He Flat-Out Sucked Less Than The Alternative

This week Italians recycled billionaire Silvio Berlusconi as Prime Minister. We'll see how long that lasts especially if Italy's ex-SISDE chief's defense lawyers are granted their request to call Silvio as a witness in the upcoming CIA extraordinary renditions trial. 25 Americans we're pretty sure are CIA agents are also being tried in absentia. Apparently some Italians have a problem with the Bush Administration completely circumventing Italy's legal system in the 2003 CIA Milan street grab of terror suspect Egyptian cleric Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr.

-AF

HT: Laura Rozen

++Laura has more on the resumption of the CIA rendition trial at MoJo's blog here.

The Gun Didn't Know I Was Loaded...

And even if it did, we can't be sure I was holding it. That's my translation of John Yoo's defense of his torture memos. Esquire's interview here. TPM's Paul Kiel has analysis here and here (on Ashcroft initially being kept out of the loop). WaPo has the Ashcroft skinny.

-AF
+Snuck a post in before heading off to the cathedral. And yes, I know snuck is not a word.