Update: CBS has a recap of this morning's testimony.

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It's Ken Lay's turn on the witness stand today as the Enron trial winds down. His defense will be he's an optimist, not a crook.

He will try to convince jurors that what prosecutors call fraud was really the misdirected power of positive thinking.

...Lay insists that he refused to dwell on problems and focused instead on good news in an honest belief that he could right the ship when it listed in late 2001. That, Lay's defense lawyers argue, is not enough to send a man to prison for what could be the rest of his life.

Where does this optimism come from?

It's time for our Sunday night Soprano's Open Thread. Tonight's episode:

Artie's business is jeopardized by a rival restaurant and staff scandal; Christopher and Little Carmine pursue a new venture out of town.

I hope it's as good as the past two weeks.

Arianna takes a break from Washington politics today to write about gender politics and how women are different when it comes to money. She's in the midst of writing a book, On Becoming Fearless: Advice for Women.

She grabbed my attention with the "bag lady" line.

But fearlessness about money isn't just about having money. Which is to say, having a lot of money doesn't necessarily mean you've conquered your fears surrounding money. Poverty consciousness is the fear that no matter how much wealth you have, it's never enough. Some of the richest women I know are still driven by a fear of ending up as bag ladies.

by TChris

If the government is powerless to interfere with our right to play with a consenting adult sex partner of either gender, it should surely be powerless to prevent us from playing with a sex toy. Some South Carolina extremists nonetheless view the sale of sex toys as the kind of commercial activity that the state legislature should ban.

The South Carolina bill, proposed by Republican Rep. Ralph Davenport, would make it a felony to sell devices used primarily for sexual stimulation and allow law enforcement to seize sex toys from raided businesses.

"That would be the most terrible thing in the world," said Ms. Gillespie, an employee the Anderson shop. "That is just flabbergasting to me. We are supposed to be in a free country, and we're supposed to be adults who can decide what want to do and don't want to do in the privacy of our own homes."

Those who fret about the private lives of adults should redirect their interest to a serious topic: the kidnapping and sex trafficking of women in Iraq, a phenomenon that began after President Bush declared "Mission Accomplished."

Bump and Update: the LA Times tells Bush to dump Cheney and Rumsfeld . As to Cheney:

Unlike most vice presidents, Cheney does not aspire to be president, and he is the consummate Bush loyalist. He would not be giving up a political birthright by agreeing to retire (citing health reasons or a concern about the publicity surrounding the trial of his former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby). And the problem of taking sides in the 2008 election is easily solved. Bush could nominate as Cheney's successor an elder party statesman -- Bob Dole, anyone? -- with no interest in the 2008 nomination.

As to Rumsfeld:

The secretary should go not because he has been criticized by a group of retired generals but because he embodies the smugness and inability to acknowledge error that has characterized both the Iraq war and the wider war on terrorism. Rumsfeld has been the pinched public face of an administration that has cut legal and humanitarian corners in dealing with people -- including U.S. citizens -- suspected of involvement with terrorists.

I'm torn between thinking it's better for Democrats in 2006 and 2008 if Bush keeps Cheney and Rumsfeld--and hoping they go for the good of the country. Your thoughts?

Here's an open thread dedicated to the Duke Lacrosse case.

Newsweek has a very detailed 8 page recap of events in the Duke Lacrosse players alleged rape case. If you don't have time to read the whole thing, here are the highlights I found significant. First, the article puts Reade Seligman's alibi defense in a clear and concise nutshell.

WtVD, the local ABC news station in Durham has viewed the transcript of the photo identification made by the rape accuser in the Duke Lacrosse player case.

Eyewitness News was allowed to look at the 15-page document describing the process. The accuser looked at pictures of 46 lacrosse players on April 4 in a police department Powerpoint presentation. She would look at a picture, then see a blank screen before looking at the next image.

She identified Reade Seligmann, 20, with 100-percent certainty as the man who forced her to perform oral sex on him. She also identified Collin Finnerty, 19, as the man who raped and sodomized her.

Today's News Observer has a very good article explaining why the DA in the Duke case may have crossed ethical lines by proclaiming his belief in the accuser's rape allegation. It also contains the ethical rules in a sidebar. As the excellent, veteran criminal defense lawyer (and TL pal) David Rudolf says,

"When a district attorney talks to the local and national media about his personal belief that certain people are guilty and are 'a bunch of hooligans,' about how horrified he is by the allegation, that 'a bunch of lacrosse players from Duke ... raped a black girl from Durham,' or how alleged racial slurs 'make what is already an extremely reprehensible attack even more reprehensible,' the State Bar would have to be concerned," Rudolf said.

Here's what DA Nifong said, according to the News Obersver which tracked his comments:

Don't miss the video of Pink's live version of Dear Mr. President

[hat tip to Bobby at Progress Now.]

by TChris

The FDA's recent claim that marijuana has no medical benefit is a triumph of politics over science, of turf protection over compassion.

Several officials in the 11 states that allow medical marijuana disputed the F.D.A.'s contention that there was no research supporting the drug's medical use. They noted, in particular, a 1999 review by the National Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, the nation's most prestigious scientific advisory panel, which found marijuana to be "moderately well-suited" to some conditions, including wasting disease from AIDS and the nausea that often results from chemotherapy.

The scientists who authored the National Institute of Medicine report have good reason to take issue with the FDA.

by TChris

It's official. Historian Sean Wilentz, writing for Rolling Stone, declares George Bush a contender for the title of Worst President in History. Here's a summary of his thorough analysis:

Calamitous presidents, faced with enormous difficulties -- Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Hoover and now Bush -- have divided the nation, governed erratically and left the nation worse off. In each case, different factors contributed to the failure: disastrous domestic policies, foreign-policy blunders and military setbacks, executive misconduct, crises of credibility and public trust. Bush, however, is one of the rarities in presidential history: He has not only stumbled badly in every one of these key areas, he has also displayed a weakness common among the greatest presidential failures -- an unswerving adherence to a simplistic ideology that abjures deviation from dogma as heresy, thus preventing any pragmatic adjustment to changing realities. Repeatedly, Bush has undone himself, a failing revealed in each major area of presidential performance.

The New York Times reports the identity of the fired senior CIA employee who disclosed information on the CIA's secret prisons to WaPo reporter Dana Priest.

The C.I.A. would not identify the leaker, but several government officials said it was Mary O. McCarthy, a veteran intelligence analyst who until 2001 was senior director for intelligence programs at the National Security Council, where she served under Presidents Clinton and Bush. . At the time of her dismissal, Ms. McCarthy was working in the agency's inspector general's office, after a four-year stint at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based organization that examines global security issues.

Agent McCarthy apparently 'fessed up after failing a lie detector: