Nina Totenberg

Ken, before we move on to other more domestic matters, while we're still in the USA, so to speak, I've been watching and listening to quite a few legal podcasts, US legal podcasts, which have been actively speculating that with the imminent that it's believed, loss of control certainly of the house and possibly the senate at the midterm elections there may be an early retirement by one of the supreme court justices to enable a rushed replacement to be in place before january when uh if things go as as widely predicted the republicans will lose control of the senate and the person who's been most actively speculated on is sam alito And he's denied it.

There was a report back in June suggesting it was Nina Totenberg, who's NPR's Supreme Court correspondent.

She's a very reliable journalist.

And she actually reported that he was about to retire, Sam Alito, only for her to withdraw almost immediately that posting as a mistake.

Right.

And then some of it was like, oh, my gosh, so stylish, like Nina Totenberg, queen.

Right.

And then some of it, too.

The U.S. Supreme Court has turned away an appeal from the alleged mastermind of the 9-11 attack, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and two accused accomplices.

Here's NPR's Nina Totenberg reporting.

The three men were captured in 2003 and have long been held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where military tribunals have faced difficulty trying the men.

Prosecutors have previously agreed not to use Muhammad's confession because he was subjected to waterboarding and other extreme measures.

The military court subsequently said Austin had exceeded his authority, but a federal appeals court disagreed, and the Supreme Court now has backed up that judgment.

Still, there remain major obstacles for the government in going to trial.

Nina Totenberg, NPR News, Washington.

And you're listening to NPR News.

We're down to 17 days before the midterms to try to put their big fat thumb on the scale in favor of Donald Trump and the Republicans.

Speaking of unfair play, all of a sudden, Sam Alito, went from trying to embarrass Nina Totenberg, NPR reporter, whose sister's a judge, by the way, who's on a legal beat because she jumped the gun and reported that he was thinking about retiring, when by the way he was thinking about retiring but then or there was about to announce his retirement and then had a back pedal she had a back pedal and got kind of embarrassed by sam molina when he said he's not retiring and then he just came out with i'm always thinking i'm i'm always thinking of retiring and then right on top of that you know this is this is in the category of um damning, faint praise, right? You've got Donald Trump going, he's a good man.

Now, usually, when the owner of a sports team says about a manager, he's a good man, they're going to start engraving the gold watch soon and send him out the back door.

Donald Trump is not shy about his his desire to to cement the mega majority on the court for decades two generations by being able to fill before he leaves clarence thomas and sam alito's seat right

Hmm

... that have the picture of Nina Totenberg, the iconic NPR reporter [laughs] on them.

No, yes, we, we did get bigger offers from other networks.

Um, but a couple things about NPR.

Or, or sometimes she doesn't understand what I said, and then we just have a huge laugh because she...

Uh, what was it? When I talked to Nina Totenberg, and...

Oh, yeah, and Nina Totenberg, [laughs] Nina Totenberg, th- um, had talked about how she felt sort of like a fraud when she was younger.

Aw.

But my mother misunderstood what I said, and s- and so she goes, "Why did she think she was a frog?" [laughs]