Team Obama is now at snooping squared — the neoliberal Panopticon

The New York Times reports that NSA warrantless wiretapping is just the tip of a much bigger iceberg that Dear Leader is inflicting on us.

We've got such overkill we're now like the Tsarist Okhrana in the last years before World War I. Here’s your nut graf:

Across the federal government, undercover work has become common enough that undercover agents sometimes find themselves investigating a supposed criminal who turns out to be someone from a different agency, law enforcement officials said. In a few situations, agents have even drawn their weapons on each other before realizing that both worked for the federal government.

None of this surprises me out of Obama, who seems to be combining a neoliberal version of a nanny state in some ways with a neoliberal version of a kinder, gentler Panopticon in others.

And, as the next two grafs after that note, sometimes, it's three federal agencies. Even worse, with the trickle-down militarization and related things happening to state- or local-level law enforcement, the snooping is there, too:

“There are all sorts of stories about undercover operations gone bad,” Jeff Silk, a longtime undercover agent and supervisor at the Drug Enforcement Administration, said in an interview. “People are always tripping and falling over each other’s cases.” 

Mr. Silk, who retired this year, cited a case that he supervised in which the D.E.A. was wiretapping suspects in a drug ring in Atlanta, only to discover that undercover agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement were trying to infiltrate the same ring. The F.B.I. and the New York Police Department were involved in the case as well.

OK, as a civil libertarian liberal, tell me, "right or wrong" Democrats — why would I vote for any 2016 presidential candidate of yours who doesn't immediately repudiate this, and sound sincere in doing so?

I'm of course talking first and foremost about one "Clinton, Hilary." 

As for the neoliberal angle? Most neoliberalist thought is about making the government more efficient, with market standards, but ... that's only true until it's not:

Most federal agencies declined to discuss the number of undercover agents they employed or the types of investigations they handled. The numbers are considered confidential and are not listed in public budget documents, and even Justice Department officials say they are uncertain how many agents work undercover. 

But current and former law enforcement officials said the number of federal agents doing such work appeared to total well into the thousands, with many agencies beefing up their ranks in recent years, or starting new undercover units. An intelligence official at the Department of Homeland Security, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss classified matters, said the agency alone spent $100 million annually on its undercover operations. With large numbers of undercover agents at the F.B.I. and elsewhere, the costs could reach hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

In short, this is all black box budgeting, just like the CIA, but spreading. Actually, the costs probably reach billions a year. With no guarantee of results — other than, of course, the "results" of manufactured cases, entrapment (even if never provable in court), and likely, some "quota" system of arrests and charges now in place at many of these agencies. 

On the entrapment issue? Just because former FBI head Bob Mueller says it hasn't won in court doesn't mean that entrapment isn't happening. Since 9/11, if the charge is "terrorism," a federal prosecutor can not only indict a ham sandwich before a grand jury, he or she can get a trial jury to give it 5 to 10 in the federal pen.

And, I'm sure that departing AG Eric Holder, just like his Bushie predecessor Alberto Gonzales, signed off on any legal questions.

Unfortunately, GOP senators who grill Obama's nominee to replace him, Loretta Lynch, will for the most part do so only for political theater, not for real concern. There's a few exceptions, but not many.

And, as for getting any of this declared unconstitutional in today's climate?

At the Supreme Court, small teams of undercover officers dress as students at large demonstrations outside the courthouse and join the protests to look for suspicious activity, according to officials familiar with the practice.

Given that the chief justice, John Roberts, oversees all aspects of the federal judiciary, surely he's not ignorant about this. 

NYT Sotomayor editorial chock full of legal idiots

Dear Gail Collins: Who within the New York Times op-ed staff had the dim-bulb idea of including Michael Chertoff and Alberto Gonzales in a mock questionnaire for Sonia Sotomayor?

Rather than this being a sign of Holder’s independence, you have to wonder if this was discussed in detail with the Obama White House.

Gonzo finally gets a job

But, contrary to the most fervent hopes of former Attorney General, and former White House Counsel, Alberto Gonzales, he won’t be replacing Bud Selig as commish of baseball. He won’t even be getting a cush Austin or Houston job.

Nope, he’s headed further west, to the windy plains of Lubbock.

Note to Alberto Gonzales – don’t plan a Spanish vacation

You may be indicted for trial there -- trial on war crimes related to Gitmo.

You, Doug Feith, John Yoo, David Addington, John Bybee, David Haynes.

Judge Baltasar Garzon, the same judge who nailed Pinochet, has agreed to open a case.

BushCo hates bloggers in the name of national security

The Bush Administration strenuously opposes Sen. Arlen Specter’s media shield law. Why?

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the bill would erect roadblocks to gathering information “from anyone who can claim to be a journalist, including bloggers.”

The legislation gives an overly broad definition of journalists that “can include those linked to terrorists and criminals,” wrote Attorney General Michael Mukasey and National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the nation would be more vulnerable to “adversaries’ counterintelligence efforts to recruit” those shielded by the bill.

Bullshit, bullshit, and bullshit.

We know the real reason they’re saying this is the same reason Mukasey took top blog Talking Points Memo off the AG’s daily e-mail news summary mailing.

They hate bloggers.

Why?

TPM got former AG Alberto Gonzales canned over partisan firings of district attorneys.

Bloggers got House Democrats to stiffen up and pass a FISA bill without telco immunity.

Bloggers took Bush, Uncle Fester Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld et al to task on Iraq long before the mainstream media had a clue.

George W. Bush, for the remaining nine and a half months of his term (not starring Mickey Rourke as Bush) wants to spy on bloggers.

It’s that simple.

Gonzo could be prosecuted for U.S. DA firings

Yes, former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may face federal charges over his canning district attorneys for political reasons, with the fallout apparently disrupting a number of cases.

Nobody this side of George W. Bush or Richard B. Cheney deserves an obstruction of justice charge more.

Are Democrats being hypocritical on Gonzo?

Both Slate and the L.A. Times weigh in on the split-personality behavior of House and Senate Democrats pummeling Alberto Gonzales for his politicizing the Department of Justice and, in doing so, apparently perjuring himself, then turning around and giving him massive new powers to control National Security Agency spying.

Both articles suggest political considerations are at stake. To the degree that’s true, then Democrats stand guilty of letting our civil liberties, in the FISA expansion bill, be made hostage to politics.

First, Slate’s always-incisive Dahlia Lithwick:

Imagine that the Democrats had been hollering for the past six months that Gonzales was an out-of-control drunk. With their eavesdropping vote, they've handed him the keys to a school bus. Nobody was forcing these Democrats to impeach or censure the AG. But this warm pat on the back they have offered him is beyond incredible.

With this FISA vote, the Democrats have compromised the investigation into the U.S. attorney scandal. They've shown themselves either to be participating in an empty political witch hunt or curiously willing to surrender our civil liberties to someone who has shown — time and again — that he cannot be trusted to safeguard them. The image of Democrats hypocritically berating the attorney general with fingers crossed behind their backs is ultimately no less appalling than an attorney general swearing to uphold the Constitution with fingers crossed behind his own.

Then the Times:

Democrats are not winning the battle to force Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales from office, stymied by a legal system that gives the Bush administration wide discretion to block investigations of itself. And they are not getting the White House witnesses or records they have demanded in recent weeks.

But many Democrats are fine with that.

Although they may prove fruitless, the Democrats’ investigative efforts may help keep President Bush and his administration the center of attention in next year’s elections, even as the Republican Party chooses a new standard-bearer and tries to move on.

Now, a bone to pick with the Times. The legal system hasn’t “given” Bush any such power; instead, he has arbitrarily seized it, which makes Congress’ failure to do more even more inexcusable.

In any case, one Democratic strategist owns up to the idea.

“This becomes a piece of the race,” said David E. Bonior, a former Michigan congressman who is managing Democrat John Edwards’ presidential campaign. By highlighting Bush’s allegiance to Gonzales, Democrats hope to make a point about how a Democratic administration would be different, drawing “the contrast of what we have and what we could have,” Bonior said.

The Times article goes on to point out that Democrats have already cut “linkage” campaign ads against New Mexico GOP Congresswoman Heather Wilson.

So, expect no escalation of attempts to get Gonzo out of office; the FISA expansion clearly indicates that, as Lithwick notes. And, expect no Democratic campaign contributions from people like Skippy and me.

FISA court ruling behind Bush attempt to expand wiretaps

According to Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, that’s why Bush is asking for expanded powers:

(House Minority Leader John) Boehner’s description of the scope of the ruling appears to focus on one key feature of the surveillance program—the large-scale tapping without warrants of telecommunications "switches" located in the United States; they are used to rout international calls even when both parties are overseas. But there are indications the ruling has in some instances interfered with the National Security Agency's ability to intercept phone calls where one of the parties is in the United States, as well.

Under President Bush's original executive order creating the surveillance program after the September 11 attacks, the NSA eavesdropped on such calls (including those with at least one party inside the country) without seeking specific warrants from the FISA court. …

At some point after the new program began, one of the FISA judges—who, by rotation, was assigned to review the program for periodic updates — concluded that some aspects of the warrantless eavesdropping program exceeded the NSA's authority under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. … The judge refused to reauthorize the complete program in the way it had been previously approved by at least one earlier FISA judge, the lawyer said, adding that the secret decision was a "big deal" for the administration.

Congressional aides said that Democratic and Republican leaders of the intelligence committees met until late Tuesday night trying to reach an agreement on a short-term measure that would grant some of the enhanced authority — including the ability to tap telecommunications switches without warrants — that the administration is seeking.

The even bigger problem, though, is that Bush wants Attorney General Alberto (V-05) Gonzales to have an oversight role. But, given his partisan hackery, there’s no guarantee he won’t try to use data mining from this program for political purposes. Given his perjury before Congress, there’s no guarantee he wouldn’t lie about having done that.

It’s good that Congress is resisting the expansion of NSA power on this ground. But, with this administration in place, I still say it should be resisting any expansion of NSA power, period.

Again, whatever restrictions BushCo is worried about didn’t seem to unduly restrict the Clinton Administration, and Congress needs to remember that.

Yet more on the ruling is in the L.A. Times and Washington Post.

The Times provides more detail on the court ruling:

(Some) officials said the ruling's reach was broader, affecting cases “where one end is foreign and you don't know where the other is” — meaning warrants would be required even when it was unclear whether communications were crossing the United States or involved a person in the United States.

One official said the issue centered on a ruling in which a FISA court judge rejected a government application for a “basket warrant” — a term that refers to court approval for surveillance activity encompassing multiple targets, rather than warrants issued on a case-by-case basis for surveillance of specific terrorism suspects.

The precise effect of the ruling is unclear, but a second official said that it “reduced the amount of intelligence we were collecting” on overseas terrorism suspects.

According to the Post, it sounds like Democrats are already ready to give away the store, with the exception of the Gonzo oversight issue:

Congressional Democrats outlined a temporary plan yesterday that would expand the government's authority to conduct electronic surveillance of overseas communications in search of terrorists.

The proposal, according to House and Senate Democrats, would permit a secret court to issue broad orders approving eavesdropping of communications involving suspects overseas and other people, who may be in the United States. To issue an order, the court would not need to identify a particular target overseas, but it would have to determine that those being targeted are “likely,” in fact, overseas.

If a foreign target’s communications to a person inside the United States reaches a “significant” number, then an court order based on probable cause would be required. It is unclear how “significant” would be defined.

It is truly both scary and fubar that Congressional Democrats would approve a FISA expansion with a blank check line item like failure to define “significant.”

At least a few Democrats still have their wits about them. From the Post story:

Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) said that the proposal, while better than the administration's, “does not have adequate safeguards to protect Americans’ privacy.”

It’s clear, and the Post makes it clear, this could significantly expand e-mail and phone snooping on American citizens and companies.

I also can’t believe that the Democrats don’t recognize that, through executive order or signing statement, Bush will try to make permanent any new provisions enacted in a temporary bill. I don’t care if the bill has a six-month “sunset” provision; I expect Bush would try to ignore that in any way possible.

Contempt? Yes. Right now? No. Ditto for perjury

The House Judiciary Committee, on party-line vote yesterday, approved contempt citations on Josh Bolton and Harriett Miers, but an anonymous top Democratic official said the full House wasn’t likely to take up the matter until after the August recess.

Now, this A. None Mouse may argue this gives Bush more time to rethink his stance, and for Fielding to reach an acceptable compromise with Congress.

I’m here to tell her or him: “Ain’t gonna happen.” All you’re doing is giving Bush one more month on the calendar to stall this out until the end of his term. Look at how much time he has already gotten.

On Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy now says he is giving Attorney General Alberto Gonzales until late next week to revise his testimony.

Hell, give him ’til Christmas; it ain’t happening. There’s a proper pace for proceedings like this, yes, but given how much Gonzo testimony water has already passed under the bridge, Leahy needs to stop confusing “proper pace” and “snail’s pace.”

If this isn’t grounds for a Congressional perjury charge against Gonzo, what is?

As this Newsweek/Washington Post article spells out, Alberto V-05 clearly perjured himself before Congress. The details:

As he sought to renew the USA Patriot Act two years ago, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales assured lawmakers that the FBI had not abused its potent new terrorism-fighting powers. "There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse," Gonzales told senators on April 27, 2005.

Six days earlier, the FBI sent Gonzales a copy of a report that said its agents had obtained personal information that they were not entitled to have. It was one of at least half a dozen reports of legal or procedural violations that Gonzales received in the three months before he made his statement to the Senate intelligence committee, according to internal FBI documents released under the Freedom of Information Act.

Now, I can already tell you what the various reactions out of Gonzo’s mouth might be:
• “These were just procedural issues;
• “Trust me, nobody’s civil liberties were violated”
• “Mistakes were made”;

Already, DOJ spokesperson Brian Roehrkasse is seeking to “contextualize” Gonzo’s statements.

However, he and Gonzo are undercut, in the story, despite Roehrkasse’s attempt to spin that, as well:

Each of the violations cited in the reports copied to Gonzales was serious enough to require notification of the President's Intelligence Oversight Board, which helps police the government's surveillance activities. The format of each memo was similar, and none minced words.

The oversight board, staffed with intelligence experts from inside and outside government, was established to report to the attorney general and president about civil liberties abuses or intelligence lapses. But Roehrkasse said the fact that a violation is reported to the board "does not mean that a USA Patriot violation exists or that an individual's civil liberties have been abused."

Looking beyond this spin, this revelation about Gonzo’s brazenness is not a tree falling in a people-deserted forest. Instead, it topples right in the midst of multiple House and Senate attempts to obtain new White House testimony on DOJ, its warrantless wiretapping, its politically-based firings of district attorneys, Vice President Cheney’s secretiveness and more.

Will Democrats do what they need to do and prefer charges against Gonzo? Will they push back? I, for one, am not holding my breath too long at this point.

WHY the Gonzo-Card rush to Ashcroft’s hospital?

On a political chat site, an acquaintance raised this issue about why Alberto Gonzales and Andrew Card felt they HAD to rush to John Ashcroft’s hospital bed and force him to sign another extension for their domestic warrentless wiretapping, when such extensions ran just 45 days at a time anyway.

My answer?

Could this be because political ops were involved?

Here’s what I told her:

I haven’t seen THAT broached yet on Talking Points Memo. It’s a VERY good question, though.

A possibility that pops into my head, given what all else were finding out about Gonzo and Rove and the “vote fraud” scam-crap, and how the Watergate similarities are ratcheting up ...

This is 2004, mind you. Presidential election year, etc.

What if some of this wiretapping is, as with the Nixon years (and some degree the Johnson years) ...

Political operations?

Think about it.

Lindsey Graham offers Alberto Gonzales a “spinning” lifeline

And he’s still too dumb to take it.

The South Carolina senator basically offered the attorney general a “get out of jail free” card during the AG’s April 19 Senate Judiciary Committee testimony.

Graham, in an obviously rhetorical question, said (semi-direct quote from listening to an NPR rehash), “These were all about personality conflicts, weren’t they?”

Easy way for Gonzo to admit that yes, they weren’t performance-based (since not a single GOP senator will defend that one), but deny they were based on the GOP’s jihad about purging minority voters from voter lists and otherwise turning voting rights issues on its head.

Sounds like a great out. I bet Graham could have lined up Senate GOP support for that talking point; he may even have done it before he threw it out there.

But, V-05 is, and was, just too damn dumb.

N.M. Senate prez indicted; but will he be convicted, because of BushCo meddling?

Politically-fired U.S. District Attorney David Iglesias DID have a corruption case under investigation. New Mexico State Senate President Pro Tem Manny Aragon (a known sleaze since I worked at a N.M. paper a decade ago, and before that, has been indicted in a $4.2 million public funds skimming scheme.

The problem, as similarly-fired U.S. District Attorney Bud Cummins puts it? The political nature of Iglesias’ firing is a GREAT defense team weapon for Aragon’s lawyers.

Way to go, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, et al.

NOW Bush and Alberto V-05 have done it: Pissed off John Conyers

The Michigan congressman, who just happens to be chair of the House Judiciary Committee, is steaming about the firing of federal district attorneys for political reasons.

Alberto V-05 (I’m sure W didn’t give Alberto Gonzales this nickname, but I am) has one week, according to a letter Conyers sent him, to provide whole lotsa info about the firings.

The Dallas Morning News veers right on Cabinet ideas

The News apparently thinks Nov. 2 was a Bush mandate, based on its Nov. 7 editorial suggesting Bush second-term Cabinet picks. By starting with John Negroponte, rather than the talked-up consensus pick, John Danforth, the News showed just how Cro-Magnon it still is at times.

Here's my reply to editorial page editor Keven Ann Willey.

1. Negroponte at State? The man who says he knew nothing about Central American right-wing killers when he was down there? I'd pay a Senator to mention "School of the Americas" during his confirmation hearing.
And why, when so many people are talking more multilateralist sounding Danforth, would you even mention Negroponte, who is certainly not known as that?
2. Rice at Defense? She should, rightfully, get flayed over Iraq, and her pre 9/11 failures. She's not shown enough bureaucratic or managerial skills, either.
Your "one-two punch" would likely leave many foreign leaders shaking their heads.
3. Rudy for Homeland Security? The civil liberties minded would bring up Louima or Diallo. I'd bring up the "the troops lost the HDX" comment, too.
4. Rudman would be good as intelligence czar. Who’d be better but will never get appointed by Bush: Richard Clarke.
5. Gonzales as AG? Not after his "you can ignore the Genevas and rewrite international law" legal memos to Bush. Horrible choice.
6. Pete Peterson would be great at NEC, but his advice to Bush would go down a black hole, unfortunately, unless Senate Republicans could get him to leak enough to lean on Bush.