Now that John Ensign has moved out of C Street, I propose a reality show to decide which moralizing hypocrite is best suited to replace him.

Thomas Fingar gives some background on the 2002 Iraq NIE, the 2007 Climate Change NIA, and the 2007 Iran NIE.

As you reflect on the horrible vote that traded reproductive choice for health care, remember that the champion of that vote is one of C Street’s top Democratic members.

As you all might know, we here at Emptywheel are car people. And one annoying thread ran common as a persistent undercurrent through all of our auto and auto bailout coverage over the last year, and that was how pitiful and incompetent the American marques were, how much they deserved their fate and how awesome [...]

The state secrets doctrine was born on the wings of fraud and lies by the US government in the case of US v. Reynolds in 1953. As Congress struggles to rein in the unbridled use of the doctrine to cover up illegality by the Executive Branch (see here, here and here), it is a good [...]

At first, I was surprised when reading about Cheney’s apparently good recall about the orders he gave the CIA seven years ago, given how forgetful he was about having ordered Scooter Libby to leak Valerie Plame’s identity. But when I looked closer, it became clear that he was just as forgetful about torture as he was about outing Valerie Plame.

Go donate to First Draft so Athenae can write more righteous rants against bad reporting.

The House Judiciary just passed Jerry Nadler’s bill reining in state secrets abuse by a vote of 18-12, with Adam Schiff as the sole Democrat voting against the bill. One thing Nadler has added to his bill since it was first introduced are measures to prevent the government from refusing to give plaintiff lawyers clearance [...]

We’re back, waiting to get a quorum. Watch along here. Schiff: Strike ordinary pen register and trap and trace changes. Follow-up to Rooney amendment, potential unintended consequences on changing trap and trace. Avoid unintended consequences. Smith: Strikes higher standard for pen register and adds audit. Schiff: Yes. Calls for same audit in one context extended [...]

Liveblog from today’s HJC hearing on PATRIOT reauthorization and State Secrets.