Michael Jackson's trial is set for January 31 and the Judge does not want a continuance. As TChris reported yesterday, new search warrants were executed at his Neverland ranch in Santa Barbara Friday and Saturday. Now we learn Jackson also submitted to a demand yesterday for a mouth swab test for DNA. All the dozens of hours spent in Jackson's home during the execution of untold number of search warrants, and they didn't have his DNA? Unlikely. They could have gotten it off a glass, a toothbrush, underwear, anything. They didn't swab him when he was arrested? Sneddon didn't save any DNA after the intrusive exam that was done on Jackson's private parts after the 1993 allegation?

It sure doesn't sound like this prosecution has its ducks lined up. We see an overzealous prosecutor, a man on a mission to make a case; a young accuser who has denied Jackson did anything improper; an accuser's mother with highly suspect credibility issues; an inprobable timeline; an official report concluding the charges were unfounded; and more.

Then there's the role of the 1993 accuser's lawyer, hired by the current accuser's mother, who sends the current accuser to the same psychologist, who lo and behold just happened to come up with a similar molestation opinion:

Dr. Stan Katz, a Beverly Hills psychologist ... interviewed the 13-year-old boy in this case. Dr. Katz also assisted in the 1993 case. He reported the allegations in the current one in June 2003 after a therapy session with the boy. In an odd twist, defense attorneys revealed that both the alleged victim and the private investigator who worked for Mr. Geragos, Bradley Miller, were patients of Dr. Katz.

Sounds to us like the prosecution is scrambling...for a continuance to avoid going to trial on a very shaky case.

Sen. John McCain refused to give President Bush his vote of confidence on the Iraq war today, saying that his recent plan to increase troops will not be enough:

McCain told "Fox News Sunday" that more troops probably will be required to protect polling places during next month's elections, prosecute the fight against the insurgency and help reconstruct Falluja, the volatile city where U.S. forces have been conducting an operation.

And the problem, when you react, you have to extend people on duty there, which is terrible for morale. There's a terrific strain on Guard and reservists. If you plan ahead, then you don't have to do some of these things.

"The military," he said, "is too small."

So what are the options? Put your head in the sand if you want, but here's how it looks to us:

Remember that big spending bill Congress passed last month? Somehow, it eliminated an amendment that would have banned the IRS from hiring private firms to go after delinquent taxpayers, a tactic President Bush supported.

So now, the IRS can use commercial debt collectors who will be allowed to keep up to 25% of what they rake in. Where are the controls against harassment? Against the invasion of privacy? There are none. This is the Bush Administration, remember?

Let's see if TChris can top this one: A teenage couple in Florida called the police to tell them their pot was stolen and they needed it back so they could sell it:

According to the police report, the couple returned to the home they share and found the home broken into and a quarter-pound of marijuana missing. They immediately called authorities to report the break-in and theft.

Police said the couple told them they were going to resell the marijuana and allowed the detectives to search the apartment. Investigators discovered several marijuana stems among other drug paraphernalia during the search, The News Herald in Panama City reported for Saturday editions. They were taken to the Bay County Jail and are each being held on $17,500 bond.

by TChris

Someone has been spraying chemicals over poppy fields in Afghanistan, and the government of Afghanistan isn't happy about it.

"The government of Afghanistan has not authorized any foreign entity, any foreign government, any foreign company, or anyone else to carry out aerial spraying," [Jawed Ludin] said [on behalf of President Hamid Karzai].

The United States denies involvement and claims to have no knowledge of the poppy eradication effort. Are those denials credible when the United States controls the airspace over Afghanistan?

by TChris

Is the Supreme Court fed up with Texas death penalty cases? More importantly, is it fed up with the Fifth Circuit?

In the past year, the Supreme Court has heard three appeals from inmates on death row in Texas, and in each case the prosecutors and the lower courts suffered stinging reversals.

Texas leads the nation in executions. The Supreme Court may have become impatient with the cursory review death penalties receive in the Texas appellate courts and in the Fifth Circuit. In a case that returns to the Court after the Fifth Circuit reinstated a death sentence by following the dissent in the Court's 8-1 decision rather than the majority opinion, the Court will have another opportunity to tell the lower courts to stop ignoring the Constitution -- and to tell the Fifth Circuit (again) to stop defying its decisions.

An editiorial in the Sunday LA Times says that Bernie Kerik is wrong for the job of Homeland Security Secretary . The Times opines that Ray Kelley would have made the better choice. But then, Kelly didn't spend election season on the prowl as a Bush attack dog--and Kerik did.

More than 13,000 U.S. army reserves have spent a year or more in medical hold units after being injured in Iraq. Congress is investigating:

Critics inside and outside the Army say "med hold" units are choked with reservists who should have been home much sooner with family or friends. Instead, they find themselves in a system that some Army officials acknowledge was unprepared to handle the thousands of soldiers wounded in combat overseas or injured while training or serving on U.S. military bases.

Shortly after the March 2003 Iraq invasion, when casualties started returning to the U.S., "the system was immediately overloaded," said Col. Lynn Denooyer, an Army Reserve nurse stationed at Fort Carson between March 2003 and August 2004.

Soldiers, veterans' advocates and some lawmakers say that despite recent efforts to beef up medical staffing and speed delivery of care, the Army still hasn't caught up, particularly when it comes to caring for National Guard and Res. erve soldiers.

The purpose of the med-hold program is to allow injured soldiers keep their full-time pay while under review. The problem is, they never leave.

Guard and Reserve soldiers can spend months in med-hold units, unable to return to their civilian lives, while the military decides whether they are fit to serve or must be discharged - and if so, how much pay they should receive.

Military hearings on the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib are underway. Here's a list of links to the most important reports and documents. Most are in pdf format, requiring the Adobe reader.

• Defense Dept. Report
• Schlesinger Report
• Taguba Abuse Report
• The Law of War [including the Geneva Conventions and Protocols]

Pretrial hearings are underway today at Fort Hood for soldiers accused of humiliating and assaulting prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Among those involved: Sabrina Harman and Javal Davis.

The Judge ordered Brig. Gen. Janice Karpinski, the former commander of U.S. prisons in Iraq, to testify about conditions at Abu Ghraib and about interaction between guards and military interrogators at Javal Davis' hearing:

Charges against Davis, a native of Roselle, N.J., include conspiracy to maltreat detainees, assault, dereliction of duty for failing to protect detainees from abuse and lying in official statements. He has acknowledged stepping on the fingers and toes of detainees, but denied hurting anyone.

Davis says the military officials condoned the abuse. Karpinski says she's been made the fall guy.

John McCain is threatening baseball with new legislation for mandatory drug testing in the wake of the media's revelation that Bonds told the grand jury his trainer, since indicted for steroid distribution, gave him substances to take while training.

McCain's threat to impose drug testing standards on professional athletes -- Congress has the authority under the U.S. Constitution's interstate commerce clause -- significantly escalates a long-simmering battle between the federal government and the national pastime over drug use.

McCain is the chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee. I think the question McCain should be asking is who leaked Bonds's grand jury testimony? While witnesses before the grand jury can discuss their testimony, prosecutors and agents are forbidden to discuss matters occurring before the grand jury including witness testimony. Bonds' lawyer denies he used steroids and says Bonds is the victim of a government smear campaign.

Bonds said he thought the substances he was given were flax seed oil and arthritis cream.

The New York Daily News puts Bernie Kerik's appointment as Homeland Security Chief in perspective: Rudy called in a chit.

"Rudy cashed in a chip on this one," said a White House source, who earlier this week predicted there was "no way" Kerik could land a cabinet-level job in the Bush administration.

Kerik was police commissioner under Rudy and then went to work for Giuliani and Partners, Rudy's consulting firm. What's a little more surprising is that Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer and even former NY police commissioner and Rudy foe Bill Bratton are supporting Kerik's nomination.

Meanwhile, in the Rudy news department, his recent Southhampton house-hunting excursions help explain why he didn't want the job himself--or any government job right now: