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.
The Senate just lost its most principled member, Russ Feingold. Consider it a beacon of our money- and fearmonger- drenched politics. Feingold was the perfect politician for America as our founders envisioned it. But a terrible politician when seats go to the highest (foreign) bidder or those screaming the loudest about heebie jeebies. But as […]
At this point of the evening, let me remind you that Tim Kaine, former Governor of Virginia, is the DNC Chair presiding over this debacle tonight. Sure, sure, it’s a wave election. Presidential parties always lose in the first midterm. But Virginia: Bob McDonnell wins Ken Cuccinelli wins Tom Periello loses Glenn Nye loses Rick […]
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had already suspended all their work with David Stern. But now they’ve officially severed all relations with him and Freddie has taken their files away. Freddie Mac took the rare step of removing loan files after an internal review raised “concerns about some of the practices at the Stern firm,” […]
You may remember how, in 2008, MI’s Republicans planned to conduct voter caging at the polls based on foreclosure lists (Democrats went to court to stop this). It appears the Republicans–this time in Kansas–are trying similar cynical efforts to capitalize on the housing crisis with robocalls telling voters they must own a home to vote. […]
In a curious story yesterday, the NYT quotes freed Iranian captive Sarah Shourd explaining that when she and two other hikers were captured in July 2009, they were inside Iran. Ms. Shourd, 32, said she wanted to correct the gathering false impression, fueled by a classified United States military report made public last week by […]
I’m going to have a few follow-up posts about Steven Rattner’s Overhaul generally and Saturday’s book salon on it. But for the moment, I wanted to add something to two excellent reviews of it by Malcom Gladwell and Felix Salmon. Together, they both distinguish between the product GM makes and the debt it had. Here’s […]
Fresh off exempting Yemen from any sanctions for its use of child soldiers and partly in response to this week’s attempted package bombings, the government appears to be ready to let the CIA start operating drones in Yemen. Allowing the U.S. military’s Special Operations Command units to operate under the CIA would give the U.S. […]
I wanted to return to a detail I mentioned in yesterday’s book salon. As I noted, in his book on the auto bailout, Steven Rattner described Citi as being worried during the Chrysler negotiations that retail customers would retaliate if Citi played hard ball. Bankers for Goldman and Citi had advised [JP Morgan Chase VP […]
I come to Steven Rattner’s Overhaul: An Insider’s Account of the Obama Administration’s Emergency Rescue of the Auto Industry from a very particular perspective. As a Michigander whose husband still works in the auto industry and whose town has benefited from battery subsidies, I’m a grateful direct beneficiary of the work the Obama Administration did […]
Apparently, football started early this week, with San Francisco’s team beating the Texas team one TD, a conversion, and a field goal to a TD on Wednesday, and shutting them out last night with three field goals. I understand the quarterbacks in these games have been a big part of the story, with the QBs […]