We're saddened to learn that writer John Gregory Dunne has died at 71. While we enjoyed his books a lot, his wife, Joan Didion, has been our favorite author for the past 30 years--since we first read Play it As it Lays in 1972. Our condolences to Ms. Didion--and to Mr. Dunne's brother, author Dominick Dunne.

The grandson of an Irish immigrant, Dunne often focused on the Irish-American experience, particularly in his novel ``True Confessions.'' The 1977 breakthrough book involved a Los Angeles murder and its effect on two Irish-Catholic brothers, one a detective, the other a priest, neither untainted by corruption. Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall starred in the movie, which Dunne adapted with Didion. ``'True Confessions' was a major novel, one of the best books ever written about politics,'' said Pulitzer Prize winner David Halberstam, a friend and fellow writer. ``He was a very important writer, and a wonderful friend--talented, edgy, combative.''

Here's how our President began the New Year:

President Bush shot quail on a hunting trip Thursday but ate beef, and encouraged Americans to do the same despite concern over mad cow disease.

"I think I shot 5," Bush told reporters at Brooks County Airport after returning from the hunt with his father on a dusty and desolate stretch of land in southern Texas.

Mark Gisleson of BushWars has a good wrap up of New Year's blog offerings.

Atrios has a New Year's resolution.

Lisa English of Ruminate This has an activist agenda up with a cheat-sheet.

Damn Foreigner has the latest Maher Arar updates, including a possible new smear campaign against him. Arar is the Canadian who was seized by the U.S. at JFK and shipped off to Syria where he was imprisoned for a year during which incarceration he says he was tortured.

Patrick Nielsen Hayden of Electrolite and David Neiwert of Orcinus are onto the U.S. neglect of domestic terrorists. David says,

If anyone wanted evidence that the "war on terror" is primarily a political marketing campaign -- in which war itself is mostly a device for garnering support -- they need look no farther than the startling non-response to domestic terrorism by the Bush administration.

He offers the Texas cyanide bomb plot up as an example. More here, including this quote from Daniel Levitas, author of The Terrorist Next Door: The Militia Movement and the Radical Right:

"Excuse me, a chemical weapon was found in the home state of George Bush," says Levitas. "I'm not saying the Justice Department deliberately decided to downplay the story because they thought it might be embarrassing to the US government if weapons of mass destruction were found in America before they were found in Iraq. But I am saying it was a mistake not to give this higher profile."

Oliver Willis makes it into Discover Magazine. We hope it's MSNBC next for Oliver.

Ezra Klein at Pandagon is angry over a Dean supporter referring to Josh Marshall and Matt Yglesias as "Heathers." We have to agree that labeling Josh and Matt as conservative media is off-base.

Josh Marshall provides some possible explanations for why Ashcroft recused himself in the Plame investigation. We still think the most likely one is to avoid claims of whitewash and conflict of interest when it turns out that a certain high level White House official is found to be the leak but the Justice Department announces it will not prosecute because it cannot prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Instapundit has a variation of this view: "Instead, it seems that his recusal would make more sense if people were likely to scream "whitewash" because Rove wasn't involved."

Skippy gives thanks for the New Year. We'd like to thank Skippy back, for bringing us so many smiles over the past year.

South Knox Bubba has the Freepers on Parade: the best of 2003. Here's a sample:

Constitution? What is that? Oh I remember. That is the document that protects pornography and the media.

Avedon Carol of Sideshow has this from Media Free America:

Chief Justice William Rehnquist ripped the PROTECT Act in a year end report and said the Act comes too close to intimidation for federal judges involved in sentencing decisions.

By singling out judges who occasionally veer from the toughest sentencing, the law "could appear to be an unwarranted and ill-considered effort to intimidate individual judges in the performance of their judicial duties," the chief justice said.

Rehnquist also blasted Congress for failing to fully fund the federal judiciary. Though he heads the Supreme Court, Rehnquist is "chief justice of the United States" and was speaking for the entire federal judiciary.

Found over at Lucas Doolin's Deer Camp:

Hope everyone is prepared for the coming year with the proper survival gear:

• Five rolls of colored duct tape (red, orange, yellow, green, blue)
• One copy of the "World Almanac" to keep in your car
• One copy of Edward Abbey's "Hayduke Lives" to put in your carry-on baggage when you fly
• Piggy bank, for saving your new Reagan dimes
• Ann Coulter action figure
• A good supply of Oxycontin, to take while you listen to the Rush Limbaugh Excellence in Broadcasting Network

Arthur at Light of Reason says

We have now been informed as to Bush's "reasoning" with regard to cases such as the Padilla one -- by none other than Bradford A. Berenson, "a Washington lawyer, who was associate White House counsel to President Bush."

Arthur reviews Mr. Berenson's claims and says we should all be frightened because our country is headed for a dictatorship.

Keep in mind that the government keeps repeating that the "war on terror" will go on for an indefinite period of time -- and that it may well go on for as long as we live. But if Mr. Berenson, and I assume the administration, had their way, any United States citizen could be apprehended, taken into custody, and held for the rest of his life -- with no charges being filed, no recourse to an attorney, and with no hope of ever being set free, until and unless the President happens to change his mind.

[the comments have changed the topic of the thread and are now closed.]

From the New York Lawyer:

The International Legal Foundation is looking for lawyers to volunteer service with the Afghanistan public defender's office in Kabul, the New York Law Journal reports. Applicants with a minimum five years' criminal law experience should expect to serve at least eight weeks in Kabul, beginning March 1.

Interviews will be conducted in New York between Jan. 26 and Feb. 6. Résumés may be sent to Executive Director Natalie Rea at NRea@TheILF.org.

Here's more. [hat tip to Hesiod at Counterspin]

We're off to a wedding tonight. It's a tale of cyberfriends making real friends. Those of you who read Eric Alterman's Altercation undoubtedly are familiar with one of his guest Altercators--Eric Rauchway. We occasionally altercate for Eric A. as well. About a year ago, Eric R. emailed us that his brother Jon and fiance Cleo were moving to Denver and suggested we get together. We did, and we've become great friends and their wedding is tonight. Eric R. and his wife and kids are in town for it (we all spent Christmas evening together as well) and we're very much looking forward to the celebration. What a fun night to get married.

Whatever your plans tonight, whether going out to celebrate or staying in with friends or even just reading the blogs and watching tv, we wish you a happy and safe New Year.

Update: The wedding was awesome--beautiful--what a happy night it was!

We weren't impressed by the Sheriff's news conference. The Sheriff played selected portions of tapes. We don't know what was on the rest of the tapes. The Sheriff said that he is considering Michael Jackson's allegations of mistreatment as a filed report and that he has asked the state Attorney General to investigate. If the Attorney General finds no misconduct, the Sheriff said he will seek to have false reporting charges filed against Jackson.

We think it's wrong of the Sheriff to hold a press conference and announce that a criminal defendant is not worthy of credibility. If a prosecutor did it, it would be unethical.

The threat of criminal charges is a weak one. Michael Jackson didn't file a report with the police so he can't be guilty of filing a false one.

The whistling and saying he's fine is of no moment to us. Most likely a defense mechanism. Most of our clients would have done the same thing, not wanting to acknowledge the power the police have over them and give them any satisfaction.

Pain can be delayed. His bruise on the arm was immediate. Jackson's feeling the effect on his shoulder could have happened that evening. He might not have mentioned it to Geragos at the time because it might not have hurt that bad at the time--and because he was more concerned with the outrageous perp walk the sheriff's and DA had insisted upon.

There was no need to handcuff Michael Jackson behind his back. They could have handcuffed him in front. When we surrender clients on arrest warrants, we bring them to the county sheriff or U.S. Marshal's and no handcuffs are involved. The $3 million bond had already been posted. There was no need--other than a publicity stunt by the prosecution--to insist on such a ritual. It was all for the cameras.

As to the bathroom, the Sheriff said Michael was locked in there for 15 minutes. Michael estimated 45. We're sure it felt like 45 minutes to Michael. Just because it was cleaned before Jackson was arrested, doesn't mean another inmate didn't get in there and mess it up--or that the cleaning wasn't less than thorough. The holding cell that had the toilet was built to house up to 7 inmates, according to the Sheriff. It most likely would have smelled.

We'll wait to hear Geragos' response, but those are our initial thoughts.

The New Jersey prison guards union is petitioning the Governor to fire the head of the Department of Corrections for racially insensitive comments. Corrections Commissioner Devon Brown, an African-American, made these comments in a speech about the unfair treatment meted out by the criminal justice system to blacks and hispanics:

"This state and nation has lost a generation of young African-Americans and Hispanics, both male and female, to the criminal justice juggernaut."

"`There are those who with some degree of justification have proclaimed our prisons as being America's new plantations," he said, "for not since slavery has our country promoted policies which have visited such enormous economic and human calamity on the black community."

Our advice to the Governor: Keep Commissioner Brown. If the shoe fits.....

The DEA has refused to comply with a Colorado state court judge's order to return a medical marijuana patient's 2 ounces of marijuana to him. The patient has a license under Colorado law to possess marijuana. A state search warrant had been issued for his residence, the DEA went along on the search and seized his pot. A misdemeanor criminal case was filed against him in state court and later dismissed, and the judge ordered the DEA to return the pot. Background is here.

Today, the court-ordered deadline for returning the pot, the DEA said it will not return the pot:

"Federal law supersedes state law, and the federal government does not recognize the medicinal use of marijuana," he said.

The man's attorney, Kristopher Hammond, will ask the Judge to hold the DEA in contempt of court.

"There's nothing federal about this case," Hammond said. "The feds can't just steal the marijuana and therefore make it federal property."

Walter in Denver says the DEA's actions are an "unspeakable evil."

It's hard to find printable words to describe these people, so let me just say if there were any justice in this case the DEA agents would be looking at jail time themselves.

We think the DEA is acting under marching orders from Ashcroft. We'll be following the case as it progresses through the various courts of appeal. In the meantime, a bill has been introduced in the House that would provide an affirmative defense to medical marijuana users facing federal pot charges--the Truth in Trials Act. Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) will be introducing a similar version in the Senate. Please take two minutes to fax your senators a pre-written letter explaining why it is necessary to provide federal protections to patients and caregivers who use and provide medical marijuana in compliance with state laws. Visit here, enter your address, select a letter, and click a button to send it to your senators.

LA Weekly ran a long interview last October with Valerie Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, called Unfair Game. It has good background on the events leading to the Novak leak and the subsequent investigation. Here's a piece:

When Novak called you before his column ran, did you then know that her identity was going to be revealed?

I assumed that the CIA would be able to advise him that he shouldn't publish her name, which they obviously tried to do. It was when it was first published that I realized they had been unsuccessful in doing that.

What was your reaction then?

My initial reaction was probably unprintable. My second thought was, "Why would somebody leak the name? What is the rational goal of doing that?" I concluded that it was probably to discourage others from coming forward. It was the White House's way of telling others, "If you do a Wilson on us, we'll do this to your wife and your family." It's only recently that a number of [White House sources] who have leaked to the Washington Post have said that it was pure revenge and spite.

Subsequent to the publication of Novak's article there was a second wave of the White House pushing the story, calling the press and saying, "The real story here is Wilson and his wife, it's not the 16 words." I got a call from a journalist who said, "I just got off the phone with Karl Rove, and he said to me, 'Wilson's wife is fair game.'" So even a week after the Novak story, Karl Rove was still thinking it was okay to trash my wife. It was only after I went on NBC and subsequently the Today Show and said this might be illegal that those phone calls stopped.

You've suggested that Rove was behind the original leak.