$5.8 Million for Hatfill. $0 for Valerie Wilson.
Steven Hatfill will no longer have to complain that he can’t get a job anymore because he was once the leading suspect to be the anthrax terrorist. The government just signed a $5.8 million settlement with him, which includes a cash payment now and then $150,000 annual payments for the next 20 years.
The Justice Department has agreed to pay $5.8 million to settle a lawsuit with former Army scientist Steven Hatfill, who was named as a person of interest in the 2001 anthrax attacks.
Hatfill claimed the Justice Department violated his privacy rights by speaking with reporters about the case.
Settlement documents were filed in federal court Friday. Both sides have agreed to the deal, according to the documents, and as soon as they are signed, the case will be dismissed.
Jeebus, between this and his federal monitoring contracts, former AG Ashcroft, who really really wanted you to believe the DOJ was closing in on a suspect in the still-unsolved anthrax case, is sure proving expensive for the US taxpayer, huh?
Meanwhile, Valerie Wilson, who had her career ruined by the Vice President and his lackey Scooter Libby, gets nothing in compensation.
Just to put some persepective on things, you know…
It’s the BushCo Department of Just-Us at work.
Shark-Fu, the Angry Black Bitch weighs in on Hatfill, too:
Do read the whole thing. With a title like “Oh no they didn’t try to slip this one past a bitch on a Friday…“, how can you not click through?
Wow – he didn’t have to cough up confidentiality for that? They must be very tres worried about what a new administration might make available to him or what a court might make them produce.
You know, that’s precisely what bmaz said, via email, Mary.
You mean that its all hush money?
Bob in HI
Did somebody mention dogs that don’t hunt??
The LA Times story on it is the most comprehensive I have seen.
Mary @3 – That was my comment on the last thread. It just jumps out like a fire engine. My guess is they tried and Hatfill said “screw that, I want my name cleared, it must be public”. I wonder if the government made a motion to seal anyway based on some national security baloney or something?
OT – Funny in a way. Or maybe not.
http://www.abcnews.go.com/print?id=5255140
It does jump out.
The Dept Obstructing Justice scores another one.
In other news, Parhat, the Uighur who the DC Cir declared NOT an enemy combatant, is still sitting in his cell, in isolation even, as his lawyer has not been allowed to communicate the Court’s ruling to him.
Gawd.
What’s their justification for keeping him in iso?
Bob in HI
They think it is fun; and, besides, nobody has made them release him. Heck, they are probably still torturing him in an effort to get him to confess to something that they can throw out as justification for their actions. Sadly, that is not really a joke.
With our group of bozos, that will turn out to be the program we actually needed.
Still think they ought to give each of the Uighers a new house in Ray Ray Hunt’s new master planned community, Sharyland.
The typical reaction when confronted with an adverse ruling.
Whoa. My impression was that the guy faked his resume and got caught for it during the scrutiny with the anthrax case. That alone is enough to get you fired from just about any academic institution. I thought he made a convenient scapegoat because of this. (SIDEBAR: While I was never convinced of his guilt, I was never convinced of his innocence, either.)
That being said, $5 million is an awful lot of money for someone who supposedly did something that is a clear-cut firing-offense, no matter how much of a smear campaign there was against him. He would have zero credibility in a courtroom. So I would imagine that there’s got to be a pretty big smoking gun somewhere to justify this kind of a settlement. And if I were him, the DOJ’s statement is the kind of thing that would make me rethink my settlement.
His suit was based on a government leaking that he was a “person of interest” to the press. That’s a violation of statute. Rather than let the public find out which person in the government was the leaker (probably pretty high up, if it was a low-level schlep, they’d have been fed to the wolves) to the press, the DoJ decided to scuttle the case with a settlement.
I’d guess it was a White House leaker, rather than DOJ.
I’m still amazed at the SJC questioning by Sheldon Whitehouse that showed how many BushCo DOJ folks were authorized to talk to the WH about pending criminal matters.
If it was a DOJ leak, I think Hatfill would have had a much tougher time getting a settlement like this. With a WH leak, OTOH, BushCo has much more incentive to make this go away. Especially if the DOJ did a little poking around and figured out who leaked the info. Wouldn’t want *that* to come out in discovery . . .
I think he was guilty, doing someone’s bidding, and was ready to blackmail them. Remember how the timing of all this coincided with the 9/11 panic….shock doctrine at work.
– In other news, Parhat, the Uighur who the DC Cir declared NOT an enemy combatant, is still sitting in his cell –
Not to make light of Parhat’s plight, but Andy McCarthy’s outrage in this case was just flat out funny.
A federal court overrules the commander-in-chief
So, are we now in the business of saying “if you’re against China, you’re an enemy of the US.”? And McCarthy makes a big deal of “Now they’re going to be ordered to be released” Helloooo … the government already decided to release them.
Crap, the judges haven’t said anything more than “you can’t use that [enemy combatant] label”, and McCarthy makes like the court order bin Laden released on a technicality.
get this
david addington is pissed because AlQueda can now identify him and target him for assignation (I presume ???) because he was called to testify before congress
apparently Al Queda knows that addington was responsible for the torture of Al Queda members, so Al Queda has a reason to “get” addington
this MUST be addington’s argument
so we have to protect the torture regime with absolute silence
but Valeri Plame and Brewster-Jennings was “Fair Game”
let the smackdown begin
Um, if Obama, er i mean Osama, and friends are really watching cspan, they already knew about Addington. This may have been the dumbest crap I heard come out of yesterday’s off-Broadway song and dance show.
come on, dude
hypocrisy and sheer gall like this call for an award, or a medal, or something
I vote we drop him in Juarez in a sack …
we could call it the “Juarez In A Sack” award
Concise summary of the Hatfill case from the Press Privilege point of view
– f it was a DOJ leak, I think Hatfill would have had a much tougher time getting a settlement like this. –
Not if the DOJ leaker was AGAG.
Except AGAG was the White House counsel at the time . . . which puts things back at the WH.
Scratch that — make it AG Ashcroft
As much as I don’t care for Ashcroft, I don’t picture him as a leaker. His hardcore religious side wouldn’t go for that.
I could easily see Ashcroft telling the WH “here’s who we’re closing in on” though, and the WH gleefully leaking that to the press.
– As much as I don’t care for Ashcroft, I don’t picture him as a leaker. –
More of a pawn. I agree.
But I’ve been around the barn a few times, and people are often not what they appear to be. I give him the benefit of trying to do the right thing, and being in a den of vipers – and faced with a genuine threat from terrorists.
And at any rate, yes, it was worth 6 million dollars to shut down the process. Odd timing, because the process is nearing the end anyway, and the cost of litigation is sunk.
Methinks the government feared evidence would show a violation, and they’d be liable anyway, plus have the evidence made public. This way, they just pay the judgment and maintain the legal fiction that they didn’t leak. But they leaked, that’s obvious from facts in evidence. The only question is whodunnit.
I agree that the government was guilty as hell, but I think that the government would have won this case at trial. They would have been able to put enough suspicion on Hatfill that a jury would not have been willing to rule in his favor. There must be something big here that they’re covering.
Yeah, I dunno about that. If I were Hatfill’s lawyer, I would seek a Motion in Limine restricting the government from making such scurrilous allegations with nothing to back it up, then show they leaked, he was damaged, and wrap it all up in a nice little Richard Jewell bow. Poor Mr. Jewell died before he could ever get his life back, folks, let’s give Mr. Hatfill his life back, starting with a shitload of money…. Walton was the judge; he wasn’t going to let the government get away with a bunch of scandalous crap.
it’s kinda off-topic ew, but we ARE talkin bout money, so …
I got a question:
I heard that GM is on the ropes
I don’t know if it’s true, but I read that at $12 a share, GM is only worth $7 billion
an I read an article about mcsame’s appearance at an auto plant from Talkin Points Memo that says Chrysler is borderline bankrupt
I suspect Ford has some problems too
since you’re in Michigan, you might have a better idea of what’s really goin on
could we see one or more of the “Big Three” automakers go belly-up before November ???
The idea (apparently) was to ruin the union movement and empty out the midwest of union employees. That began in the early 1980s (at least) and continues today.
So, the question isn’t whether they’ll go bankrupt, but when. It’s part of the plan.
Of course, for the Republicans the sooner the better since they don’t want all those nasty union Dems voting in Michigan or Illinois or West Virginia (for that matter). They hope to push those states away from unions (the strongest Dem supporters outside of the Afro-American community) and toward Republicanism. Here in WV we’ve gone down from 5 representatives to 3 (in my lifetime) and one of those 3 is now Republican (daughter of a former governor) and we went from strictly Dem to voting for Bush (though it may have been stolen). So, their plan is working.
There is also a strong Catholic vote in Michigan which the Republicans have been courting for some time.
Probably none of that will matter in the upcoming elections since Bush is a disaster and McSame is too.
On the economic aspect of your question: health care costs are driving some companies to the wall and that might do in auto makers as quick as other problems. Of course, if Congress acts (and overrides a likely Bush/oil-company veto) they might bring oil & gasoline prices down. It’s doubtful they will or can do anything on healthcare for a year or two.
Whether we fall off the cliff, as many are predicting, or are rescued is anybody’s guess. Although I feel good about our future, right now things are precariously hanging by a thread. Even holding off the vote on the Home Mortgage Act and Oil Market Reform for a week could have significant consequences.
– Especially if the DOJ did a little poking around and figured out who leaked the info. –
Or, regardless of the leaker, that the leaker acted on orders, not on his/her own initiative.
There you go. We have a winner!
14 – Who knew the AUMF was for capturing the “enemies of China?”
When will our “Tibetan Monk” wing be finished? Who gets to waterboard the Dalai Lama? How many Japanese speaking interpretors do we have to interrogate the Tibetan enemies of China? Will we still have enough resources for our Zimbabwe wing, since we are bursting at the seems with Mugabe enemies right now?
I know LHP and others have said that McCarthy isn’t a low renter, but it’s really hard to believe based on the few things I’ve seen.
I have to admit, one thing that caught my eye a long while back on the Uighur cases was the lawyer for several of them, Sabin Willet, is a commerical bankruptcy lawyer (which used to be my gig when I was practicing law much) Not a crim def litigator, just a good lawyer.
Here’s one of several pieces he has written:
http://www.boston.com/bostongl…..uantanamo/
– I know LHP and others have said that McCarthy isn’t a low renter, but it’s really hard to believe based on the few things I’ve seen. –
Mixed bag. He was open to Libby being guilty of obstruction (which necessarily means that Libby was a leaker) – but on the DTA/MCA/GTMO material, he’s a waterboy for the administration.
Obviously he’s no slouch, having been a high profile prosecutor. I figure he’s a victim of groupthink, being steeped in NRO world. Maybe a $$ component too, but I discount the probability of that.
“Who gets to waterboard the Dalai Lama?”
I wouldn’t mind waterboarding Richard Gere, any man who couldn’t attain Nirvana in Cindy Crawford’s arms
deserves our highest contempt !
*hic* … thank you Sir, might I have another ?
It’s funny. The right was all over the Clinton’s for their “We didn’t do it if you can’t prove it” approach to allegations of wrongdoing (legal or ethical) – Mrs. Clinton’s “But that will never be proven” coming to mind.
Well lookie here … same conduct by Republicans.
I’ll be consistent. I think that approach shows weak character.
First of all a drink to David Gregory who keeps getting more and more ridiculoser every minute.
And ole leaker Toni Locy will probably have contempt actions and lawsuits against her dismissed now, and she will be off Reggie Walton’s official D.C. District Court shit list, although she’ll be eternally on mine. The D.C. CA panel will set her free.
Will Le Tony Loci continue to teach leaking fiction to the good students of journalist at the University of West Virginia on Christy Hardin Smith’s home turf? You betcha ass she will.
Five people died in the wake of the Anthrax mailings and the incompetence and stupidity of DOJ played a prime role in this as well as the stupidity of the CDC’s Julie Gerberding, M.D. who continues to run the CDC into the ground driving off key researchers to private industry and hemorrhaging money out the wazoo.
Second of all let’s raise a glass high to Hatfill–he zoomed a lot of people with his resume–he’s not a killer–he’s a poor shlep that DOJ and in particular Pierre Howard then with ABC and CNN’s shill for DOJ and drinking buddie of the DOJsters Kelli ah Don’t Know Jack but it don’t stop mah mouth Arena.
What happened to Valerie Plame was truly reprehensible and dangerous of Bush, Cheney, Rove, Scooter and others,and she is entitled to damages and the satisfaction of seeing the criminals Rove, Cheney, and Bush jailed. Fitzie came close and his apologists say he didn’t have the evidence, the gray mail and the email screwed him, and we may never know.
However Valerie and her husband have enough money and pensions to live comfortably not to mention great health care on the gov, and Stephen Hatfill was left screwed and tatooed by the Department of Jusssst Uzzzzzzz with not a cent. Now he can go out and buy a Prosche, a house and live reasonably well. Applying for a job with his totally nutcase resume and the way he’s been smeared is like Typhoid Mary going into a D.C. Georgetown ‘yuppie bar’ with her name tatooed on her forehead and trying to get laid.
Your kid can grow up to make six figures and dish shit if Gregory can.
Out of Gregory’s pithed brain and mouth:
“What does Obama have to offer as far as energy saving? McCain offers a gas tax relief package and he wantsa drill.”
Reality check: Gas tax relief wouldn’t be passed by Congress ever, and it ain’t in session soon after fucking you on FISA and if it could pass Blue Doggies and Bush’s veto which it can’t it would buy you 5 packs of Gummie Bears on sale. Boy that’ll stop the mortgage crisis and exponential numbers of foreclosures fer sure.
Far be it from reality–ole prematurely grey Gregory doesn’t want to drill below the Barbie Doll surface. Both solutions from McCain have an equally high index of moronicity and pandering to morons.
_________________________________
This is perfect for the middle of a Friday Happy Hour. It makes you want to have another double partly because you’re happy for Dr. Hatfill. He had the putziest resume for a physician I’ve seen in captivity, with some very absurd credentials that were an enigma enshrouded in a mystery. None of them added up to expertise in germ warfare or much else however the Dept. of Jussssst Uzzzzzzzz did screw him over. Good for Stephen–way to hang in their and glad you bit their ass on Mooooooo Cassseeey’s (the SDNY’s world’s biggest nebish –the mighty Mooo Casssey Kasey struck out on this one).
From the wiki folks who make pedias: (Stephen seems to take a little hike down Alice’s rabithole with the truth and his background–i.e. he doesn’t have any compelling credentials for expertise in microbiology, pathology, hematology, or germ warfare.
His resume reads and translates: Sean Puffy Combs hip hop artist, concert violinist who taught Yo Yo Ma, and after one year training neurosurgeon. It doesn’t add up to diddly, not because he trained out of the U.S., but none of his degrees or periods of study make any sense whatsoever.
At any rate, he got a job working with seriously dangerous microbes, and hey the CDC in Atlanta now has their most dangerous lab’s broken door seal covered with duct tape. Welcome to the bannana republic of America. They say they don’t need the duct tape, and their duct taped doors have failed inspection as a seal, but someone has the duct tape on the door. I’ll bet Emory University Hospital next door is sure happy with that news.
Say what? How’d he get to be that?
Any kid’s dream can apparently come true ’cause:
So even though his background is purely surreal and much of it faked, he was working with some bad boys if he worked with Ebola–we’ll give him that however the hell he got his hands on that and hey Don Rumsfield was Sec Def with questionable qualifications for that so what the hell.
1) A toast to “/shark-fu/shark bitch”–the girl do have some spunk in her rhetoric even if her message is misdirected and confused. Further the name “shark bitch” will get you a couple great man to take home before the bar closes on Friday. “Yo ahm shark bitch and maybe ah kin be your boo.”
The gov aka the Dept. of Justtttt Usssssss ain’t gonna put some things past shark bitch but her Congress doesn’t give a rat’s ass–they love lying to her face.
I wonder when shark bitch will figure out that the DOJ or Dept. of Jusssst Uzzzz fucked around with the samples of the antrhax striken postal workers who might have been saved if real physicians had tested the patients and instituted an IV quinolone stat, i.e DOJ was a co-conspirator in killing these people with whoever sent the Antrhax and 4+ stupid to boot as was the CDC’s Julie Gerberding MD who wanted to stay on the short list and gave the samples up to DOJ who fucked around with them while the patients that died deteriorated.
If the “bitch” were in power and there were real eye for an eye justice, maybe the people at DOJ who fucked with the treatment of these postal victims would have the same pathogen and the same witholding of prompt appropriate IV quinolone treatment and respiratory support. They might get the idea then to leave the treatment to doctors instead of futzing around with the samples for valuable days.
At the risk of further preoccupation with the quotidian, and kind of sure McCaffrey knows how to enlarge the font at the workstation when the principals leave the laptop on, I demur from the veleity toward mentioning the high tech bloodhounds, the only true legal beagle, as a topic previously mentioned in Hatfill’s regard. That said, however, I noticed in some of the Pakistan literature that there is commerce in bioweapons chemicls, so Hatfill may be offstage but the area of his expertise likely is of enduring interest in the intell and security agencies internationally, so his presence will remain significant, a small price to pay him, though I have yet to read the Locy information. I hope she is reprieved. One of the wierd sidelights of the appropriate other part of the article’s title I noticed was Melanie Sloan was encouraged by the hyperbole in McClellan’s recently published retrospective, evidently; I was surprised and glad to hear that gloss on the infinitely banal hearing at which McClellan appeared, though I know what some smart criminal law experts have opined regarding VPW’s case’s prospects. If she gleans aught from her complaint she will add a little more poetry to justice, and I hope it is of the IIPA variety, to tax the neocons for their profligate torque of the law and for poisoning international relations. Perhaps she can write about it after 25 years pass, though I doubt our generations will have the privilege to read of it fully. In the Leahy relevance to the FISA rewrite, I happened again upon the reminder on his senate website that his office was recipient of one anthrax letter. The whole episode seemed to originate on the reactionary side of the political number line. I mentioned previously Leahy has provided a prominent place for a dog theme artist’s works in his Senate office, Mr. Huneck. Glad to leave a morsel for McCaffrey, much deserved.
Ah have a rule.
Anytime anyone mentions bloodhouds profferring evidence in Court, I always cite this Fifth Circuit (old Eleventh Circuit before the split in a way) case
a href=”http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2008/03/25/who-let-the-dogs-out-the-hounds-of-hatfill-and-the-federal-rules-of-evidence/#comment-60401″>from “Who let the dog’s out?
U.S. v. Rozen, 600 F.2d 494 (5th Cir. 1979)
and I remind them that bloodhounds and beagles are nice doggies on the bottom rung in evolution who desperately want to evolve to being Bassets who are not only funny and cuter but have the best legal minds.
John is that you and I think it probably is with the “quintodian” unlike what I did in the ninth grade?
My dad gave me a thesaurus in the 9th grade. I began substituting the largest words I could find in my papers every few sentences. My English teacher who was probably as helpful as any I’ve had although you probably could never tell sat me down.
She laughed and said where did you get this insane bunch of words? I said “my dad gave me his old thesaurus and said to use it so I tried to put it to good use.” She laughed some more and said–don’t use it to sub for words just because you want bigger more abstruce ones.
She was right. I learned, but I enjoyed adding “quintodian” to my vocab. I’m sure I’ll get to use it someday.
Who Let The Dogs Out? The Hounds Of Hatfill and the Federal Rules of Evidence
A genuinely decent Senior Status Eleventh Circuit judge wrote this as he reversed this case and set ‘em free. Judge Godbold and his law clerk writing in one of my fave opinions:
so they never let clyde testify ???
the bastards
another poor dog disgraced by his human
a sad day for legal beagles everywhere
I don’t understand why the Dept. of Justtttt Uzzzzz couldn ‘t have resucitated Clyde though he had been dead for a good while.
Mooo Kassseeeyyy and Addington could’ve cryorevived him. And why didn’t they cryo preserve him like Ted Williams? What kind of Federal Rules of Evidence aficianados were they anyway?
PP @40, circadian is ok unless typed too quickly with typographical errors. It worked in the forensic society, but being a polyglot and etymologist helps. I think I cited circuit precedent in that thread, or simply referred to it. It depends on which judge it is, and whether they are experienced with canines. ew launched me on a research project in English law with the referenced post, as well. It seems in the US bloodhounds are the pinnacle of evidentiary admissibility, and Hatfill’s case involved some unusual hitech researchers’ dogs. I forget the specifics and am busy on something else at the moment. I appreciate the link to the prior thread about the Hatfill side. I agree with the Wilsons, that McClellan may have given them a gift.
Here’s the most cerebral version of what you’re striving for John.
Bassets rule. If you doubt what I’m saying just ask Mrs. Tbogg or Tbogg
And one important point of comparison. Bassets have experience with tracking and are world class. As to federal judges, a significant proportion of trial judges and appellatge judges not to mention Monica Goodling the twit’s appointment of Immigration judges have had not one nanosecond of litigation experience in a federal courtroom and I know an Eleventh Circuit judge who never defended a client or prosecuted anyone in any single courtroom on the planet earth–Frank Hull.
How ’bout them apples? The problem is though, seriously there are all kinds of ways to clusterfuckup and confuse a dog although they are very impressive trackers and some have great eyesight. I think the most significant legal principle about hound dogs is they are consumately lovable.
They are walking teddy bears and nearly all of them have a well developed congenital sense of humor. Some can pick your back pocket while your on a pc/mac.
I have come to always getting a kick out of your comments along with the erudition, although I have to read them 2-3 times like staring at one of those disco balls after one drink too many. It’s also stretching my limited vocabulary in a good way, I think.
I seriously hope, as do all of us that
1) The Wilsons win on appeal and they win big. I believe that these crass cowards/bastards went way beyond attacking someone’s wife with a 527 the way the ignorant 527s will go after Michelle Obama (and it will backfire against them on all cylinders). No bones about it. They went after Valerie Plame Wilson and they didn’t give a damn about her safety and the safety of her collegues and they then had the nerve to say she wasn’t covert/in danger.
2) That the right people will be marched out in handcuffs sentenced to long periods of time. I’m usually on the defense bar’s side–but no way here. I’d like to think that somehow Fitz is biding his time, quietly, dillegently and carefully gathering compelling evidence despite the email destruction and obfuscation these bastards threw at him (and you know the bastards I mean).
I can promise you I’ve seen so enough fallacies in Daubert and so-called expert testimony that if I had a nickle for every one I’d be set.
Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, 509 U.S. 579 (1993).
Daubert Tracker
http://www.daubertexpert.com
The folly of Daubert
Federal and state courts make scientific and medical decisions every day, and the disconnect between scientific and medical reality and opinions that they render is apalling beyond the pale. I’ve never had a great deal of respect for the trilogy of Daubert, Joiner, and Kumho Tire determinations of scientific reliability.
Is it loopy to speculate that the VP is responsible for the anthrax attacks? Is his reported abhorance staged? We could never have suspected he would order the outing of a covert asset or lie US into war. Was he taking early aim on implementing a state of emergency? Just wondering….
I just happened to read this today before reading EW’s thread:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.c…..ergen.html
Peter Bergen in this article was tracing where neocon thinking came from.
According to Bergen, a second strike using anthrax was in the neocon playbook of Laurie Mylorie.
Peter Bergen, Dec 2003 quotes her making this argument in a debate with her:
“There is a very acute chance as we go to war that Saddam will use biological agents as revenge against Americans, that there will be anthrax in the United States and there will be smallpox in the United States.”
VP has done criminally significant damage to this country, and much that is irreperable. But it did not send Anthrax.
CDC and DOJ were negligent in getting prompt diagnosis and treatment for the post office patients.
CDC currently has their most dangerous lab covered with ducktape. Director Julie Gerberding, M.D. has done significant damage to CDC and lost scores of some of the best and brightest.
Currently, it’s most dangerous pathogen lab door seal has not been replaced and it has been covered with duct tape about the way you would expect CDC’s lab to be secured by this government.
CDC action at germ lab questioned: Duct tape used to seal door inside Atlanta facility after possible leak of bioterror bacteria last year.
Welcome to Bannana Republic USA where far more than Congress are stupid.
I follow your argument here, and certainly know your sympathy for Valerie, but still aren’t you stretching a bit and comparing apples and oranges?
Of course it’s apples and orhanges. Plame was endagered and all this bullshit about her not being covert was simply swiftboating by one of the largest 527s the Bush administration.
Hatfill was stalked by a lazy desultory Deeeparrrtmunnnt of Jussssst Uzzzzzzz and the Federal Bumblers/Bastards of Investigation the way Richard Jewell was stalked everywhere he went in plain sight but for much longer. The imbeciles in the MSM like Kelli the Moron Arena (don’t see her fat ass anywhere do ya now and Pierre Howard–don’t see his dumbass either do ya? so there is some justice out there.
If a big event goes down and your ass is designated as “person of interest” it will interest some moron vultures from the media and your life will be destroyed.Plame and Wilson live the good affluent life in New Mexico and they are heroes except to the Delusional Right.
I might add that so far as to zero dollars, what Marcy hasn’t said is that we live in the Age of Surveillance Nation where a cowed and complicit judiciary so far dismissed her case. Some of the biggest cowards, and I disagree strongly here with Bmaz have emerged and will emerge in the D.C. district court home of Bates who is fucking us right and left, and certainly for the most part the D.C. Circuit.
Once in a while the D.C. Circuit panels get it right when it comes to enemy combattants on a much more narrow basis than the commentariat who analyzes their decisions determines–you need to go to places like Scotus Blog and the law reviews and the V Conspiracy to get honest analysis, the law prof blogs or Balkinization.
But as to privacy issues, or the government fucking people, the D.C. Circuit and the D.C. District courts are poised to uphold the fucking if I can be elegant and articulate for a moment.
Totally OT, reporting from Hong Kong.
This is a really beautiful city, especially the harbor. There is a cultural center on the Kowloon peninsula, fronted by a long walk way that extends from the Star Ferry Pier (the fun way to cross to the main island) for about half a mile. The boats ply the waters all day, the ferries nimbly escape the wakes of the incoming and outgoing boats in a sort of water dance.
The paper reports that there are 95,000 millionaires (in USD) here, and true to form, every brand name I’ve ever heard of, or seen advertised in Architectural Digest, is here: Chopard (showing a brilliant diamond and ruby necklace), Audemars Piquet (putting Rolex to shame), Chanel (which was showing a beautiful suit in an indescribable fabric), and the more common brands, Luis Vuitton, Gucci, Tudor, Tiffany, Agnes B, and all the rest.
And, EW, in my wanderings, I found the local outlet for Christian Laboutin. Among other things, they were showing patent leather pumps with 3 1/2 inch heels, and the trademark red soles. As I realize you are an athlete, I hesitate to make a joke, which I fear would fall flat, so let the brave insert their own.
lol.
masaccio, are you a Le Carré fan? I think it’s The Honorable Schoolboy that’s set mainly in Hong Kong — haunting story.
One other loose Hong Kong association: Chris Patten, who was the last British governor of the colony, is now the co-chair of the International Crisis Group, who I find interestingly … constructive, given the suspect nature of some of these patrician-led groups. I don’t follow all their reports, but they have been very good for years on, eg, Somalia. Maybe just my prejudice, but it’s always a bit of a surprise to me to see privileged people acting in truly disinterested ways.
I haven’t ever read any Le Carré, but that might be a fun read on the airplane home. I have been reading Terror and Consent by Phillip Bobbitt during the interminable flights that make up this trip, and the down time, of which there isn’t as much as I usually get on these trips.
OT to an OT, but this is Sat. a.m, after all.
Was just in Hong Kong this spring. Things I enjoyed and are not to be missed because they will soon be gone are the street markets on HK island at Wellington and Poole, each specialized in a certain product. One for dress up costumes.
Also fantastic tea stores for buying tea and the paraphnelia for the Kung Fu tea ceremony. yes, like the martial art, because it means hard.
They will make any tea you want to taste in the Kung fu method.
When you get back if interested I can send you all the links needed to do it more or less yourself.
This is the time to buy green tea, which is harvested in April and best in the first three months.
Change your mind about green tea.
Pre-Qingming Dongting Biluochun is the one you wnat.
two, one behind the other.
at 290 Queens Rd. Central, no English in Window, but they do speak it. local, untouristic and the teas are fantastic.
Up the stairs, fantastic too, but more tourist oriented, Lok Chu, 290B Queens Rd. Central.
Want more suggestions?
Got to run, ck back after 13:00 edt.
Thanks for the tips. We have only one tea drinker in the family, and on this trip, we were gifted with a large amount of Jasmine in Beijing, and we bought some Dragon Well here. Even the confirmed coffee drinker, me, was impressed with the Chrysanthemum and the Jasmine. I also liked the Pu Erh, but it didn’t go over with my spouse, and both the lichee flavored oolong and the ginseng flavored I forget what were delicious. Too bad about my caffein addiction.
masaccio–
Your travel comments are very appreciated.
Scientist Is Paid Millions by U.S. in Anthrax Suit Evildoer and Walking Axis of Evil Tony Locy Off Hook Probably; Mueller his Usual Incompetent Bumbling Moron Self
I’ve very much enjoyed the reports masaccio. The one about the visit to the schools has, in particular, stayed with me.
OT – but maybe not completely, as the Privacy Act is partly involved in this as well. NYT has a story up today touching on some of what I have been wondering about as the unchecked, unsupervised information sweeps have been taking place.
US and Europe Near Agreement on Private Data
Post-SWIFT and other incidents of US information grabs with no oversight on personal interest use, the US has been having a bit harder time getting information cooperation (thanks for making us safe that way, loyal Bushies) As the evidence and lawsuits have been mounting, the US has decided it needs to protect its corporate partners and go get some European law safe harbors for the massive turnover of fishing expedition info.
True to form, Bush is only wanting an agreement that doesn’t require any Legislation out of Congress – only his ring seal and the ceremonial kissing of his feet by European supplicants. It will be a “binding international agreement” (like the Geneva Conventions and Conventions Against Terror) and will allow US “law enforcement and security agencies to obtain private information.”
Unlike the reprehensible FISA amendment that the Democratic Congress is pushing through, the “binding” international agreement at least has the pretty rhetoric, requiring – get this – that access can only be give to “authorized individuals with an identified purpose.” Wildly vague, sure, but by contrast to what Congress is passing right now regarding freeforalls through American communications by pretty much anyone for pretty much any purpose, at least the Europeans are making a pass at using nicely concerned sounding words.
There are double pronged pressures to get the agreement done NOW rather than later. First, apparently after 2009 this kind of agreement would require that the European Parliment approve it. The EP (based on a quaint, old-fashioned concept once known as “evidence”) thinks Bush and his loyal Bushies are all egoridden liars willing to torture, kidnap, kill, destroy countries and displace millions on whims; that the Unitarian Bushies have been given something akin to divine rights by deity-needy Americans, such that the only consequence for any of their actions is that another ‘furrin’ virgin gets tossed in another volcano after each revelation. IOW, the EP mays not go for “trust me, I’ve made sure the other attacks happened in Europe, not America” Bush.
Second, (the thing I’d have been more than mulling over if I was telecom or google or banking or credit card co etc. counsel) “businesses that operate on both sides of the Atlantic are pushing to make sure they are not caught between conflicting legal obligations.” This is exactly what happened to the SWIFT group, with the US telling them that we could “legally” snarf all the info to sift through it for “suspicious” activity while European law required this odd concept of judicial warrants specifically describing what can be seized and from/about whom.
Not to worry, as that is ready to quickly become a thing of the past. Although Europeans (unlike the Democratic Congress with its approval of massive scoop and store and access for anything legislation) reportedly want to have something called “safeguards” on how the information will be used, this has been worked out. In Europe, those safeguards would meant that, among other things, independent (not staffed by loyal Bushies) agencies that police the police and provide oversight on how data is used and assist people with concerns about their data would continue to hold sway.
In a true Monty Python moment, the Europeans have agreed to replace this approach in the US with allowing the Executive Unitarians to provide safeguards by pinkyswearing they will have “internal oversight.” Apparently the selling points on the European acceptance of US internal oversight have included: untold thousands and thousands of misused NSL with no accounting, accountability, punishments or fixes and DNI McConnell admitting to having unchecked telecom felonies over the better part of decade that would lead to staggering penalites if anyone ever did exercise oversight and an agreement by the Democrats in Congress to just not look; and under oath, on the record and in memos statements of the loyal Bushies at the very head of DOJ saying that, “if the President says do it, it’s legal.” He may only be Mr. Decider in the US, but in Europe they will call him Lord Oversighter. I think his coat of arms will have a man in a corner, staring fixedly at his own bellybutton.
What is left is a “sticking point” over the right of Europeans to sue for misuse of their information. Apparently they have failed to take their cue from our Democratic Congress which has cheerfully taken this right away from US citizens in at least one setting. And even declared it a “victory”
As Dept Homeland Security employe Baker notes: ““Globalization means that more and more companies are going to get caught between U.S. and European law.” And the Democratic Congress has shown us how you fix that. You just get rid of law.
Considering the secrecy cloaking government-acquired personal data and the means and methods of gathering it, what’s the most likely risk scenario to companies? That individuals claiming to have been harmed will deduce that information used in the harming could only have originated with a certain company or certain companies and petition, perhaps successfully, that the company or companies be subject to criminal or civil accountable?
Not needing multiple, complicated privacy policy statements might be one desirable result for the concerned companies, I suppose.
“accountability” should replace “accountable” at the end of the first paragraph.
One thing you did not say, Mary is that this new grab for any and all information if someone flies into US or out of it from Europe will begin to pinch the rich and more franchised citizenry of kingdoms of the US and Europe. This will include travelers who can travel with the rise of the Euro against the dollar in the Bush toilet, and business travelers employed by corporations.
Their will also be increased opportunities for blackmail as the corporate masters can pay the governments for information like they pay for anything else, and will be able to weild the messy, dirty sexy personal lives of the travelers as clubs including information about their liasons and off shore money transfers.
That is what Valerie Plame Wilson gets for putting her ass on the line for her country. A big kick in the ass by the Bush thugs. Inspiring message.
As Joe Wilson has said “it was a hit job”
ACCOUNTABILITY NOW
I would point out that while Valerie Wilson has been screwed by her country that has been screwed and hijacked by an administration., she still has a handsome pension coming in every month and so does her husband.
Dr. Hatfill despite his bizarre, and highly inflated and questionable quality mosaic of a background so that no rational MD could tell what the hell training he really had did work with dangerous microbes like Ebola and Q fever in a DOD lab and in that sense he too, put his life on the line and no one gave a rat’s ass about him except that the liberal blogosphere found him a curiosity and got all jazzed up about one of the more extremely ridiculous unscientific bents in a federal court system where the lawyers and judges aren’t trained at all in science and it shows and we have the spectacle of Daubert hearings and it shows.
During a Daubert hearing a judge whose level and extent medical and scientific sophistication is exhibited when the judge pees and at no other time, some federal judge who may not have ever even litigated as an attorney in a federal courtroom before taking the bench presumes to make all sorts of decisions as to Phase 4 drug impact with no pharacological or clinical medical background, whether a heart valve or a stent is harming thousands of people, etc.
It is an absurdly bizarre and stupid system, and physicians are also to blame for letting the legal community take over decisions that should be made by highly trained medical personnel period.
When these judges need a bypass or a lens implant, or a breast operation, I sure as hell don’t see them standing in a mirror treating themselves and when a husband or wife of one of these judges takes a fatal overdose of Tylenol, I sure as hell haven’t seen them trying to figure out the Domes Nomogram to save their spouses life. That I know.
Daubert is so flawed you might as well have Ashleigh the lapdancing fortune teller making the determinations
Thanks
http://www.truthout.org/articl…..-all-along
It was oil all along.
Bill Moyers
PetePierce, well, agreed, there was a wrong in each case.
In the Plame case there was ”politics as usual” and once Joe Wilson went the Times Op Ed route, it was open season for ducks, lawyers, and agents and whatever, and no one pays in politics except at the ballot box perhaps.
In the Hatfield case and in a like case with the security guard at the Atlanta Olympics bombing it was shoddy malicious police/FBI work and in each case for Hatfield and the Security Guard there was direct recourse to the courts, and Hatfield and the Guard were paid big bucks though they probably still don’t think it was worth it.
There is one common thread in all three of those incidents, and that is our precious ”media.” They carried the dirt in each incident, and yet there seems to be the sentiment to shield the dirty little telltales from the responsibility of their deeds.
What excites all of us here and at FDL about Plame is it’s such a metaphor for how this administration has operated for eight years in so many of the circumstances that have been chronicled on these blogs and that the door is open to nail some of the players who are a common denominator for so much of the arrogance that has destroyed individua rights and made a shambles of this government.
OT-from Agonist
Seymour Hersh is said to have a piece out this weekend about U.S. clandestine operations in Iran.
Wrong timing. It would have been–and likely was–AGJA.
I have worked in a field for years that has an exponential number of acronyms and abbreviations–thousands of them actually so I guess I can’t complain. And 80%-85% of the abbreviations you use I either know or can find out by the context.
I’m going to guess though that the wrong timing isn’t part of the Arizona Gymnast Judges Association although bmaz is around here a lot. It’s not the America Junior Golf Classic either. So whatever it is the AG may be Attorney General and Judge Advocate? Naw. That would make no sense. I give up.
Attorney General John Ashcroft. Remember him? Let the eagle soar?
Thanks. I’ve seen it used a lot and I was the opposite of Swift. It’s always amazed me how the top people at DOJ can break laws so flagrently and remain teflon. They go after smaller fish like the Schloz aka Bradley Schlozman but AGJA has made millions of dollars administering DFA’s lately pitched to him by another crook (I’m not tossing these terms around either) Christopher Christie the very politicized USA in New Jersey who has launched a lot of prosecutions targeting Democratic politicians.
Ashcroft Defends Contract That U.S. Steered to Him
For appearances sake alone, none of this business should have been pitched to Ashcroft and his firm.
flaglantry and theirs for theres–may never get these correct.
Thanks. I needed help with that acronym myself.
Bob in HI
Excellent extended article in the LA Times on the Hatfill boondoggle:
The government may have gotten out of this cheap at 5.8 million. I will bet dollars to donuts that somewhere tucked in all this was an attempt to plant evidence or to extort others to implicate Hatfill falsely and Connely was getting close to getting it firmed up enough to really hammer them.
This is a good article. Omitted is the roll Kelli Arena then at CNN, now in obscurity and rarely on played in facilitating not only leaks but false suppositions on Hatfill not supported by evidence and fact. Kelli Arena was probably right in the center of those chopper groupies headed to Hatfill’s place before the FBI made their search.
She is purportedly the “Supreme Court reporter” for CNN lol–are standards high or what? Kelli Arena on the standard of review–I don’t think so. Kelli Arena on the implications of Boumediene or the connections of Heller probably not.
The article neglected to drill what happened to delay the treatment of the postal workers. FBI and DOJ delayed the testing and treatment by trying to hog samples. There was a delay of several days at the Express Mail handling facility near Baltimore-Washington International Airport days after it remained closed.
Workers have not been tested at every facility the letters passed through up to this second, i.e. tesing wasn’t done on all people who could have been fatally killed by Antrax.
After those episodes, in several of the largest cities in the US Cipro which is in a group of antibiotics, the Quinolones that notoriously elicit resistance and lose efficacy rapidly, was bought out of every pharmacy both large and small and many people asked physicians to “prophylactically Rx for them” which would have done nothing but helped promote resistance (we do that pretty well anyway with many antibiotics). The culprits who bought up the vast majority of Cipro in one city–physicians.
It’s interesting to me that in some large states where an anthrax vaccine program has been offered to “key medical personnel” that only a handful of docs and nurses, etc. were willing to take vaccine because of a mistaken perception of the severity and the frequency of side effects.
We also have states ridiculously purchasing Tamiflu because they believe falsely that Tamiflu would have a significant impact on a rapidly mutating H5N1 virus (it wouldn’t except to increase resistance to treatment and this has been reported in many of the most reputable medical journals repeatedly like NEJM, JAMA, Annals of Internal Med, and the ID lit.
Mueller’s conduct and lack of responsibility both in the leak investigations and the choices he made in investigating the anthrax mailings continuing to waste extraordinary resources focusing on Hatfill make him my candidate for the worst FBI director in the US not to mention the abuse of
the security act and National Security Letters
I should have added that from the NYT article reporting the award on Friday, Hatfill’s suit against NYT reporter Nicholas G. Kristoff was dismissed by the District Court, and is now on appeal.
Tony Locy who reported fiction in USA today and is still held in contempt facing fines for refusing to reval her sources (no doubt FBI and DOJ leakers) is proud of protecting her sources of fiction and her fictional reporting where she was too lazy to find any facts or evidence to substantiate her claims basically being used as a tool for the FBI, and is now going to teach this kind of bullshit to Washington and Lee journalism classes in Lexington, Virginia.
Somewhere in a journalism school or newspaper museum there should be an exhibit of charlatans and liars with Arena, and Locy, Judy Miller and now Eric Lichtblau given wax statues prominently displayed.