Murray Waas has a new exclusive article reporting that Democratic Senators are considering pressing for a Senate Select Committee -- along the lines of the Senate Watergate and Church Committees -- to investigate the Administration's pre-war intelligence claims as well as the Valerie Plame affair.

Waas recites the history of Phase I and Phase II of the Senate Senate Intelligence Committee investigation. As to Phase II, which was to examine whether the Bush Administration misrepresented the intelligence information that led us to war, Waas reports that the Senators feel stymied by the Administration's failure to provide key documents.

Waas reported last week in the National Journal that David Addington, Cheney's counsel whom he elevated yesterday to Chief of Staff to replace Scooter Libby, along with Cheney and Libby, played a key role in the decision to withhold documents from the Committee.

Karl Rove was perceived as one who stabbed Trent Lott in the back when he lost his position as Senate Majority Leader to Bill Frist. Today, it was Lott's turn.

Crooks and Liars has the video of Trent Lott today on Hardball.

TRENT LOTT: Well, the question is, that you asked, is he good for American politics? Look, he has been very successful, very effective in the political arena. The question is should he be the Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy under the current circumstances? I don't know all that's going on, so I can't make that final conclusion. But, you know, how many times has the top political person become also the top policy advisor? Maybe you can make that transition, but it's a real challenge, and I think they have to – I do think they need to look at bringing in some more people, you know, old gray beards that have been around this town for a while, help them out a little bit at the White House.

The Supreme Court heard arguments today in the case of a New Mexican religious sect that wants to be allowed to drink a hallucinogenic tea at ceremonies twice a month.

The justices were critical of the Bush administration's position that drug laws forbidding such use trumps the right of the sect to practice its religion. John Roberts and Sandra Day O'Connor seemed particularly harsh on the Government. Nancy Hollander of Albuquerque argued for the sect.

The AP notes that Justice O'Connor may be gone from the bench by the time the vote is taken in the case. How would Alito rule? That's anybody's guess. But if it comes down to a 4-4 split, it could be important.

ScotusBlog has detailed coverage of the arguments and case. The case is Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao Do Vegetal, 04-1084. TChris wrote about the case here.

Great news for Jamie Olis, the Dynergy exec who was royally aggrieved at sentencing by the Judge computing his guidelines at 24 years. The 5th Circuit has ordered a resentencing.

Sentencing Law and Policy provides more media coverage of the reversal. White Collar Crime Blog weighs in here. Also, Houston's Clear Thinkers has been following the case since the beginning. Click through their links.

The Justice Department's press release at the time of sentencing is here.

ABC reported this morning that Time Reporter Matt Cooper told Good Morning America that Lewis Libby had identified Valerie Plame Wilson as an undercover operative to him.

Bloggers knew this was a bogus report. ABC has now corrected its error. [Note: The article is still misleading in reporting that "One of the reporters at the center of the investigation into the leak of the identity of an undercover CIA officer, says he first learned the agent's name from President Bush's top political advisor, Karl Rove." Rove never used the name Valerie Plame when talking to Cooper.]

Bloggers on the ball: Firedoglake, Mark Kleiman (who posts the text of the original report)and Talkleft (see comments)

The transcript is not up on lexis yet, I searched. I think the ABC article got it wrong, but we'll see.

Patriot Daily was the first to alert me to the suspect article.

Houston lawyer Dick DeGuerin scored another win for Tom DeLay today. The judge who had donated to Democratic causes has been removed from the case.

Australian David Hicks, one of the detainees at Guantanamo whom the military is set to try by tribunal on November 18, alleges he was sexually abused at Guantanamo.

Hicks' lawyers say they have witnesses relating to the abuse and that the United States has photographic evidence.

Digby has a great analysis.

Here are the Senate Rules on closed sessions:

• During a secret session, the doors of the chamber are closed, and the chamber and its galleries are cleared of all individuals except Members and those officers and employees specified in the rules or essential to the session.

• Standing Senate Rules 21, 29, and 31 cover secret sessions for legislative and executive business. Rule 21 calls for the Senate to close its doors once a motion is made and seconded. The motion is not debatable, and its disposition is made behind closed doors.

Why are the Democrats doing this? According to an e-mail statement I received:

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid took the senate into closed session today over intelligence leading up to the Iraq War. Raw Story reports this has happened only 53 times in Senate history, with the last time being during the Clinton impeachment hearings.

Here's a large portion of Sen. Reid's statement (received by e-mail.)

This past weekend, we witnessed the indictment of the I. Lewis Libby, the Vice President’s Chief of Staff and a senior Advisor to President Bush. Libby is the first sitting White House staffer to be indicted in 135 years. This indictment raises very serious charges. It asserts this Administration engaged in actions that both harmed our national security and are morally repugnant.

My latest edition of Scoring Scotus about Judge Sam Alito is up at Eric Alterman's Altercation. It's about how this nomination, even if it succeeds, is unlikely to help Bush's presidency or the Republicans. Here's a snippet, I hope you will go over and read the whole thing:

With Alito's nomination, Bush has turned flames of dissent into a rip-roaring wildfire. His transparent attempt to regroup from the debacle of the Harriet Miers nomination and the scandal of the indictment of Scooter Libby by caving in to the radical right through the nomination of an anti-abortion Supreme Court Justice with a troubling record on civil rights and criminal justice issues, has unleashed a maelstrom.

Bloggers had a great conference call last night with many of the liberal groups opposing him. It was the first time I got to be a presenter on one of these call and my theme was asking the liberal groups not to leave criminal justice issues out of the debate. Half the cases before the Supreme Court are criminal cases - it's not all about abortion and choice. Just like TalkLeft voices support for the messages of PFAW's Save the Court, Alliance for Justice, NARAL and American Progress, we'd like to hear some support for our issues.

Matthew Cooper was on ABC's This Week Sunday speaking about his conversations with Lewis Libby and Karl Rove. (Transcript on Lexis.com)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS: Matt, I have to begin with you today because you are right in the middle of this Lewis Libby case and let me show you part of the indictment where some of Scooter Libby's, Scooter Libby's testimony was included. There was a question to him in the grand jury, March 5th, 2004, "And it's your specific recollection," this is to Mr. Libby, "that when you told Cooper about Wilson's wife working at the CIA you attributed that fact to what reporters," answered, "Yes," "plural, were saying, correct?" "Yes, I was very clear to say reporters are telling us that because in my mind I still didn't know it as a fact. I thought I was, all I had was this information that was coming in from the reporters." Is that how the conversation went?

by TChris

Echoing yesterday’s TalkLeft request for Dick Cheney to come clean, Nicholas Kristof today urges the vice president to “clear the air” by answering six questions in a televised press conference. The NY Times no longer provides free online access to Kristof’s columns, but the questions merit discussion, so they are reproduced (from the print edition) here (Truthout provides a free link here):

Did you ask Scooter Libby to undertake his inquiries about Ambassador Joseph Wilson? Mr. Libby made such a concerted push to get information, from both the State Department and the CIA, that I suspect that you prodded him. Is that right? If so, why?

Why did you independently ask the CIA for information about the Wilsons? The indictment states that on June 12, 2003, you advised Mr. Libby that you learned, apparently from the CIA, that Mr. Wilson’s wife, Valerie, worked in the agency. So did you ask George Tenet, then the director, about Mr. and Mrs. Wilson? Did you review the related documents that the CIA faxed to your office?