The jury in Tom DeLay's Texas money laundering trial deliberated three hours today, and will be back tomorrow:

Dick DeGuerin, DeLay's lead attorney, restated what he had often said throughout the trial: that prosecutors had failed to prove the ex-lawmaker committed a crime and the money swap was legal.

Throughout his closing arguments, DeGuerin repeated one phrase in particular: no corporate money went to candidates in Texas. He even included the sentence — in bold, black letters — in a slide show he presented to jurors.

He also used his partisan politics theme: [More...]

I'll be in court the rest of the day. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

The American Music Awards are on tonight. Some red carpet photos are here and here. Are there any performances you want to see or thought were good? Kid Rock is on now and Bon Jovi will be on in about 40 minutes.

There's also the finale of the Next Iron Chef and a new Boardwalk Empire.

Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton today on Face the Nation:

"I don't believe so ... The terrorists who are serving time in our maximum security prisons are there because of civilian courts, what are called Article Three Courts. Our Article Three Courts have a much better record of trying and convicting terrorists than military commissions do, and in fact this defendant having been convicted will be sentenced somewhere between 20 years and life."

But she also seemed to defend military commission trials, at least in some cases:

"The civilian courts have a better record of actually convicting and imprisoning than we do yet have in the military commission. But we also don't want to have security problems or publicity problems for particularly dangerous leading terrorists. So we should look at the military commission."

So will this be Obama and Holder's final decision and justification? That security and publicity justify the use of military commissions? I hope not. Another lame idea, this time by Rep. Steny Hoyer: Holding a federal criminal jury trial at Guantanamo. Who's there to serve? Guards and their spouses? Or would they fly in a jury from New York? The security and surroundings would obliterate the presumption of innocence. Who would agree to move to Gitmo for the many months or longer the trial would take? Certainly not a cross-section of the public. [More...]

AQAP has released the third issue of Inspire Magazine. (Inspire is the "al Qaeda for Dummies" version of their propoganda releases.) You can read it here. (H/T Jihadology and IntelWire.)

In it, they explain how they made the cargo bombs and why. It wasn't to kill people. Their motives are economic. They want to cause a hemorrhage in the airline industry. They knew our predictable response would be to spend billions ramping up ineffective airline security measures. They are laughing at us, and on this point, with good reason. They also promise many more of these operations, by sharing their findings with their followers in other countries, so they can mail packages and get them on civilian planes going to the U.S. [More...]

National Opt-Out day: If you're flying Wednesday, will you refuse the scan? Here's the latest: A bladder cancer survivor is left soaking in his own urine after a humiliating pat-down.

Anyone online tonight? If so, here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

I'm not the only one who thinks politics has run Dancing With the Stars into the ground. According to Popeater, AOL's online entertainment news site, Dancing With the Stars producers and ABC and other TV insiders believe the show will be permanently ruined if Bristol Palin wins, and they fear she might, due to her mother's fan base and campaigning. Insiders give three reasons:

• It will go from being a dancing competition to a popularity competition where whoever has the most rabid fan base will always win no matter how little talent they have."

• "[A]fter Bristol wins no one in Hollywood will ever want to be on the show again," a well-placed ABC source tells me. "Why would a real star want to compete and lose against someone like [former U.S. Senate candidate] Christine O'Donnell or Levi Johnston. It's humiliating. The producers know they are in big trouble for sure."

• "A friend of one of the judges [says] Bristol has made a fool out of all of them. It's now painfully obvious that the judge's scores and opinions mean nothing."

Here's how the voting is supposed to work: [More...]

This week's picks:

Penn St (-10) over Ind., Wisconsin (-3) over Michigan, South Florida (+4) over Pitt, Okla St(-24) over Kansas, Louisville (+4) over W. Va., K. State (-2) over Colorado, Utah St. (-2) over Idaho, Iowa (+4) over Ohio State, Illini (+9) over Northwestern, Stanford (-7) over Cal., Miami (+3) over Va Tech, Ole Miss (+17) over LSU, Arkansas (-2) over Miss State (5 units), Maryland (+5) over FSU, Ore. State (+4) over USC, Notre Dame (-8) over Army (3 units.).

Open Thread.

Joe Scarborough gets a 2 day suspension from MSNBC for political contributions. Scarborough says one was to his brother and the other to family friends, so he thought the rule didn't apply.

A judge in Florida has revoked Wesley Snipes bail and ordered him to start serving his 3 year prison sentence for tax evasion immediately. "Snipes' appeal for a new trial and motion to interview the jurors who sealed his fate were denied."

Tom DeLay's defense has rested in his Texas trial. He did not take the stand. Deliberations begin Monday.

Georgia Federal Judge Jack Camp pleaded guilty today to aiding and abetting a felon's possession of cocaine and two misdemeanor counts of possession of cocaine and giving a court computer to his stripper friend. His guidelines: 4 to 10 months. Not charged: possession of a weapon. He resigned from the bench this morning.

Cholera has struck Haiti's main prison in Port-au-Prince. Thirteen inmates are dead and dozens more infected.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Ed Kilgore:

[T]rue independents tend to vote against the party in power when the economy is bad, regardless of the perceived ideology or partisanship of the party in power. It happened in 2006 and it happened again in 2010. Arguing, as some have done, that the answer for Democrats is to "move to the center" and find some way to work with Republicans makes sense only if such steps contribute to an improvement in the performance of the economy. If they don't, then it's not the right direction to take, particularly if you consider the costs in terms of sacrificing progressive policy goals and making the Democratic elements of the electorate unhappy precisely on the eve of the cycle when they can be expected to return to the polls.

(Emphasis supplied.) What former DLCer Ed Kilgore said.

Speaking for me only

One of the better things I have written (IMNSHO) was the first thing I ever wrote for Talk Left in 2006. This part remains pertinent I think:

Politics is not a battle for the middle. It is a battle for defining the terms of the political debate. It is a battle to be able to say what is the middle.

Mike Lux does a nice job of this:

Via Atrios, The MERS Protection Act:

The [Grifting h/t kdog] industry is seeking legislation that would effectively affirm MERS's legality and block any bill that would call into question what MERS does. MERS has spent more than $1 million in lobbying since fall 2008, when lower courts around the country began to rule against it. But MERS had kept its name under the radar until the recent uproar over foreclosures revealed broad problems in mortgage paperwork.

How much you wanna bet that the incompetent and corrupt Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner supports this?

Speaking for me only