Times Ombudsman Clark Hoyt:

Jill Abramson, the managing editor for news, agreed with me that the paper was “slow off the mark,” and blamed “insufficient tuned-in-ness to the issues that are dominating Fox News and talk radio.” She and Bill Keller, the executive editor, said last week that they would now assign an editor to monitor opinion media and brief them frequently on bubbling controversies. Keller declined to identify the editor, saying he wanted to spare that person “a bombardment of e-mails and excoriation in the blogosphere.”

Right, the problem with the ACORN story was it got too little attention. So now the New York Times will expressly take its cues from Fox News and the Drudge Report. The Media is dead. There really is no reason to pay attention to them anymore. (NOTE: I only found about this because some blogs wrote about it.)

Speaking for me only

The New York Times has an editorial today on the economic toll of the death penalty. Some stats it obtained from the Death Penalty Information Center:

According to the organization, keeping inmates on death row in Florida costs taxpayers $51 million a year more than holding them for life without parole. North Carolina has put 43 people to death since 1976 at $2.16 million per execution. The eventual cost to taxpayers in Maryland for pursuing capital cases between 1978 and 1999 is estimated to be $186 million for five executions.

Perhaps the most extreme example is California, whose death row costs taxpayers $114 million a year beyond the cost of imprisoning convicts for life.

As to how the money could be better used: [More...]

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

If you're watching TV, there's the season premiere of Desperate Housewives and Brothers and Sisters. For movies, the IFC channel is replaying the depressing but good film Drugstore Cowboy with Matt Dillon and Kelly Lynch. There's also a new Food Network Challenge.

A Roman Polanski update:

Poland and France intend to make a joint appeal to Switzerland and the United States to have Polanski released from his detention, Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski told the Polish news agency PAP. Sikorski said he and French counterpart Bernard Kouchner also plan to ask Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to offer Polanski clemency.

There are new security camera tapes of the minutes before the OKC bombing -- at surrounding buildings. The man who obtained them thinks they were edited.

What's on your mind tonight?

Yom Kippur, the Jewish holiday marking the end of the High Holy Days and a Day of Atonement, begins at sundown with the Kol Nidre service.

You can watch a live service online at 6:00 pm ET. You can even download the prayer book here to follow along. The service will be conducted by Rabbi Naomi Levy. It is expected to reach 200,000 worshippers around the world.

The live service will emanate from Brentwood Presbyterian Church and will be transmitted via the broadband channel of the Jewish Television Network. The service will also be available subsequently on demand.

Update: Here is the Motion to Dismiss (pdf)and the Victim's Declaration (pdf). If you aren't going to familiarize yourself with the facts of the case, please refrain from commenting.

The Swiss have arrested Roman Polanski on an outstanding warrant from California relating to his 1977 prosecution on a sexual assault charge. They were laying in wait, as they knew Polanski, who had always been allowed to freely travel to the country, was en route to accept an international film award. CNN has more here.

France is outraged. So am I. Polanski has lived in France since fleeing the U.S. in 1978 after the Judge, at the behest of a prosecutor not involved in the case, re-negged on a plea deal and was going to sentence Polanski to prison instead of the agreed upon time served in exchange for his guilty plea. [More...]

My NFL picks today (I am 6-4 on the season (.600 winning percentage):

The J-E-T-Ss host Tennessee (+2.5). The spell is broken and the Titans, holders of the original New York AFL franchise's name, win outright.

The Brett Favres host the up and coming Niners in the Metrodome. I like the Favres (-6.5), because their defense is too good for the Niners.

In my other selections, I like the Seahawks (-2.5), Denver (-2), and Arizona (-2.5).

This is an Open Thread dedicated to the speedy recovery of Tim Tebow (snark).

An Obama Administration official said Saturday that a decision on where to move the 223 remaining Guantanamo detainees is in the final stages:

"We are doing everything we can to close it by the date," the official said, declining further identification. "We are in the final stages of locating a secure facility in the U.S. where detainees can be held."

Not likely to be chosen: Standish, MI and Fort Leavenworth, KS. That seems to leave Supermax in Florence, CO, also known as "Alcatraz of the Rockies" and U.S. military brigs. More than 200 prisoners convicted on terror charges are currently in U.S. prisons.

Supermax sounds like the most likely choice. The offical said Obama hasn't been briefed yet on the possibilities, which means a decision is not imminent.

President Obama called NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly today to thank him for "thwarting the terror plot that targeted the city's subway system, police said."

Obama expressed his "appreciation and admiration" for the NYPD's effort in stopping the attack, sources said.

Except, there was no known plot to target the city's subway system. The Feds have consistently said they have no evidence Nabijullah Zazi was planning an imminent attack, and if he was, where it was to take place, what he was targeting or when.

"Nothing in the bulletins references the current investigation," a Federal Bureau of Investigation issued spokesman said Tuesday. Investigators still don't have specific evidence indicating an imminent threat to particular targets in the alleged plot, federal officials said.

They are speculating Zazi was planning something for Sept. 11, but don't know that. Big difference. No one has a clue what Zazi was up to with his chemicals. September 11 came and went with Zazi in New York and there was no attack. And, as to thanking the NYPD, had they not blown it by alerting the Iman who notified Zazi's father he was being watched, the feds might have a lot more information than they do now. [More....]

Alla Ali bin Ali Ahmed, an innocent Yemeni stranded at Guantanamo for months after being ordered released by a U.S. District Court Judge, has been sent home to Yemen. Judge Gladys Kessler's May opinion is here. (pdf.)

Two other Gitmo detainees have been sent to Ireland. Their names haven't been released yet. Here's a chart with the names of those ordered released but still detained in red. The New York Times has this list of countries that have accepted Guantanamo detainees.

Post stolen from Melissa McEwan, the Secretary of State speaking at the Female Heads of State And Foreign Ministers Luncheon:

As many of you know, I have advocated for many years that women are the key to progress and prosperity around the world. I believe that. I know that many of you do as well. And the evidence increasingly supports that assertion. We know that investments in women yield very big dividends, and we want women to be given the tools so that they can make the most out of their own lives – run for office to be president or prime minister, work your way up to be appointed to a position of foreign minister, so many opportunities, because we know there is so much talent.

But what I have concluded over the years is that talent is universal, but opportunity is not. And in many places, opportunity is still out of reach for women, no matter how smart they are, how hard they work, how much encouragement they might be given even by their own families, that it is still a very difficult task.

Read the whole thing. What strikes me about Secretary of State Clinton's speech is not that she is speaking about women, but that the statement is true for all manner of people. It is a recurring theme in my writing -- the world is not fair and those of us lucky enough to have had opportunities in our life should understand how much the luck of the draw has put us in a position to achieve whatever successes we have in our lives.

Speaking for me only

Leave it to Hugo Chavez to insert himself on the side of Iran on nukes:

A senior aide to Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chávez, said Friday that Iran was assisting Venezuela in the detection and testing of uranium deposits found in remote areas of Venezuela. The disclosure points to the importance Mr. Chávez has placed on the development of a nuclear energy program.

“Iran is helping us with geophysical aerial probes and geochemical analyses,” Rodolfo Sanz, Venezuela’s minister of basic industries and mining, told reporters outside a meeting of Latin American and African leaders in Porlamar, Venezuela.

Just what this situation needs. Sheesh.

Speaking for me only

Charles Blow:

Maybe Obama was wise to hang back. While anger can simmer forever, overheated outrage is exhausting and ultimately counterproductive. Anyone familiar with Aesop’s fable “The Tortoise and the Hare” surely remembers this lesson: slow and steady wins the race. I was beginning to think of Obama as the hare, but maybe he’s the tortoise.

Instead of 11 dimensional chess, Blow posits, Obama was playing rope a dope. Whatever. In any event, can we all agree that if that is how President Obama plans to "lead," then it is imperative that we have a strong, vibrant and VOCAL progressive Caucus (in the House and if possible, in the Senate) and movement to push the debate in the proper direction (where would the health care reform debate be if not for the Progressive Caucus and Senators like Jay Rockefeller and Sherrod Brown?) Can we dispense with the "Don't Worry, He's Got It" nonsense? Clearly, if Obama is going to use an Accidental President approach, he's going to need policy driven by progressive elements in the other branches of government (think about Gitmo detainees and habeas petitions.) If this is Obama's approach, it DEMANDS a loud and vocal progressive pushback on every issue (even the ones I disagree with progressives on, such as Afghanistan and free trade.) It is imperative that the Progressive Caucus become a force to be reckoned with.

Speaking for me only