DOD Declares War on ... Underwear
Charlie Savage just tweeted that the Abu Ghraib tactics will continue for Bradley Manning.
Quantico tells me Bradley Manning will now be stripped every night as a "precautionary measure" to prevent self-injury
Remember, Manning was already…
DOD Passes the Buck Rather than Let Kucinich Visit Bradley Manning
On February 4, Dennis Kucinich asked DOD to allow him to visit Bradley Manning so he could assess his conditions of confinement. On February 8, Robert Gates wrote Kucinich a short note telling him we was referring his request to Secretary of…
Online Personas and Congress
I've been meaning to return to our government's contracting for persona software for a while. Last week RawStory had a good story providing details of the persona management contract the Air Force put out for bid. RS reveals that the contract…
Nine Years of Nudity in American Detention
It's just like old times!
... the CIA interrogators also announced they planned to become Zubaydah’s "God." They reportedly took his clothing as punishment, and reduced his human interaction to a single daily visit in which they would…
We Have Met the Enemy and He Is Us
The stated intent of the Wikileaks.org Web site is to expose unethical practices, illegal behavior, and wrongdoing within corrupt corporations and oppressive regimes ...
[snip]
The developers believe that the disclosure of sensitive or…
Bradley Manning's New Charges: "Bringing Discredit upon the Armed Forces"
Aside from learning that we--the recipients of a bunch of information Bradley Manning is alleged to have leaked--are the enemy, what did we learn from the new charges the government filed against Bradley Manning yesterday? Most of the charges…
Will DOJ Finally Finish Its "Review" of Faulty White Paper on Illegal Wiretapping on Monday?
Steven Aftergood reports that, as of December 10, DOJ was still "reviewing" the flawed January 2006 white paper that the Bush Administration used to retroactively claim the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force also authorized Bush to…
Time to Reevaluate the Importance of Bradley Manning's Alleged Leak?
Back when WikiLeaks leaked the Collateral Murder video, I was agnostic about the value of the leak. Surely, exposing the cover-up of the killing of the Reuters journalists was important. But I thought the response focused too much on the soldiers…
Will Issa's Fired Spokesperson Expose How Politico "Wins the Morning"?
When news broke yesterday that Darrell Issa had fired his spokesperson, Kurt Bardella, for sharing emails with NYT reporter Mark Leibovich, I suggested,
I suspect Issa just fired his spokesperson because Issa cares more about staying in…
Liar Calls Access Journalist a Pot
Even before Tom Ricks handed his blog over to Bob Woodward to rip Donald Rumsfeld a new asshole, Ricks shared this quote from H.R. Haldeman about Rummy as a way to introduce Rummy's dismissal of Ricks' Fiasco and Woodward's books.
So in my…
Court Should Deny DOJ & Scott Bloch Collusion to Avoid Accountability
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bmazAs you will recall, Scott Bloch is the senior governmental attorney who formerly served as head of the United States Office of Special Counsel:
The U.S. Office of Special Counsel (OSC) is an independent federal investigative and prosecutorial…
American Girl, Made in China, The Reality Show
This is a really cool project. ABC's World News has a series this week on whether or not a typical upper middle class family can survive without consumer goods made in America. It includes:
Footage of a bunch of Americans claiming to buy…
Bob Woodward, Blogger
Let me just say, without qualification, that of the high profile journalists whose techniques were discussed or entered as evidence in the Scooter Libby trial, Bob Woodward had the best note taking. Judy Miller, Matt Cooper, Bob Novak, Andrea…
Progressives Demand House GOP Committee Chairs Investigate Hunton & Williams
When I first posted on Hank Johnson's letter demanding an investigation into Hunton & Williams' appropriation of counterterrorist techniques to attack citizen speech, I was a bit skeptical. Without a way to get some coverage of the demand,…
If a TBTF Bank Lost Its Quant Code to Chinese Hackers and No One Knew, Would We Still Have a Functioning Market?
Bloomberg has an excellent catch from the HB Gary emails, revealing that Morgan Stanley was one of the 20-200 companies targeted by the Chinese-based Aurora hack in 2009.
Morgan Stanley experienced a “very sensitive” break-in to its network…
"Tactics Developed for Use against Terrorists May Have Been Unleashed against American Citizens"
Hmmm. "Tactics developed for use on terrorists may have been unleashed against citizens." That sounds like something I would have written about the HB Gary scandal. Twice.
It's nice to see some members of Congress understand what the entire…
HB Gary CEO Aaron Barr Resigns
He'll probably just get picked up by TASC, which was about to buy out HB Gary Federal anyway. But I do take some pleasure at his recognition that his reputation is for shit.
Embattled CEO Aaron Barr says he is stepping down from his post at…
Why We Need an Industrial Policy
I've long said that, after the big military-industrial-complex states outside of DC (which have, after all, benefited from 10 years of big stimulus), MI is the state that has most benefited from Obama's economic policies. Not only did Obama…
The Alternative to NYT's Subservience: Actual Journalism
The Guardian has its version of the Arthur Brisbane article approving of NYT's decision to withhold all mention of Raymond Davis' identity. One of the two main reasons why the Guardian chose to publish even as CIA and MI5 were warning that that…
"Shut up and explain how we could assist the FPs in finding *MORE* detainees"
Atrios points out the hypocrisy of our foreign policy as displayed in his Twitter stream.
It reminded me of this:
(02:26:01 PM) Manning: i dont believe in good guys versus bad guys anymore… i only a plethora of states acting in self…
