Marcy Wheeler is an independent journalist writing about national security and civil liberties. She writes as emptywheel at her eponymous blog, publishes at outlets including Vice, Motherboard, the Nation, the Atlantic, Al Jazeera, and appears frequently on television and radio. She is the author of Anatomy of Deceit, a primer on the CIA leak investigation, and liveblogged the Scooter Libby trial.
Marcy has a PhD from the University of Michigan, where she researched the “feuilleton,” a short conversational newspaper form that has proven important in times of heightened censorship. Before and after her time in academics, Marcy provided documentation consulting for corporations in the auto, tech, and energy industries. She lives with her spouse in Grand Rapids, MI.
In my rush to leave town on Thursday, I missed this letter Pat Leahy sent to Brad Schlozman about his missing homework:
Dear Mr. Schlozman:
According to news reports, you have confirmed that you resigned last week from the Department of Justice. Yet, the Judiciary Committee is still waiting for your responses to written questions from Committee Members following your June 5 testimony at the Committee’s hearing on “Preserving Prosecutorial Independence:
Say, has anyone noticed how omnipresent Ari Fleischer has been, of late? Obviously, the big news is his pimping for a $15 million propaganda campaign in favor of death and destruction.
“For those who believe in peace through strength, the cavalry iscoming,” said former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, who isa founding board member of the group.
But Ari is also, all of a sudden, a seemingly acceptable source of the
Remember how federal prosecutors were denied the ability to review Brent Wilkes’ affidavit showing he was indigent? Well, ChrisC sent along news of a civil magistrate case in which one of Wilkes’ creditors appears to be trying to force Wilkes to reveal where his assets are–also to no avail.
The unopposed motion to compel filed by plaintiff De Lage Landen Financial Services, Inc., as
assignee of Union Bank, is denied, without prejudice.
Before we crown Michael Chertoff Attorney General, I recommend we pull him before some oversight committee and ask him if he ever used Department of Homeland Security’s Privacy Office to review planned domestic surveillance activities before they’re used to collect data on American citizens. CSM reports that DHS is suspending a massive data-mining program because it has already started using live data without ever putting the program through a privacy review.
Just some random thoughts on AGAG’s resignation.
AGAG and Kim
There have been a number of people connecting Gonzales’ resignation with Rove’s (Cenk Uygur’s take and Sidney Blumenthal’s). I am much much more interested in the timing of DOJ Civil Rights Division head Wan Kim’s resignation. Here’s the chronology:
The week of August 13:
If you compare Bush’s comments on Rove’s resignation with his comments on Gonzales’ resignation, it sure seems like Rove left on Bush’s terms, whereas Gonzales left on his own terms. Here’s how Bush announced the departure of the man who had made his entire political career.
Karl Rove is moving on down the road.
Mr. emptywheel and I are headed to DC so McCaffrey the MilleniaLab can attend a very important Furrin’ Policy Summit with Kobe, Katy, and Lucy (oh, and so we can go to a wedding or some such rot). The emptywheel pack is going to play around in the mud together for a couple of days on the way back.
Via TPMM, the Director of DOJ’s Civil Rights Division has resigned.
Wan J. Kim, Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’sCivil Rights Division, today announced his resignation, effective atthe end of this month. President Bush nominated Mr. Kim to the positionon June 16, 2005, and the Senate unanimously confirmed his appointmenton November 4, 2005.
In this post, I compare what Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell revealed yesterday about why Democratic bills amending FISA were unacceptable with the content of those bills. The comparison shows that DNI McConnell found it unacceptable to require the government to:List what the minimization procedures were that protect data collected from Americans
Allow either a FISA judge or Congress to review its compliance with its own minimization procedures
In short, the