Entries by emptywheel

Sometimes You Eat The Bear, Sometimes The Bear Eats You – Stearns Thoughts

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What was the the Bear Stearns takeover/bailout about anyway? Who really benefitted in the present? What does it portend for the future? I don’t have these answers; but I have a lot of questions and the ground seems to be morphing so fast on this that not only are we not getting answers, the real questions are getting left behind in the wake. To paraphrase Wilson Pickett, we need to “slow this mustang down” and think about what has occurred and where it will lead us for the future.

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Crewsing For A Bruising: The NSA Responds To EOP

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Three days ago, Saturday March 22, we discussed the hard driving charge being mounted in DC District Court by the National Security Archive and CREW in relation to the destroyed missing White House emails. In that post, we dissected the Administration’s pleading and support documents. Today, we do the same in relation to the reply pleading and supporting affidavit just filed by NSA/CREW.

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What To Get Teh Woman Who Knows Everything

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I am here to tell you, keeping this here car known as the Emptywheel blog well maintained, full of fuel and on the road is more work than it looks like. Marcy not only does that consistently day in and day out, she does it with a style, grace, competence and consistency that is unmatched in the blogosphere. The effort she leads here is not only informational and enjoyable reading, it is of demonstrated importance in the effort to expose and repair all of that which is currently broken in our government. So, if you have a couple of extra Euros, please contribute to keeping this the finest forum in the toobz.

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Who Let The Dogs Out? The Hounds Of Hatfill and the Federal Rules of Evidence

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Okay, earlier I made a mostly flippant comment on the dogs in the Hatfill case. Despite it being mostly in jest, that comment had what I consider to be a critical, if not the critical, point in it. From what it appears, the only bit of “evidence” (and I use that descriptor loosely here, and in the generic sense, because I don’t think there was any proper evidence at all) against Hatfill that served as the basis for identifying him was that the dogs had alerted. How well does the dog scent evidence hold up to scrutiny? Not so well it turns out.

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Feith Based Initiative At The Pentgon

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The latest breaking news out of the Pentagon is that the US mistakenly shipped ICBM warhead nuclear triggering mechanisms to Taiwan in stead of the helicopter batteries that Taiwan ordered. When our government can’t even keep track of our nukes and warhead triggers, Grover Norquist can pretty much pull the drain plug; the job of eviscerating the United States Government “down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub” is about complete.

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Hard Drives To Hell

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Hard drives? Emails? We don’t need no stinkin hard drives and email”! And that is pretty much what the Bush Administration has told Judge John Facciola and the DC District Court, not to mention you, me and the rest of the citizens the government is supposed to work for.

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March Madness – Bracketology and Other Chides of March Trash Talk

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Spring is in the air! And, thanks to the Bush EPA, a whole bunch of toxic substances are in the air with it. But, for the moment, lets leave the real work aside and get our swerve on again with the trash talk. There is a lot of ground to cover with March Madness in full swing, MLB opening day a heartbeat away, the stretch run in the NBA at hand and, my own pet favorite, the start of the Formula One Grand Prix season. So put the beer on ice, fire up the grill and, for godsakes, put a hat on! Play Ball!

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WiFi Turkey

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As I’ve mentioned a couple of times, I’m about to go to Kentucky for a week–and will have no WiFi (get it–WiFi Turkey?). Long time readers know that every time I go off-grid, something crazy happens–the last time, Alberto Gonzales resigned.

My predictions are one or more of the following will happen:At 1:20 today, a letter from Henry Waxman to Condi Rice, inquiring what State is going to do about three people

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The Breach: McCain Dates, Not Obama Dates?

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As you’ve no doubt heard, three second-rate burglars have been caught accessing Obama’s passport files. The WaPo reports the tree days when his files were accessed:

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the employees had individually looked into Obama’s passport file on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14. To access such a file, the employees must first acknowledge a pledge to keep the information private.

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