Richard Clarke: The Chamber Broke the Law

/in /by

I’m really deep in the weeds on the Jack Goldsmith memo right now (I should have a weedy post up later).

But in case you’re bored w/bmaz’s rant about the assault on Miranda rights, I thought I’d point to this TP post describing Richard Clarke suggesting that the Chamber of Commerce (funded by foreign sources, he notes) may have broken the law in targeting Chamber opponents.

Clarke denounced the scandal in no uncertain terms. Noting accurately that the Chamber “took foreign money in the last election,” a story also uncovered by ThinkProgress, Clarke said the Chamber had conspired to commit a “felony”:

FANG: Hi. You talked a lot about classifying and recognizing cyber security threats, but you mostly focused on foreign threats. I’m curious about a story that broke last month, that the US Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest trade association, based here in DC, had contracted or attempted to contract military defense firms like HB Gary Federal, Palantir, and Berico, to develop proposals to use the same type of cyber warfare tactics normally reserved for Jihadi websites against left-wing activists, trade — labor unions, and left of center think tanks here in America. What do you think about that type of threat from a lobbyist or a corporation targeting political enemies, or perceived enemies here in the US?

CLARKE: I think it’s a violation of 10USC. I think it’s a felony, and I think they should go to jail. You call them a large trade association, I call them a large political action group that took foreign money in the last election. But be that as it may, if you in the United States, if any American citizen anywhere in the world, because this is an extraterritorial law, so don’t think you can go to Bermuda and do it, if any American citizen anywhere in the world engages in unauthorized penetration, or identity theft, accessing a number through identity theft purposes, that’s a felony and if the Chamber of Commerce wants to try that, that’s fine with me because the FBI will be on their doorstep in a matter of hours.

Now if only we had Feds anymore that would consider busting big business…

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  1. BoxTurtle says:

    that’s fine with me because the FBI will be on their doorstep in a matter of hours.

    Yeah, to take the chambers complaint and then hunt you down.

    Boxturtle (Clarke can’t really believe the FBI would act)

  3. MadDog says:

    OT – Former Administrative Assistant and Husband of Senator John Ensign’s mistress charged by DOJ:

    Former Administrative Assistant to U.S. Senator Charged with Making Prohibited Communications to Senate Office

    The former administrative assistant to a U.S. senator was charged today by a federal grand jury in the District of Columbia with violating criminal conflict of interest laws, announced Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen of the District of Columbia; and James W. McJunkin, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office.

    The indictment charges Douglas Hampton, 48, formerly of Las Vegas, with seven counts of violating the criminal conflict of interest laws. Hampton will be arraigned on March 31, 2011, in U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia…

    Meanwhile, Senator John Ensign continues to play with his zipper.

    • earlofhuntingdon says:

      There’s more than one mob, and omerta applies to them too. Some of their members have lovely golden blond hair. They just don’t hail from Sicily or the Ukraine.

      I would see this startling misuse of DoJ resources as a federal placeholder for state blackmail laws they can’t charge him with. Besides, Ensign’s parents probably want their nearly $100,000 back for hushing up having helped this couple re-establish their lives after their sons serial predation blackened them. TPTB protect their own. Everyone else, even their former courtiers, especially their former courtiers, are at risk.

      Meanwhile, Ginny Thomas and her hubby skate on significant conflicts of interest that directly affect national legal policy. Banksters and their government agency advocates massive conflicts of interest are ignored. And the government fights punishing the former head of the Dept. of Injustice’s whistleblowers’ watchdog – for the handful crimes he explicitly admitted in open court that he committed.

      “Down the rabbit hole” no longer adequately describes the world as seen from inside the Beltway.

  4. IntelVet says:

    Dumping on the “little” people, yet again.

    Sad how we have destroyed this country and everything it stood for.

  5. pdaly says:

    Glad to hear Richard Clarke is speaking out again. Wondering if and when he’ll comment on topics that go directly to Bush Co.’s illegal activities–if only for the historical record, expired SOLs and all.