displayed a screengrab of a security camera video of Tsarnaev in his cell raising his middle finger to the camera. It hasn't been admitted into evidence, so there isn't a copy, but the media reports it was taken a year ago and shows his face was scarred and he was very angry.

The defense deferred their opening until the start of their case. Several witnesses testified as to their injuries in graphic detail. Victim impact testimony in these cases is always horrific. Over defense objection, the judge admitted a video of one victim on the ground, with constant blood curdling screams. [More...]

For those of you who do not like to read my posts, here is an Open Thread for your comments.