I’ll have more on Maureen Mahoney’s first response on behalf of Jay Bybee to the OPR report later today. But I wanted to draw attention to a footnote she includes to–apparently–explain that Jay Bybee was a very busy man at the time when he was supposed to be overseeing John Yoo’s attempts to legalize torture [...]

Practically the first thing Pat Roberts did after he became Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee was to back down off nascent efforts Bob Graham had made as SSCI Chair to exercise real oversight over the torture program. That’s one of the most important details revealed in the Memo for the Record [big PDF] of [...]

The latest Ghost Detainee FOIA materials [long pdf] (for a general overview see this post) prove that Michael Hayden lied to the Senate on April 12, 2007. One of the things included in this packet is a heavily redacted transcript of Hayden’s classified briefing to the Senate Intelligence Committee (SSCI) on April 12, 2007. There’s [...]

In the midst of all the excitement over the OPR release, there’s an equally revealing FOIA release in CCR and Amnesty International’s Ghost Detainee FOIA. I will do very detailed posts on each of the Memoranda for the Record included in this release. But here’s a general overview of what is included in the release: [...]

The Toyota hearings this week–particularly Wednedsay’s hearing featuring Akio Toyoda–are looking more and more devastating. The Detroit News reports that the House Oversight Committee has an internal Toyota presentation from last July boasting that it had saved $100 million by doing its bullshit floor mat recall in 2007, rather than isolating the real source of [...]

The first, and most obvious, issue of conflict with OPR is that it places evaluation and resolution of ethical complaints against DOJ attorneys in the hands of the DOJ. The power to determine whether there is any impropriety is solely within the hands of those supervising and/or ultimately responsible for the impropriety. It is a process ripe with conflict and cronyism that protects DOJ malfeasants at the expense of the public interest and well being.

As I noted yesterday (though I got the details slightly wrong), the OPR report revealed that a number of John Yoo and Patrick Philbin’s emails had been deleted (and that Goldsmith’s had been deleted but were subsequently recovered). OLC initially provided us with a relatively small number of emails, files, and draft documents. After it [...]

Happy Saturday. Memorandum for the Attorney General OPR Final Report (a searchable copy, courtesy of burnt, is here) OPR 1st Draft Report (a searchable copy, courtesy of burnt, is here) OPR 2nd Draft Report Yoo Response to OPR 2nd Draft Yoo Response to OPR Final Draft Bybee Response to OPR 2nd Draft Bybee Response to [...]

A great way to spend a Friday night–reading this with all my friends! Memorandum for the Attorney General OPR Final Report OPR 1st Draft Report OPR 2nd Draft Report Yoo Response to OPR 2nd Draft Yoo Response to OPR Final Draft Bybee Response to OPR 2nd Draft Bybee Response to OPR Final Draft I’m working [...]

DOJ has posted its Anthrax Report and related documents. The Justice Department, FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service today announced that the investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks, which killed five individuals and sickened 17 others, has formally concluded. Earlier today, representatives of the FBI and Justice Department provided a 92-page investigative summary along with [...]