The New York Times today reports on recommendations for loosening federal regulations on using experimental drugs on prison inmates made in June by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences at the request of the the Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Human Research Protections.

Under current regulations, passed in 1978, prisoners can participate in federally financed biomedical research if the experiment poses no more than "minimal" risks to the subjects. But a report formally presented to federal officials on Aug. 1 by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences advised that experiments with greater risks be permitted if they had the potential to benefit prisoners. As an added precaution, the report suggested that all studies be subject to an independent review.

This is a sensitive area, particularly for those who recall what happened at Holmesburg prison in Philadelphia between 1951 and 1974 and even worse, the Tuskegee syphilis studies, both of which prompted the current regulations.

Via Patriot Daily, NBC reports that the UK didn't want to arrest the London Terror suspects this week, but the US did.

NBC News has learned that U.S. and British authorities had a significant disagreement over when to move in on the suspects in the alleged plot to bring down trans-Atlantic airliners bound for the United States.

A senior British official knowledgeable about the case said British police were planning to continue to run surveillance for at least another week to try to obtain more evidence, while American officials pressured them to arrest the suspects sooner. The official spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the case.

This British official contradicts earlier reports that the threats were imminent.

Finally some good news from the middle east. The Wall St. Journal reports the Israeli cabinet has agreed to halt the Lebanon war at 7am Monday. Hezbollah has agreed to abide by the U.N. to cease-fire resolution.

Here is the text of the resolution. The next steps are here.

(Guest Post by Big Tent Democrat)

For the past two and one half years, the Left blogs have been severe in their criticism of Senator Joe Lieberman's brand of "bipartisanship." When Ned Lamont launched his challenge to Lieberman, the Left blogs came under severe attack for their strident support of Lamont. In July, I wrote:

[S]ome in the Media do not think kindly of the Netroots involvement. That David Brooks flails in ridiculous terms against Netroots involvement in Democratic primaries and in favor of an apparently saintly Lieberman, is not surprising nor troublesome really. After all, he is a Republican.

But when Democrats like Jon Chait object one has to wonder what is going on here. . . . [Chait wrote:]

The Wall St. Journal (free link) reports on the latest Harris Poll.

When asked whom they would vote for "if elections for Congress were held today," 45% of U.S. adults said they would vote for the Democratic candidate and 30% would vote for the Republican, the Harris Interactive poll shows. In a similar poll in April, 41% supported a Democratic candidate for Congress and 37% supported a Republican.

The margin is even greater for women voters:

Glenn Greenwald has a great post today, Legal surveillance, not illegal eavesdropping, stopped the U.K. terrorist attacks.

No one objects to electronic surveillance of terror suspects per se...it's surveillance without warrants and without court authorization that is objectionable -- particularly of Americans. Glenn writes,

From the very beginning of the NSA scandal, this has been the point -- the principal, overarching, never-answered point. There is no reason for the Bush administration to eavesdrop in secret, with no judicial oversight, and in violation of the law precisely because the legal framework that has been in place for the last 28 years empowers the government to eavesdrop aggressively on all of the terrorists they want, with ease.

As I noted yesterday , the Washington Post reports:

It's too bad American media doesn't care enough to make this kind of documentary. Cheers to the BBC who Sunday night will be airing Prisoners of Katrina at 2200 BST on BBC Two.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, while thousands fled New Orleans, the city's prisoners were trapped. Fresh eye-witness accounts reveal what really happened to those left behind, and how crucial forensic evidence was simply washed away.

In September 2005, long after most people had fled a devastated city, inmates of Orleans Parish Prison - many of them shackled - were still waiting to be rescued from the blazing heat and the stinking floods.

One man, a chef jailed for an unpaid fine that should have at most netted a week's term, ended up spending 103 days in the jail, "abandoned without food, drink or sanitation as the waters rose."

"We were just left there to die," said Cardell Williams, a prisoner who spent two months in jail without ever being charged.

The London attacks were scheduled for August 16 according to British authorities.

Investigation by British intelligence agents has revealed that Wednesday, August 16, was D-Day for the foiled terror attacks. Flight tickets for that day were reportedly found at one of the suspects' houses.

Details are now available about the 19 suspects arrested and in British custody.

The list includes a security guard, a science student and a university drop-out who works for a music company.,,,One of the suspects has recently become a father and worked in security at Heathrow Airport.

There have been 7 arrests in Pakistan.

Late this afternoon, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert endorsed a cease fire proposal. The Israeli cabinet will vote on it Sunday.

The agreement calls for the deployment of 30,000 Lebanese and U.N. troops along the Israel-Lebanon border. It falls short of some of Israel's demands, including a strong mandate for the U.N. forces to take on Hezbollah guerrillas.

Lebanon has not officially responded, but word is they view it favorably.

The ACLU has lost its case challenging the constitutionality of the New York Subway searches.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday rejected a challenge to the searches by the New York Civil Liberties Union, saying that a lower court judge properly concluded that the program put in place in July 2005 was "reasonably effective."....The appeals court said it was proper for Judge Richard M. Berman to conclude that preventing a terrorist attack on the subway was important enough to subject subway riders to random searches. The text of the opinion is here.

In its written ruling, the appeals court noted that New York's subway system is an "icon of the city's culture and history, an engine of its colossal economy, a subterranean repository of its art and music, and, most often, the place where millions of diverse New Yorkers and visitors stand elbow to elbow as they traverse the metropolis."

The court said that in light of how many people use the subway, it was "unsurprising and undisputed that terrorists view it as a prime target."

This doesn't mean we can't remind the searchers of the Fourth Amendment as they go through our bags.

I forgot to do an open thread earlier this week, so here it is. Jabber away. I'll be back late tonight.

Some news today, courtesy of Patriot Daily.

• Bush's rating drops on nearly every issue
• Road Home Program Requires Fingerprints
• Foiled Terror Plot Comparable to 9/11
• Richardson Calls on Lieberman to Step Aside

Does anyone besides me wonder what would have happened between March, 2003 and now, had Bush not made the decision to take out Saddam and instead focused solely on finding and taking out Osama?

Only the most incompetent of the incompetent could fail to find Osama in five years time. September 11, 2006, which is coming right up upon us, has our leaders in a tizzy. Doesn't it ever occur to them that they wasted three years playing neo-con games in Iraq when they could have invested the manpower and less money in finding Osama and breaking up al Qaeda?

Instead we have a neutered Saddam languishing in a courtroom, while violence in Baghdad has escalated past anyone's expectations.The U.S. repsonse: re-employ 3,700 more of our youth to Baghdad, not to fight our war, but to fight the crazy insurgents.

Bush has been an utter incompetent at dealing with terror threats. Condi Rice has been totally ineffectual at negotiations for a middle east peace plan.

Is there anything this adminstration can do competently and correctly? It sure doesn't seem that way.