Atrios:

YAAAY!

Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of economic activity, fell at a 1 percent annual rate in the April through June quarter, the Commerce Department said.

Oh, wait...

That compares with a 6.4 percent pace of decline in the first quarter, a revision from an earlier estimate of a 5.5 percent rate of decline.

Don't worry. Be Happy.

Speaking for me only

Jeralyn told the story of Rolando Cruz way back in 2002. Cruz, Alejandro Hernandez and another man were charged with raping and murdering a 10-year-old girl who was abducted from her home in Naperville, Illinois in 1983. Cruz and Hernandez were convicted and sentenced to death in 1985. (The jury hung as to the third man and he was never recharged.)

All three men were innocent. The crime was actually committed by Brian Dugan, who went on to murder a 27-year-old woman in 1984 and a 7-year-old girl in 1985. If the police hadn't been so busy fabricating evidence against Cruz and his co-defendants, they might have apprehended Dugan before he committed those later crimes and Cruz would have been spared the 11 years he spent on death row.

Even worse, police and prosecutors knew in late 1985 that Dugan was the killer because he offered to confess to the 1983 murder during plea negotiations concerning the two subsequent homicides. They chose not to believe Dugan because he said he committed the crime alone -- a fact that made the death sentences imposed on Cruz and Hernandez rather inconvenient for the prosecutors who obtained them. [more ...]

I continue to be surprised at how much people have to say about the Gates/Crowley/Obama story. But the threads keep filling up.

In other news: A team of U.S. investigators report that marijuana use, even long-term, is associated with a “significantly reduced risk” of head and neck cancers. The Cash for Clunkers program is broke. More details on the search warrants for Michael Jackson's doctor.

Here's a late night thread for these and any other topics you wish to discuss.

I'm not sure why CBS put this up since there is no sound (except for Joe Biden's laugh) but you can tell only Biden and Obama were enjoying themselves at today's Happy Hour on the White House lawn.

Apparently, there was no kiss and makeup between Crowley and Gates, as Crowley said afterwards, "he and Gates had a "cordial and productive discussion" in which they "agreed to disagree.."

Rick Hertzberg wants Obama to put the Big Dog to work on health care reform:

Over at her Daily Beast, our former editor Tina Brown has a very good suggestion for President Obama: unleash Bill Clinton to sweet-talk and arm-wrestle the Blue Dogs into dropping their obstruction of health-care reform. Now that Tina mentions it, why hasn’t Obama done this already? . . . Given the horrific structural hurdles health care has to surmount . . ., this President needs all the help he can get. And it’s hard to think of anyone whose help would help more—especially since, as Tina notes, nobody has thought more about how to avoid the mistakes that were made last time than Mr. Clinton. Except maybe Mrs. Clinton.

I have the greatest respect for the former President but he can't help President Obama here. The Big Dog does not have political bite anymore. Former Presidents generally do not. Clinton has an extraordinary intellect, grasp of the issues and political acumen, but he does not have the political muscle. President Obama has to handle this one.

Speaking for me only

Pew:

Obama’s job rating among independents and Republicans is now significantly lower than at any other point in his presidency. While Democrats are less supportive of Obama on a number of specific issues, overall job approval among Democrats is little changed from earlier in the year.

Republican assessments of Obama’s job performance – already negative since February – have taken a sharp turn for the worse over the past month. Just 19% of Republicans say they approve of his overall job performance, a 12-point drop since June. At the same time, independent opinion also has become less positive. While a plurality of independents approves of the job Obama is doing (48% approve, 37% disapprove), this is an eight-point decline in approval since June. By contrast, Democrats continue to approve of Obama’s job performance at levels similar to those seen over the course of the last six months.

In the end, if Obama and Democrats do some good governing, they'll continue to win. If they do some bad governing, they could lose (the GOP is so inept, that Dem ineptness might not be enough for them.) The only poll that matters is on election day.

Speaking for me only

We've got lots of posts up today but it seems everyone still wants to talk about Gates. There's many more important things going on in my opinion, but here's an open thread if you want to keep discussing it -- or anything else we haven't covered today.

There's new details on Karl Rove and investigation into the firing of U.S. Attorneys.

I'm going to be interviewing Manhattan District Attorney candidate Richard Aborn on Monday. Here is his stand on issues. If you have suggestions for questions I should ask him, let me know in comments. I like that his stance against our current drug policies include rehabilitation for both first and second time offenders: [more...]

In an effort to aid the closing of Guantanamo, Ireland has agreed to take two detainees. Ireland's Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform issued this statement yesterday.

During my time as Minister for Foreign Affairs, I was the first EU Minister to call for the closure of the detention facility. The Government has consistently called for its closure since then. In making this decision I am conscious of the intention of the United States to close the centre at Guantanamo Bay, in part by transferring detainees, no longer regarded as posing a threat to security but who cannot return to their own countries, to other countries willing to accept them."

[More...]

Bump and Update: The Judge in has granted Mohammed Jawad's habeas petition and ordered his release from Guantanamo and return to Afghanistan. The Obama Administration filed a proposed Writ of Habeas Corpus (pdf)last night agreeing to Mohammed Jawad's release in 22 days. The order the judge signed today is here. The ACLU's statement is here.

Does this mean they are giving up? It doesn't sound like it:

"We have informed the judge in this case that we will not contest the writ of habeas corpus and that we are not detaining Jawad in order to conduct a criminal investigation of his actions," Justice Department spokesman Matt Miller said in a statement last night. "Instead, we have informed the court that there are a number of steps the government must undertake to comply with Congressional reporting requirements before any transfer can take place. In the meantime, Department prosecutors are investigating whether they can make a criminal case against Jawad, an effort that is proceeding separate and apart from his habeas case. (my emphasis)

Today, the Judge advised the Government to think long and hard before charging Jawad. [More...]

Look what that terrible man, Harvard Professor Henry Louis (Skip to his friends) Gates, made a nice Boston police officer do:

An officer in the Boston Police Department has been suspended after allegedly writing a racially charged e-mail about Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. to colleagues at the National Guard, a law enforcement official said.

The law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Officer Justin Barrett referred to the black scholar as a “jungle monkey’’ in the letter, written in reaction to news coverage of Gates’s arrest July 16. Barrett was suspended Tuesday, pending a termination hearing.

I blame Gates. Here are the words Gates forced upon this police officer - "If I was the officer (Gates) verbally assaulted like a banana-eating jungle monkey, I would have sprayed him in the face with OC (pepper spray) deserving of his belligerent noncompliance." Indeed. h/t Dkos diarist Dirk McQuigley.

Speaking for me only

Via TPM, Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) lashed out at Democrats for supporting Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court. AP reports:

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the head of his party's Senate campaign committee and a Sotomayor opponent, shot back that Reid and other Democrats were trying to exploit the nomination and "giving cover to groups and individuals to nurture racial grievances for political advantage." "I don't think it influences people's votes, but what it does encourage is a very poisonous — indeed a very toxic — tone of destructive politics," Cornyn told The Associated Press. "They ought to be ashamed of themselves."

(Emphasis supplied.) I think he is talking about "giving cover" to people like me, Latinos. Let me inform Senator Cornyn that, speaking for me only, I do not need Harry Reid to "give me cover" to understand that the Republican Party is hostile to me and people like me. Look in the mirror. You are the problem with regard to how Latinos feel about the GOP. Not Harry Reid.

Speaking for me only

Late last year, TalkLeft called attention to Benton Harbor, Michigan police officer Andrew Collins, who invented facts that he swore to be true in applications for search warrants. His misconduct caused seven convictions to be reopened and dismissed.

Benton Harbor police officer Bernard Hall apparently decided to emulate Collins. Like Collins, Hall fictionalized the affidavits upon which he relied to obtain warrants. Like Collins, he also stole from the people he searched. Six people have had their charges dismissed or their convictions set aside, and arrest warrants against three others have been withdrawn, as a result of Hall's wrongdoing.