August 1st, 2008
I’d like to take a moment to bask in nostalgia. It was just a little over two years ago, in the heady days of the do-nothing Republican Congress, and when the President’s approval ratings were several points higher than Nixon’s corpse, that Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska stepped onto the floor of the Senate Commerce committee chambers to inform America that, “The Internet is not just something that you dump something on. It’s not a big truck. It’s series of tubes.”
Thank you, Senator. Thank you for your words of wisdom.
Ahh, so many jokes were spawned by that one little sentence. I can personally thank the Senator for at least five News segments worth of material. It was the most perfect illustration of technological illiteracy by one of our nation’s leaders up until we found out that his colleague, Senator McCain, is “aware” of the Internet.
We’ve come a long way since then. The Internet comes on wires these days. Perhaps Senator Stevens should have paid more attention to the wires, or the wiretapping legislation that he helped sign into law.
• Streaming audio of Senator Stevens’ comments before the markup committee
The Senator had better keep close track of who’s tapping his own tubes in the coming months, and we’ll tell you why here on the Timothy Jordan Show News for the very first day of August (It’s really August already?), on this fine Friday in 2008.
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The longest-serving Republican in Congress, Ted Stevens has been a veritable fountain of special interest and earmarked money for his home state of Alaska since being elected in 1968. He backed, for instance, a plan to Federally fund a $400 million dollar bridge to connect Gravina island to the mainland.
Not surprising in a state where most of the revenue is generated through oil production, the Senator was also on very close terms with oil drilling and support companies.
A little too close, according to Federal investigators, who have charged the Senator with seven counts of making false statements on his Federal financial disclosure forms.
The yearly disclosures are required by a 1978 Congressional ethics reform law. They are a publicly available line-item breakdown of any debts over $10,000, or gifts worth more than the yearly maximum, between $260 and $305 for the years in question here, to a member of Congress, their spouse, or dependent children.
Starting in 1999, the indictment alleges, Senator Stevens forgot to include gifts from one Bill Allen, the CEO of VECO corporation, one of Alaska’s largest private companies. The gifts in question range from a car swap, where Mr. Allen traded a brand-new Land Rover for Mr. Stevens’ 1964 Mustang and $5,000 in cash, a deal nearly 20 grand in the Senator’s favor.
VECO then began performing a six-year renovation project on one of the Senator’s homes in Alaska, work that totaled more than $250,000 in free labor and materials. None of this was reported on the Senator’s disclosure forms.
During this period of time the Federal indictment says that he used his position of influence to help VECO land lucrative contracts, government grants, and greasing the paperwork for a major gas pipeline project in Alaska, although there are currently no charges of bribery.
The Senator plead not guilty to all seven counts of making false statements when he appeared in Federal court earlier this week.
The indictment has been a long time coming. Federal Agents raided the Senator’s residences in Alaska just about one year ago, and the other person directly named in the case, Bill Allen, avoided heavier Federal bribery charges by pleading guilty to providing nearly a half million dollars in “illegal benefits” to politicians.
In fact many observers, myself included, expected heavier charges against the Senator. The Department of Justice said in their announcement of the indictment that a further criminal investigation is ongoing.
We won’t be weeping any tears for the Senator around here. Aside from being one of the chief opponents of Network Neutrality legislation, Stevens has also been a staunch supporter of the wiretapping that brought him to court this week, and a champion of global warming deniers.
• DoJ, U.S. Senator Indicted on False Statement Charges
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Another thing we won’t be shedding shedding tears over is the Global War on Terror. Using a tool as blunt as the U.S. military to conduct global operations against small terrorist organizations has always struck my Staff and I as pure folly. Smart bombs and network warfare are great for blowing up bridges and assuring air supremacy, but they don’t do much for targets shaped more like a guy with a backpack.
Check it out: Tim has a backpack. He could be a terrorist. I can say for certain that he isn’t because I know him, and that’s how terrorist groups are defeated.
The RAND Corporation agrees. According to a new book out this week by the esteemed think-tank, military force is the least effective tool available in a battle with terrorists.
Surprisingly, they say that theirs was the first major study into how terrorist organizations come to an end. In 83% of the cases that they surveyed, civil measures, either police work or political reconciliation, marked the end for terrorist groups.
Only 7% of the time was direct military action effective. That covers just 19 of the 268 terrorist groups from the last forty years considered in the RAND study that came to an end.
Terrorist organizations were victorious more often than they were defeated through military action.
The report concludes that in situations where political accommodation isn’t possible, I’m looking at you al Qaeda, simple police work is most effective in destroying terrorist organizations.
Hopefully this is another nail in the coffin of the Global War of Error.
• RAND, HOW TERRORIST
GROUPS END Lessons for Countering al Qa’ida PDF
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Coffins are also being nailed in the nearly seven year-old investigation into the five letters full of anthrax mailed in the weeks after the 2001 terrorist attacks.
The FBI confirmed this morning that a senior researcher at the U.S. Army biodefense lab at Ft. Detrick, Bruce Ivins, committed suicide Tuesday, soon after being issued with a summons to appear before a Federal grand jury this afternoon.
His counselor recently filed a restraining order against him, saying that he had a history of homicidal threats and sociopathic behavior dating back to grad school. That restraining order has been rescinded in light of its target’s death.
His suicide is being equated to likely proof of guilt in the media, but as with everything around this case, we’re a little more skeptical around here.
Remember that this isn’t the first time someone was linked with the investigation. Steven Hatfill, another researcher at Ft. Detrick, was originally identified as a “person of interest” in the case in the years after the attack. He has since won over $15 million in damages as a result of successful lawsuits against the government and the publisher of Readers Digest for the media circus that descended upon him after his name became public.
The same investigative subtlety that drove Mr. Hatfill crazy was applied to Mr. Ivins as well. Little is known about his interactions with the FBI in the last few months, or the timeline of the investigation, but they’ve never really been known to be all that subtle.
If claims about his long-term mental health are true, then a comprehensive FBI investigation would have been a significant strain. The restraining order, leaked to The Smoking Gun, claims that he threatened his counselor three times earlier this month, before being voluntarily committed to a mental ward on the 16th of July.
On Tuesday he committed suicide by overdosing on over the counter medication.
He may or may not have been guilty, but his death is awfully convenient for the government in either case. The investigation has made no clear progress since it began, and although the FBI was apparently confident enough to consider issuing charges against Dr. Ivins, that’s far short of a conviction.
• DoJ, Statement by the Department of Justice on the Anthrax Investigation
• The Smoking Gun, Anthrax Suspect “Homicidal, Sociopathic”
• FBI Amerithrax investigation page
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Our coverage of the warrantless wiretapping program continues with an update on the legal fight over the future of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
The ACLU had asked that one of their representatives be present during FISC reviews of Federal government wiretap requests. They want to provide an advocate for people being targeted by the surveillance court, creating a more normal court structure.
The Bush Administration has, to nobody’s surprise, filed a motion to dismiss the request, saying that the ACLU doesn’t currently have access to the classified certifications, and therefore can’t provide meaningful arguments.
The government also objects to the presence of any third-party during secret trials where classified information is likely to be present.
When you’re engaging in wholesale surveillance of Americans in direct violation of the 4th Amendment, you’re going to be understandably skittish about things like independent oversight.
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I like oversight, open and visible oversight. I consider it excellent, and I’ll consider this…
There’s this thing that we have in this country that a lot of people in our government don’t like very much. It’s called the Freedom of Information Act. Within a few exemptions, Federal agencies are required to provide access to the public when official information is requested.
This all being thoroughly embedded within the legal system, you’ve got to know a little bit about what you’re requesting. Spell something wrong, and they’ll quite clearly tell you that what you requested doesn’t exist.
This being the Federal government, and usually the more secretive agencies at that, it understandably takes quite a long time to see a successful request through to the end. Russ Kick, editor at The Memory Hole, had that kind of patience. He waited nearly four years and spent some $700 in fees, but in the end was the proud owner of 687 pages of blank National Security Agency paperwork.
Representing 400 different standard forms, the papers are a window into that highly paranoid agency. Some of them are entirely standard, like motor pool requests and daily allowance forms.
But others are a little more interesting. The form for approving release of material relating to the FISA caught my eye while looking over the collection. Also notable was the checklist for secure classified facilities. It lays out exactly what the NSA looks for in a secure location. It’s detailed enough to be a good baseline for building your own.
If you’ve ever wanted to get a better sense of No Such Agency’s daily culture, it’d be hard to find a better source.
And for that Russ and The Memory Hole win this week’s Award of Excellence.
• The Memory Hole, [exclusive] Over 400 forms used by the National Security Agency
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That’d be the News for the first day of August, Ought-Eight.