Steven Aftergood linked to this colloquy on the PATRIOT Act which reveals a lot about Ron Wyden and Mark Udall’s efforts to force the government to admit how it’s suveilling Americans. The colloquy basically puts not just the agreement, but the circumstances that went into the agreement, into the Congressional record. After some Senatorial blathering [...]

I’ve been reviewing the docket on Thomas Drake’s case to see whether it touches on the privacy concerns Drake had about NSA’s post-9/11 activities. It appears it doesn’t, even while there was an ongoing dispute about whether or not Drake will have access to the materials he submitted to the DOD Inspector General in support [...]

The other day, when Sheldon Whitehouse asked Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar why BP had gotten an exemption from the full-blown NEPA process from which it presumably should have been categorically excluded, Salazar referenced a 30-day deadline from Congress to approve exploration plans. Senator, there has been significant environmental review, including Environmental Impact Statements that [...]

At yesterday’s Environment and Public Works hearing on the BP disaster, Sheldon Whitehouse asked Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Council on Environmental Quality Chair Helen Sutley why BP had been exempted from doing an Environmental Impact Study on the Macondo drilling site. He listed a number of things that should categorically exclude a project from [...]

In response to the news that David Margolis spiked the misconduct conclusion in the OPR Report on OLC justifications for torture, I wanted to put together a timeline of its construction. Two things stick out. First, the role of Mary Patrice Brown–who replaced Marshall Jarrett at a time when OPR was backing off its offer [...]

There’s something missing from the EFF document dump: Sheldon Whitehouse’s efforts to get language from four different OLC opinions authorizing Bush’s surveillance program declassified. Not only should some of those efforts be included in the document dump–but they provide keys for understanding the communications within the document dump.

Not like it’ll matter to Republicans who are attacking Eric Holder’s decision. But Sheldon Whitehouse slammed Republicans for beating up on federal prosecutors. And then he got really steamed, accusing the Republicans of politicizing prosecutorial opinions. From my perspective, popular opinion is a very dangerous bellwether to hold prosecutors to. … I think it gets [...]

The discussion in Thursday’s hearing on the PATRIOT Act pertaining to ongoing investigations.

The only responsible thing for a Prosecutor to do is investigate the facts.

Eric Holder doesn’t think it problematic to give John Rizzo–and others at the CIA who made representations on which OLC wrote opinions authorizing torture–a chance to review the OPR report on those OLC memos.