Has anyone noticed Billmon at Whiskey Bar has a "closed" sign up? We hope it's temporary.

Geoff Nunberg will be mentioning a bunch of blogs on his NPR Fresh Air program Monday. Congrats to Skippy for being included.

Happy blogiversary to Atrios and James Capozzola -- Eschaton and Rittenhouse Review turned two years old this week.

Wonkette makes the New York Times:

With her gossipy, raunchy, potty-mouthed blog, Ms. Cox, a 31-year-old self-described failed journalist, has grabbed the attention of staid Washington, where gossip columns usually amount to little more than records of Capitol Hill staff changes and James Carville sightings. As she puts it, her mission for her blog (www.wonkette.com) is to write "a blend of gossip and satire and things I make up." It supports no party line, mixing gossip items from newspapers and Web sites with tips e-mailed from readers, which could be anything from guesses about which members of the Bush administration are gay to blind items on Washington luminaries. "

Josh Marshall receives a heartfelt e-mail from the employer of the four kidnapped Italian bodyguards in Iraq, with special praise for Fabrizio who was killed.

The number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq in April now stands at 99.

Ten U.S. troops were killed on Saturday in combat across Iraq - including five U.S. Marines killed in pitched battles near the Syrian border - and an eleventh soldier died in a tank rollover, the military said. The deaths brought to 99 the number of U.S. troops killed in violence since April 1.

Steve Gilliard says we're losing to the guerillas. Is he right?

Make no mistake, none. This has been a month of defeats for the US. We had to stop outside Fallujah, stop outside Najaf and now face a blockade of Baghdad. We are actively losing this war and that will be clear as time goes on.

Did Illinois let this man freeze to death in prison?

A McHenry County man who in December died of hypothermia in a Downstate prison wore only a hospital gown in his bare cell, while staffers wore winter coats, hats and gloves and drank hot beverages to keep warm, according to a wrongful-death lawsuit. The suit, filed by the father and brother of Charles Platcher, seeks more than $1 million from the state Department of Corrections and its health-care contractor, Health Professionals Ltd. of Peoria. It alleges abuse of Platcher, including that a sock was stuffed in his mouth and that he was pushed down metal stairs.

Platcher, 31, was serving a 40-year sentence in Menard Correctional Center for stabbing his mother to death in 2001. After being found unresponsive Dec. 25, he was taken to Memorial Hospital in nearby Chester, where he was pronounced dead. A coroner's inquest ruled March 30 that Platcher died of hypothermia. "He was allowed to freeze to death in their care," said John Julian, the Platchers' lawyer. "At the very least, their conduct was negligent and fell below the standard of care one would expect to be provided to inmates."

The 9/11 Commission studied the use of wiretaps since the Sept. 11 attacks:

The number of secret surveillance warrants sought by the FBI has increased 85 percent in the past three years, a pace that has outstripped the Justice Department's ability to process them quickly. Even after warrants are approved, the FBI often doesn't have enough agents or other personnel with the expertise to conduct the surveillance. And the agency still is trying to build a cadre of translators who can understand conversations intercepted in such languages as Arabic, Pashto and Farsi.

....The warrants, authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, allow for wiretaps, video surveillance, property searches and other spying on people thought to be terrorists or spies. After the 2001 Patriot Act and a key 2002 court decision crumbled the legal wall separating the FBI's criminal and intelligence investigations, use of FISA warrants has soared as sharing of information has become easier.

And now, Bush calls for renewal of the Patriot Act. We say no, pass the Safe Act instead.

[Ed. title edited to reflect the 85% figure reflects increase in wiretap requests rather than actual wiretaps]

We're on lunch break, in the lobby where we have a wireless connection for a few minutes. There was a very interesting presentation this morning by five prosecutors and a judge. All have begun programs to find prison alternatives for drug offenders--the most innovative is in Brooklyn, New York, called DTAP.

DTAP is the first prosecution-run program in the country to divert prison-bound felony offenders to residential drug treatment. The program targets drug-addicted defendants arrested for nonviolent felony offenses who have previously been convicted of one or more nonviolent felonies. Qualified defendants enter a felony guilty plea and receive a deferred sentence that allows them to participate in a residential therapeutic community (TC) drug treatment program for a period of 15 to 24 months. Those who successfully complete the program have their charges dismissed; those who fail are brought back to court by a special warrant enforcement team and sentenced to prison. To prevent relapse and reduce recidivism, the District Attorney's Office has formed a Business Advisory Council to identify and develop employment sources in Brooklyn. DTAP also has a job developer to assist graduates in finding and maintaining employment.

What strikes us as particularly notewortthy is that they take repeat offenders. They realize that drug treatment fails the first few times around for many. In New York, under the Rockefellar drug laws, a first offense for over 1/8 ounce is 15 to life. For a second offense of less than 1/8 of an ounce, it's still 41/2 to 9 years. And these are mandatory minimum sentences.

Well, one thing we didn't figure on is a hotel with just dialup. And slow dialup at that. How the ABA could pick such a place is beyond us, but it's like being stuck in Palm Springs circa 1958. Not is there only no high speed, there is no minibar, no water in the rooms, no HBO, no late night food service, a shortage of electrical sockets, etc. Right now we're on wireless, but it's only available in the hotel lobby, and much as we'd like to blog all night, sitting in a hotel lobby with a room full of strangers just doesn't seem like fun.

We'll be in a Criminal Justice Section Council meeting all day tommorrow, no wireless in the conference center, so we're not sure when we'll return to blogging. It may be tomorrow night or Sunday night.

If you haven't checked out the great sites on our blogrolls, please do.

by TChris

George Tenet testified before the 9/11 commission that he hadn't talked with President Bush during the entire month of August 2001. Well, not quite.

CIA records showed Tenet briefed the president on national security threats once during Bush's 27-day ranch vacation, on Aug. 17, and again at the White House on Aug. 31. He also met with the president at least six more times during the first eight days of September, the spokesman said.

Since Tenet received a memo in August 2001 entitled "Islamic Extremist Learns to Fly," as well as the infamous August 6, 2001 memo warning of "patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks," it is reasonable to wonder whether he briefed the President about a possible connection between extremists learning to fly and extremists who plotted to hijack airplanes. If he didn't, why not? Difficult questions for Tenet to answer, given his inability to recall the meetings he had with the President.

Regardless of what Tenet remembers, Bush still has a difficult question to answer:

No one has been able to say whether Bush followed up in any way after he asked his intelligence agencies whether there was a domestic threat from Al Qaeda, and got a loud "yes" in response.

by TChris

The heat on Donald Rumsfeld would make a less self-righteous man sweat. It's embarassing to be publicly criticized by another Republican, but Rummy can dismiss John McCain's complaints on the ground that McCain is a maverick politician. Besides, McCain is careful to express "enormous admiration" for Rumsfeld even as he complains that Rummy underestimated the number of ground troops needed to restore and maintain order in Iraq.

Rumsfeld should find criticism less easy to dismiss when it comes from a man who spent 39 years in the military: retired Marine General Anthony Zinni, the former commander of the U.S. Central Command.

Zinni wondered aloud yesterday how Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld could be caught off guard by the chaos in Iraq that has killed nearly 100 Americans in recent weeks and led to his announcement that 20,000 U.S. troops would be staying there instead of returning home as planned.

Zinni says he's warned decision-makers for years that Iraq would become more dangerous to American interests without Saddam Hussein. He thinks "heads should roll over Iraq." As entertaining as the sight of a headless Rummy might be, this administration refuses to make accountability a part of the game plan, and never admits it erred.

Osama bin Laden has released a new tape, referring to the recent train bombings in Spain. He offers Europe a truce--but not the U.S. or Israel. The tape was played Thursday on Al Jazeera.

I offer a truce to them (Europe) with a commitment to stop operations against any state which vows to stop attacking Muslims or interfere in their affairs," the voice said on the tape aired by Dubai-based Al Arabiya and Qatar-based Al Jazeera channels.

"The announcement of the truce starts with the withdrawal of the last soldier from our land and the door is open for three months from the date of the announcement of this statement. "Whoever rejects this truce and wants war, we are its (war's) sons and whoever wants this truce, here we bring it." Security analysts said bin Laden was maneuvering to split the U.S.-led coalition and scare wavering members out of Iraq.

Bin Laden said the Spain bombings were retaliatory for Spain's actions in Afganistan and Iraq and against the Palestinians.

[comments now closed]

The country's first "faith-based prison" for women opened yesterday in Tampa. Florida also is home to the first such prison for men which opened in December, with Jeb Bush on hand to work the crowds.

President Bush is also trying to institute religious bias:

Bush is trying to get Congress to exempt religious groups from adhering to anti-discrimination laws on hiring policies. He wants the groups to be able to discriminate based on religion and sexual orientation.

Background here.

Good news! The three Japanese hostages have been released.

Anti-polygraph.org reports:

AntiPolygraph.org has received anonymous, but seemingly credible reports that the head of the LAPD's polygraph unit, a Mr. Roy Ortiz, falsified polygraph test results of both LAPD applicants and currently serving officers seeking assignment to elite units such as counternarcotics and the anti-terrorist division, and that LAPD commanders swept the matter under the rug.

You can read the actual communications here.