OPR Report Working Thread
A great way to spend a Friday night--reading this with all my friends!
Memorandum for the Attorney General
OPR Final Report
OPR 1st Draft Report
OPR 2nd Draft Report
Yoo Response to OPR 2nd Draft
Yoo Response to OPR…
DOJ Anthrax Report Working Thread
DOJ has posted its Anthrax Report and related documents.
The Justice Department, FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service today announced that the investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks, which killed five individuals and sickened 17 others,…
Unsolved Anthrax Case to be Closed Today
Though DOJ will presumably insist that Ivins did it.
The FBI is expected to issue a final report today on its six-year investigation of the 2001 anthrax letter attacks, according to the attorney representing former Frederick resident Bruce…
Toyota Pays Whitewash Firm to Produce UNBELIEVABLY Bad Whitewash
To get an idea of just how ridiculously bad the Toyota-funded study of its "sticky accelerator" problem is, you need only compare the 6 vehicles the contractor in question purchased to study, with the years and makes of vehicles Toyota has recalled.
Here…
Will Akio Toyoda Testify on Brakes?
As you may know, there are a slew of hearings scheduled next week to try to understand the Toyota brake problems. The head of Toyota (and grandson of the company founder) caused a bit of a stir yesterday when he tried to correct the mistaken…
UK Relations with Israel "in the Deep Freeze" over Dubai Assassination
Those JSOC guys doing America's assassinating better make sure they don't get caught using British passports. Because if the Brits' claimed anger at Israel for giving its Mossad killers UK passports is any indication, it would not help relations.
Britain…
Happy Stimulus Day to Susan Collins, Who Killed Billions in School Funding
ThinkProgress has an absolutely devastating report on 111 Republican members of Congress who have attacked last year's stimulus bill, but who have since taken credit for it. Click through for details on Republican hypocrisy close to you, but…
The FOUR OLC Opinions Retroactively Justifying Telecom Data Collection
Alright. I lied. I'm not going to post on why I think FBI went to the trouble of getting an OLC opinion that, apparently, opens a huge loophole in privacy protections from data collection until I first lay out all four OLC opinions that we know…
WaPo Retracts Report that Anwar al-Awlaki on CIA Kill List
As Steven Aftergood reports, the WaPo has issued a correction to Dana Priest's article claiming that Anwar al-Awlaki was added to the CIA's assassination list.
The article referred incorrectly to the presence of U.S. citizens on a CIA list…
Did Evan Bayh Quit Because Reid Refused to Give Paris Hilton a Tax Break?
In his statement explaining why he was quitting, Evan Bayh named the Harry Reid's decision not to let MaxTax Baucus and Chuck Grassley hold the jobs bill hostage as one of the reasons he does not like Congress.
Just last week, a major piece…
Big Brother Kidnapping Your Babies' DNA?
Because I was diagnosed with breast cancer at a really young age, doctors routinely ask if I want to undergo genetic testing. I've always responded that I'd be happy to give researchers DNA material, and even to arrange for other family members…
Why Did FBI Need the Exigent Letters OLC Memo? (Background Post)
Yesterday, I did a post on what the DOJ IG Report on "Exigent Letters" revealed about the January 8, 2010 OLC opinion exploiting some kind of huge loophole in the Stored Communications Act. Today, I'm going to look at why--three and a half years…
Why Did the FBI Need the Exigent Letters OLC Memo
Note: April 12, 2016: I accessed this today and because of some technical issues am not sure whether I published it back in 2010 or not. I'm republishing it dated to the day I wrote it in its apparently incomplete form.
I've been working…
Fresh Off Negotiations w/Rahm, Lindsey Graham Demands Military Commissions AND Indefinite Detention
I guess, once Rahm Emanuel designated him the Acting Attorney General, Lindsey Graham realized he could demand even more from the Administration. Because now he is saying he will only support closing Gitmo if he can also pass a law authorizing…
Dick and the Naked Senator: Waterboarding BFFs
Breaking! (Not) Dick Cheney loves him some waterboarding.
KARL: If you have somebody in custody like Abdulmutallab, after just trying to blow up an airliner, and you think he has information on another attack, I mean, do you think that…
Rahm's Method of Politicizing DOJ
The NYT has an account of how Rahm and Jim Messina tried to give Eric Holder a minder a year ago.
Last winter, when Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. called the United States a “nation of cowards” for avoiding frank conversations…
The Exigent Letter OLC Opinion
Update: Bob Schacht asked for more context, so here goes. This IG Report was the third DOJ's Inspector General, Glenn Fine, has done on the FBI's use of National Security Letters and "exigent letters," though this is the first to focus almost…
Second Working Thread on Exigent Letter IG Report
It has taken me a while. But I've finally gotten through the DOJ IG Report on exigent letters. Page numbers below will be to the PDF page.
Page 14: Footnote 1 notes there are Secret and TS/SCI versions of this report. Keep that in mind as…
Scott Brown and Do-Nothing Senate Will Cause 900,000 More to Lose Jobs
Count me among those who are grateful that Harry Reid scaled back the Senate jobs bill instead of letting MaxTax Baucus and Chuck Grassley use it to push through another estate tax break for Paris Hilton. That said, what he is pushing is another…
Of COURSE Blumenthal Is Running against Civilian Law
Gregg has a post up expressing shock that Richard Blumenthal, CT's craven Attorney General running to replace Chris Dodd, advocated against using civilian law for both Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the UndieBomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. Gregg…