Entries by emptywheel

Spying on Your Friends and Enemies

Laura’s right. Jeff Stein’s article detailing the several ways in which Senator Richard Shelby spied on Anthony Lake and similar activities raises all sorts of questions.

Tenet also wrote that, “National Security Agency officials told usthat Shelby staffers had been asking whether there was derogatoryinformation in their communications intercepts on Lake.”

But the NSA refused Shelby’s entreaties, two sources said, and there was no derogatory information in the FBI’s files.

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Is This Just a Reference to Libby’s Harrassment?

A lot of folks have noted Tweety’s latest chirping.

Chris Matthews had barely finished praising hiscolleagues at the 10th anniversary party for his “Hardball” showThursday night in Washington, D.C. when his remarks turned politicaland pointed, even suggesting that the Bush administration had “finallybeen caught in their criminality.”

In front of an audience that included such notables as Alan Greenspan, Rep.

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The Legislative Branch Shows Signs of Life

When I was at the Duke conference last week, I premised a question to ACLU’s Legal Director that ACLU was having more success in the courts than in Congress of late. He responded by joking about my faint praise. Perhaps I reverse jinxed him. Because we’re beginning to make some progress in Congress.

Rep.

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Wherein emptywheel Disagrees with PatFitz

As some of you might remember way back, I first got sucked into the Plame investigation when Judy Miller was heading to jail. I found her appeal to a non-existent reporter’s privilege a farce, given that her relationship with the Bush Administration had long dropped any pretense of journalism.

So it may surprise you that I think Patrick Fitzgerald uses the wrong approach in his editorial lobbying against the shield law

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Cathie Martin’s Working Media on One Side

And her FCC Chair hubby, Kevin Martin, is working media on the other side. The LAT reports (h/t Sirota) that the FCC is leaking information on key votes to big stakeholders. Since there’s a restriction on lobbying in the week before a vote, this has the effect of making it impossible for those representing citizens to lobby in a timely fashion.

People are allowed to submit comments and meet with FCC commissionersand

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Oh, THAT’S Who We Get to Kick Around

Larry Craig, that’s who.

Shortly after a state judge denied his request to withdraw the Augustplea admitting to disorderly conduct, Mr. Craig said he had reversedhis previously announced decision to leave the Senate if he could notget the plea thrown out and would instead serve out his third term,which expires at the end of 2008.

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Waterboarding Is Fair Game

I’m pooped so will have to return to this article. It explains how, after DOJ under Jack Goldsmith threw out John Yoo’s torture policies, Steven Bradbury came in and replaced them with still worse opinions.

When the Justice Department publicly declared torture “abhorrent” ina legal opinion in December 2004, the Bush administration appeared tohave abandoned its assertion of nearly unlimited presidential authorityto order brutal interrogations.

But soon after Alberto R.

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Who Do We Have to Kick Around Anymore?

We already lost Abu Gonzales, Karl Rove, Monica Goodling, Kyle Sampson, Brad Schlozman, and Michael Elston. And now we’re losing Pete Domenici.

Veteran Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) is expected to announce tomorrowthat he will retire from the Senate in 2008, according to severalinformed sources, a decision that further complicates an alreadydifficult playing field for Republicans next November.

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About Those Emails? The Contractor Did It

I guess if you make sure your contractors can’t reveal what they’ve done in your name, it becomes harder for others to discover what it is that you, personally, have done. But not impossible. The IT companies for the White House are denying that their the company that missed 5 million missing emails in their daily audits.

When Congress asked about 5 million executive branch e-mails that wentmissing, a White House lawyer

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A Game of Telephone

So AT&T says they’ll cut off your broadband if you say anything mean about them. But they say they don’t really mean that.

However, an AT&T spokesperson tells Ars Technica that thecompany has no interest in engaging in censorship but stopped short ofsaying that AT&T could not in fact exercise its ability to do so.

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