Amnesty International is making a smart move. They are trying to place their anti-torture ad on 100 conservative blogs through Blogads. Here's the numbers so far:

To date, 62 blogs have accepted the ad, 21 have outright rejected it and 17 have yet to decide to run it or not. In the spirit of the free flow of information, we would like to thank those bloggers who have agreed to run our ad.

A few of them weigh in here. Personally, I think it's sleazy for a blog to accept an ad and then mock and trash the advertiser, as Junkyard Dog and Right Wing News have done. I wouldn't mind a reasoned debate on the issues raised in the ad, but to make statements like "So click on the ad. Laugh at the page it links to. Amnesty International is a joke" and "The ad is a lame little connect-the-dots video they really didn't put much effort into" makes it seem like they are only into blogging for the ad money and willing to compromise their principles for financial gain.

Update: Atrios and Crooks and Liars disagree and see nothing wrong with mocking the ads.

Arianna is as enthusiastic as I am about Instapundit Glenn Reynold's new book, An Army of Davids.

The book is a powerful paean to how changes in technology are empowering the little guy to take on the goliaths of Big Media and Big Government. "Small is the new big," says Reynolds....Reynolds also nails how the blogosphere has become an invaluable tool for holding the mainstream media's feet to the fire: "Where before journalists and pundits could bloviate at leisure, offering illogical analysis or citing 'facts' that were in fact false, now the Sunday morning op-eds have already been dissected on Saturday night, within hours of their appearing on newspapers' webites."

Markos and Jerome's book, Crashing the Gates, also is getting great reviews. Here's another one at Slashdot.

Winners of the night: Crash! I'm so glad. Jon Stewart, George Clooney, and Three-Six Mafia for "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp." Chris "Ludicris" Bridges as presenter. Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Anistan and Jessica Alba. Reese Witherspoon for Best Actress in Walk the Line. The New York Times has the best photospread.

Who should have won: Terrence Howard or Joaquin Phoenix.

Other takes:

• Atrios weighs in on John Stewart
• HuffPo
• James Wolcott
• AP Oscars articles and pix.
• Red Carpet pictures
• Digby
• More Jon Stewart Media Reviews

Your thoughts?

Update: Jon Stewart is getting great reviews in after-Oscar interviews from those in attendance. Example: Steven Spielberg.

They are about to start. If anyone's online while watching, here's a space for you to live blog in the comments.

Good luck, Jon Stewart, I know you will be great.

So far, all the dresses have been goregous.

I think I"m rooting the most for Terrence Howard in Hustle & Flow.

The best part of the pre-Oscar shows: No Joan and Melissa Rivers.

As for what's different about the Oscars this year for me, it's the movies. So many movies with liberal themes...so many great performances and a great choice for host.

Update: Arianna has a bunch of threads going, all worth reading. I've included links below.

It's time to start the countdown to the Oscars. Some of today's coverage:

• WAPO: And This Year's Oscar Goes to Social Issues. WAPO full coverage is here.
• The LA Times has an awesome site up. Also check out their Oscar Beat.
• BBC is already on site live-blogging.
  
• Arianna's got an Oscar Watch going. Look for updates as she is attending the Vanity Fair events.

What fun is the Oscars without predictions? Here's a printable version of the full list of Nominees. Here are the top six categories plus Best Original Music.

Update (5:30 pm) As for my picks: Best Picture: Brokeback Mountain will win but I prefer Crash. Best Actor: Terrence Howard. Best Supporting Actor: George Clooney; Best Actress: Reese Witherspoon; Best Supporting Actress: Rachel Weisz; Best Director: Ang Lee; Best Song: It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp

Crooks and Liars has the video. Also, check out the video of David Gergen on Howard Kurtz's Reliable Sources this morning:

This administration has engaged in secrecy at a level we have not seen in over 30 years. Unfortunately, I have to bring up the name of Richard Nixon, because we haven't seen it since the days of Nixon. And now what they're doing -- and they're using the war on terror to justify -- is they're starting to target journalists who try to pierce the veil of secrecy and find things and put them in the newspapers.

Now, in the past what the government has always done is go after the people who leak, the inside people. That's the way they try to stop leaks. This is the first administration that I can remember, including Nixon's, that said -- and Porter Goss said this to Congress -- that we need to think about a law that would put journalists who print national security things to...bring them up in front of grand juries and put them in jail if they don't -- in effect, if they don't reveal their sources.

Bump and Update: HuffPo is running an Oscar's mashup thread with the best to be published Monday.

Update: CL, TalkLeft's man in Hollywood, came through with our new Oscar graphic. He also took these photos today of the preparations going on at the Kodak Center.

I'm going to watch Hustle and Flow now. Terrence Howard is up for Best Actor for his role in it. I think he was great in Crash and he's supposedly even better in H&F.

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Original Post: 10 am

Ok, I'll admit it. I love the Oscars. I try to see as many movies as I can. I like watching the clothes as much as the Awards. This year they should be even more interesting than usual because Jon Stewart is hosting. And there are so many good movies.

I agree with Aaron Brown. The priorities of cable news networks have become too skewed in favor of the sensational. With soldiers being killed overseas, our government passing more Patriot Act legislation and other laws that don't make us safer, only less free, who wants to hear about another celebrity shooting or more from Natalie Holloway's mother? I think the Holloway case is the best example right now. Why does this mother get air time night after night to talk about her missing daughter? She continues to impugn the reputation of Joran van der Sloot, who has not been charged with a crime. Now Joran is fighting back, taking to the airwaves himself. What is newsworthy about any of this?

Back to Aaron Brown:

This software program sounds a little scary.....

For companies like ConAgra, the individual opinions blasted out in cyberspace are becoming an increasingly powerful force. Together, they form the fabric of online word of mouth that can determine the hottest new product, make or break a TV show, or set off a customer revolt. Eager to tap into the buzz, a growing number of companies are turning to sophisticated new technologies that track what's said on Internet social networks, blogs, message boards, product review sites, "listservs" -- wherever people congregate publicly online.

The companies are very interested in what commenters on blogs and message boards have to say:

The New York Observer has an article about discrepencies between Nancy Grace's version of her fiance's murder and the version told by the documents and trial participants.

I'm all for criticizing Nancy Grace's point of view and her "fry 'em" mentality and even her sometimes overly melodramatic delivery style, but I have to say, aside from misrepresenting, perhaps unknowingly, the prior record of the man who killed her fiance, there's very little here.

I'd much rather see an article that takes her to task for her program format, the show's failure to journalistically inform and her one-sidedness in favor of victims, than for minor details in how her fiance got murdered, even if she does claim it was the hook in deciding to go to law school and become a prosecutor.

The real problem is that guilt sells in this country while innocence doesn't. Grace takes advantage of that phenomenon to the utmost, but then so do many other tv personalities.

I just finished watching "Exspuditious:" Two Rotten Potatoes (Bush and Cheney),a new entry in the HuffPo contagious festival. I really liked the photos and music and soundbites. One example, check out page 20. And this Bush quote on page 18.

With more than 20 hours spent on planes to and from Amsterdam this past week, I had a lot of time to read books and watch movies on my laptop. Here are some of the best:

Crashing the Gates by Markos of Daily Kos and Jerome Armstrong of MyDD. This Nation review says it all:

Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics is both of the blogosphere and beyond it. Writing with the outrage of outsiders and the access of insiders, the two bloggers analyze a Democratic Party they find oddly complacent despite its losing record and tarnished reputation. They argue that the party's most consequential problem is not branding but its sclerotic leadership, quarrelsome coalitions and anachronistic fundraising methods [...]

In the end, Armstrong and Zúniga have written the rare polemic that focuses more on fostering innovation than defending a particular worldview. They decline to outline a progressive policy agenda and humbly reject attempts to anoint themselves leaders of their website communities, let alone the netroots. Instead, they are trying to develop a decentralized progressive movement that draws strength from its members and has no traditional leaders to be co-opted. It is an admirable vision of "people-powered politics," and one that the Democratic Party sorely needs.