by Last Night in Little Rock

The wife of prominent Oakland criminal defense attorney and TV legal commentator Daniel Horowitz was found murdered in their home yesterday evening. Horowitz was four days into the murder trial of Susan Polk at the time of the murder. (The San Francisco Examiner and the Oakland Tribune had no stories about the murder today. The Contra Costa Times had this article. For a summary of the "sensational" Polk trial to date, go the Tribune's website and enter "Horowitz" or "Susan Polk" in the archives search.) Horowitz is a frequent guest on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News, and he was regularly seen during the Peterson trial.

by TChris

eLottery, a company that wanted to sell lottery tickets online, hired Jack Abramoff to lobby for the defeat of the Internet Gambling Protection Act in the House of Representatives. Abramoff’s first task was to buy off conservative groups to stifle their opposition to gambling while using their clout to influence Republican representatives.

In May [2000], eLottery hired Abramoff's firm, Preston Gates & Ellis LLP, for $100,000 a month, according to lobbying reports. In the following months, Abramoff directed the company to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to various organizations, faxes, e-mails and court records show. The groups included [Grover] Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform; [Rev. Louis] Sheldon's Traditional Values Coalition; companies affiliated with [Ralph] Reed; and a Seattle Orthodox Jewish foundation, Toward Tradition.

I just got back home to Denver and three days of e-mails, snail-mail, voicemail and now laundry. Aside from RoveGate news (Huffington Post has an excellent wrap-up of blogger views) there's an op-ed by the former Seattle police chief, Let Those Dopers Be, and news of the terrible murder of defense attorney Daniel Horwitz's wife and the Susan Polk murder trial he is in the midst of trying.

Until I settle in, I'll just turn it over to the readers for what else I've missed.

by TChris

John Podesta debunks former FBI Director Louis Freeh’s attempt to rewrite history by shifting blame for the FBI’s failures to Congress and Bill Clinton.

From the embarrassment of the Russian mole Robert Hanssen to the bungling of the Wen Ho Lee investigation to the wasting of hundreds of millions of dollars in a failed attempt to build a modern, computerized case management system, the bureau under Freeh's leadership stumbled from one blunder to the next, with little or no accountability. The nadir, as the nation knows too well, was reached in the astonishing string of failures that helped leave America vulnerable to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In the face of this record, Freeh has now published "My FBI," a book distinguished by its shameless buck-passing. Nothing, it seems, was ever Louis Freeh's fault.

Just go watch over at Crooks and Liars. Think Progress has the money quote:

The fact of the matter is that when we were attacked on September 11, we had a choice to make. We could decide that the proximate cause was al Qaeda and the people who flew those planes into buildings and, therefore, we would go after al Qaeda…or we could take a bolder approach.

Time Magazine reports:

Another character in the drama remains unnamed: the original source for columnist Robert Novak, who wrote the first piece naming Plame. Fitzgerald, says a lawyer who's involved in the case, "knows who it is—and it's not someone at the White House."

Remember what Joseph Wilson said Novak told him initially?

I'm not sure this is big news as opposed to stating the obvious, but Time Magazine reports Rove and Libby will resign if indicted.

Here are two theories about Bush's judicial nomination plans I'm told were floating around at high levels in Washington legal circles just before her nomination, both of which proved to be incorrect:

• Bush intended to put Alberto Gonzales on the Supreme Court instead of Roberts, and to appoint Harriet Miers Attorney General. The radical right's opposition to Gonzales' felled that plan.

• When Roberts was nominated for the Supreme Court, creating a vacancy on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, it was Bush's intention to nominate Harriet to fill that seat.

In other words, either way, Bush had planned to elevate Harriet Miers. A question: Did Bush get erroneous advice that the right would be pleased with Miers due to her evangelical beliefs while the left would regard her as a consensus nominee? Which advisor would have told him that? Has Rove lost his touch or was he out of the loop until the decision was made?

In either event, I still say Harriet Miers will be confirmed and I think she will be good on many criminal justice issues.

No wonder Judith Miller is now Fitzgerald's hero. Here's her lawyer, Bob Bennett, on ABC's "This Week" today when asked if Libby tried to influence Miller's testimony. [Update: BradBlog has the video.]:

"I wouldn't say the answer to that is yes, but it was very troubling," Bennett said on ABC's "This Week." "Our reaction when we got that letter, both Judy's and mine, is that was a very stupid thing to put in a letter because it just complicated the situation," Bennett said.

"It was a very foolish thing to put in a letter, as evidenced by the fact that you're highlighting it here," Bennett said. "It was a close call and she was troubled by it; no question about it."

The import of what Bennett is saying: Libby should have known Miller wouldn't lie for him and his letter was a suggestion that she should.

by TChris

Here's a good reason to buy your niece or daughter (or maybe your boss) a doll from American Girl this holiday season:

The maker of the highly popular American Girl line of dolls has become the target of conservative activists threatening a boycott unless it cuts off contributions to a youth organization that supports abortion rights and acceptance of lesbians.

American Girl supports Girls Inc. programs that help girls develop self-esteem by improving math and science skills, encouraging athletic participation, and nurturing leadership ability. Some right wing groups contend that Girls Inc. deserves no support because it also opposes abstinence-only education and "condones lesbianism." In other words, Girls Inc. supports tolerance and wants children to have the information they'll need to make smart decisions as they mature.

The New York Times' 8 page article on Judith Miller is now online. [hat tip Raw Story.] It's written by Don Van Natta, Adam Liptak and Clifford Levy.

More interesting, is Judith Miller's five page account.

Let the analysis begin. Is Scooter Libby going to be Indictment Number One? Is Dick Cheney cleared? Does Judith Miller have too many convenient lapses of memory for us to believe her, even though Fitzgerald is giving her a pass? For anyone who still thinks she is going to be indicted, please understand that her lawyers would have carefully vetted this article before they allowed her to send it in to the Times. If Miller was in jeopardy from Fitzgerald, there would have been no article.

Will Miller now retire from the Times and get that 1.2 million book deal? Or will her advance be $4 million by the time the Indictments are announced?

Update: Reactions: Arianna says Miller's account raises more questions than it answers. Armando is rocking over at Daily Kos. Jane at Firedoglakeis taking her time to analyze both articles, as will I.

by TChris

It's good to have a large campaign war chest, particularly when you need cash to finance your effort to taint a jury pool.

Tom DeLay is using his congressional campaign to distribute to voters derogatory information about the Texas prosecutor who has indicted him - and to raise more money for a re-election bid that has been affected by the criminal case.

...

Contributors, voters and others who sign up can get regular e-mails and an electronic "toolkit" from DeLay's campaign with the latest disparaging information his legal team has prepared on Texas prosecutor Ronnie Earle.