Author Archive for: emptywheel
About emptywheel
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.
Entries by emptywheel
The Blind Leading the Blind
/14 Comments/in automobiles, Press and Media/by emptywheelThe WaPo is scouring the business world looking for the perfect talent to lead the failing company. Today, they announced they’ve hired the guy who drovem GM into the ditch to its board. Rick Wagoner, who was fired as chief executive of General Motors by the White House, has been elected to The Washington Post […]
David Boies: Prop 8 Trial Establishes as “Matter of Fact” that Marriage Equality Doesn’t Hurt Straight Marriage
/19 Comments/in prop 8/by emptywheelThe lawyers for the plaintiffs in Perry v. Schwarzenegger trial had a conference call to preview what they will say in next week’s closing arguments (which Teddy, bmaz, and I will cover from the courthouse). The most interesting response from the legal team came in response to questions about the defendants’ complaints about having a […]
Chamber of Commerce Flip-Flops on Retroactive Legislation
/6 Comments/in Energy Policy, Environment, FISA/by emptywheelAs you’ve likely heard, the Chamber of Commerce has officially endorsed government welfare to limit corporate risk. (Again.) The head of the United States Chamber of Commerce said Friday that his group is not yet lobbying against legislative efforts to raise BP’s liability cap, viewing the issue as not yet “ripe.” He signaled, however, that […]
The Value of Advice and Consent: Clapper Nomination
/38 Comments/in Intelligence/by emptywheelI’m going to have more to say about James Clapper’s nomination to be Director of National Intelligence. But for now I want to point out similarities between how the Administration’s treated that nomination and its involvement in primaries. Two things make James Clapper’s nomination anything but a done deal. Most important to us little people […]
Prediction: Media Will Be Angrier About AT&T Breach than Illegal Wiretapping
/56 Comments/in FISA/by emptywheelAnyone want to bet that Rahm Emanuel will be more incensed that AT&T made his Gmail address vulnerable than about the illegal wiretapping the telecom did for Dick Cheney? Apple has suffered another embarrassment. A security breach has exposed iPad owners including dozens of CEOs, military officials, and top politicians. They—and every other buyer of […]
The US Prison Colony
/17 Comments/in emptywheel/by emptywheelI’m not in the least surprised by the LAT report that Obama is trying to come up with a compromise plan that would allow it to use Bagram as its terrorist prison even after it hands over the prison to the Afghans. The Obama administration wants to retain the ability to hold terrorism suspects from […]
Congress Thinks BP Commission Needs Subpoena Power, Too
/61 Comments/in emptywheel/by emptywheelA bunch of hippie members of Congress noticed the same thing about Obama’s BP Commission that I noticed: it lacks subpoena power. So Lois Capps and Ed Markey in the House and Jeanne Shaheen and several of her colleagues are pushing legislation to give the Commission subpoena power. U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), along with […]
Bhopal Justice, Sort Of
/42 Comments/in Energy Policy, Environment/by emptywheelTwenty-some years after one of the biggest industrial disasters in history, seven former Union Carbide executives have been sentenced to a few years in jail. A court in central India ruled Monday that seven top executives and the company they worked for are guilty for their role in the 1984 industrial disaster that killed thousands […]
BP Well Bore And Casing Integrity May Be Blown, Says Florida’s Sen. Nelson
/308 Comments/in Energy Policy, Environment, Law, Obama Administration/by emptywheelSenator Bill Nelson indicates the most horrific possible outcome is at hand in the BP Gulf Oil Spill, namely that basic well integrity is truly shot and oil and gas have breached the well casing and well bore and are escaping into the rock and out into the ocean through the sea floor.