Entries by emptywheel

Warrantless Wiretapping and the IG Loophole

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I’m working on a massive post on how the Administration has gamed the system to sustain their wireless wiretapping program. For the moment, though, I’d like to make a discrete point about the aborted Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) inevstigation into the program.

When Senator Spector asked Alberto Gonzales last year why BushCo refused to give OPR the clearance to investigate the wireless wiretapping program because OPR included many career employees,

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What Happened to the FISC Appeal?

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Both the WaPo and the NYT have stories today explaining how the crisis in the warrantless wiretap program got so bad that Congress got punked into passing a shitty bill. The story is simple, on its face. The FISC rejected a government subpoena in March, another in May, and those two rulings resulted in the government losing the ability to wiretap a great deal of foreign communication.

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Two Rulings?

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No wonder BushCo wanted oversight of FISA totally out of the hands of the FISC. If I’m reading this WaPo article correctly, there were actually two rulings that went against the Administration–one in March, and one in May.

But in a secret ruling in March, a judge on a special court empoweredto review the government’s electronic snooping challenged for the firsttime the government’s ability to collect data from such wires even whenthey

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None of the Above

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Here’s the way I figure this math, from the Iowa Straw Poll.

They had 24,000 voters in 1999.
They wanted 20,000 voters today.
They got 14,000.

That says, presumably, the Iowa Republican Party wrote off 4,000 votes because Giuliani and McCain pulled out and Thompson’s not in yet (24,000 minues 20,000).

But that still leaves 6,000 people (20,000 minus 14,000) they expected–and didn’t get.

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A Reverse F.U.

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You know how Thomas Friedman’s six months always seem to end up being indefinite forevers? Well, the reverse seems to be going on with Republican accusations that:

For months, congressional Democrats ignored warnings from Director ofNational Intelligence Michael McConnell that FISA’s antiquatedprovisions were tying the hands of U.S. intelligence agencies fromcollecting against terrorist communications.

In fact, it appears that Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell actually sat on the information for months, from

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Hoekstra’s Leaks/Cheney’s Leaks

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Steven Benen writes most of the post I was going to write (thanks Steve!) in response to the news that Pete Hoekstra is a big fat hypocrite about intelligence leaks. Steve links to Justin Rood’s coverage of Hoekstra leaking details about the supposedly secret intelligence budget; RawStory first noticed Hoekstra’s leak.

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Photographs

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If you haven’t already, go read Jane Mayer’s article on our methods of torture. The short version: we’re using psychological methods to impose “learned helplessness” and dependency, and as a result, we’re getting some intelligence, a whole lot of garbage, and we’re turning our own interrogators into moral zombies.

I wanted to focus on one aspect of the calculated humiliation she describes:

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Well, Of Course

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Holden asks:

They’re just thinking of this now?

U.S.military intelligence officials are urgently assessing how securePakistan’s nuclear weapons would be in the event President Gen. PervezMusharraf were replaced as the nation’s leader, CNN has learned.

Key questions in the assessment include who would control Pakistan’s nuclear weapons after a shift in power.

[snip]

The United States has full knowledge about the location of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, according to the U.S.

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Republican Self-Hate

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Crooks & Liars links to Bobo Brooks informing Chris Matthews that Republicans hate Matthews’ man-crush, President Bush.

BROOKS: Bush…you gotta remember though…a lot ofRepublicans hate Bush. I mean, we look..we talk about the Democrats,how they hate Bush, in private…

MATTHEWS: What do you mean, “hate Bush?”

BROOKS: They think Bush is incompetent and destroying their party.

Having just taped a Sunday show of my own (this one may be good–I’ll actually provide a link, but

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This Is What Nancy Should Have Done on FISA

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Josh marvels at the (big surprise) latest galling corruption from a member of the Alaska delegation: Don Young snuck an earmark into a 2005 bill after it had been passed by both houses of Congress, but before Bush signed it.

The ‘Coconut Road’ earmark wasn’t in the bill passed by the Houseand Senate.

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