It has taken me a while. But I’ve finally gotten through the DOJ IG Report on exigent letters. Page numbers below will be to the PDF page.

Page 14: Footnote 1 notes there are Secret and TS/SCI versions of this report. Keep that in mind as you read the redactions–while it’s probably safe to assume that Feingold and Wyden (who are both on SSCI) have seen the entire report, it’s not clear who else will have seen the entire report.

Page 14: I hadn’t really noticed it before, but the time frame on the first IG Report’s investigation of exigent letters ended on December 16, 2005–the day that Eric Lichtblau and James Risen exposed the illegal wiretap program. That suggests that the use of exigent letters, among other things, may have changed on that date in response to the discovery of the program. Also note that in Fine’s first report on NSLs, he decided to lump 2005 in which the time frame–2002 to 2004–required by statute. This is parallel to what he did with Section 215, suggesting that there were significant changes in 2006 after disclosure of the overall program.

Page 18: Note that the IG Report doesn’t say when the Public Integrity Section declined to prosecute these abuses. I do hope Fine gets asked that question.

Page 24: Notes that most exigent letters issues from April 2003 to March 2006. That latter date suggests they implemented a fix with the PATRIOT revision passed that month.

Page 28: Note the organization of the Communication Exploitation Section (CXS):

• Document Exploitation (which became Digital Media Exploitation on March 26, 2006
• Communication Analysis Unit (the section that issued the exigent letters, and therefore working on communities of interest)
• Electronic Communication Analysis Unit (how does this differ from CAU???) (ECAU)
• Electronic Surveillance Operations and Sharing Unit (EOPS)

Does this suggest the EOPS collected this stuff and the others did network analysis on it?

Page 29: Note the final date for the exigent letter range here is November 13, 2006, which is different from the December 16, 2005 used elsewhere

Page 34: Note how Company A (AT&T per EFF’s math) does something (maybe “analyze” toll records) that the other two providers don’t do (per footnote 26).This is almost certainly the community of interest analysis. This may sugges that by default mean they were working with massive data collection, since it would mean they had access to the signals of their competitors?

There also must be internet analysis in here (which presumably might be the ECAU), which itself would seem to require telecom assistance. So I wonder whether that fully-redacted paragraph describes a contract that does both phone and internet analysis?

Page 35: Does the redaction showing the size of the contract midway down the page appear to be 10 digits? Suggesting the contract would be in the single million range? (That making the digits something like this: $X,XXX,XXX) Though the amount for Company B seems to consist of words, not just numbers.

Page 36: The language about whether companies were able to provide subscriber data or not closely resembles language surrounding Section 215, which was used during some of this time period to get subscriber data (though possibly in larger batches). And note the redacted second half of the first full paragraph on this page says that they were also doing something in addition to giving meta data and subscriber data. And footnote 28, saying that Company A would only provide subscriber data, suggests that that company (AT&T?) was demanding more than one of the others was, legally.

Page 37: The IG report notes, but does not say explicitly, that the computers at CAU networked into service providers were not segregated from FBI employee space. Are they suggesting FBI employees may have accessed the computers directly?

Page 38: Note the redaction of others that service provider employees communicated to–NSA? OGA?

Page 52: Asst Section Chief CXS 2003-2004, John Chaddic: The practice of exigent letters “seemed consistent with at least one classified FBI program ongoing at the time.”

Page 56: Note the reference to numbers coming in from somewhere. Remember the description Lichtblau and Risen used of the program–saying it started in earnest after they got AZ’s laptop. The grammar of this passage is consistent with the exploitation of numbers they get off of hardware collected in the field.

Page 62: In a description of a “sneak peek” the report does not redact Oregon, but does redact another location. Why are they hiding just one location? Also note that Oregon is the location of (among other things) al Haramain and Brandon Mayfield.

Page 64: Company A (presumably AT&T) was providing 9 different kinds of records to the FBI.

Page 65: Note the reference to FBI data bases, in addition to some other kind of database used for analysis of calls.

Pate 68: The section on community of interest reports is the first significantly redacted section in the report. It’s the part that shows where six degrees of separation from OBL was used to do further investigations.

Page 69: Number of Community of interest reports: 50 exigent letters, 250 NSLs, 350 grand jury subpoenas, with boilerplate attached to requests later on.

Page 72: Per one of the analysts doing the community of interest work, they did not segregate the information out–which means there are still people whose contacts have been collected against whom there was no probable cause.

The CAU Intelligence Analyst responsible for the team that uploaded toll billing records into the [redacted] database told us that when the responsive data was delivered to his team for uploading, the team could not distinguish [full line redacted] numbers provided by Company A in response to community of interest requests. He said he would only be able to identify the records derived from the community of interest requests by analyzing the information accompanying the original request and other background information. This CAU Intelligence Analyst told us that no one in the FBI had every asked him to segregate records obtained in response to community of interest [redacted] requests or asked any questions about the pracitce.

Page 73: The report goes on to admit that if there was not reason to connect these numbers with an authorized investigation, they violated ECPA.

Page 74: Some details about COI volume.

One Company A analyst estimated that he may have used the community of interest [redacted] for up to 25 percent of the [redacted] he [redacted]. Company A records show that from 2004 to 2007, Company A analysts used its community of interest [redacted] to review records in its database for 10,070 [redacted] telephone numbers. We believe that most of these numbers were [redacted] by Company A analysts without community of interest requests from the FBI but did not generate records that were provided to the FBI. A Company A attorney told us, based on information provided to him, that the majority of the community of interest [redacted] by the on-site Compnay A analysts did not result in disclosure of any data to the FBI.

Page 86: The details of the August 28, 2007 request to OLC. (Note this was filed not long after PAA was approved).

Page 88: In discussion of communities of interest, it appears that Company A was both providing information in response to requests, and performing some kind of service which might include communities of interest.

As noted above, we believe that most of Company A’s community of interest [redacted] without requests from the FBI as part of Company A’s [redacted] service, and records were not provided to the FBI.

Page 115: The IG Report makes it clear that FBI did not tell the reporters all details about the collection of their calls (presumably, that it came through onsite collaboration with the telecoms).

Page 130: In the description of the third attempt to get a reporter’s call data suggests that the process was driven by the Company A (AT&T) employee. The Company A employee actually looked at the content of the reporters’ calls, and after he found there were no calls in question (effectively showing that the person in question was not the source for the reporter), they didn’t pursue it any further. As the description continues, however, it makes it clear that Company A analyst of his own initiative (apparently) went to the two other Companies’ analysts to get them to check their databases for contacts involving the reporter.

Page 137: Note the date of the notice to FISA: August 2008. Which may be in response to the DOJ IG Report on the warrantless wiretap program. (Though the fourth, on page 140, was dated November 2008).

Pae 141: FBI told IG that in February 2006, they instituted new process to make sure FISA applications were accurate. This would have been in aftermath of revelation of illegal program.

Page 184: In the first blanket NSL, 39 of 192 numbers were associated with “domestic terrorism investigations” (but NSLs can only be used for international terrorism investigations).

Page 185: The January 16, 2009 OLC opinion pertained at least in part to whether an Acting DAD could sign an NSL.

Page 187: The July 5, 2006 blanket NSL included 7 numbers that were associated with domestic terrorism investigations.

Page 188: 134 of the numbers on the September blanket NSL were domestic terrorism and criminal investigations.

Page 276: FBI makes a new assertion about not needing any backup to get these records.

I wouldn’t think I’d need to explain this to a Deputy District Attorney for a major city like Patterico, but here are some of the definitions Merriam-Webster includes for the word “Bugger.”

Bugger: (Noun) A worthless person

Bugger: (Verb) Damn

Bugger: (Verb) Bungle or botch

Bugger: (Noun) A person who plants bugs

Bugger all: (Noun) Nothing

Bugger off: (Verb) Leave

Now, Patterico may not know me well enough to know that I live with an Irishman, and therefore it is not uncommon for me to hear and even use the word “bugger” as the Irish or Brits or Aussies do, as a catchall swear word generally tied to a fuck-up (though said Irishman wants it known that he says “bollocks” more than he does “bugger”). But it’s hard to know anything about me without knowing that I have a bit of a reputation for having a potty-mouth.

And so when Patterico thinks he’s caught me in a lie because I persist in describing four pathetic overgrown boys who botched their prank in Senator Landrieu’s office as TeaBuggers…

“Teabugger”? Oh, I get it. It’s like “tea bagger” — only the word “bugger” is substituted . . . a reference to O’Keefe’s “bugging,” which it’s now clear he did not do. So it’s a joke name based on a lie.

When the post in question includes all this in the first paragraph…

TeaBugger James O’Keefe had called on the FBI to release the videos he took while (according to the FBI) by false pretense, entering US government property with the intent of interfering with a phone system owned by the US government. He wanted those released because they would show he neither bugged the phones nor managed to do anything in the phone closet (largely because they were arrested before they were able to get to the phone closet).

It just shows that Patterico knows bugger all about language.

But Patterico’s post is quite amusing for the lengths he goes to to … confirm the NYT owes its readers a correction.

You see, Patterico claims that when the NYT wrote the following passage:

Mr. O’Keefe made his biggest national splash last year when he dressed up as a pimp and trained his secret camera on counselors with the liberal community group Acorn — eliciting advice on financing a brothel on videos that would threaten to become Acorn’s undoing.

He quickly became a cult hero among young conservatives who saw his work as groundbreaking and sought to emulate him.

Liberals have denounced his methods as dishonest, a form of entrapment, but national Republican leaders seized on them as revelatory, pressuring Congress into cutting Acorn’s financing.

Mr. O’Keefe produced his videos with a partner, Hannah Giles, who posed as a prostitute in them [my emphasis]

The NYT did not mean (Patterico claims) to imply that James O’Keefe was wearing his silly pimp costume when he went into ACORN offices and filmed them not breaking the law. Rather, Patterico insists, the NYT only meant that O’Keefe was posing at being a pimp, without suggesting that he was dressed up as one.

You can “pose” as a pimp without dressing like one. Look up the definition if you don’t believe me.

And therefore, Patterico seems to be saying, Bradblog was wrong to ask the NYT to correct the impression they left that O’Keefe was dressed up as a pimp when he went into the ACORN videos.

But there’s a problem with that, aside from the NYT’s use of the phrase “he dressed up as a pimp.”

The editor in question, Greg Brock, made it quite clear he understood the passage to mean that O’Keefe was wearing his pimp costume in the ACORN offices, because one of his emails said this:

As I said, we see nothing to correct. It is not merely a matter of accepting his version. He was videotaping some of the action, including when he left some of the offices. At one point, the camera was turned in such a way to catch part of the “costume” he was wearing. And ACORN employees who saw him described his costume.

And, as Eric Boehlert points out in his response to this same Patterico post, the NYT’s earlier reporting (which Brock also references for his proof that they don’t need to make a correction) clearly says that O’Keefe was dressed as a pimp, not just claiming to be a pimp while wearing his typical prep outfit.

Ready for the embarrassing part where I quote the New York Times claiming O’Keefe was dressed as a pimp visiting ACORN offices?Behold:

The undercover videos showed a scantily dressed young woman, Hannah Giles, posing as a prostitute, while a young man, James O’Keefe, played her pimp. They visited Acorn offices in Baltimore, Washington, Brooklyn and San Bernardino, Calif., candidly describing their illicit business and asking the advice of Acorn workers. Among other questions, they asked how to buy a house to use as a brothel employing under-age girls from El Salvador. Mr. O’Keefe, 25, a filmmaker and conservative activist, was dressed so outlandishly that he might have been playing in a risque high school play.

And again:

But never has his work had anything like the impact of the Acorn expose, conducted by Mr. O’Keefe and a friend he met through Facebook, 20-year-old Hannah Giles. Their travels in the gaudy guise of pimp and prostitute through various offices of Acorn, the national community organizing group, caught its low-level employees in five cities sounding eager to assist with tax evasion, human smuggling and child prostitution.

So Patterico is insisting that O’Keefe wasn’t dressed as a pimp but was just posing as one, all the while wearing khakis. He’d better tell the NYT, then, because they have reported multiple times (and Brock continues to claim in his response to Brad) that O’Keefe was not posing-in-khaki but was in fact dressed as a pimp.

One more thing.

In response to my repeated calls for O’Keefe to release his raw video from the ACORN stunt (particularly as he calls for authorities to release his raw video from the Landrieu stunt), Patterico very generously reminds me that there are unedited audiotapes of the stunts.

Also, all three bloggers repeatedly refer to a supposedly “independent” report by a guy paid by ACORN, which makes various findings totally at odds with the unedited audio that the report (and all three bloggers) refuse to acknowledge even exists. (Did you know there is unedited audio? In all the whining about the lack of unedited video, did anyone ever bother to tell you that you can listen to the full unedited audio of these visits? It’s true! Click the link if you don’t believe me.)

That’s as clever as Patterico gets, I guess! Want proof of how O’Keefe was dressed in one or another of his stunts, given that the videotape we do have is clearly edited? I know! Check the audiotape!

Video. Audio.

Yeah.

In other words, try as hard as Patterico can, he’s got bugger all to refute that O’Keefe in both his ACORN videos and his Landrieu stunt was involved in a bolloxed attempt to deceive.

Update: Edit to bugger reference above.

Since Richard Shelby continues to hold several of Obama’s military nominees hostages to his efforts to help France’s Airbus win a lucrative contract, I thought we ought to meet the professionals whose service Shelby sees fit to disrupt.

In this post, I’ll look at Frank Kendall, who was nominated to serve as Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (PDUSD) for Acquisition and Technology on August 6, 2009.

Kendall appears intent on fixing some of the urgent management and cost problems with defense acquisitions, and he appears to have the management experience to get that done. Yet Shelby is holding up his nomination to benefit Airbus.

Kendall describes the job of PDUSD for Acquisition and Technology as serving as the Chief Operating Officer for Defense Acquisition, under the direction of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition. The USD for Acquisition, Dr. Ashton Carter, has committed to fixing some of the urgent problems with our defense acuisitions–see POGO’s positive response to Carter here. As such, Kendall would be implementing Carter’s efforts.

Kendall summarized this qualifications to serve in this function in his pre-hearing questionnaire this way:

I have over 35 years experience in the areas of national security, defense, and acquisition. My education includes degrees in engineering, business and law. I served on active duty in the Army for over ten years including in operational units and research and development commands. As a civil servant I worked as a systems engineer and systems analyst. I spent over eight years in the Pentagon on the Under Secretary for Acquisition’s staff first as Assistant Deputy Under Secretary for Strategic Systems (Defense Systems) and then as Director, Tactical Warfare Programs. Outside of government I have been the Vice President of Engineering for Raytheon Company and a consultant on national security and acquisition related matters, principally program management, technology assessment, and strategic planning, for a variety of defense companies, think tanks, and government laboratories or research and development organizations.

And when asked to describe the biggest challenges he would face in the PUSD for Acquisition, he focused on efforts to increase the acquisition workforce in order to effectively manage DOD’s huge programs.

I anticipate a major challenge in ensuring that the Department’s acquisition programs are executed within cost, schedule, and performance goals. I understand that many programs are falling short in this area and I would work to regain control of existing programs and to ensure that new programs do not repeat these problems. There is a challenge and opportunity in growing both the size and capability of the acquisition workforce particularly in the areas of program management, engineering, contracting, and cost estimating. I also believe there is a need to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the transition of technologies from the science and technology community into acquisition programs. Finally, maintaining the strength and resiliency of our national defense industrial base is a challenge that I anticipate will require attention.

Among other ways he described to address these challenges include using more prototypes, attending to technology transfer and manufacturing base, retaining inherently governmental functions in government, limiting consolidation among defense contractors, supporting in-sourcing (that is, replacing contractors with civilian employees), and limiting time and material contracts.

In short, Kendall has a lot of no-nonsense ideas that will make our military more effective for less money.

That’s what Richard Shelby is impeding by holding Kendall’s nomination hostage.

In the face of Kendall’s intelligent response to fixing defense contracting, the Senators from Alabama (Jeff Sessions also has placed a hold on Kendall’s nomination) want to corner him into committing to a particularly approach to the Tanker contract for which Airbus would bid against Boeing. Consider this exchange between Kendall and Jeff Sessions from Kendall’s nomination hearing October 22, 2009:

Senator SESSIONS. Thank you, Senator Reed.

I congratulate all of you on your nominations. I think the Senate will do its duty and you’ll move right along.

Mr. Kendall, the recently released request for proposal by the Air Force marks the third attempt in nearly a decade to acquire a replacement for the KC–135 refueling tanker. As you know, the first two attempts were marred by controversy. First there was a leasing scandal, and people went to jail over that; and then a bid protest.

Do you believe that it’s possible, given the outcomes of those attempts, that there might have been overcompensation in the development of the current RFP and that as a consequence of that overcorrection to make the RFP foolproof or technically unassailable that an unintended consequence might be that the warfighter gets a less capable platform or is in some ways disadvantaged?

Have you had a chance to look at that and will you comment on it?

Mr. KENDALL. Senator Sessions, I have not. I am sorry; I can’t really give an answer to your question.

Senator SESSIONS. Well, if you were bidding on the purchase of a house or some other important item in your life, I think we would all know that price alone is not the most important thing. There are other qualities that go into making the kind of selection that Americans do every day. You want a good price, but you want a good price for the best value and the capabilities you get. [ed: GAO found that the bid Airbus won did not adequately account for the costs Airbus would incur over the life of the program]

Do you believe that under normal circumstances the best value for the warfighter is what we should be seeking?

Mr. KENDALL. In general, Senator Sessions, I would agree with you, best value, which obviously price is a very important factor in that.

Senator SESSIONS. Well, some have contended that the best price in this would be just to reproduce the existing KC–135. Originally the Air Force proposed and their goal was to obtain a game-changer, a step up in quality and capabilities. It’s just something I know will be on your portfolio. It will be an important issue. It’s the Air Force’s number one priority in acquisition and we are way behind schedule, and I hope that we can—that the Department of Defense—and you will be a leader in this—will just make up your mind to do the best and fair bid and call it like it is. I think that’s all we can ask, but I think we have a right to ask for that. Don’t you?

Mr. KENDALL. Absolutely, Senator Sessions.

[snip]

Senator SESSIONS: Well, Mr. Chairman, I thank our members on these nominations, for this hearing. I will probably submit some written questions as follow-up. But I wish you all success, and if you are fortunate to be confirmed I know that you will commit yourself to making sure our military men and women have the best value systems that can help them be successful as they serve America, often in harm’s way. [my emphasis]

From what I’ve read, it seems that Kendall is serious about fixing some of the big problems with the way we acquire defense systems and it sounds like he has good management ideas on how to do so.

But Shelby (and Sessions) want to prevent Kendall from beginning that process. Instead, they appear to want a commitment that he’ll ignore the issue that led GAO to side with Boeing in its bid protest–cost–as the Tanker contracting process moves forward.

(Shelby hostage image by Twolf; Frank Kendall image from his confirmation hearing.)

The WaPo reports, mistakenly, that Richard Shelby has released his holds on Obama’s nominees.

But as Shelby’s own statement makes clear, he is still holding up some of the military nominations to benefit Airbus.

The purpose of placing numerous holds was to get the White House’s attention on two issues that are critical to our national security – the Air Force’s aerial refueling tanker acquisition and the FBI’s Terrorist Device Analytical Center (TEDAC). With that accomplished, Sen. Shelby has decided to release his holds on all but a few nominees directly related to the Air Force tanker acquisition until the new Request for Proposal is issued. The Air Force tanker acquisition is not an ‘earmark’ as has been reported; it is a competition to replace the Air Force’s aging aerial refueling tanker fleet. Sen. Shelby is not seeking to determine the outcome of the competition; he is seeking to ensure an open, fair and transparent competition that delivers the best equipment to our men and women in uniform. Sen. Shelby is fully justified in his concern given the history and current status of this acquisition. [my emphasis]

Now, how can he claim that he is ensuring an “open, fair and transparent competition” when he is holding key military nominations hostage until … what? Until he gets the RFP France’s Airbus wants? What if they don’t like the RFP? Will Airbus ask Shelby to keep those nominations hostage until they rewrite the RFP?

Call me crazy, but I don’t see how taking hostages contributes in any way to open, fair, and transparent competition.

Update: Here are the three people he still has holds on:

• Terry Yonkers, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Installations, Environment, and Logistics (Nominated August 4, 2009)
• Frank Kendall, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (PDUSD) for Acquisition and Technology (Nominated August 6, 2009)
• Erin Conaton, Under Secretary of the Air Force (Nominated November 10, 2009)

I really had no interest in reading Jenny Sanford’s book. But I might have to read it only to get clarity on this tidbit that Ruth Marcus writes about. (h/t Rayne)

After one of the all-too-rare pre-affair moments in which Jenny gets angry, Mark enlists leaders of a congressional Christian fellowship to talk her down. They told her she was right to be angry, Jenny recounts, but that “staying angry with Mark was not an option. If I wanted to heal the relationship, I had to open my heart and be kind, even if Mark was in the wrong. They would work on Mark. We even went so far as to talk about sex and [one of the leaders] told me not to withhold it as punishment as that would make everything worse.” [my emphasis]

So those beacons of Christianity told this woman that she should keep having sex with her husband even though he was cheating on her. It was awfully nice of them, wasn’t it, to eliminate one source of pressure Jenny Sanford had over her husband. Because we can’t have women have any source of power in a traditional Christian family, don’t you know? [ed.–see Frank Probst’s comment; on re-reading I agree the implication is this advice came pre-affair.]

The clarification I want, though, is whether OB/GYN Tom Coburn–who we know was actively counseling Mark Sanford on this affair–was involved in the advice to Jenny Sanford that she should just keep having sex with her husband, even as he was fucking another woman. I’d really like to know what the fine doctor would say in such a situation.

Speaking of improper influence in defense contracting, BAE just settled the British and American fraud investigations against it.

BAE Systems will admit two criminal charges and pay fines of £286m to settle US and UK probes into the firm.

It will hand over more than £250m to the US, which accused BAE of “wilfully misleading” it over payments made as the firm tried to win contracts.

Perhaps not surprisingly, we don’t get the details about what role particular individuals–like Bandar bin Sultan–played in the influence peddlings.

In a deal with the US Department of Justice (DoJ), BAE admitted a charge of conspiring to make false statements to the US government.

A charge filed in a District of Columbia court contains details of substantial secret payments by BAE to an unnamed person who helped the UK firm sell plane leases to the Hungarian and Czech governments.

The DoJ also details services such as holidays provided to an unnamed Saudi public official and cash transfers to a Swiss bank account that it says were linked to the £40bn Al-Yamamah contract to supply military equipment to Saudi Arabia.

The DoJ gave a damning condemnation of BAE which it said had accepted “intentionally failing to put appropriate, anti-bribery preventative measures in place”, despite telling the US government that these steps had been taken.

It then “made hundreds of millions of dollars in payments to third parties, while knowing of a high probability that money would be passed on to foreign government decision-makers to favour BAE in the award of defence contracts”, the DoJ said.

But at least they’re going to have to pay far more than Scooter Libby paid for his false statements.

There has been a lot of discussion of how foreign companies will be able to influence elections and politics given the Citizens United deal. But foreign companies are already dominating our politics.

Consider Richard Shelby’s decision to place holds on all of Obama’s nominees unless some federal money that may benefit Alabama gets released.

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary “blanket hold” on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate, according to multiple reports this evening. The hold means no nominations can move forward unless Senate Democrats can secure a 60-member cloture vote to break it, or until Shelby lifts the hold.

The key issue is that Shelby wants the Air Force to tweak an RFP for refueling tankers so that Airbus (partnered with Northrup Grumman) would win the bid again over Boeing. The contract had been awarded in 2008, but the GAO found that the Air Force had erred in calculating the award. After the Air Force wrote a new RFP in preparation to rebid the contract, Airbus calculated that it would not win the new bid, and started complaining. Now, Airbus is threatening to withdraw from the competition unless the specs in the RFP are revised.

Essentially, then, Shelby’s threat is primarily about gaming this bidding process to make sure Airbus–and not Boeing–wins the contract (there’s a smaller program he’s complaining about, too, but this is the truly huge potential bounty for his state).

I understand why any Senator would fight for jobs in his or her state. And I understand that there was dirty corruption in this original contracting process.

But underlying the refueling contract is the question of whether the US military ought to spend what may amount to $100 billion over the life of the contract with a foreign company, Airbus. Particularly a company that the WTO found preliminarily to be illegally benefiting from subsidies from European governments.

Richard Shelby is preparing to shut down the Senate to try to force the government to award a key military function to a foreign company.

Oh, this is rich. Chief TeaBugger, James O’Keefe is preparing to argue that, the whole time he was sitting in jail with the son of the acting US Attorney for Shreveport, the US Attorney for New Orleans was abusing his rights.

Interviewed on Fox just moments ago, Andrew Breitbart claimed that alleged Landrieu phone tamperer James O’Keefe “sat in jail for 28 hours without access to an attorney.”

Breitbart, who has been on a public campaign defending O’Keefe, a paid contributor to Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, also charged that the U.S. Attorney’s office in Louisiana leaked information to the press “helping” them to frame the episode as “Watergate Junior.”

It’s all retaliation, you see, because TeaBugger O’Keefe has pressured Eric Holder to investigate ACORN based on TeaBugger O’Keefe’s own attempts to frame the organization.

Asked by Fox’s Megyn Kelly what motivation the U.S. Attorney would have to make such an effort, Breitbart responded: “Well, it’s tied to the Justice Department. And we’ve been very aggressive in asking Eric Holder to investigate what’s seen on the ACORN tapes, and he’s ignored it.”

I guess Breitbart and his little TeaBugger honestly believe that the press, faced with news of inept Republicans entering Democratic offices in disguise with the intent of “interfering” with that office’s phones, would need a cheat sheet to make the connection with Watergate?

You know, several days ago I was willing to dismiss this as a stupid juvenile prank. But given the increasing concern that the perpetrators are showing–and their increasingly dubious stories–I’m convinced it merits a closer look.

In any case, I bet that O’Keefe is going to hang this complaint on being stuck with the representation of J. Garrison Jordan for 24 hours, rather than the big name Watergate lawyer who is now representing him, Michael Madigan. Because somewhere in the Constitution, I’m certain, it says citizens are entitled to a lawyer with Watergate experience, and may not be required to make do with the representation of local lawyers.

There’s a real irony in James O’Keefe’s latest explanation for why he committed an alleged felony in an attempt to embarrass Mary Landrieu. He is now calling for the FBI to release the tapes that he and his accomplices made while in Landrieu’s office.

We video taped the entire visit, the government has those tapes, and I’m eager for them to be released because they refute the false claims being repeated by much of the mainstream media.

As you recall, one of the reasons why O’Keefe managed to impugn ACORN even though they had not engaged in any illegal activity is because he edited his videos significantly. He has refused, repeatedly, to release that raw video.

The unedited videos have never been made public. The videos that have been released appear to have been edited, in some cases substantially, including the insertion of a substitute voiceover for significant portions of Mr. O’Keefe’s and Ms.Giles’s comments, which makes it difficult to determine the questions to which ACORN employees are responding. A comparison of the publicly available transcripts to the released videos confirms that large portions of the original video have been omitted from the released versions.

[snip]

Experienced forensic investigators would be able to determine the extent to which the released videos have been manipulated to distort, rather than merely shape, the facts and the conversations, as ACORN alleges.

So when O’Keefe wants to rebut the FBI’s affidavit alleging that he “by false and fraudulent pretense … did in fact enter [] real property belonging to the United States for the purpose of willfully and maliciously interfering with a telephone system operated and controlled by the United States,” he’s in favor of releasing his video tapes. But when O’Keefe seeks to sustain an inaccurate narrative about ACORN’s alleged corruption, he refuses to release his tapes.

Once again, this reveals O’Keefe’s attempt to limit the damage of his alleged crime. Here’s the part of his statement that doesn’t attack the MSM, with my interjections.

The government has now confirmed what has always been clear:  No one tried to wiretap or bug Senator Landrieu’s office.  Nor did we try to cut or shut down her phone lines.  Reports to this effect over the past 48 hours are inaccurate and false.

Note the careful wordplay here. O’Keefe claims that the government agrees that “nor did we try to cut or shut down her phone lines.” But that’s not quite the same as having the intent of “maliciously interfering” with her phone lines, which the FBI did allege. Now, for starters, given that Landrieu’s staffer stated that “BASEL [took] the handset of the phone and maipulate[d] it,” Basel did do something with the main phone in the office. Moreover, since the TeaBuggers never got to the phone cabinet, where they might be able to “cut or shut down” her phone lines, it may well be that the TeaBuggers never had a chance to do so, even assuming they’d be competent to do so. Sure, they didn’t try to do so. They were arrested before they got a chance to.

As an investigative journalist, my goal is to expose corruption and lack of concern for citizens by government and other institutions, as I did last year when our investigations revealed the massive corruption and fraud perpetrated by ACORN.  For decades, investigative journalists have used a variety of tactics to try to dig out and reveal the truth.

Note here how O’Keefe’s entire excuse depends on the veracity of the claim that he “revealed the massive corruption and fraud perpetrated by ACORN.” But of course he didn’t. He revealed that a couple of volunteers, part-timers, or other employees that ACORN didn’t directly control were way too credulous. He didn’t reveal anyone breaking the law (because no ACORN employee did anything in response to O’Keefe’s stunt). And O’Keefe specifically chose not to reveal that a number of other ACORN employees called the cops to report him and his accomplice.

In other words, central to O’Keefe’s excuse is a lie, a lie meant to obscure what he has and hasn’t “exposed.”

I learned from a number of sources that many of Senator Landrieu’s constituents were having trouble getting through to her office to tell her that they didn’t want her taking millions of federal dollars in exchange for her vote on the healthcare bill.  When asked about this, Senator Landrieu’s explanation was that, “Our lines have been jammed for weeks.”  I decided to investigate why a representative of the people would be out of touch with her constituents for “weeks” because her phones were broken.  In investigating this matter, we decided to visit Senator Landrieu’s district office – the people’s office – to ask the staff if their phones were working.

While I’m sure this kind of fiction works for many of O’Keefe’s biggest fans, it is a lovely example of the extent to which O’Keefe was framing Landrieu, rather than “exposing” anything about her conduct. First, even assuming the TeaBaggers who were having trouble getting through on Landrieu’s line were actually Landrieu’s constituents (of the TeaBuggers, only Flanagan is a Landrieu constituent), the belief that she, personally, was taking millions of federal dollars for her vote on the healthcare bill is backed by no evidence. Rather, the TeaBaggers were mischaracterizing the Louisiana Purchase, which actually involved Landrieu getting millions for her constituents.

And then, similarly, O’Keefe takes Landrieu’s explanation that her “lines have been jammed for weeks” (which was actually true of a great many members of Congress during this time frame) to mean that “her phones were broken.” Another false leap in logic designed, even after having been caught in a potential felony, to frame Landrieu inaccurately.

And then my favorite part of this whole explanation: “we decided to visit Senator Landrieu’s district office – the people’s office – to ask the staff if their phones were working.” First, I repeat my question: if the phones that–TeaBaggers had alleged–were jammed were in Baton Rouge, then why go to her NOLA office?

And nowhere in the FBI affidavit does it record the TeaBuggers “ask[ing] the staff if their phones were working.” Instead, it describes the TeaBuggers telling Landrieu’s staffer that they were there to fix something: “FLANAGAN and BASEL represented to her that they were repair technicians from the telephone company and were there to fix problems with the telephone system.” In other words, they never asked if something was broken. They simply asserted something was–and then “manipulated” the phone. Of course the entire clown outfit get-up would make no sense if they intended to “ask” if the phones weren’t working. Key to the narrative O’Keefe was spinning, then, was the claim that the phones weren’t working.

And if you were just asking if the phones were broken, why go to the telephone closet? And why have Dai on call with his walkie-talkie, in a car rather than Flanagan’s office practically next door? If you were just asking if the phones were broken, why delete all your friends on FaceBook after you get busted?

No, it’s clear that, at best, O’Keefe intended to pretend the phone was broken to film Landrieu’s staffers’ response.

On reflection, I could have used a different approach to this investigation, particularly given the sensitivities that people understandably have about security in a federal building.  The sole intent of our investigation was to determine whether or not Senator Landrieu was purposely trying to avoid constituents who were calling to register their views to her as their Senator.  We video taped the entire visit, the government has those tapes, and I’m eager for them to be released because they refute the false claims being repeated by much of the mainstream media.

Once again, if your sole purpose was to “determine whether or not Senator Landrieu was purposely trying to avoid constituents,” it would involve no more than a question. Heck, you could even film the receptionist answering the damn phone to see how she was responding to real constituents. That would be a way to expose the truth, whatever that might be. But to do what O’Keefe and his accomplices did–even accepting the parts of his statement that aren’t obvious lies as reasonably accurate–necessarily involved the depiction of false narratives rather than the truth.

Just like his ACORN tapes did.

Which is why O’Keefe only wants select tapes released.

Everybody’s talking about this slapdown David Shuster had with Andrew Breitbart, the guy who employs chief TeaBugger James O’Keefe.

Aside from all the yelling, what I find notable about this is the way Breitbart succeeds in preventing Shuster from explaining what O’Keefe has been charged with: entering US property “for the purpose of willfully and maliciously interfering with a telephone system operated by the United States of America.”

And the TeaBuggers don’t deny that claim–they now say they wanted to cut off Landrieu’s phone system to see how she’d react.

I’ll have more to say about this going forward. But even accepting the TeaBuggers at their word, that makes several things very clear.

1. They had the intent of illegally shutting down tampering with the phone systems of a member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security
2. They planned to do so to get a reaction out of Landrieu (and, apparently, to film that reaction)

Now, given that O’Keefe’s prior film on ACORN was about framing people and editing video of that frame for political maliciousness, it’s probably safe to assume that if O’Keefe’s current story is true, he had the same intent to falsely frame Landrieu and then edit his film to exacerbate her reaction.

Maybe that’s why Breitbart is so desperate to prevent Shuster from explaining that to his viewers.

Update: TPM got a response from Landrieu to the TeaBuggers’ latest excuses.

“Senator Landrieu believes this feeble explanation is a clear and calculated effort to divert attention away from the fact that his client stands accused of a federal crime that could land him in prison for up to 10 years,” said Landrieu Press Secretary Rob Sawicki, in a statement to TPMmuckraker.