Friday nite, tune in to Now with Bill Moyers on PBS (schedule here) who will be covering the William Pryor judicial nomination.

There's a battle in the Beltway over President Bush's judicial nominee William Pryor. Currently the Attorney General of Alabama, Pryor's strong views on Roe v. Wade and gay rights have some Democrats worried that as a judge on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, he would be unduly influenced by his ideological convictions. Republicans contend that once on the bench, Pryor will set aside his personal beliefs and uphold the law.

On Friday, July 11, 2003 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings), NOW with Bill Moyers spotlights Pryor and what is shaping up to be on of the administration's most controversial nominations to date. Also on the program, NOW spotlights the cutting-edge satire of Comedy Central's The Daily Show in an interview with its host Jon Stewart.

Free at last--of Michael Savage. We can't even begin to image why MSNBC hired him in the first place. Ratings at the expense of the network's credibility don't make sense. Here's what Savage said that got him canned:

So you're one of those sodomists. Are you a sodomite?" Savage asked.

The caller replied: "Yes, I am."

"Oh, you're one of the sodomites," Savage said. "You should only get AIDS and die, you pig. How's that? Why don't you see if you can sue me, you pig. You got nothing better than to put me down, you piece of garbage. You have got nothing to do today, go eat a sausage and choke on it."

He asked for another phone caller who "didn't have a nice night in the bathhouse who's angry at me today."

These bums "mean nothing to me," he said.

[link via Tristero]

It's Monday Comedy over at The Hamster . We like this one:

The big story: President Bush announced today we will rebuild Iraq after the war. You think that will happen? We still haven't rebuilt South Central after the riots." Jay Leno.

Daniel Precht, a defense lawyer for one of the defendants in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing trial, has written a book about the experience, to be published in September. Precht spares no one in the book, including himself, in his portrayal of the trial as one filled with error and prejudice. Precht is now an Assistant Dean at the University of Michigan Law School. He says that had he stayed practicing in New York, he could never have written this book.

One example of Precht's criticism of the trial, the Judge and himself:

Mr. Precht, then with the Federal Defender Division of the Legal Aid Society, accuses the judge, Kevin T. Duffy of the Federal District Court in Manhattan, of lacking impartiality and of essentially convicting his client before the trial ended.

Mr. Precht describes one incident in which Judge Duffy summoned him and his co-counsel, John J. Byrnes, into his chambers and told them that two of Mr. Salameh's co-defendants had met privately with the prosecution before trial in an unsuccessful attempt to negotiate guilty pleas. One defendant implicated Mr. Precht's client, the judge said. "I think your client will be convicted," Mr. Precht quotes the judge as saying. "I'm fairly certain he did it."

He considered asking Judge Duffy to disqualify himself, but did not out of fear that the request would only antagonize the judge further. "This was a terrible mistake," Mr. Precht writes. "My handling of this episode is my biggest regret."

Mr. Precht said yesterday that although the jury ultimately convicted his client, he believes the judge was biased throughout the trial, as evidenced by rulings and jury instructions that favored the government, and, in Mr. Precht's view, influenced the verdict.

Here's one more allegation of prejudice described in the book:

Mr. Precht also describes the judge and smiling prosecutors entering the courtroom together before the verdict was announced, leading him to believe that the judge had privately shared the verdict with them, and congratulated them. "Duffy was treating the prosecutors as conquering heroes," Mr. Precht writes. Prosecutors deny the met with the Judge, saying they only shared a hallway with his chambers.

Among the editorials we like today:

From the Boston Globe, Bush's war on poverty:

AS A PRESIDENTIAL candidate in 1999, George W. Bush shocked and angered House Republicans by saying he didn't ''think they ought to balance their budget on the backs of the poor'' by delaying tax credits to low-income families. As president he has done far worse: The more than $1.6 trillion in tax cuts he has pushed through Congress in his first 30 months in office are fundamentally a declaration of war against the poor.

The New York Times rakes Tom Delay over the coals.

The Washington Post in Wanted: A Real Defense:

THE SUPREME COURT sent an uncharacteristically strong and positive message this week regarding the obligation of defense lawyers in capital cases. A seven-justice majority threw out the death sentence in Maryland of Kevin Wiggins, who was convicted in 1989 of drowning an elderly woman in her bathtub.

....The only question it faced was whether Mr. Wiggins -- guilty or not -- could be sentenced to death without a jury's ever having heard about his nightmarish childhood. By putting its foot down even on this limited point, the court has made clear that defense lawyers must do reasonable investigations so that juries can hear the best case for mercy. The majority found that Mr. Wiggins's lawyers did not make even a cursory effort to learn about his childhood.

Calpundit says now that the 20th century is over, we should be able to figure out which trial really was the "Trial of the Century." He suggests a few, and asks for more suggestions.

For anyone who hasn't viewed law professor Doug Linder's site, Famous Trials , we highly recommend you do and scroll through those in the 20th Century. Open one or two of the trials and we think you'll see what a treasure trove Linder has put together.

Conservative, Pro-Bush Hollywood comic Dennis Miller is getting his own gig at Fox News. He will have a regular once-a-week slot on Hannity and Colmes' Friday edition, which may be repeated on Weekend Live with Tony Snow.

Miller seems to be a good fit for the network. He has been one of the few Hollywood types to publicly support President Bush and his foreign policy, prompting Hannity to proclaim him a "hero of conservative America" during an interview last month, though Miller says he doesn't have a particular affinity for that label.

In other broadcast news, NBC's Soledad O'Brien, whom we like a lot, is moving to CNN where she will take over Paula Zahn's slot as co-host of American Morning.

Great news from Congress today: The Senate Commerce Committee voted to overturn parts of the FCC Decision allowing the merger of media companies.

Too funny. Someone made a "human error" at a New Zealand tv station last night and displayed this graphic to 360,000 people watching the news. The station has apologized and promised an investigation.

Former VP Al Gore has a new avocation--he is seeking funding to start a liberal-oriented cable news channel and a liberal talk radio station.

Sounds good to us. Should we add that we're available to comment?

Dog the Bounty Hunter made good on his promise five months ago to bring in Max Factor Heir Andrew Luster.

He's an ex-felon turned muscle-shirted, leather-pants-wearing, born-again Christian bounty hunter. The motto of his Honolulu-based company: "From 18 to 80 Blind crippled or Crazy If they can't walk or crawl we'll Drag Em Back."

We remember when Dog first hooked up with motivational Guru Anthony Robbins. Robbins lived in Hawaii and Dog went out there and fell in love with the place. What does Robbins think about Dog now?

"Dog's a genius at the practical side of humanity, especially when it comes to understanding the criminal mind," says Anthony Robbins, world-renowned motivational speaker who talks highly of the bounty hunter's abilities in his book Awaken the Giant Within. "He's the best in the world at what he does."

Dog says he ain't no role model but Robbins disagrees:

In fact, he allowed his son, Joshua, to spend many summers under the bounty hunter's wing simply because he found Dog to be a fine example. "What makes him so special," Robbins adds, "is that he has the mind-set to convert these criminals to a better life. Itss as if hess here to serve a greater good."

How does someone become a bounty hunter anyway?

Chapman says he first worked as a bounty hunter in 1979 after serving 18 months of a five-year sentence in Texas. A leader in a motorcycle gang called the Devil's Disciples, he was convicted for his role in a fatal shooting that took place during a drug deal.

When Chapman was fresh out of jail and owing child support, a judge said he would make a payment toward the debt if Chapman could bring back a fugitive authorities were seeking. Chapman found his man and was hooked.

Cursor is all over the media's obsession with the Laci Peterson case today, even linking to one of our posts from over a month ago, Guilt Sells.

We think the coverage is excessive, but we continue to be part of it. Why? Is this what we went to law school for? To repetitively cover the murder of one woman when there are thousands of murders every year that get no coverage because the victims were neither attractive, white nor in possession of a winsome smile?

In a sense, yes. We do it to remind people of the presumption of innocence, and to try to stem the media lynch-mob mentality that has convicted Scott Peterson when there is not a shred of physical evidence in the public domain linking him to the crime.

This is a death penalty case. Peterson is entitled to a level playing field when his trial starts. Can you imagine sitting in a jail cell, innocent, having just lost your wife and your soon-to-be born son, and facing a death penalty trial? That's how you should be picturing Scott Peterson now. He's entitled to that as are all persons accused but not convicted of crime.

As long as the prosecutrix pundits are out there proclaiming his guilt , we'll be out there doing our part to preserve and protect his constitutional rights--including the most basic one, the right to a fair trial by an impartial jury.

Tonight, Hannity and Colmes....debating OJ former prosecutor Marcia Clark.