Some people in Jonesboro, Ark. don't like that Mitchell Johnson, who at 13, along with 11 year old Andrew Golden, shot and killed five people at his middle school, is being released from prison. Johnson is now 21.

Johnson was rightfully tried as a juvenile. 13 year old brains are not well-developed enough to be competent to stand trial. They can't understand the proceedings, meaningfully assist their lawyers in their defense, or understand the consquences of various decisions that need to be made. Our criminal justice system believes in rehabilitating our youthful offenders. That's why juveniles don't get a permanent criminal record.

In Arkansas, the maximum age a juvenile can be held is 18. Johnson was held till he is 21, because the state added some weapons charges.

Johnson wants to become a minister and enroll in college. He's spent 8 years in juvenile and adult prisons. It's time for him to leave.

Funding prevention, not prisons, is the way to reduce these kinds of crime.

It's Cindy Sheehan day over at Huffington Post, with entries by Cindy herself, Arianna, Norman Lear, Gary Hart, Christine Lahti, Andy Stern, Sarah Jones, Rep. Jim McDermott, Tom Hayden and Jodie Evans.

Crooks and Liars has video of Cindy on Olbermann tonight.

Joe Trippi has an audio of a conference call with Cindy. And Attytood casts doubt on the e-mail critical of Cindy one of her family members reportedly sent to Drudge. [Via Atrios.]

Looks the DEA cares more about their image than helping kids go to college:

(Columbia) The local Drug Enforcement Agency is pulling out of a partnership with the University of South Carolina because of their new "Four strikes and you're out" drug policy. "Based on come recent decisions by the University on relaxing their drug policy, we decided it was not a good idea for the DEA to stay associated with the university policy," said John Ozaluk of South Carolina¹s DEA. "That's why we pulled our name off the support list for the golf tournament."

The tournament raised money for a scholarship fund in honor of a fallen DEA agent. The university has not commented on the situation.

[Via NORML]

Now this is way cool. From Crooks and Liars:

Green Day has given me permission to host the video. I'm working on an interview with the band...

Release: This is the latest Green Day video, "Wake Me Up When September Ends." This timely and politically charged filmic vignette documents Green Day's view of the effects on young soldiers and loved ones left behind. The seven minute epic video causes a moment's pause to reflect upon and understand the impact of what you just watched. Directed by Samuel Bayer, it stars Evan Rachel Wood (Thirteen) and Jamie Be.

I hope this starts a new trend of bringing rockers and bloggers together. I'd be glad to host their views (I'll leave the video to C&L) or do an interview. Just send me an e-mail.

Speaking at the Aspen Institute, journalist and author Bob Woodward told the audience that he thinks Dick Cheney will run for President in 2008. Cheney will be 67. Woodward says Nixon was 68 when he ran, and Reagan was 69.

I thought Presidents were limited to two terms.

Raw Story has an investigative piece up in which it says that Sen. Pat Roberts fixed the pre-war intelligence to help Republicans.

Former big-time lobbyist Jack Abramoff was indicted by a Fort Lauderdale federal grand jury today on charges he and Adam Kidan, who also was indicted, schemed "to defraud two lenders in a $147.5 million purchase of SunCruz Casinos."

Josh Marshall has been following the case. Washington Post report here.

Scott Sullivan, the architect of the accounting fraud scheme that toppled WorldCom, was sentenced today to five years in prison. He could have gotten 25 years, but he was rewarded for his cooperation in the case against former WorldCom CEO Bernie Ebbers, who got 25 years and will almost certainly die in prison.

Sullivan provided the only direct evidence at Ebber's trial that Ebbers knew of the fraud. But Ebbers testfied at his trial and while he did okay on direct, he didn't do so well on cross-examination. As I said at the time,

Why did Ebbers take the stand? With only one witness, Scott Sullivan, testifying that Ebbers knew about and endorsed the illegal accounting practice, why not just stick with an attack on Sullivan? When a defendant does great on direct exam, being questioned by his own lawyer, and then flubs it on cross, being questioned by the government, the contrast alone makes jurors think he's guilty. Just another reason why most defendants should not take the stand.

Bump and Update: Crooks and Liars has some video from the speech contained in a new ad - "Jeanine Pirro's Positive Vision for New York - without a script, she is speechless."

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Original Post 8/10 3:15 pm

Jeanine Pirro officially announced her candidacy against Hillary Clinton today. John Nichols of the Nation, writing for CBS, says Hillary lucked out. But the most reported news of her speech at the Waldorf Astoria is that she couldn't find page 10 , causing a 32 second pause.

Michael McKeon, who provided the text and said later that she had been writing until the last minute and left that page in another room. Not unexpectedly, New York Democratic Party officials, who sent an aide to monitor Ms. Pirro's speech, seized upon that long pause as an excuse to tweak the Republican as minor league.

"Today's announcement speech of Jeanine Pirro shows she may not be able to take on her primary opponent, let alone Senator Hillary Clinton," Denny Farrell, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said in a statement. "The speech was long on attacks and literally silent on specifics for New Yorkers - 32 seconds of silence that spoke volumes."

I have an all day Daubert hearing at which Government "experts" (agents and cops) will attempt to convince the judge that their interpretation of more than 100,000 wiretapped conversations of suspected crack cocaine sellers is both reliable and helpful to the jury. When the expert hears "I'm out of milk," he will tell the judge, the speaker is saying "I'm out of crack." Courts routinely admit this ridiculous evidence. With 17 of the charged 30 defendants still refusing to take plea bargains, it will take all day.

So if you have a thought on what's "crackalackin' " today (real translation: "What's happening?" -- ask any rapper, it has nothing to do with crack cocaine) here's the place.

Via Daily Kos and Attytood we learn the story of Gennaro Pellegrini, a police officer and boxer who got caught in the Pentagon's Stop Loss program through which his tour of duty in Iraq was extended. Here's the background, from Will Bunch's article in the Philadelphia Daily News. Yesterday, Bunch (aka Attytood) brings us the unhappy ending.

"I just want to get it done, come home, and continue my life." Those were just about the last words that Gennaro Pellegrini, Jr. -- a 31-year-old Philly cop and up-and-coming boxer -- said to us when we spoke last last November. In less than 48 hours, Pellegrini was about to step onto an airplane bound for Iraq, along with the rest of his Pennsylvania National Guard unit from Northeast Philadelphia.

For anyone who's worried about the return of a military draft, Pellegrini was living proof that we already have one in George W. Bush's America. He desperately did not want to serve in the Persian Gulf. He was just two weeks away from finishing up his six-year stint in the Guard when he was told that his tour of duty was being extended and that he would serve in Iraq for at least a year, maybe longer. The news could not have come at a worse time for Pellegrini. He was training for his first pro fight, newly engaged to be married, and settling into his job as a Philadelphia police officer, just like his dad.

Walter Pincus has a new article in the Washington Post trying to connect the inconsistent dots about who selected Joseph Wilson for the Niger mission in 2002 - was it at Valerie Plame's suggestion or at the direction of higher ups at the CIA's Directorate of Operations counterproliferation division (CPD.)

The White House officials speaking with reporters in the days between June 6, 2003, when Wilson's op-ed appeared in the Times, and June 14, 2003, when Bob Novak's column came out, tell the same story: Valerie Plame suggested Wilson for the job. The CIA officials tell it differently.