I’d Love to See Conyers and Pelosi in a Spat

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That may not be a mature sentiment, wanting to see Conyers and Pelosi in a spat. But after reading that Pelosi knee-capped Conyers on his subpoena of Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten, I have marginal hopes that this will piss off Conyers and escalate things in HJC, rather than bury them as Pelosi seems content to do.

House Democratic leaders have decided to postpone a vote on a criminalcontempt resolution against White House chief of staff Joshua Boltenand former White House counsel Harriet Miers for several weeks, andpossibly longer, according to top lawmakers and aides.

[snip]

But the slowdown, approved by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) andher top lieutenants, is also stirring objections among Democrats.House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) saidhe is uncomfortable with the delay and worries the House will be seenas toothless unless it moves quickly to hold top officials in contemptfor failing to provide documents and testimony in congressional probes.

[snip]

Conyers said it was critical for Congress to enforce its subpoenasagainst executive branch officials, including senior White House aides.

“Otherwise, we just become a [social] club,” Conyers said, adding that he would be reviewing the issue with Pelosi soon.

You see, after a long history of noting the importance Read more →

Whose Credibility Is Declining Faster?

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Mike McConnell or General Petraeus?

Petraeus has become Fox’s latest pundit, while McConnell is claiming the amended FISA is responsible for those German terror arrests last week.

The government’s ability to eavesdrop on terrorism suspects overseasallowed the United States to obtain information that helped lead to thearrests last week of three Islamic militants accused of planning bombattacks in Germany, Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, told senators on Monday.       

Butanother government official said Mr. McConnell might have misspoken.Mr. McConnell said the information had been obtained under a newlyupdated and highly contentious wiretapping law, the ForeignIntelligence Surveillance Act. But the official, who has been briefedon the eavesdropping laws and the information given to the Germans,said that those intercepts were recovered last year under the old law.The official asked for anonymity because the information is classified.

It’d be nice if we actually started holding government officials accountable for the lies they tell during oversight hearings, huh?

The Warrantless Wiretap Program Was Illegal

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When Jim Comey testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, he refused to say the warrantless wiretap program was illegal.

SPECTER: Well, you don’t have to.

If the certification by theDepartment of Justice as to legality is required as a matter of law,and that is not done, and the program goes forward, it’s illegal. Howcan you — how can you contest that, Mr. Comey?

COMEY: Thereason I hesitate is I don’t know that the Department of Justice’scertification was required by statute — in fact, it was not, as far asI know — or by regulation, but that it was the practice in thisparticular program, when it was renewed, that the attorney general signoff as to its legality.

There was a signature line for that.And that was the signature line on which was adopted for me, as theacting attorney general, and that I would not sign.

So itwasn’t going forward in violation of any — so far as I know –statutory requirement that I sign off. But it was going forward eventhough I had communicated, "I cannot approve this as to its legality."

Jack Goldsmith doesn’t say so directly, either. But in this excerpt from his book, he makes it very clear that Alberto Gonzales should have no authority to investigate leaks about FISA–and particularly shouldn’t subpoena Goldsmith–since Gonzales had had to be get bailed out of an illegal program in the first place.

Communities of Interest

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This Eric Lichtblau article provides a lot of dots that have been, heretofore, missing in our picture of the surveillance they’ve got us under. It’s no surprise the government has been using data mining on not just suspects themselves, but also on their friends and associates–a virtual "Friends and Families" plan of surveillance.

The documents indicate that the Federal Bureau of Investigation usedsecret demands for records to obtain data not only on individuals itsaw as targets but also details on their “community of interest” — thenetwork of people that the target in turn was in contact with.

But given the description, it’s more clear now why the Administration refused all meaningful oversight of the minimization they’re doing on their warrantless wiretapping. You can’t really collect a "community of interest" and at the same time be claiming you’re eliminating all data on those not directly targeted.

Further, the article explains why Alberto Gonzales got all squirmyearly this year when SJC asked him for information on National SecurityLetters. They were still trying to hide these communities of interest,so Gonzales didn’t want to provide much information on the program. Andmeanwhile, they were trying to bury the program.

The government official who spoke on condition of anonymity said theF.B.I. recently stopped asking the telecommunications companies for thecommunity of interest data. The exact time of and reason for thesuspension is unclear, but it appears to have been set off in part bythe questions raised earlier this year by the inspector general’sinitial review into abuses in the use of national security letters.

“The White House Needs to Hire an Archivist”

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WTF is the Administration doing, claiming it has briefed members of Congress on the warrantless wiretap program when it hasn’t?

After the domestic surveillance program was revealed in 2005, formerSenate Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham (D-FL) said thatWhite House briefings that he attended in the Vice President’s office failed to disclose that the administration was spying on Americans:

There was no reference made to the fact that we weregoing to…begin unwarranted, illegal — and I think unconstitutional —eavesdropping on American citizens.

Shortly thereafter, Cheney fired back at Graham, arguing, “Well that’s not true. [Graham] knew.” The White House accused him of “misremembering the briefings.”

In a recent interview with ThinkProgress, Sen. Graham told us that,after the controversy erupted in late 2005, the White House providedhim with dates when they alleged Graham had been briefed. Graham saidhe consulted his famous spiral bound notebooks and determined he had not been briefed on these dates:

I mean, I’m not surprised they didn’t brief members of Congress fully (or at least, the Democratic MOCs). But why claim you had when you hadn’t? Particularly when one of them (as TP points out) is a notoriously anal note-taker?

Most interesting is the Administration’s claim that Graham was briefed on April Read more →

What Indictments Did Schlozman Speak to Elston About?

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Brad Schlozman remains unresponsive on a few of the questions he (finally) returned to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Take this question that asks for very specific details about any conversations he had with Mike Elston about indictments in WD MO:

Did you speak with Michael Elston regarding any other indictments filed while you were U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri? If so, which indictments?

Mr. Elston, who is a former federal prosecutor and appellate chief in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, and I are personal friends and we spoke about various cases from time to time. I am certain that, given his position as chief of staff to the Deputy Attorney General, Mr. Elston spoke with many U.S. Attorneys about their cases and other matters affecting U.S. Attorneys’ Offices.

I guess Shorter Schloz doesn’t understand what the question "If so, which indictments" means. Because he sure dodged answering that very specific question.

Unfortunately, when they get around to asking Schloz about indicting Democratic politician Katheryn Shields, they only ask Schloz about whom he consulted on the timing of the indictment–not the indictment in general.

Get Your Satellite Out of My Backyard

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This will be interesting. The Dems are trying to prevent Chertoff from implementing his big brother satellite domestic spying program on October 1.

We are so concerned that, as the Department’s authorizing Committee,we are calling for a moratorium on the program until the manyConstitutional, legal and organizational questions it raises areanswered.

Today’s testimony made clear that there is effectivelyno legal framework governing the domestic use of satellite imagery forthe various purposes envisioned by the Department. Without this legalframework, the Department runs the risk of creating a program that –while well-intended – could be misused and violate Americans’Constitutional rights. The Department’s failure to include its PrivacyOfficer and the Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Officer before thisJuly, almost two years after planning for the NAO began, only heightensour sense of concern. Privacy and civil liberties simply cannot remainan afterthought at the Department.

We ask that you provide theCommittee with the written legal framework under which the NAO willoperate, the standard operating procedures (SOPs) for the NAO –particularly those SOPs that will be used for requests by State, local,and tribal law enforcement, the privacy and civil liberties safeguardsthat will accompany any use of satellite imagery, and an analysis ofhow the program conforms with Posse Comitatus. Read more →

Were They Bypassing Gonzales, Too?

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Marty Lederman points to this excerpt from Jack Goldsmith’s book at Slate. Goldsmith explains he only saw Alberto Gonzales disagree with David Addington once–and that Bush ended up siding with Addington.

Addington’s hard-line nonaccommodation stance always prevailed when thelawyers met to discuss legal policy issues in Alberto Gonzales’ office.During these meetings, Gonzales himself would sit quietly in his wingchair, occasionally asking questions but mostly listening as thequerulous Addington did battle with whomever was seeking to "go soft."It was Gonzales’ responsibility to determine what to advise thepresident after the lawyers had kicked the legal policy matters around.But I only knew him to disagree with Addington once, on an issue Icannot discuss, and on that issue the president overruled Gonzales andsided with the Addington position.

Logically, Goldsmith suggests that Addington literally always prevailed in these discussions. In the nine months or so Goldsmith attended these meetings, Gonzales only advised a position Addington didn’t support once. And Addington still won that battle.

This suggests Addington–or more likely Cheney–was able to present his view to Bush directly. Which suggests that, in this case, at least, Gonzales’ purported role as a filter on these legal decisions was illusory.

And boy would I like to know what the subject Read more →

Yet Another Whine about a Report Card

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No, seriously. The GAO’s report on DHS is really important evidence that Bush has done very little to make this country more safe. But I’m most struck by the fact that the DHS people quoted are making exactly the same complaint the military did last week, when GAO reported that Iraq has met few of its benchmarks (for the record, DHS seems to be doing somewhat better than Iraq, making at least moderate progress in 6 of 14 benchmarks, whereas Iraq has made at least moderate progress in 7 of 18.

Then again, Iraq has a civil war raging

Both agencies, however, are complaining that the GAO is being unfair because it dares to give failing grades, because it refused the change failing grades, and because it used outdated reports largely because the agency in question wouldn’t give GAO the current ones. Here’s the DHS hack:

DHS Undersecretary for Management Paul A. Schneider said that the GAOshould have graded the department higher on 42 of 171 directives. TheGAO relied on a flawed methodology that "fails to accurately reflectthe Department’s progress in many specific program areas," he said in aformal 42-page response.

Schneider also said investigators relied on outdated reports, appliedvague, shifting and inconsistent grading standards, and set up anunfair, "pass-fail" approach to assessing a spectrum of progress thatshould be expected to take many years.

"The GAO Report treats all of the performance expectations as if theywere of equal significance," Schneider said. "In contrast, theDepartment uses a risk-based approach to consider its overallpriorities," adding that the DHS has met 37 of 50 objectives insecuring transportation modes, which were targeted in the 2001 attacks.

And here’s the Administration on its Iraq benchmarks.

Somebody to Fire!!!!

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I’m thrilled with the news that George Bush just gave Barry Jackson a promotion.

Yesterday, President Bush named Barry Jackson to be Peter Wehnher’s replacement to run the White House Office of Strategic Initiatives.Jackson was the major White House strategist behind Bush’s failedSocial Security privatization ploy, and was one of the White Houseemployees discovered to be using RNC email accounts to e-mail an associate of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

That’s because just about all the people involved in politicizing our government–Sara Taylor, Monica Goodling, Kyle Sampson, and, of course, Rove–have already left the Administration. So even if Scott Bloch’s Office of Special Counsel investigation into Hatch Act violations finds that the political briefings held throughout the government finds that those were, in fact, violations, there’s no real punishment, since the normal punishment is simply firing the person responsible.

So I’m glad for Jackson’s promotion. It’ll give us the satisfaction of firing somebody for treating our government like the Soviet state.