As if the long, sordid story of the O.J. Simpson trial wasn’t enough, there’s a new chapter: Eleven years after his acquittal, Simpson will reportedly offer — in a new book and a two-part Fox TV special — a hypothetical account of how he would have committed the murders if, that is, he had done the deed.

Joseph Buckley, president of John E. Reid and Associates, the firm that teaches the influential “Reid Technique” of interrogation to law enforcement agencies across the country, says that this sort of hypothetical scenario, especially one so freely given, would not come from an innocent man.

“Somebody who says, ‘Well, I didn’t do it, but if I did do it, here’s how I would have’ — you very rarely see that from a truthfully innocent person,” Buckley says. “You see that much more often with guilty people; it’s kind of a way for them to perhaps release some of the guilt associated with the crime and yet not take full responsibility, or any actual responsibility.”

In a statement given to the New York Post, Judith Regan, who heads the publishing house responsible for Simpson’s book and will interview him Nov. 27 and 29 on Fox, strikes a similar note.

“I have not spent a lifetime in the study of deception detection,” she writes, “but ex-CIA specialist Phil Houston has. ‘When killers confess,’ he told me, ‘the way they often do it is by creating a hypothetical’ — and then they spill their guts.

“For many of them, it is the only way to tell the truth.”

There are few, if any, legal risks for Simpson. Because of the constitutional protections against double jeopardy — being tried twice for the same crime — he can not face criminal charges for the murders. Additionally, Simpson has already been the target of a wrongful death lawsuit in which he was found liable; he has, so far, avoided paying anything but a minimal portion of the $33 million judgment against him in that case.

According to Saul Kassin, a professor of psychology at Williams College, who co-wrote the book “Confessions in the Courtroom,” cost-benefit analysis nearly always goes into the decision of whether or not to confess. In Simpson’s case, the freedom from legal risk makes his situation unique.

“The psychology of O.J. may be the psychology of nothing but O.J.,” Kassin says. “From a psychological standpoint, I can’t think of any clearer instance in which somebody has — at least on the face of it — everything to gain and nothing to lose. I’m not sure I can even come up with another example, where a true voluntary confession brings a financial gain to a criminal without putting them at risk.”

Another way some criminals may attempt to avoid taking full responsibility is to admit — as they or their stories break down under interrogation — to elements of a crime but not to actual culpability. For instance, they could say they were indeed at the scene but did not take part. It appears that Simpson may be doing something similar; the New York Daily News has reported that he will admit to being at the scene with “Charlie,” an accomplice, who handed Simpson the bloody knife after the murders.

William Morrissette, a former CIA forensic investigator who specializes in the science of interrogation and now runs Intuition, a company that trains law enforcement in forensic interrogation techniques, says some criminals “rationalize” their crimes in order to alleviate their conscience.

“Guilt can become a physical thing,” Morrissette says. “It can actually make you sick. So this rationalization, saying, ‘Well, I did this, but it was because of…’ is a way of letting some of that guilt out without admitting culpability. … We [as interrogators] try to encourage that rationalization, to help them along in that.”

Kassin points out that Simpson is not under interrogation, and he believes this situation is different, partially because of that.

“You know, if this just looked like a guy who needed to get this off his chest, I’d say sure, that’s possible,” he says. “But it looks like a guy who has some tangible benefit to gain; I’m more likely to believe he’s doing this for personal gain than to get it off his chest, as somebody of conscience might have.”

Morrissette agrees, contrasting the Simpson case with that of Michael Skakel, the Kennedy cousin who was convicted of killing his neighbor, Martha Moxley, years after the crime was committed — partially because some years later he confessed the crime to classmates at a private school for teenage substance abusers. That, Morrisette says, was evidence of guilt driving a criminal to confess, but he doesn’t believe that’s the case with Simpson.

“A genuine confession coming out of guilt,” Morrissette says, “you don’t write a tabloid book to do that.”

Richard Leo, an associate professor of law at the University of San Francisco, agrees, and thinks there may be an additional factor in play: Simpson’s own ego, and desire to be the focus of the public’s attention.

“There may be some psychiatric need here,” Leo says. “Yes, he may be in the spotlight, may have always been in the spotlight, but he may need more, and this is a way for him to get it.”

After three and a half years — and almost 3,500 posts and stories — today is my last day at Salon, and this is my last post. It’s time for me to move on, to get back to the longer-form writing I did when I first started at Salon and have missed ever since taking the reins of War Room from Tim Grieve a little more than two years ago.

When I was in college, Salon was a dream job, one I never thought I’d get. It didn’t let me down; working here has been a fantastic experience. I’d thank everyone who’s helped me over the years individually, but we’d be here all day, because there are just so many great people at Salon. So instead, let me just thank everyone I’ve worked with — though, really, mere thanks are inadequate for everything they’ve done for me.

There’s been quite a bit of turmoil and bad news over at the Republican National Committee lately, and Monday evening brought more: One of the RNC’s top officials, Chief of Staff Ken McKay, has resigned.

The resignation is effective immediately, the RNC announced. Mike Leavitt, who worked on Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign and has been the party’s deputy chief of staff, will be replacing him.

This move comes in the wake of revelations that the RNC allowed a staffer to expense the cost of taking potential donors to a Los Angeles nightclub that often features topless women, with a bondage theme. That news had only sharpened the criticism Steele has faced over the organization’s spending during his tenure, and increased the pressure on him to do something about it. It appears this resignation is both an attempt to show something is being done and to throw McKay under the proverbial bus.

For years now, it’s seemed like the word “maverick” was permanently fused to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. He seemed to cherish it, and his advisors often worked to push it; they may have played it down a little during the 2008 Republican presidential primary, but it was an essential part of the eventual nominee’s image during the campaign.

Now, though, McCain is in another Republican primary, facing a legitimate challenger from his right — former Rep. J.D. Hayworth — in a decidedly anti-incumbent year. So he’s been reinventing himself to some extent. He went to the right on immigration, for instance, despite the fact that his moderation on the issue had been one of his signatures between the 2000 and 2008 campaigns.

The senator’s latest step in that direction goes much further than that, however.

“‘Maverick’ is a mantle McCain no longer claims; in fact, he now denies he ever was one,” Newsweek’s David Margolick reports in a new article, quoting McCain as saying, “I never considered myself a maverick.”

Following up on Gabriel Winant’s earlier post on conservatives’ feelings about this year’s Census, here’s an interesting bit of news: The Census Bureau has tapped Karl Rove for a new public service announcement in which he encourages people to return their forms.

Conservatives farther out on the fringe might be wary of the Census, but Rove is smart enough — and mainstream enough — to know that it could be politically disastrous for the Republican Party if the right has an unusually low response rate. That might be what’s motivating him here.

The Birthers are back.

They never really went away, actually — in all likelihood, unfortunately, they never will — but the people who believe President Obama doesn’t meet the Constitution’s eligibility requirements for his office have at least faded from the news lately. Now, some are working to change that, and they have a new figurehead to rally behind.

Last week, the American Patriot Foundation announced that Army Lt. Col Terrence Lakin, a flight surgeon, has decided that he’ll refuse to obey any and all orders because of his concerns over the circumstances of Obama’s birth and birth certificate.