NSA Twice Chose to Forgo Privacy Protections in Domestic Data Mining Programs
While Jane Mayer's profile on NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake has generated a lot of attention for the way Obama's DOJ is senselessly prosecuting him, there has been less focus on the key revelation that Drake and others went on the record to…
War, Intelligence, Law and Forever
There are a number of oddly coinciding legal issues that I wanted to pull together into one post.
The Administration Fudges the War Powers Act
First and most obviously, today is the day the 60-day grace period for Libya under the War Powers…
Karl Rove, Bankster Bailer
I'm not surprised that Karl Rove has weighed in on the foreclosure fraud scandal with an erroneous op-ed in the WSJ. I'm just a bit baffled why he did so now.
The overall gist of the op-ed is that a $20 billion settlement of the robosigning…
If Only They Had Listened to Thomas Drake, They Might Have Prevented CableGate
I'm in the process of reading all the Siobhan Gorman stories for which Thomas Drake might have served as an anonymous source. And one of the ten or so articles for which he's a possible source exposes the NSA's failure on an issue at the heart…
Reid and Republicans Tee Up Another PATRIOT Extension
This is the disrespect in which our Congress holds our Constitution: they will continue to chip away at the Fourth Amendment, by passing yet another extension of the PATRIOT Act without addressing the clear abuses identified since the last extension.
US…
Obama's Middle East Speech: Applause Lines for Democracy
Obama gave an inspirational speech advocating for change in MENA--"Prosperity also requires tearing down walls that stand in the way of progress – the corruption of elites who steal from their people"--that I wish he'd advocate in the US.…
As the Arab Spring Gives Way to the Sunni Summer
The AP has a interesting--and interestingly timed--story on the help we're giving Saudi Arabia to build a "facilities security force" to protect, among other things, its oil fields and planned civilian nuclear sites. The story is based, in part,…
Jared Bernstein's Glorious Diarrhea of Quashed Ideas
I rarely post solely to recommend you follow a blog or twitter feed. But I am here.
You see, Joe Biden's economic advisor, Jared Bernstein, was recently liberated from the White House.
And, as part of that liberation process, it seems,…
Report on Entrapment Describes Pattern of Informant-Created "Terrorism"
We've been writing a bit about Mohamed Osman Mohamud, the young Oregon man charged on WMD charges for allegedly trying to detonate an inert bomb the FBI helped him get. His attorneys are preparing an aggressive entrapment defense (those defenses…
DHS' Top Cybersecurity Officer Resigns
As Marc Ambinder reports, the top cybersecurity guy at DHS, Phil Reitinger, announced his resignation today. Which is pretty odd, given that Obama just rolled out his cybersecurity strategy a few days ago. Though that's the excuse that Reitinger…
Larry Thompson: From Rendering Maher Arar to Pushing Pop to Teaching Lawyers
Oh is Mary going to love this.
As she has tirelessly reminded us over the years, Larry Thompson, the former Deputy Attorney General who signed off on Maher Arar's rendition to Syria to be tortured, has spent the last 7 years at PepsiCo serving…
FBI Takes 2 Years to Indict FBI Agent Facilitating Mortgage Fraud
Does it help to explain DOJ's failure to crack down on mortgage fraud that one of the agents assigned to investigate it was instead sleeping with--and helping defend--one of those being investigated for fraud?
The FBI just indicted Special…
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Just over two years ago, right around the time I reported that Khalid Sheikh…
The Issues Thomas Drake and Others Whistleblew On Remain Urgent
I've been looking at one of the Siobhan Gorman articles that accused whistleblower Thomas Drake served as a source for. I'll have more later, but I wanted to point out one main thrust of the story: the NSA had no way of measuring efficacy and…
Goodwin Liu To Get Senate Floor Vote On Cloture Thursday
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bmazGoodwin Liu will finally get a vote Thursday on cloture for his nomination to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. It will be a tough road, but Liu is worth the fight.
Is Mukasey Suggesting We Ignored Information Mohammed al-Qahtani Gave Us?
I've been having difficulty finding the time to get through the entire AEI torture extravaganza that took place yesterday ("Moderated" by John Yoo). But by the time I read this Greg Sargent piece, I had gotten through the point at about…
Hillary Picks Cheney Aide to Replace PJ Crowley
It's bad enough that Obama didn't clear out the Cheney folks burrowed into the permanent bureaucracy. Now the Obama Administration will appoint former Cheney aide Victoria Nuland to replace PJ Crowley as State Department spokesperson.
Victoria…
Apparently the Terrorists Can't Learn How Much Radiation They'll Get from Going through TSA Security
When I first read tweets pointing to this article, reporting that the Administration won't let independent scientists evaluate the radiation exposure from RapeAScan machines, I joked that it was because we can't let terrorists know how dangerous…
Did the Administration's Own Propensity for Leaks Crash the SEAL's Blackhawk?
The AP has an astoundingly detailed description of the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound. It describes the kinds of aircraft used, the minutes spent completing each part of the task, and even explained that the Geronimo name just served to…
Eric Holder Claims Rule of Law Exists in Cyberspace
Just days after asking Congress not to give the intelligence community a hard deadline to put a basic cybersecurity measure into place, the Obama Administration rolled out a cybersecurity strategy yesterday with great fanfare. The event itself…
