I'll be travelling until Friday so here's an open thread to keep yourselves current. I'll have my laptop with me, so I won't be gone entirely. And TChris and LNILR may check in as well.

If there's PlameGate news, be sure to check Firedoglake, Empty Wheel at the Next Hurrah, and Tom Maguire.

All of the sites on our blogroll are special, so I hope you give them a read too.

The ACLU has released another 9,000 pages of documents it received from the Defense Department pursuant to its Freedom of Information Act request. Check out this document (pdf) charting the detainee deaths prior to May, 2004.

Of 58 deaths, 8 were homicides and several others were unknown or under investigation. It lists each death and a cause. Here are some of them:

"Soldier killed detainee in violation of ROE"; "Soldier killed detainee while handcuffed"; "1 strangulation found outside isolation unit"; "1 blunt force trauma and choking, died during interrogation" (there are three of these); "Soldier drowned detainee, body not found"; and "died sleeping after interrogation."

And that's just one document I happened to click on out of the 9,000 new pages. As to Gen. Sanchez, the ACLU reports:

All has been quiet on the judicial nominations front for a while. A big fire is about to erupt. Two more controversial judges are up again for confirmation -- Terrence Boyle and Brett Kavenaugh. Democrats aren't happy with either, but they are particularly incensed about Boyle.

Democratic leaders said they certainly would filibuster one of the nominees, Terrence W. Boyle, and might filibuster the second, Brett Kavanaugh, if Republicans refuse to call him back for a second hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. The partisan rhetoric was the strongest signal yet that the Senate might revisit the brinkmanship that brought the chamber to the edge of crisis a year ago, when a bipartisan group of 14 members crafted a temporary cease-fire.

The Bush family has been trying to get Boyle on the appellate bench since 1991. Bush I was unsuccessful. Now it's his son's turn.

Death penalty proponents like to say that it has never been established that an innocent person has been executed in the United States. That may no longer be the case. Arson experts have found that Texas executed a man whose crime may not have been a crime at all. The fire for which he was executed appears to have been an accidental one. Junk science and inadequately trained experts are the culprit.

Update: Don't miss JR's comment below. S/he is the son of one of the experts in the case and provides a lot more information.

Dan Froomkin at the Washington Post has more on Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondents Dinner, as does today's New York Times. But it's Froomkin's personal account of the dinner I found most interesting. He got to meet Karl Rove, whom he describes as "charming" and not looking very worried at all. Dan explains why it would have been inappropriate for him to ask Rove any questions about PlameGate or his last grand jury appearance. He also posits that the annual dinner is past its prime.

Indeed, if the press and this particular White House had an even moderately functional professional relationship, then a chance to build personal relationships would be a nice bonus. But it's not a functional professional relationship. From the president down to the freshest press office intern, this White House seems to delight in not answering even our most basic questions.

So the last thing in the world we need is a big party where the only appropriate mode of communication is sucking up.

Mike Nifong, Durham County District Attorney, has won the Democratic primary election. Since there is no Republican candidate, he retains his job for another term.

Now that the election is out of the way, maybe he will have time to take a look at the defense photos showing Reade Seligman at the ATM machine at 12:24 am, a critical time period for the alleged rape.

by TChris

A "turning point" has finally been reached in Iraq. How do we know? The ever-optimistic president said so yesterday, on the third anniversary of his "Mission Accomplished" speech. Remember "Mission Accomplished"?

It didn't turn out that way.

Violence in Iraq continued instead of ebbed. In the six weeks from the start of the invasion to Bush's speech, 139 U.S. soldiers had died. In the three years since, as of Sunday, there have been another 2,258 U.S. military deaths in Iraq -- an average of 63 each month.

The latest "turning point" may mark a turn from disaster to chaos.

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby has filed his response to various reporters' motions to quash his subpoenas for records and notes.

Thanks to Tom Maguire for hosting the 45 page response, here and here.

I've only skimmed them, so I'll be back later with some thoughts. In the meantime, feel free to weigh in, or for analysis, check in with Empty Wheel.

Related: Jane at FDL has a new Karl Rove timeline.

by TChris

In response to a lawsuit that was filed to enforce a Freedom of Information request, the Bush administration says it will release Secret Service logs of Jack Abramoff's visits to the White House. The logs probably won't resolve an ongoing mystery:

It is not clear if the logs will resolve the issue of how Mr. Abramoff and one of his lobbying clients, the chief of an Indian tribe in Texas, were able to attend the May 2001 reception with Mr. Bush, since Mr. Abramoff's name was not on the guest list for the event. The White House has said it cannot explain how Mr. Abramoff was able to enter the White House complex that day.

Maybe he used his key to the back door.

by TChris

Pearl Jam joins Neil Young, the Dixie Chicks, and the Rolling Stones with a song of protest.

World Wide Suicide, already frying the airwaves with indignation, is a stormy anti-war rant tailor-made for Eddie Vedder's howling rasp.

Here's a review of the album. (Update: Alert readers called attention to the omission of Pink's protest song. If you've heard other recent protest songs, feel free to list them in the comments.)

Former mayor Rudy Giuliani campaigned in Iowa today. He said if he thinks he can win, he will run for President in 2008.

It's time to get his history out in the blogosphere. The man is not qualified. People think he is some sort of hero because he didn't fall apart during 9/11. He is not. He was a prosecutor who loved putting people in jail and a Mayor who trounced the downtrodden.

How low can he go? A new CBS poll finds Bush's approval rating at his lowest ever, 33%.

Only 33 percent approve of his job performance, Mr. Bush's lowest approval rating yet in CBS News polls. A majority - 58 percent of those polled - say they disapprove of the president. Mr. Bush appears to be losing support from his own party. His approval rating among Republicans has dropped to 68 percent.

Complete poll results are here. (pdf)