If this press release wasn't on the DEA's website, I'd think it was a hoax. Incredibly, it celebrates the killing of a suspect.

Justice is done when a suspect is brought before a court and tried, not when he's murdered before his guilt has been determined. Yet, DEA Director Michelle M. Leonhart writes:

“President Calderon of Mexico scored a major victory against the Arturo Beltran-Leyva drug cartel. Last August when DEA, along with our U.S. law enforcement partners, announced the indictment of Mexican drug kingpin Arturo Beltran-Leyva, we were confident that our Mexican counterparts would work with us to pursue him and hold him accountable for his horrific crimes. And last night they did.”

Some background: Alleged Mexican cartel leader Arturo Beltran-Leyva was shot and killed by the Mexican military last Wednesday. He was under indictment in the U.S. (available here), As Leonhart writes:

...[W]hen the Mexican Navy closed in on Beltran-Leyva’s apartment complex, a sustained firefight ensued and Arturo Beltran-Leyva was killed, along with several of his bodyguards.”

As for the future, it looks like we can expect more of the same: Forget the trial, just shoot the perp on sight. Leonhart continues: [More...]

How happy are you? If not as happy as you'd like to be, maybe it's where you live. A new scientific study of 1 million Americans shows New Yorkers are the least happy folks in the country. (48th and 49th are CT and NJ.)

Who beats them? Here's the study. The top ten places:

• Louisiana, Hawaii, Florida
• Tennessee, Arizona, Mississippi
• Montana, South Carolina, Alabama and Maine

California ranks near the bottom at 46th. Colorado is #21.

Would you be happier if you lived someplace else?

Microsoft Office 2007 sells $3 billion a year. It contains Microsoft Word. An appeals court has upheld an injunction against the sale of Word beginning Jan. 11, because a portion of it infringes on a patent for xml held by a Canadian company.

The ruling means Microsoft can't sell versions of Word that can open documents saved in the .XML, .DOCX, or .DOCM formats that contain custom XML.

Microsoft plans to abide by the injunction and stop selling Word 2007, releasing new versions without the xml editor.

I have Microsoft Office but I've never liked Word. I'll take WordPerfect over Word any day, it's all I write in, but aside from a handful of lawyers who can't break the WP habit, I'm sure I'm in the minority. Maybe Corel will come out with a new version of WP and get back in the game.

Apparently the President is entitled to his own "facts". Unfortunately, as Ezra Klein says, "Thanks to the magic of Google," we know that, according to Ezra:

[I]it's easy enough to revisit the plan (pdf) Obama campaigned on in light of the plan that seems likely to pass. And there are, to be sure, some differences. The public option did not survive the Senate. [. . .

I think even Ezra, poblano and Booman won't be able to swallow this one.

Speaking for me only

The temperature is dropping here rapidly and snow is soon to come. I'm off to do a round of errands before that happens.

Here's an open thread for you, all topics welcome.

A new report shows that federal prosecution of crimes is at an all-time high. The increase is due to the number of immigration-related crimes. The breakdown by agency:

[T]he FBI — which at one time was the premier investigative agency with the largest share of investigations resulting in prosecutions — has now slid to fourth place, accounting for only 8.7 percent of the FY 2009 filings. Leading the pack last year was Customs and Border Protection in the Department of Homeland Security, which includes the Border Patrol, with 46.5 percent of all prosecutions. Coming second was Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) with 12 percent, also in Homeland Security. In third place was the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) which accounted for 9.5 percent of all prosecutions.

So the FBI and DEA together now account for only 18.2% of federal proseuctions. [More...]

No one can accuse the Obama Administration of "governing by poll" at least:

As the Senate prepares to vote on health care reform, American voters "mostly disapprove" of the plan 53 - 36 percent and disapprove 56 - 38 percent of President Barack Obama's handling of the health care issue, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. [. . .]

While voters oppose the health care plan, they back two options cut from the Senate bill, supporting 56 - 38 percent giving people the option of coverage by a government health insurance plan and backing 64 - 30 percent allowing younger people to buy into Medicare.

Certainly the politics of health care does not look promising for Democrats, but time will tell.

Speaking for me only

Pass the POS. Don't pass the POS. But don't tell me we're all moving forward together through a historic moment. Y'all sound like idiots. -- Charles Pierce

The title of this post is a reference to myself (which is silly of course, while I am angry, I am hardly Left) and people like me. People who agree with the critiques made against the bill, who disagree with the the "regulatory reform" framework that bill elevates, who believe in the public insurance reform framework that would be undermined by the bill - but do not oppose the bill. How can I support passage of the bill? Well, I'm not there yet, but I can tell you why I do not oppose the bill - the expansion of Medicaid eligibility. Having the wealthy pay for public insurance for the less well off is an important good. I just can not bring myself to oppose the bill because of that.

The debate between the proponents of the bill and the opponents of the bill is, at this point, an empty exercise. Lines have been drawn. Insults have been hurled. Credibility has been sacrificed. I mean, at this point, is there a credible actor in the discussion? No. For me there is nothing left to say that I have not already said. I leave you with this - Charles Pierce speaks for me:

I feel like I just got a Christmas present. Rudy Giuliani will announce tomorrow he's not going to run for either NY Governor or Senator.

Smart choice, we've had our fill of Rudy, but it's good to hear it from the horse's mouth.

BTD is traveling, and I'm on my way out to dinner.

Anthony Marshall, Brooke Astor's 85 year old son was sentenced to 1 to 3 years in prison today for larceny and fraud in connection with his mother's estate. His 66 year old co-defendant, a lawyer pal, got the same sentence.

Whoopi Goldberg and Al Roker wrote letters of support for Marshall. Marshall's lawyer had argued that this should have been an estate case rather than a fraud or elder abuse case. The jury disagreed. I didn't follow the trial, but after reading about it once the verdict came down, had this to say:

I have no idea if the jury made the right call. Elder abuse sucks. But isn't it just another form of elder abuse to send an 85 year old non-violent offender to prison, even if he's an elder abuser himself?

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

A California appeals court has rejected Roman Polanski's bid to dismiss his 1977 case due to prosecutorial and judicial misconduct.

The 70 page opinion is here (pdf).

We conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in applying the fugitive disentitlement doctrine and refusing to consider dismissing the action. In so doing, we do not disregard the extremely serious allegations of judicial and prosecutorial misconduct that have been brought forward, but urge the parties to take steps to investigate and to respond to the claims.

[More...]

Last week, U.S. District Court Judge Cormac J. Carmey, before closing arguments, dismissed a federal prosecution against William Ruehle, former CEO of Broadcom, and another defendant charged in a stock options backdating case. He also vacated a guilty plea of a third defendant who had cooperated with the Government and done nothing wrong. The grounds: prosecutorial misconduct.

The defendants were represented by major white collar lawyers, including Brendan Sullivan of Williams & Connolly, and lawyers from Skaaden, Arps.

I just received a copy of the transcript. It's probably the strongest condemnation of prosecutorial abuse I've ever read. Any federal criminal defense lawyer reading through the list of abuses will be reminded of some of his or her clients these same things have happened to, but weren't fortunate enough to prove it. [More...]