I was out recruiting FBI informants at a cocktail party and look who I ran into! Woo-hoo!
Monday, March 31, 2008
Look who I recruited for the FBI!
I was out recruiting FBI informants at a cocktail party and look who I ran into! Woo-hoo!
Wave to the nice people at the CIA part II ...
This is CIA article No. 2 ... I'll have to get to the rest tomorrow. Meanwhile keep recruiting at those cocktail parties! The book at right is -- a book I like by Stephen Kinzer. Lots of CIA stuff. As in: CIA-as-corporate-lapdog stuff. Good night and good luck from Jeanie, your perfect hostessCIA has eye on
Intelligence experts say the agency's domestic unit may be headed for the
The
Mike Soraghan, John Aloysius Farrell and Alicia Caldwell
Beauprez, a Republican from
"The CIA is looking to increase staffing and mission (in
He said he wasn't told how many people would be involved, but "I got that it's a significant responsibility and a significant number of jobs."
The Washington Post reported Friday that the intelligence agency was eyeing
"That story we are not commenting on," she said. "I can understand your interest."
The unit, officially called the National Resources Division, consults with academics and debriefs American business travelers who go abroad. It also collects intelligence on foreign nationals in the
Gov. Bill Owens' office confirmed that the governor met with the division director in
"I can't comment directly on my conversations with the CIA, other than to say that they involved terrorism and related subjects," Owens said through his press office. "I would say that the
The number of people who work at the division is classified, but experts put the number between a few hundred and a thousand.
Boost for the metro area
Beauprez, who has worked on redeveloping the
"In my estimation,
If the move happens, the public in the
"I would be surprised if there were a big construction project or a publicly announced event in
Denver is already home to the Aerospace Data Facility at Buckley Air Force Base, which has about 2,000 employees and puts about $1.5 billion into the economy, said former military intelligence an
Wave to the nice people at the CIA ...
That's me, at left, recruiting informants at a cocktail party. Alas: This post isn't about my informant-recruiting efforts. I just like that picture of me recruiting informants at a cocktail party juxtaposed with the "Loose Talk Can Cost Lives" poster from the War Office.This post is actually about waving to the nice people from the CIA when you pass the Federal Center in Golden. Tell your children: Wave to the nice CIA people!
This is the first in a bunch of articles I am going to post about the CIA in Colorado. Christi sp? from CIA public affairs -- she is at 703-482-8069 if you would like to chat with her -- said there isn't anyone from the CIA in the metro area. But I think there is a CIA liaison in every FBI Field Office, bare minimum. Let me know your thoughts! Love from Jeanie
CIA move no simple matter – If the agency opts for Colorado digs, even wildlife part of planning
The Denver Federal Center has thousands of workers, lots of critters and not much readily available space.
Bruce Finley
Denver Post Staff Writer
And that could depend on a wildlife management plan federal landlords at the site are developing as part of a master plan, General Services Administration spokeswoman Cara Hoevet said.
Some 6,000 government geologists, water managers, food and drug inspectors, and others share the
U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez, R-Colo., said late last week that the square mile of grass and riparian land surrounded by
U.S. Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., a former intelligence committee member, "is going to meet with the CIA people and get a briefing," said Angela de Rocha, Allard's spokeswoman. Allard "thinks this is a good idea. We're just waiting to hear the details. There are all kinds of considerations that would have to be taken. Once we have the details, we'll have a better fix on this."
Gov. Bill Owens spoke with local CIA officials and last year met in
"We know nothing definite at all,"
Beauprez said he knows "absolutely nothing" more. "A friend of mine who would know" in
If the CIA did move its domestic operations division to the state, it wouldn't significantly add to security risks, officials said, because
At the
"Several people mentioned the employment opportunities this would provide to folks in the
CIA officials remain tight-lipped. "The only acknowledged CIA facility is CIA headquarters in
Former high-level CIA and White House security official Bryan Cunningham, now a consultant in
At the center, a wildlife management plan that the landlords are developing would balance work priorities with needs of rabbits, foxes, coyotes, rattlesnakes, squirrels,
Security guards once had to herd bears out of the area, said Steve Schaad, regional chief of federal protective services for the Department of Homeland Security.
If CIA chiefs move employees here, Schaad said, ``we would work with the CIA and make an assessment and put together a plan to provide security."
If you would have missed this it would have been tragic so I had to step in!
It would have been totally tragic if you never got this from July 25, 2007. Who says the press isn't doing its job? After you read this, try to recruit as many people as you can to be part of the network. Cocktail parties and grocery store lines work well. Once we are all on board, we can piece together "bits of careless talk" by our neighbors -- or those in the lines at the grocery store who we did not care to recruit.ABC News: The Blotter
July 25, 2007 1:01 PM
FBI Proposes Building Network of
Justin Rood Reports:
The FBI is taking cues from the CIA to recruit thousands of covert informants in the
According to a recent unclassified report to Congress, the FBI expects its informants to provide secrets about possible terrorists and foreign spies, although some may also be expected to aid with criminal investigations, in the tradition of law enforcement confidential informants. The FBI did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
The FBI said the push was driven by a 2004 directive from President Bush ordering the bureau to improve its counterterrorism efforts by boosting its human intelligence capabilities.
The aggressive push for more secret informants appears to be part of a new effort to grow its intelligence and counterterrorism efforts. Other recent proposals include expanding its collection and analysis of data on
To handle the increase in so-called human sources, the FBI also plans to overhaul its database system, so it can manage records and verify the accuracy of information from "more than 15,000" informants, according to the document. While many of the recruited informants will apparently be
The total cost of the effort tops $22 million, according to the document.
The bureau has arranged to use elements of CIA training to teach FBI agents about "Source Targeting and Development," the report states. The courses will train FBI special agents on the "comprehensive tradecraft" needed to identify, recruit and manage these "confidential human sources." According to January testimony by FBI Deputy Director John S. Pistole, the CIA has been working with the bureau on the course.
The bureau apparently mulled whether to adopt entire training courses from the CIA or from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which like the CIA recruits spies overseas. But the FBI ultimately determined "the courses offered by those agencies would not meet the needs of the FBI's unique law enforcement." The FBI report said it would also give agents "legal and policy" training, noting that its domestic intelligence efforts are "constitutionally sensitive."
"It's probably a good sign they are not adopting CIA recruitment techniques wholesale," said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, an expert on classified programs.
Try to recruit as many people as you can! Bring them in person to the Federal Building downtown! Thanks from Jeanie
Give everything your JOHN HANCOCK and you will be safe!
I told my father yesterday that I had a blog called "Infiltrate and Overthrow." He, being my father, was wondering if I weren't worried that a government team might knock on my door.
I told him the reasons I do not worry:
No. 1: If I were going to infiltrate and overthrow, would I blog about it?No. 2: I give everything my John Hancock. That puts everyone involved at ease.
No. 3: This president is really into Freedom of Speech. It is, like, a total cause. History books will reflect his passion for the First Amendment. George W. Bush thinks "a country is not truly free if its citizens cannot burn the flag."
Love and sensible flag-burning from Jeanie
Hello and welcome to new head of FBI Denver Division, James H. Davis ...
Here's my 03/26 letter to James Davis -- the new FBI chief in Denver. Note the picture below. Those are the two guys who were riding the Seattle ferry. To the right: Our very own James Davis posing with Saddam Hussein.Mr. James H. Davis
Special Agent in Charge
Federal Bureau of Investigation, Denver Division
Byron G. Rogers Federal Building
1961 Stout Street, Suite 1823
Denver, Colorado 80294
Dear Mr. Davis:
Hello and welcome to Denver. I enjoyed watching the profile of you on FoxNews Monday night and appreciated reading the even more detailed information about you in the official press release put out by the FBI. I love all things FBI and receive a Google Alert whenever a story mentions the Bureau.
Interesting that you were in Iraq.
I am a Colorado native and wanted to communicate a concern to you right off the bat. Since you were in Iraq until recently, you probably missed the FBI ferry incident in Seattle. Here’s what happened: The FBI approached the newspaper of record in Seattle, asking the paper to publish photographs of two men who were obviously of Middle Eastern descent; the FBI said the men had been seen on several ferries and seemed “overly interested in the workings and layout” of the ferries. The managing editor of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer initially refused to run the photos, citing concerns over civil rights. The issue blew up, and the editor eventually caved in.
Scores of United States citizens of Middle Eastern descent complained to Seattle-area community leaders about the photographs. Earlier the same month of the incident, half a dozen men of South Asian and Middle Eastern descent had been stopped and questioned for as many as six hours as they left a ferry following a trip to the Olympic Peninsula.
I am in no way implying that ferry riders be put in danger; I am saying that I would not sacrifice civil liberties or privacy for the illusion of security, and that I hope you think the same way now that you are in charge here.
I have discussed the FBI “ferry incident” at length with many people and have not met a single person who disagrees with me on this: If the two obviously-Middle Eastern men had instead been two affluent white women from the suburbs – dressed like veteran law librarians out taking pictures with high-end cell phones – they would have been invisible. No ferry worker would have snapped their picture in the first place. Two affluent white women could have done their best to act as suspicious as possible, traveling back and forth on those ferries for months. Still no mug shots in the paper by request of the FBI.
At the time of the Seattle incident, the FBI emphasized that the men were not suspects in any crime and that there had been no threats to the ferry system. Two days after the photos ran, a ferry was shut down because officials found an object in a men’s bathroom during a routine sweep. The object – cylindrical, made of duct tape and smelling of marijuana – turned out not to be dangerous, and was not linked to the men. “It was not a bomb or a bong,” a Washington State Patrol spokesman said. “We don’t know what to call it.”
I do not think it is a good time to be an American of Middle Eastern descent in this country. But I know you will prove me wrong during your tenure here.
Best regards,
Jeanie
Monday, March 17, 2008
I love Mariah Carey ...
Every once in a while we have to interrupt the broadcast to enjoy life. As in: I love Mariah Carey. Did you see her on SNL 03/15/2008? LOVE THAT GIRL! Can she sing! What talent! Here is her MySpace page if you want to hear her RIGHT THIS MINUTE: http://www.myspace.com/mariahcareyHere are the lyrics to "Touch My Body" -- totally steamy!
Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah
Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah
I know that you've been waiting for it
I'm waiting too
In my imagination I'd be all up on you
I know you got that fever for me
Hundred and two
And boy I know I feel the same
My temperature's through the roof
If there's a camera up in here
Then it's gonna leave with me
When I do (I do)
If there's a camera up in here
Then I'd best not catch this flick
On YouTube (YouTube)
'Cause if you run your mouth and brag
About this secret rendezvous
I will hunt you down
'Cause baby I'm up in my bidness
Like a Wendy interview
But this is private
Between you and I
Touch my body
Put me on the floor
Wrestle me around
Play with me some more
Touch my body
Throw me on the bed
I just wanna make you feel
Like you never did
Touch my body
Let me wrap my thighs
All around your waist
Just a little taste
Touch my body
Know you love my curves
Come on and give me what I deserve
And touch my body.
Boy you can put me on you
Like a brand new white tee
I'll hug your body tighter
Than my favorite jeans
I want you to caress me
Like a tropical breeze
And float away with you
In the Caribbean Sea
If there's a camera up in here
Then it's gonna leave with me
When I do (I do)
If there's a camera up in here
Then I'd best not catch this flick
On YouTube (YouTube)
'Cause if you run your mouth and brag
About this secret rendezvous
I will hunt you down
'Cause baby I'm up in my bidness
Like a Wendy interview
But this is private
Between you and I
Touch my body
Put me on the floor
Wrestle me around
Play with me some more
Touch my body
Throw me on the bed
I just wanna make you feel
Like you never did.
Touch my body
Let me wrap my thighs
All around your waist
Just a little taste
Touch my body
Know you love my curves
Come on and give me what I deserve
And touch my body.
Imma treat you like a teddy bear
You won't wanna go nowhere
In the lap of luxury
Baby just turn to me
You won't want for nothing boy
I will give you plenty
Touch my body
Touch my body
Put me on the floor
Wrestle me around
Play with me some more
Touch my body
Throw me on the bed
I just wanna make you feel
Like you never did.
Touch my body
Let me wrap my thighs
All around your waist
Just a little taste
Touch my body
Know you love my curves
Come on and give me what I deserve
And touch my body
Oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah
Oh yeah oh yeah
Oh oh oh oh yeah
Touch my body
Buy Mariah Carey in April! Love from Jeanie
Thursday, March 13, 2008
In case you missed this BRILLIANT story ...
These images TOTALLY relate to this story from 03/07/2008, which should be reprinted every day for the next year for sheer comic relief. You gotta LOVE IT.GAO Seeks Review of Spy Agencies
The Outgoing Chief Auditor Makes a Pitch on Capitol Hill
By Paul Kane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 7, 2008; A15
As he leaves his post as the nation's top auditor, David M. Walker is again asking Congress to give the Government Accountability Office the power to review the finances of the CIA and other intelligence agencies.
Walker, whose 10-year term as comptroller general concludes Wednesday, is supporting legislation that would give the GAO access to the last major area of the federal government not subject to its audits and investigations.
With some support on Capitol Hill, Walker said he is fighting powerful legislative patrons of intelligence agencies, especially the CIA, who have resisted examinations of how taxpayer dollars are spent.
"Everybody's for accountability in Washington until they're the ones subjected to it," Walker said in an interview. "There are a lot of forces that are vested in the status quo."
The GAO, Congress's investigative arm, has the power to review the finances and management of most government agencies. But the Justice Department issued a ruling in the early 1990s that restricted oversight of the CIA to House and Senate select committees on intelligence.
That authority has been a sensitive topic since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, when information sharing between the CIA and law enforcement agencies that might have revealed the plot was bungled. More recently, the corruption scandal involving former congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.), who used his influence to steer intelligence contracts in return for bribes, has added to calls for more oversight.
Prompted by recommendations from the 9/11 Commission, the House and Senate in 2004 reorganized the way their committees oversee intelligence and homeland security issues. But the lawmakers have never pushed to allow the GAO to examine CIA spending. They have questioned whether the GAO is too closely aligned with the congressional majority and whether its investigators have the proper clearances to handle classified intelligence matters.
"You can't just sort of wander in and do this stuff like you're investigating FAA weather stations," said Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), chairman of the Senate intelligence committee. Rockefeller called GAO investigations of the intelligence world a "rather bad idea" and suggested his committee should have more oversight authority, including the power to appropriate funds to intelligence agencies. THAT IS A KILLER FUNNY QUOTE!!
"The GAO does precisely what the majority [in Congress] asks them to do. It follows what the majority asks," said Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), who chaired the intelligence committee before Rockefeller. "I don't want any further politicization of intelligence."
Walker, however, said he is not asking to look into the "sources and methods" used by spy agencies. Instead, he wants the GAO to look into "basic management transformation challenges" such as how the CIA recruits and retains top talent and, more important, how the agency has allocated its multibillion-dollar budget. LIKE HOW COME THE GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK CAN'T PAY FOR A PROSTITUTE BUT ANYONE IN INTELLIGENCE CAN?
The GAO is already empowered to examine the finances of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and it has highlighted many examples of waste, fraud and abuse. Walker said. "I have little doubt that those challenges exist within the intelligence community," he said.
The CIA disagrees. Mark Mansfield, a spokesman for the agency, said that in 2007, CIA officers testified at more than 60 hearings on Capitol Hill, gave more than 500 briefings, delivered 100 "congressional notifications about our most sensitive programs" and answered more than 1,200 on-the-record questions posed by members of Congress.
"That's hardly a culture of rejecting oversight. It's a recognition of the importance of it," Mansfield said. He said CIA critics have no basis for alleging that the agency is littered with waste.
Sen. Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii), sponsor of the bill that would give the GAO access to the intelligence community, said there is no way to know about problems unless the GAO can wade into CIA finances and management strategies. But in a brief interview, Akaka said he doubts the bill can clear the chamber given the bipartisan questioning it faces.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/06/AR2008030603773_pf.html
DOES THIS JUST KILL YOU? KILLER FUNNY! Love from Jeanie
The man in the iron mask ...
“Locking someone up for five years without charges is a disgrace and a betrayal of American and constitutional values.” Yes: Today's dinner-table discussions are generated from the following excerpts from the March 13, 2008, New York Times story “Pentagon Cites Tapes Showing Interrogations”:
Ali al-Marri is a citizen of Qatar who was arrested in December 2001 while in college in Illinois. He was moved five years ago to a “Navy detention site” in Charleston, S.C., after being designated an “enemy combatant.” Government officials say they believe he was an Al Qaeda operative plotting a terrorist attack.
Two government officials say a tape showed Mr. Marri being manhandled by his interrogators, but did not show waterboarding or any other treatment approaching what they believed could be classified as torture. According to one Defense Department official, the interrogators dispensing the rough treatment on the tape were FBI agents. An FBI spokesman declined comment, citing a continuing review of being carried out by the Department of Justice’s inspector general.
Mr. Black, the spokesman for the Defense Intelligence Agency, said its director, Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples, had reviewed the tape and was satisfied that Mr. Marri’s treatment was acceptable.
He said that Mr. Marri was chanting loudly, disrupting his interrogation, and that interrogators used force to put duct tape on his mouth, while Mr. Marri resisted. Mr. Black said most of the videos showing Mr. Marri’s interrogations had been destroyed. The government has never charged Mr. Marri, but because of his designation as an enemy combatant, the Pentagon is allowed to hold him indefinitely.
Lawyers for Mr. Marri, who have challenged his imprisonment in court, sought access to any tapes or other records of his interrogations, but in 2006 a federal judge in South Carolina said the government did not have to produce any tapes. That decision is being appealed.
Jonathan Hafetz, one of the lawyers, said Mr. Marri had heard guards describe “a cabinet full of tapes” showing his interrogations, but had never had independent confirmation that such tapes existed. Mr. Marri has alleged that earlier in his imprisonment he was deprived of sleep, isolated and exposed to prolonged cold.
Mr. Hafetz said he planned to file papers in court describing the psychological harm done to Mr. Marri. “Locking someone up for five years without charges is a disgrace and a betrayal of American and constitutional values,” he said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/washington/13intel.html?ref=middleeast Let me know how the dinner-table discussions went. I can always provide more fodder. Thanks from Jeanie
Monday, March 10, 2008
Waterboarding photo only goes with top-most story ...
Waterboarding: the most horrific experience of my life / As the US Justice Department investigates whether waterboarding constitutes torture, a former Japanese POW, who was a victim of it in 1943, recounts its full terror
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article3476414.ece
FBI Sniper Arrested for Shooting
http://www.witntv.com/home/headlines/16434566.html
Prison Nation / After three decades of explosive growth, the nation’s prison population has reached some grim milestones: More than 1 in 100 American adults are behind bars. One in nine black men, ages 20 to 34, are serving time, as are 1 in 36 adult Hispanic men (EDITORIAL)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/10/opinion/10mon1.html?hp
Cheating with multiple posts ...
... so that I can post multiple pictures. At right is Washington, D.C. If I haven't mentioned this before, one of my most favorite things to do is to look at satellite pictures of stuff. Like Somalia. The ocean. Fallujah. Northern Canada. Cuba. The Panama Canal. On and on. Name something, I've looked at it via satellite. LOVE THAT STUFF!! The CIA should hire me to sit at home watching you on satellite. * (In case one day you decide to take a dirty bomb outside with the morning trash.)* Instead they pay me to make folks like Warren Buffett nervous.
Anyway, to cheat and post more pictures, I am feeding you the news you should chew in multiple posts. Here is Post No. 1. Picture of Washington, D.C. Goes with these stories for a change.
Bush vetoes
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN08379875
Text: Bush’s Message to the House of Representatives / Following is the text of President Bush’s message to the House of Representatives about his veto of the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008. “To the House of Representatives: I am returning herewith without my approval H.R. 2082, the “Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008.” The bill would impede the
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/08/washington/08cnd-pletter.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Defense official says recruitment declining
http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=60537&archive=true
Pentagon insider attacks war plan / A former Pentagon official has written a book attacking Colin Powell, the CIA and other
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7286683.stm
Happy Monday from Jeanie
Sunday, March 9, 2008
LOVE IT ...
In honor of Daylight Savings, here is a kick-ass government site you will LOVE: http://www.time.gov/At right -- yes, having nothing to do with the cool site giving you the official time whenever you might need it -- is another image of women in Iran. (I am guessing it is OK for a woman to smoke in Iran!)
Here are some news items:
Why Congress, Bush disagree on waterboarding of terror suspects:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0307/p03s03-usmi.html
FBI admits Internet spying (double yawn -- was this news to folks traveling on the Mayflower?):
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2211460/fbi-admits-internet-spying
Mental health providers too few for troops:
http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-troophealth0307.artmar07,0,3291995.story
Wishing you a nice Sunday and a painless loss of that hour.
Jeanie
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
FBI post and then I promise I'll stop for the evening ...
More FBI Privacy Violations ConfirmedMar 5,
By LARA JAKES
WASHINGTON (AP) - The FBI acknowledged Wednesday it improperly accessed Americans' telephone records, credit reports and Internet traffic in 2006, the fourth straight year of privacy abuses resulting from investigations aimed at tracking terrorists and spies.
The breach occurred before the FBI enacted broad new reforms in March 2007 to prevent future lapses, FBI Director Robert Mueller said. And it was caused, in part, by banks, telecommunication companies and other private businesses giving the FBI more personal client data than was requested.
Testifying at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Mueller raised the issue of the FBI's controversial use of so-called national security letters in reference to an upcoming report on the topic by the Justice Department's inspector general.
An audit by the inspector general last year found the FBI demanded personal records without official authorization or otherwise collected more data than allowed in dozens of cases between 2003 and 2005. Additionally, last year's audit found that the FBI had underreported to Congress how many national security letters were requested by more than 4,600.
The new audit, which examines use of national security letters issued in 2006, "will identify issues similar to those in the report issued last March," Mueller told senators. The privacy abuse "predates the reforms we now have in place," he said.
"We are committed to ensuring that we not only get this right, but maintain the vital trust of the American people," Mueller said. He offered no additional details about the upcoming audit.
National security letters, as outlined in the USA Patriot Act, are administrative subpoenas used in suspected terrorism and espionage cases. They allow the FBI to require telephone companies, Internet service providers, banks, credit bureaus and other businesses to produce highly personal records about their customers or subscribers without a judge's approval.
Last year's audit by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine, issued
Several Justice Department and FBI officials familiar with the upcoming 2006 findings have said privately the new audit will show national security letters were used incorrectly at a similar rate as during the previous three years.
The number of national security letters issued by the FBI skyrocketed in the years after the Patriot Act became law in 2001, according to last year's report. Fine's annual review is required by Congress, over the objections of the Bush administration.
In 2005, for example, Fine's office found more than 1,000 violations within 19,000 FBI requests to obtain 47,000 records. Each letter issued may contain several requests.
In contrast to the strong concerns expressed by Congress and civil liberties groups after last year's inspector general's report was issued, Mueller's disclosure drew no criticism from senators during just over two hours of testimony Wednesday.
Speaking before the FBI chief, Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., urged Mueller to be more vigilant in correcting what he called "widespread illegal and improper use of national security letters."
"Everybody wants to stop terrorists. But we also, though, as Americans, we believe in our privacy rights and we want those protected," Leahy said. "There has to be a better chain of command for this. You cannot just have an FBI agent who decides he'd like to obtain Americans' records, bank records or anything else and do it just because they want to."
Following last year's audit, the Justice Department enacted guidelines that sternly reminded FBI agents to carefully follow the rules governing national security letters. The new rules caution agents to review all data before it is transferred into FBI databases to make sure that only the information specifically requested is used.
Fine's upcoming report also credits the FBI with putting the additional checks in place to make sure privacy rights aren't violated, according to a Justice official familiar with its findings.
Critics seized on Mueller's testimony as proof that a judge should sign off on the national security letters before they are issued.
"The credibility factor shows there needs to be outside oversight," said former FBI agent Michael German, now a national security adviser for the American Civil Liberties Union. He also cast doubt on the FBI's reforms.
"There were guidelines before, and there were laws before, and the FBI violated those laws," German said. "And the idea that new guidelines would make a difference, I think cuts against rationality."
Feist buries pro-Canada post ...
At left is my favorite '70s photo, completely unrelated to this post, which is just a plug for Feist, a band I TOTALLY LOVE. Get their new CD, The Reminder. Check them out: http://www.myspace.com/feistOK. I'm thinking on the pro-Canada post, because really Claudia and I were strip-searched at the border. But it is about waterboarding, a news item I follow closely, so I suppose I have to do a little plug for Canada. Instead of giving Canada its own post, however, I will just paste the text of the story below. This is from Newsweek:
Tainted Evidence
Canada tosses CIA terror testimony obtained through waterboarding.
Newsweek Web Exclusive
Updated: 5:41 PM ET Mar 5, 2008
The Canadian government is no longer using evidence gained from CIA interrogations of a top Al Qaeda detainee who was waterboarded.
According to documents obtained by NEWSWEEK, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the country's national-security agency, last month quietly withdrew statements by alleged Al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah from public papers outlining the case against two alleged terror "sleeper" operatives in Ottawa and Montreal.
The move, which so far has received no public attention, is the latest sign of potential international fallout from the CIA's recent confirmation that it waterboarded a handful of high-profile Al Qaeda suspects in 2002 and 2003. The use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques were approved by the Bush White House and Justice Department. Waterboarding, which critics charge is a form of torture, involves strapping a suspect to an inclined board and forcing water into his lungs, typically by pouring water through a cloth placed over his nose and mouth.
The Canadian cases involve two men: Mohammed Harkat, an Algerian native living in Ottawa, and Moroccan-born Adil Charkaoui of Montreal. Both were arrested after the September 11 terror attacks and detained without charges on suspicions of links to Al Qaeda. Unable to develop enough evidence to bring criminal charges against either man, the CSIS sought to deport them on grounds that they had both allegedly spent time in Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan in the 1990s. (Both men now have been released on bail but remain under government scrutiny).
At least part of the case against the Canadian suspects was derived from the CIA-supplied statements of Zubaydah, the suspected Al Qaeda logistics chief who was arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and became the first high-value detainee subjected to waterboarding. A Canadian government dossier filed with the courts after Harkat's arrest, for example, stated that "a foreign agency" (an apparent reference to the CIA) "advised the Service [CSIS] in March 2003 that Abu Zubaida [sic] was able to identify the respondent [Harkat] by his physical description, including that he operated a guest house in Peshawar, Pakistan in the mid 1990s for mujahadeen travelling to Chechnya."
But last month, the CSIS filed a revised version of the dossier on Harkat as part of its case to deport the suspect. The new version deleted the detailed information from "the foreign agency" about Abu Zubaydah's identification of Harkat. Instead, in the new dossier, dated Feb. 22, 2008, the CSIS said simply that, "Based on its investigation, the Service concludes that HARKAT [sic] has associated with Abu Zubaydah [sic], one of [Osama] bin Laden's top lieutenants since the early 1990s." A footnote in the dossier attributes this information to news articles from the British press and to a counter terrorism newsletter published by a Chicago think tank.
Lawyer Paul Copeland, who represents Harkat, also provided NEWSWEEK with a letter sent to him in January by John Sims, Canada's deputy Justice minister, in which the government official said he could "confirm that [in Harkat's case] the Minister of Public Safety and the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration will not rely on information provided by Mr. Zubaida [sic]." Copeland also noted that similar allegations were deleted from an official CSIS report on Adil Charkaoui.
Copeland said the Canadian government's decision to drop claims about Harkat and Charkaoui that came from the CIA's interrogations of Abu Zubaydah indicates "the government of Canada, or at least the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, has concluded that everything that came from Abu Zubaydah was obtained by torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."
Asked why the statements from Zubaydah had been dropped from the dossiers against Harkat and Charkaoui, Bernard Beckhoff, a spokesman for Canada's public safety ministry, which oversees CSIS, said he could not comment on developments in either case because they are both still before the courts. But he then added, pointedly: "The CSIS director has stated publicly that torture is morally repugnant and not particularly reliable. CSIS does not knowingly use information which has been obtained through torture."
The CIA declined to comment on the CSIS's apparent rejection of the agency's evidence. Spokesman Paul Gimigliano told NEWSWEEK, "The agency's terrorist-detention program has been run in keeping with U.S. law. The Department of Justice deemed CIA's interrogation methods to be lawful at the time of their use."
But the development was immediately seized on by human-rights advocates as proof that the Bush administration's use of interrogation techniques rejected by the rest of the world will undermine counterterrorism cases in foreign courts. "This shows how the United States is shooting itself in the foot in terrorism cases," said John Sifton, the director of One World Research, a public-interest group that investigates human-rights abuses internationally.
The Canadian action comes as controversy within the United States over waterboarding and other "aggressive" interrogation methods is escalating. At a Capitol Hill hearing last month, CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden acknowledged for the first time that the CIA had used waterboarding on three Al Qaeda detainees: Zubaydah, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks) and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri (allegedly Al Qaeda's operations chief in the Persian Gulf). American and other intelligence agencies say that Zubaydah, a longtime bin Laden lieutenant of Palestinian origin, was in charge of pre-9/11 Al Qaeda training camps and guest houses in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
All three of the waterboarded suspects were held for years by the CIA in a still-secret network of clandestine detention centers. In September 2006, President Bush ordered them and about a dozen other CIA detainees transferred to the Guantánamo detention camp. The Defense Department recently charged Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and five other men with plotting the 9/11 plot in a case that will be tried under specially set up U.S. military tribunals. The cases, for which the suspects will face the death penalty, are expected to raise a host of complex legal issues about whether the men had been subjected to mistreatment by U.S. officials. (The Justice Department recently launched a criminal investigation into reports that CIA officials destroyed videotapes of interrogations of Zubayadah and Nashiri.)
The White House and Capitol Hill continue to be at odds over the issue: Congress recently approved an intelligence authorization bill that would expressly forbid the CIA from using waterboarding and certain other interrogation methods. Although it says the U.S. government no longer engages in waterboarding, the White House has signaled President Bush will veto the measure because he does not want to tie the agency's hands in the future.
Apology to the Denver cops for the stupid way that sounded ...
At left is where I live, which for a change has to do with this story I'm going to share about the Denver cops and this stupid, stupid thing I said the other day that I am mortified about. OK so this is Tuesday or so and I'm leaving my building to go to work and these two guys who look like, you know, cops in plain clothes (note regional taste in attire), are walking up the steps and ask if I will let them in. I'm one of those people who feels pretty safe in the world, so unless you've got a crack pipe hanging from your mouth or are holding an AK-47 -- side note from Wikipedia:AK-47 is short for Russian:
Автомат Калашникова образца 1947 года; Kalashnikov model automatic rifle of 1947
LOVE THAT STUFF!! ANYWAY! Whatever, I'm probably going to let you into the building. (Like, this isn't South Africa and this isn't the suburbs, where you are more likely to be murdered in your bedroom by someone you know.) So the Denver cops are about to cross the threshold into my building and the one guy holds up a cop-style flier featuring the mugshot of a young-ish black man. The cop says: Have you seen this guy? And I look at the picture and say no. Then I proceed to say a really horrible, crappy thing. At least it comes off that way, which is why I would like to track down those nice detectives and apologize to them in person. OK so this is what I say: I go, um, I hate to say this but this is pretty much the white building and that is the black building. And I point to the building next door. Now don't get me wrong. That sounded horrible, but WHAT I MEANT was that if you sent the Census Bureau in, they would find that my building is 100 percent white, and that the building next door is 98.5 percent black -- an elderly white woman with a yap dog accounts for the 1.5 percent non-black. Can you get me here? I totally did not mean to come off as the worst racist in the history of my block. I just meant that I could save them some time. They could go door to door in my building shielding their eyes or they could go to the other building -- as a matter of fact the one detective holding the flier was like, OK, yeah, we've got the wrong address it is 1544 and this is 1540. So they headed over to the other building. STILL I FELT LIKE SHIT ALL DAY LONG. I really want to apologize to them for the way that sounded. I wish I could take it back and say, OK, purely in terms of Census figures, you'd be better off at that building over there. Nah. No matter how I said it it would have sounded awful. I should have said: I have never seen him. You might consider that building next door as well as this building. Thank you and have a nice day, detectives.
See next post on Canada. I really hate Canada because my girlfriend and I got strip-searched at the border, but I do have to do the "Go Canada" post.
Jeanie
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