With the trial of Osama bin Laden drive Salim Hamdan underway in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, writer Jonathan Mahler compares the proceedings those in Nuremberg after World War II. Nuremberg mattered, Mahler says, but Guantanamo is another matter in the eyes of the public.

With President Bush facing a pile of applications for pardons, The Takeaway goes back to one of the most famous and controversial pardons a president has ever made.

The number of people of seeking pardons and commutations for federal crimes continues to climb — and the backlog of petitions is in the thousands. With President Bush's term coming to a close, who will he pardon?

Who would you pardon?

Jack Abramoff	Former lobbyist | Overcharging Indian casinos in lobbying fraud
Conrad Black	Former newspaper tycoon | Skimming money from his company, Hollinger International
Randy "Duke" Cunningham	Former U.S. Representative from California | Bribery
Tom Delay	Former Speaker of the House | Indicted for fundraising violations
Edwin Edwards	Former governor of Louisiana | Racketeering
Marion Jones	Former Olympic sprinter | Perjury over the use of performance-enhancing drugs
I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby	Former Chief of Staff for Vice President Dick Cheney | Perjury, obstruction of justice related to leak of covert CIA officer Valerie Plame's identity
John Walker Lindh	Former Taliban fighter | Aiding terrorism
Michael Milken	Former bond trader | Insider trading, fraud
Bob Ney	Former U.S. Representative from Ohio | Conspiring in lobbying fraud
Pete Rose	Former professional baseball player | Tax evasion
George Ryan	Former governor of Illinois | Racketeering
Wesley Snipes	Actor | Tax evasion
Martha Stewart	Homemaking magnate | Conspiracy related to insider trading

John Fox is the most wanted person at the FBI this week. Not because he's a criminal, but because July 26, 2008, is the 100th anniversary of the FBI and he's the Bureau's only historian. If it happened in the FBI, Fox knows about it.

The Hamdan trial continues in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Yesterday, U.S. Military prosecutors played an interrogation video of former Osama bin Laden driver Salim Hamdan in which he denied any connections to al-Qaida. Hamdan asked to leave the courtroom as video playback began.

A Miami Herald investigation has revealed that thousands of convicted felons, including bank robbers and people convicted of drug, fraud and grand larceny were allowed to write mortgages, costing state residents millions of dollars.

Eyes are once again on the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. This week, it’s because of the release of a hidden-camera video that gave the world a glimpse into interrogations. And, next week, pending a federal hearing Thursday, Osama bin Laden driver Salim Hamdan is scheduled to appear in Guantanamo’s first trial — the first American war-crimes trial since World War II.

This year the drug trade's been in full bloom in Mexico. While US-Mexican relations have been a strained by illegal immigration issues, the two countries are renewing joint efforts to fight the seemingly escalating cases of drug trafficking. On June 30th, President Bush signed the Merida Initiative, which appropriates $465 million to help fight drugs in Mexico and Central America. We welcome David Johnson who's leading that fight.

Guest: Dan Harris, ABC News

This week, a federal judge ordered the University of Texas at Brownsville and the Department of Homeland Security to continue discussing alternatives to a border fence that, if left to current DHS plans, will cut through a large portion of the campus.

An article in Atlantic Monthly magazine has kicked off a firestorm of controversy. Author Hanna Rosin ties the demolition of public housing projects to a rise in crime in the city of Memphis. Rosin’s critics say she uses circumstantial evidence to unfairly implicate former residents of public housing.

Federal authorities have charged the first executives in the aftermath of the subprime mortgage collapse. The Takeaway talks with a reporter with a first-hand account of the arrest and the case, WNYC's Bob Hennelly.

Guest: Kate Kelly, The Wall Street Journal

With demand growing for tougher immigration enforcement and a flurry of new state laws addressing the issue, local police are stepping up and arresting illegal immigrants. Damien Cave, the Miami Bureau Chief for the New York Times, has been tracking these local crackdowns.

Producer's Notes:

Detective Larry Findley didn't want to be on the radio. But the gumshoe's desire to educate people about grease theft trumped his suspicion of what he calls "media types."

The demand for grease (used cooking oil) is at an all-time high. That's due in ...

Reporter Lowell Bergman has been covering the Tijuana border for nearly 40 years. In a new PBS FRONTLINE/World documentary, "Mexico: Crimes at the Border," he investigates the inner workings of the business of human smuggling and the temptations of corruption for U.S. border guards.

Tijuana, Mexico, just across the U.S. border, has become a flashpoint in a drug war. The violence there is tied to a crackdown on drug cartels by federal Mexican police and soldiers. The gangs are also feuding among themselves for control of lucrative shipment routes. Richard Marosi, a San Diego-based border reporter for the Los Angeles Times, says Tijuana is a microcosm of the problems and violence currently afflicting broader regions of Mexico.