President-Elect Barack Obama gets his man:

Barack Obama has picked John O. Brennan as his top adviser on counterterrorism, a role that will give the CIA veteran a powerful voice on the government's use of security contractors and on other sensitive issues in which he recently has played a private-sector role.

.... The president-elect's decision comes only six weeks after Brennan was forced to pull out of contention for the directorship of the CIA because of fears that his statements supporting some controversial interrogation techniques would have complicated his confirmation.

This reminds me of Bush's tendency towards recess appointments to get around Senate confirmation. [More...]

At the conclusion of a federal court hearing in a case in which Morgan County, Alabama Sheriff Greg Bartlett was being sued for withholding adequate food from inmates, the Judge ordered him arrested.

A federal judge ordered an Alabama sheriff locked up in his own jail Wednesday after holding him in contempt for failing to adequately feed inmates while profiting from the skimpy meals. U.S. District Judge U.W. Clemon had court security arrest Morgan County Sheriff Greg Bartlett at the end of a hearing that produced dramatic testimony from skinny prisoners about paper-thin bologna and cold grits.

During the hearing the Sheriff acknowledged pocketing $212,000 from the prisoner food budget, but said it's legal and a practice that has gone on since the depression: [More...]

Oh Mercy! Percy! And Tebow! And the defense!

Go Gators!

Speaking for me only

Allegations of grade tampering and falsification of attendance records at a Chicago charter school are troubling, but this is shocking:

Three high school girls, taken into a washroom one at a time by an off-duty Chicago police officer, told to drop their pants, squat and cough -- all in the hunt for a cigarette lighter that was never found. ... Chicago Public School officials say ... the off-duty Chicago police officer who was acting as a school security guard [has] been "disciplined'' and left the school as a result. ...

[A] federal lawsuit is expected to be filed Thursday against the off-duty female police officer and [the school] on behalf of two of [the] three girls .... The attorneys contend the off-duty officer searched under the girls' shirts for a lighter allegedly used by a boy to set a fire in the boy's washroom.

Conducting a strip search for a lighter is an outrageous invasion of privacy. Did the officer intend to humiliate the girls? The third girl avoided the strip search by having the guts to refuse.

After reading this, I fiddled around with my cell phone until I learned how to use the video camera.

The videotaped shooting death of Oscar Grant by a BART police officer on New Year’s Day marks how far technology has advanced since the 1991 videotaped beating of Rodney King. The cell phone video recorded by BART rider Katrina Vargas shows that Grant was unarmed, and that he apparently was not acting in a manner that would compel an officer to consider using a firearm. Grant’s death was recorded by several other cell phone video cameras, and may have been recorded by BART security cameras. The videos were posted immediately on the Internet, where they were seen by thousands, if not millions of people before being picked up by the Mainstream News Media.

Here's the video. BART's Board of Directors personally apologized for the senseless killing. Protests in Oakland have taken a misguidedly violent turn. The officer (who may have mistaken his Glock for a Taser, although that seems unlikely) has not yet been arrested or charged with a crime.

Vice President Dick Cheney has told the Associated Press there is no need for President Bush to issue preventive pardons for abusive interrogation techniques. Why?

He also said he doesn't think anyone at the CIA did anything illegal during interrogations. He says they followed the administration's legal opinions.

What about waterboarding? Cheney believes the information gleaned from suspects after the simulated drowning is reliable. And,

The vice president said waterboarding has been used with "great discrimination by people who know what they're doing" and produced much valuable information.

He's learned nothing since 2006 when he publicly first endorsed waterboarding. Is he living in an alternative universe or what? 12 days and counting.

Long time readers of TalkLeft will recall the many posts here by Last Night in Little Rock (LNILR), John Wesley Hall, Jr. He's now a TL alumni, with his own blog at FourthAmendment.com.

John is President this year of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL). The Arkansas Times has a terrific profile of him today. I hope you'll give it a read.

In a unanimous panel decision, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down 18 U.S.C. 4248, which authorized the indefinite civil commitment of individuals whom the Bureau of Prisons deemed "sexually dangerous." The appeals court relied heavily on United States v. Morrison and United States v. Lopez, and upheld the district court ruling which stated that Congress lacked the enumerated power to encroach on the general mental health and police powers reserved to the states.

After carefully considering the Government’s arguments, we conclude, for the reasons set forth below, that § 4248 does indeed lie beyond the scope of Congress’s authority. The Constitution does not empower the federal government to confine a person solely because of asserted "sexual dangerousness" when the Government need not allege (let alone prove) that this "dangerousness" violates any federal law. We therefore affirm the judgment of the district court.

The opinion (available here (pdf)) represents the first circuit court opinion to rule on the constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. 4248. District courts addressing it have been divided.

Congrats to the Federal Defenders in Raleigh, NC who presented the successful challenge.

Colorado U.S. Attorney Troy Eid announced yesterday he will resign, effective Jan. 19. He's going to run for state attorney general. The current attorney general, John Suthers, is expected to challenge newly appointed Sen. Michael Bennet, the replacement for Ken Salazar, in 2010.

Eid's wife, Allison Eid, currently serves on the Colorado Supreme Court. If Eid wins the attorney general election, he said she will resign from the bench.

Eid will return to private practice with his former law firm, Greenberg Traurig (Jack Abramoff's old firm.)

Ex-Senator Larry Craig has decided to give up on his appeals of his conviction for the bathroom stall sex-sting incident.

Craig is now back in Idaho. His tenure as senator expired this week.

A panel of the Illinois House has released its report recommending that Ill. Gov. Rod Blagojevich be impeached. The full report is here.

The report finds "the totality of the evidence" provides cause to impeach the governor.

The panel may vote on whether to approve the report today. If it approves, the full House could vote tomorrow, and then pass it to the Illinois Senate.

The list of exhibits attached to the report, beginning at page 68, is lengthy. Many look quite interesting. They are available here.

For those interested in things not college football, here is an Open Thread.

Tonight, the Fighting Gators of the University of Florida (UF) meet the Sooners of the University of Oklahoma (OU? Why isn't it UO?) for the BCS college football championship. The winner of this game will be voted number 1 in the Coaches Poll (the coaches of Texas and Utah have stated they will not follow the rules of voting (which they agreed to) and will vote their teams number 1, hopefully this leads to the end of the Coaches Poll, which is a travesty of conflict, even though it will not change the result of the poll) and likely the AP Writers' Poll.

What to expect tonight? If you care about this game, you already know that Oklahoma scored over 700 points this year, averaging 54 points and 540 yards of offense per game. Florida was not shabby on offense, averaging 45 points and 445 yards per game. Florida's defense was much much better than Oklahoma's during the season, both in terms of points and yards allowed. More . .

Remember Dr. Jan Adams, the plastic surgeon who operated on Kanye West's mother the day before she died?

Adams was sentenced to a year in jail yesterday following his guilty plea to misdemeanor drunk driving. Why so much time? It was his third D.U.I. and he was still on probation for one of them when he caught the last one. (Medical examiner board complaint here (pdf.) Despite the board's recommendation that his license be suspended due to the alcohol offenses, it appears when his license was suspended this June, it was for failure to pay child support. His ex-wife got a restraining order against him alleging spousal abuse.

Adams asked to begin serving the sentence immediately.

Your turn.

Update (TL): I've been gone all day, I'm just catching up now. Today's headlines seem like the same as yesterday's to me so right now I have nothing to add. What am I missing?

One new story: Chris Matthews decided against running for the Senate.