Well thanks for clearing that up, “administration officials”! On Sunday Rahm Emanuel suggested that “those who devised policy” around torture wouldn’t be prosecuted, but by yesterday other Obama people were rushing to walk that one back. What he meant, apparently, was that officials who ordered the torture shouldn’t be prosecuted, but the lawyers who devised the legal rationale maybe could. MORE »

• NORM COLEMAN’S LAWYER IS ‘DONE,’ SOMEHOW: Joe Friedberg, Norm Coleman’s recount attorney, tells Hotline, “Yes, I’m done,” after being asked if he is “done.” It is not clear whether this means he’s quitting, but it does mean that maybe someday, in 2025 or something, Norm Coleman’s legal challenges to his lost 2008 election will be over. [Hotline]

Attorney Edward Genson has abruptly quit his role leading the Gov. Blago defense team two days before the idiot’s impeachment trial begins in the Illinois Senate. Instead of listing the standard “personal reasons” or a professional conflict of interest, Genson cites that JESUS CHRIST HOW DO YOU WORK WITH THIS IDIOT: “I never require a client to do what I say, but I do require them to at least listen.” MORE »

For further proof of just how bumblefuck a state Alaska is, look no further than the ease with which a couple of lawyers for the McCain campaign have destroyed the Troopergate investigation — which was a legitimate issue in Alaska for a while! — after half-assedly skimming off a few handy topic sentences from the Alaskan law code. Todd Palin and several other witnesses were subpoenaed to testify this morning, but no one bothered to show up, and the investigators don’t give a shit. And now the Alaskan legislator in charge of the investigation has announced that the probe will end, as originally scheduled, on October 10, without these key witness reports, cuz whatcha gonna do? MORE »

Every four years, a mysterious combination of negligence, incompetence, fraud, and criminality conspire to make a single state responsible for getting some doofus into the White House. In 2000, Florida took the honor; in 2004, it was Ohio. And every four years, Hendrik Hertzberg writes angry editorials about how the whole electoral college should be bombed from space as a Republican takes office yet again. So which state will we be able to blame when Sarah Palin is hastily sworn in as America’s 45th president after John McCain expires from gout and agues in the spring of 2009? MORE »

One of the weirder angles on the John Edwards Sex Scandal is the part where the guy who says he’s Rielle Hunter’s baby daddy, Andrew Young, has to live in the same weird compound (OK FINE A “GATED COMMUNITY”) in North Carolina as Rielle Hunter, and then they all have to move to California, together, with their families, including Mrs. Young and their three children, because they are all in a terrible sex-induced Witness Protection Program. MORE »

Today in the exciting world of horse race politics: Obama lawyer tries to sneak into McCain lawyer conference call, gets rejected, is called sexist — and obvious political motives glue each development together! Jesus, this must be “Friday Night At The Movies” for Mark Halperin ‘n’ pals. MORE »

There’s nothing we can add to this: “A magazine published by the American Bar Association on Wednesday named former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales its Lawyer of the Year for 2007 — mostly for creating so much controversial news.The ABA Journal also picked Attorney General Michael Mukasey — Gonzales’ successor — to be its lawyer of the year for 2008 because he has to deal with the problems left when Gonzales resigned under fire last fall.” [AP]

Yesterday, we posted a fairly testy letter from former gossip columnist and all-time dog enthusiast Karen Feld. MORE »

Former Examiner gossip and queen-of-all-media Karen Feld has a small bone to pick with Wonkette. So she sat right down and wrote a letter to our bosses. It’s reprinted in its entirety after the jump, but here’s the gist:

What documentation does he have that I suffer from dementia?
And that I am a dog abuser?

Pareene gets a stern, rambling talking-to, after the jump.

MORE »

Welcome back to the internet Mr. David Lat, former federal prosecutor, anonymous blogger, and, yes, co-proprietor of this very site. Mr. Lat is back in the warm, tubular embrace of the blogosphere with Elizabeth Spiers’ brand new legal weblog, “Above the Law” (rejected name: “Barely Legal”). MORE »