The winner will be chosen tonight on Dancing With the Stars and it's Adam Lambert vs. Chris Allen on American Idol, with the winner being announced tomorrow night. My votes: Melissa and Adam. Who I think will win: Gilles and Adam. I'm not counting Shawn out though, she has been terrific the past few weeks, especially last night.

My pal Jesse Csincsak, former Bachelorette winner, is looking to be on the next season of Dancing With the Stars. I'd think he'd be terrific. As a professional snowboarder, he's certainly got the athletic skills and balance and coordination. Plus, he really looks good (and even better in person than on camera.) So I hope you'll take a few minutes and go sign the petition to help get him on the show. (You can even sign and click the box not to have your name displayed.)

I'll be putting longer posts on DWTS and AI on PopLeft tonight (it's still a work in progress), feel free to comment either place.

This is an open thread, all topics, tv-related or not, are welcome.

The 17 Uighur detainees at Guantanamo Bay are fighting back against Newt Gingrich. Via Ryan Grim at Huffington Post:

Chinese Muslims known as Uighurs, detained for more than six years and counting at the American prison at Guantanamo Bay, are firing back at Newt Gingrich, who has accused them of terrorist ties and says that releasing them into the United States would endanger the country. The seventeen Uighurs sent their message to the Huffington Post through their translator, Rushan Abbas, who has been working with them in Guantanamo since 2002, initially contracted by the Department of Defense.

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The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act passed the Senate today by a vote of 90 to 5. From Sen. Mark Udall (received by e-mail, no link):

The 90-5 vote for the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act culminates four years of work by Senator Udall to clean up the fine print and bring fairness and common sense to the credit card business. Udall was a co-sponsor of the Senate Credit CARD Act, and as Congressman, he authored the bill in 2005, which became the Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights and passed the House of Representatives last month. The House must now take a second procedural vote on the Senate bill before the final legislation can be sent to President Obama for his signature.

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Matthew Yglesias was on MSNBC yesterday to discuss his article at the Daily Beast, GOP's Torture Tricks Backfire.

The video is from Crooks and Liar's Video Cafe site -- I really like what they've done with that page.

At the Peabody Awards yesterday, New Orleans TV reporter Lee Zurik took home a Peabody for his investigation into a city-run program called NOAH (New Orleans Affordable Home Ownership.)

NOAH was supposed to fix and remediate Katrina wracked homes but Zurik's investigation--which was kick-started by reporting from a New Orleans blogger named Karen Gadbois--found that NOAH charged the city for work they did not do and for addresses that did not exist. [More...]

When we last checked in with Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu, he had just pleaded guilty to fraud relating to one of his investment schemes, probably hoping to keep those allegations out of his trial for making fraudulent campaign contributions.

It didn't make a difference. After less than a full day of deliberations, a Manhattan jury has convicted him of violating campaign finance laws by using straw donors to get around limits.

Hsu's defense argued he was framed by investors who cut deals with the government to avoid prosecution.

Updated news article here.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals today ruled the White House does not have to turn over millions of e-mail records from the Bush Administration. Its reasoning:

The White House Office of Administration is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act.

Your turn.

This is an Open Thread.

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to be confronted with the witnesses against him . . . - Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution

Via TPM's David Kurtz, the Obama Administration says:

Mr. Obama’s statement on Friday said that “the use of hearsay will be limited.” . . . A memorandum describing the administration’s changes that was filed with the military judges said that such “hearsay admissibility remains much broader than in domestic courts” in the United States. One of the senior administration officials said that although federal courts bar many kinds of hearsay evidence, “the hearsay rule is not one of those things that is rooted in American values.”

On military commissions, a plethora of cliches screams out - lipstick on a pig -- meet the new boss, same as the old boss. What a disappointment Obama is on these issues.

Speaking for me only

In Alabama, Johnny Holly, Jr. has been freed after serving 30 years of a sentence of life without parole. His crime: he stole a toolbox. His sentence was the result of a three-strikes law.

How did he get free?

He is free today only because the Legislature changed the repeat-offender law early this decade.
The change in the law allowed for the possibility of parole. Even so, it took him several years to be resentenced and to get out.

Who helped him ? The prosecutor and a host of prison guards.[More...]

Today is Amnesty International's Global Day of Action. More than 100 protests are planned. Among them is one in Georgia for death row inmate Troy Davis, who has a compelling case for innocence.

Amnesty asks you watch the video and forward it on to a friend.

The AP has an analysis today of President Obama's "shift to the center" on economic and national security issues. The most disconcerting line:

Afghanistan "could well be Obama's Vietnam, eventually," said James Thurber, a political scientist at American University.

Another analyst says:

"Obama calls himself a pragmatist. That often ends up with fairly centrist policies," Shapiro said. "In the end, the progressives, the left in Congress, will support the president even on getting a half loaf in health care rather than a full loaf," he added.

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