Across the country, tomorrow will see the biggest 4/20 events to legalize marijuana ever. As the New York Times explains:

April 20 has long been an unofficial day of celebration for marijuana fans, an occasion for campus smoke-outs, concerts and cannabis festivals. But some advocates of legal marijuana say this year’s “high holiday” carries extra significance as they sense increasing momentum toward acceptance of the drug, either as medicine or entertainment.

“It is the biggest moment yet,” said Ethan Nadelmann, the founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance in Washington, who cited several national polls showing growing support for legalization. “There’s a sense that the notion of legalizing marijuana is starting to cross the fringes into mainstream debate.”

You can stay on top of all the goings on at NORML, especially their twitter feed and their special site created for tomorrow, 420MoneyBomb.

Rahmbo talks:

STEPHANOPOLOUS: The President has ruled out prosecutions of CIA officials who believed they were following the law. Does he believe the officials who devised the policies should be immune from prosecution? . . . [W]hat about those who devised the policies?

EMANUEL: [President Obama] believes that they . . . should not be prosecuted either. And it's not the place that we go -- as he said in that letter, and I really recommend that people look at that full statement. Not the letter, the statement. In that second paragraph: This is not a time for retribution. It's a time for reflection. It is not a time to use our energy and our time in looking back, and in a sense of anger and retribution. . . .

Um, is it ok if we talk about it President Obama? Personally, as I have written before, I can accept this policy IF the President supports a full investigation via a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (even Fred Hiatt supports this idea.) That seems to not be in the cards.

Speaking for me only

A lot of talk about Cuba the past few days. Here is one aspect of the goings on:

On Cuba, [Obama] said Castro should release political prisoners, embrace democratic freedoms and cut fees on the money that Cuban-Americans send back to their families.

Will it happen? No. Will the embargo be lifted? No. I could be wrong of course.

Speaking for me only

Your turn.

This is an Open Thread.

Devilstower, a great writer, pens a quite misguided piece about the tea parties, ascribing much more potential to it than it deserves. In particular, Devilstower is wrong to separate it from the Republican Party. Devilstower writes:

This wasn't a tax protest or a conservative movement, it was the semi-regular Gathering of the Disaffected. . . . Like the folks who backed Perot, the baggies are not Republicans. . . . What started on April 15th might actually be the beginning of a movement. And just because third parties haven't be successful in the last 150 years is no guarantee that they'll continue to be unsuccessful for the next 150, or even the next five. One of these days, candidates with letters other then (D) and (R) after their names will take their seats in Congress. One of these days we'll have a president from some party you've never heard of.

This strikes me as completely wrong. [More...]

Americans (and citizens of other democracies) have long resisted the concept of a national identity card. Despite the widespread use of social security numbers as identifiers and the Bush administration's rabid support of Real ID, American citizens who do not drive or fly or work can get by without carrying a mandated identification document.

Will DNA databases make the fear of a national identity card obsolete?

©riminal justice experts ... worry that the nation is becoming a genetic surveillance society.

States routinely take DNA samples from convicted felons. Some states have started to collect DNA from individuals convicted of misdemeanors and from minors. Even more disturbing is the latest trend in privacy violations: DNA collection upon arrest, from individuals who are presumed innocent. The FBI has adopted that practice and expects a 17-fold increase in the size of its database by 2012. {more ...]

April 19, 1995. It was the largest act of domestic terrorism in the history of the country. Until September 11, it was the largest act of mass murder in the United States. It left 168 people dead and more than 500 people injured.

It was a massive case (pdf) to defend. There were:

• 30,000 interviews of witnesses taken by the FBI and other government agencies.
• More than 200,000 photographs
• Records of 156 million telephone calls and over one million hotel and motel registrations
• Over 500 hours of audio tape and over 400 hours of video tape.
• 25,000 pages of lab reports and worksheets
• 23,000 pieces of evidence

It cost the Government $82 million to investigate and prosecute and $10 to $15 million to defend.[More...]

It's still snowing. I'm going to spend the day on the couch in front of the fireplace, listening to music while I read yet more wiretap affidavits and draft more motions to suppress that are due Monday.

What's going on in your world today?

Yesterday, implicated Bush Administration officials Michael Mukasey and Michael Hayden decried the release of the Bush Administration torture memos:

Proponents of the release have argued that the techniques . . . cost us more in the coin of world opinion than they were worth. [This] claim [does not] survive[] scrutiny.

While Mukasey and Hayden do not explain why it does not survive scrutiny, they are surprisingly countered by torture advocate David Rivkin:

Via Jane Hamsher@ Twitter:

So how many times have you watched Susan Boyle?

My answer: At least six, I never get tired of watching it. She was great on Larry King Live tonight as well. I don't know which I like watching more, her singing or the judges' and audience reaction to her when she first started to sing. (Video link here.)

It's great that one person can make so many people in so many countries smile. More than 30 million viewers on You Tube in under a week. I wonder if that's a record.

The reaction among commenters here the other night were terrific. I'm reprinting a few below: [More...]

The snowstorm is bad and getting worse by the hour. Flights canceled, schools closed, power outages, some highways shut down.

I was out this morning when it was just warm, wet snow and kind of fun. Now with the accumulation and colder temperatures, it's a mess out there. The TL kid is coming for dinner, so I'm going to start cooking. It's a great night for a slow, home-made spaghetti sauce.

[Hat tip to Skippy who made the picture for us during a prior year's blizzard.]

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Dr. Christian Hageseth, a Colorado psychiatrist, was sentenced to 9 months in prison today for practicing medicine in California without a license. He prescribed Prozac to a college student in California over the internet after reviewing his online application.

His case is one of the first criminal prosecutions of a practitioner of "telemedicine," the furnishing of medical advice by phone or the Internet, for failing to have a license in the patient's state.

Two months after filling the prescription, the student killed himself. While there were trace amounts of Prozac in his system, it was later determined the prozac did not cause or contribute to his suicide. [More...]