Open Thread.

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens today denied former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich's request for a stay of his trial. The trial is set to begin Thursday.

Blagojevich wanted a continuance until after the Supreme Court ruled in the case involving the validity of the honest services portion of the wire fraud statute.

Justice Department lawyers urged Stevens on Friday to allow the trial to proceed on schedule. They said in a 15-page filing that the judge presiding over the trial told the lawyers they were not to even mention the term "honest services" in their opening statements to the jury. They also noted the Blagojevich trial is expected to run for four months, so that the lawyers and the judge will have plenty of time to consider the Supreme Court's decisions on the constitutionality of the honest services provision.

I would have granted the delay. Jury selection, opening arguments and all-around trial strategy are impacted by the particular charges a defendant faces. If the Court tosses the law in the middle of the trial, it changes the entire complexion of the trial. The Court is ruling on the issue this term, so why not wait? Judicial economy shouldn't trump the defendant's right to a fair trial.

Uh-oh. Now that the full House has voted to approve DADT and the defense funding bill, there may be a monkey wrench in the works.

The House also approved funding for an alternative engine that Defense Secretary Robert Gates wants to eliminate. President Obama has threatened to veto the bill if it's not removed. At issue is "an amendment providing $500 million to continue developing a second engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter." The Senate version didn't include the engine funding.

The White House warned again on Friday that the president's advisors would push for a veto if the money for the second engine remained in the bill.

What needs to happen: When the bills go to reconciliation, the House engine amendment needs to be dropped.

Also, Secretary Gates told upset members of the military today not to worry, DADT's repeal won't result in changes right away.

"The legislation involved is a deferred repeal," he said. "It would repeal 'don't ask, don't tell,' but only after — I repeat after — the ongoing Department of Defense high-level review is completed."

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The U.S. Sentencing Commission held a hearing yesterday on mandatory minimum sentences. Here is the prepared testimony outlining the position of the Department of Justice which has implemented a task force to study the laws.

Bottom line: DOJ is willing to make some adjustments, mostly minor:

Our study has led us to the conclusion that in an era of advisory guidelines, mandatory minimum sentencing statutes remain important to promote the goals of sentencing and public safety. At the same time, we recognize that some reforms of existing mandatory minimum sentencing statutes are needed and that consideration of some new modest mandatory minimum sentencing statutes is appropriate.

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A guard at the T. Don Hutto immigrant detention facility in Texas has been fired and ICE is investigating allegations he sexually assaulted women detainees being held for deportation. The prison is privately managed by Corrections Corp. of America, which has been put on probation while the investigation is conducted.

Several women who were held at T. Don Hutto detention facility in Taylor, Texas, were groped while being patted down and at least one was propositioned for sex, ICE said. "We understand that this employee was able to commit these alleged crimes because ICE-mandated transport policies and procedures were not followed," David Sanders, the Homeland Security Department's contracting officer said in a letter to Corrections Corporation of America obtained by The Associated Press.

Obama changed the Hutto facility from a family detention center to one holding only females because of past abuses such as prisoner neglect that resulted in the death of detainees. [More...]

It may be a holiday weekend, but there's little to celebrate with Arizona's immigration law. Protests will be held in 60 cities across the country.

The protest in Phoenix, to include a five mile march to the state capitol, is expected to draw 50,000. I'll bet it's a lot higher. Sports fans are being asked to boycott some games.

The San Francisco Giants are also hosting a weekend series against the Arizona Diamondbacks, and activists are planning to protest outside AT&T Park Friday night and Saturday.

Today, DOJ filed a petition with the Supreme Court asking it to find that federal law trumps Arizona's Employers' Sanctions law. [More...]

Via CNN:

Hillary Clinton struck a strong populist chord while wading into territory secretary of states rarely go Thursday: Domestic policy. [. . .]

"The rich are not paying their fair share in any nation that is facing the kind of employment issues [like the U.S.] – whether it's individual, corporate or whatever the taxation forms are," Clinton said after clearly stipulating that these were her opinions, no those of the Obama administration.

[. . .] "Th[is] formula [. . .] used to work for us, until we abandoned it, to our regret in my opinion," she added.

Three thoughts. First, go Hillary! Second, is this appropriate for a Secretary of State? Honestly? I'd say no. Third, I think she will run for President in 2016. And win.

Speaking for me only

Officials say BP's "Top Kill" has stemmed the oil leak...for now.

The next 12 to 18 hours are critical and it could take 48 hours for a final assessment of Top Kill's success. The Times reports this is the biggest oil leak in history, bigger than the Exxon Valdez. Obama is in Louisiana today.

Republicans need to find another issue. White House Counsel Robert Bauer issued a memo (available here) on the Joe Sestak "job" talks today.

An unpaid, advisory position within the executive branch is not a job.

We found that, as the Congressman has publicly and accurately stated, options for Executive Branch service were raised with him. Efforts were made in June and July of 2009 to determine whether Congressman Sestak would be interested in service on a Presidential or other Senior Executive Branch Advisory Board, which would avoid a divisive Senate primary, allow him to retain his seat in the House, and provide him with an opportunity for additional service to the public in a high-level advisory capacity for which he was highly qualified. The advisory positions discussed with Congressman Sestak, while important to the work of the Administration, would have been uncompensated.

[More...]

Steve Benen writes:

It's too soon to know if Republicans will re-take the House majority, but it's probably a good time to consider the consequences of a GOP majority. The obvious outcome is gridlock, with Republicans passing right-wing legislation, which would either be blocked by the Senate or vetoed at the White House. [. . .] But Jonathan Bernstein argues that we can also expect a GOP majority to at least try to impeach President Obama.

[More...]

Via the Miami Herald, a federal judge yesterday granted the Habeas petition of Yemeni Mohammed Hassan, finding he was was illegally detained at Guantanamo.

Hassen argued at a 2004 status hearing at Guantanamo that the first time he heard of al Qaida was "in this prison.'' He claimed that he had been unjustly rounded up in a March 2002 dragnet by Pakistani security forces in the city of Faisalabad that targeted Arabs, including himself a student of Islam.

The number of detainees determined to be unlawfully held at Guantanamo by federal judges is now 36.

The win-loss scorecard was 14-36 on Wednesday. Civilian judges have upheld the military detentions of 14 other foreign men among the 181 war on terror captives at the U.S. Navy base in southeast Cuba.

As Glenn Greenwald writes today in A Disgrace of Historic Proportions, 72% of the 50 detainees who have brought habeas petitions since the Supreme Court ruling allowing them, have won.

The Obama Administration opposed Hassan's petition even though he had been cleared for release by the Bush Administration.

This is one of the silliest studies I've read about in a long time. In the UK, a study was done of meth-using snails. The findings:

They discovered that the drug enhanced the creatures' abilities to learn and remember a task. This gives insight into how some addictive drugs produce memories that are hard to forget, and that can even cause addicts to relapse.

"These drugs of abuse produce very persistent memories," explained Dr Sorg. "It's a learning process - drug addiction is learning unwittingly. ...So addicts might be able to kick their habit in a treatment centre, but when they return to their old haunts, all those cues trigger craving and relapse."

If the meth high produces a memory, so would the meth crash, which is a very powerful and miserable experience. Who would seek to replicate that memory? And if they are suggesting that meth users only recall good memories while being able to forget the bad ones, I'm not buying it.

This was a Pavlovian experiment tinkering with the snail's physical ability to breathe. The snail wasn't trying to feel good, he was trying to stay alive. What bunk.