It only took seven years, but unidentified DNA from JonBenet Ramsey's underwear has finally been submitted to the FBI for comparison with persons in its national databank.

Previous tests showed the DNA did not match members of the Ramsey family. Why wasn't it submitted earlier? The police say it was because the sample wasn't good enough. Miraculously, after being in storage for seven years, now it's just fine.

Lin Wood, the Ramseys' lawyers, have a much more plausible theory:

Wood accused Boulder police of not aggressively pursuing the DNA because it appeared to have been from someone outside the Ramsey family. The Ramseys have long contended that an outsider killed their daughter, and they have accused police of ignoring that possibility.

Police declined to comment, referring questions to the district attorney's office.

As an aside, we've maintained a website on JonBenet's murder since 1999. It's called: Jon Benet Ramsey: The Media UnLynch Mob Page. It was on hiatus for 2003, but if this DNA testing shows anything, we will resurrect it.

JonBenet was killed seven years ago today, December 26, 1996.

The lawsuit filed by the parents of JonBenet Ramsey against Fox News lists the following evidence linking her murder to an intruder:

• Male DNA found on JonBenét's panties that is not the DNA of anyone in the Ramsey family and has not been sourced;
• Male DNA found under JonBenét?s fingernails of both hands that is not the DNA of anyone in the Ramsey family and has not been sourced;
• Two pairs of marks on JonBenét?s body which indicate that a stun gun was used to subject and torture her;
• Evidence of an intruder found in the Ramseys? basement, including a broken open window with a suitcase and broken glass under it, and a window-well to this window with signs of recent disturbance;
• Material from the window-well found in the room where JonBenét was discovered;
• Male pubic or ancillary hair and numerous fibers found on JonBenét's body, clothing and blanket which do not match anything in the Ramsey home and have not been sourced;
• Unidentified shoe prints in the basement and unidentified palm prints on the door to the room where JonBenét was found, which do not match those of anyone in the Ramsey home and have not been sourced;
• JonBenét's autopsy findings, which indicate that she was sexually assaulted, strangled, tortured and then bludgeoned at or near the point of death
• physical evidence of the manner and timing of her death which does not fit the theory of an accidental killing by a parent or sibling followed by staging;
• The garrote and slipknots used to bind and kill JonBenét were sophisticated torture and bondage devices which no one in the Ramsey family had the knowledge to construct;
• Materials used to assault and strangle JonBenét. The stun gun, nylon cord and duct tape which necessarily existed but which were never owned by the Ramseys and were not found in their home;

James Ridgeway of the Village Voice writes that police state tactics are transforming our nation. The most recent victims: the foreign press.

Every day, Ashcroft and Bush work the country toward something like martial law, though the administration has suffered setbacks, like last week's rulings by two federal appellate courts in Padilla v. Rumsfeld and Gherebi v. Bush. Both of those decisions, for now at least, hamper the government's ability to simply lock up suspects indefinitely. But the government has other targets and other ways of dealing with them. The most recent crackdown seems to be on the foreign press—the source of much of the substantial critique of its policies.

U.S. immigration authorities are detaining foreign correspondents on grounds they have not obtained special visas permitting them to operate here, reports the Associated Press. True, there is a law stipulating a special visa for journalists, but few have ever heard of it and it is seldom enforced. No more. No one ever told the visiting journalists it had suddenly been revived. As a result, immigration officials aren't allowing reporters from abroad to come in under ordinary 90-day tourist visa waivers.

Here's but one of Ridgeway's examples:

Peter Krobath, chief editor for the Austrian movie magazine Skip, was seized and held overnight in a cold room with 45 others who landed without visas. Is he an Osama follower? A disguised fedayeen from Saddam's clan? No. He is guilty of flying to the U.S. to interview Ben Affleck.

The Government's response:

An embassy official in Vienna insisted that the government was only acting in accordance with the letter of the law.

Joe Lieberman is in hot water over his abortion stand. A New Hampshire paper, The Union Leader, says he would re-examine Roe v. Wade. (We couldn't find the article online). Nonsense, says Lieberman, clarifying his position.

Today Lieberman describes himself as pro-choice, and says if he were President, abortions would be safe, legal....and rare. Rare? If it's a woman's choice, Joe, who are you to say the procedure should be rare? Your position still sounds muddled to us.

From the Toledo Blade....Diverse Views on the Patriot Act

What Section 215 of the Patriot Act says: The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation ... may make an application for an order requiring the production of any tangible things (including books, records, papers, documents, and other items) for an investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities, provided that such investigation of a United States person is not conducted solely upon the basis of activities protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution.

What the U.S. Department of Justice says about Section 215: "Law enforcement authorities have always been able to obtain business records in criminal cases through grand jury subpoenas. ... The government can now ask a federal court (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court) to order production of the same type of records available through grand jury subpoenas."

What the American Civil Liberties Union says about Section 215: "Section 215 vastly expands the FBI’s power to spy on ordinary people living in the United States. ... The FBI can investigate persons based in part on their exercise of First Amendment rights. ... The FBI could spy on a person because they don’t like the books she reads. ... Those who are the subjects of the surveillance are never notified that their privacy has been compromised."

As co-author of this book on the Patriot Act (Matthew Bender, 2001) here's what we have to say about Section 215:

More countries are banning U.S. beef. A second herd has been quarrantined because it contains a calf from the cow that had mad cow disease. We haven't been too worried, thinking it's an isolated instance, but this has us a little concerned:

The animal that came down with the nation's first case of mad cow disease had been made into hamburger and probably eaten before the U.S. Agriculture Department received test results.

Howard Dean says it's too early to judge Bin Laden:

Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean says it's premature to recommend what penalty Osama bin Laden should face before he's been legally determined to be guilty of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Asked whether bin Laden should be tried in the United States and put to death, Dean told the Concord Monitor: "I still have this old-fashioned notion that even with people like Osama, who is very likely to be found guilty, we should do our best not to, in positions of executive power, not to prejudge jury trials."

In an interview with the New Hampshire newspaper for Friday editions, Dean added: "I'm sure that is the correct sentiment of most Americans, but I do think if you're running for president, or if you are president, it's best to say that the full range of penalties should be available. But it's not so great to prejudge the judicial system."

Calling Iraq "probably the best place" for Saddam Hussein to be tried, Dean said he is willing "to be flexible about that because I don't think it's essential to the security interests of the United States." Dean said he plans to keep reminding Democrats that he, unlike his major rivals for the nomination, opposed the Iraq war, in spite of polls showing the vast majority of the American public supporting the invasion at the time.

We have no problem with Saddam being tried in Iraq, provided the trial is conducted by a UN tribunal and not the recently formed Iraqi War Crimes Tribunal. Our reasons are here.

Really good news. The prosecutors in the Lionel Tate case have re-offered him the deal his mother turned down for him prior to trial. In three months he'll be out of prison, serve a year on home detention and then ten years on probation:

Tate beat 6-year-old Tiffany Eunick to death when he was 12, claiming he accidentally killed her while imitating pro wrestling moves he had seen on television. He was tried as an adult, convicted of first-degree murder and received an automatic life-without-parole sentence in a case that led to international criticism of Florida's tough handling of juveniles who kill.

The plea bargain would let Tate, now 16, plead guilty to second-degree murder and receive a sentence of three years in prison, of which he has already served 33 months, Broward State Attorney Michael J. Satz said in a statement.
That would be followed by a year under house arrest and 10 years of probation. Tate would also have to undergo psychological treatment.

More details of the case and history are available here.

Atrios and Daily Kos report via the New York Times that Bush has developed a strategy to defeat Dean. It's to portray Dean as pessimistic.

Atrios did an Nexis search back to October and found the first purveyors of the false theory: Laura Ingraham and Mary Matalin.

Nathan Newman says that since Dean thinks he can get rid of Bush and solve our economic problems, that makes him optimistic. "So I'd say this calls for a positive google bomb promoting the idea that Dean is optimistic."

Since the beginning of the war in Iraq, 20 U.S. soldiers have committed suicide.

The Army is concerned about the deaths. Outside experts have said the rate is alarmingly high compared with the military's average suicide rate. A report by a 12-member team of military and civilian mental-health professionals dispatched to Iraq in October to evaluate troops is expected to be released after the holidays, officials said.

Independent experts said they hope the team's report offers some insight into the suicides. Did they result from personal issues, such as the loss of close relationship, or from legal or financial matters? Or did they involve larger, more sensitive issues about the U.S. mission?

Those broader questions relate to the morale of troops in Iraq, many of whom have complained of their long deployments. And they bear upon whether the Bush administration is overstraining the military with such practices as deploying soldiers, such as Suell, on consecutive tours with insufficient family time, experts said.

Indicted or not, former Illiniois Governor George Ryan remains a hero to a lot of people, including African-Americans in Illinois. He's one to us as well:

WVON-1450 morning talk show on Tuesday were asked who they would have picked as Time magazine's "Person of the Year." Although several African-Americans have played critical roles in national and international issues this year, including Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, one man's name was mentioned several times--and he isn't black. At least three callers named indicted former Gov. George Ryan, Kelley told me.

Ryan's insistence on a death penalty moratorium and his blanket clemency of Death Row inmates, has guaranteed that -- at least among most African-Americans -- his legacy would not be buried under federal corruption charges.

Obviously, three votes as "Person of the Year," is not enough to gauge the sentiments of an entire ethnic group. Still, given that Ryan is a Republican and one is hard-pressed to find a handful of black Republicans in the Chicago region, I would say Kelley's callers are expressing a widely held sentiment.

Ryan has been honored by both the local NAACP and Rainbow/ PUSH Coalition. These civil rights groups aren't likely to abandon him now in his battle to stay out of prison.

The Government's investigation into who leaked the identity of CIA undercover agent Valerie Plame may be taking a step forward. A fourth prosecutor has been assigned to the case and the FBI has said administration officials may be called to a grand jury.

On Monday, the Senate minority leader and the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee sent a letter to Attorney General John D. Ashcroft demanding more information about the probe. "We request that you provide us with an overall status of the investigation, including the number of people the Justice Department has interviewed, the number of briefings you have received, the general types of information you are briefed on, what conditions you have placed on the scope of these briefings to ensure the independence of this investigation, and whether you have discussed this case with senior administration officials outside the Justice Department," wrote the senators, Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.) and Carl M. Levin (Mich.).

The senators said that it is an apparent conflict of interest for Ashcroft to be briefed on the subject, and again requested a special counsel to prosecute the case, which Ashcroft has so far opposed.

There's lots more detail in this article, so read the whole thing. Our Valerie Plame coverage is accessible here.