Silvestre Reyes

Deal in the Works for FISA Law?

Andrew Tilghman | June 4, 2008, 3:28PM

House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) may have agreed to a compromise on a deal to rewrite the nation's electronic surveillance laws.

A report in Congress Daily says Reyes is "fine" with the Republican-brokered deal that would "leave it up to the secret FISA court to grant retroactive legal immunity" to telecoms that helped the Bush administration's warrantless conduct surveillance on U.S. citizens.

But an aide for Reyes appeared to backpedal, saying Reyes still supported a proposal being pushed by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) to shift the decision-making about immunity from the secret FISA courts to traditional federal courts.

William Jefferson

More Jefferson Family Indictments?

Andrew Tilghman | June 4, 2008, 1:59PM

The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that a sister of Rep. William Jefferson is facing imminent indictment:

U.S. Attorney Jim Letten is expected to announce this afternoon that 4th District Assessor Betty Jefferson, an elder sister of U.S. Rep. William Jefferson, has been indicted on fraud-related charges by a federal grand jury. At least one other sibling, the previously indicted Mose Jefferson, is also expected to face additional charges, sources close to the case said.

Letten has scheduled a news conference for 2 p.m. He declined to comment.
Sources close to the investigation say the charges are the culmination of a probe into charities run by members of the Jefferson family and their allies. In a rare move, the FBI announced it was investigating the nonprofits after a 2006 Times-Picayune story revealed apparent self-dealing at them.

Jefferson is still fighting his own federal corruption charges.

Condi Rice

Today's Must Read

Andrew Tilghman | June 4, 2008, 10:01AM

In a speech yesterday to the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee in Washington, Condoleezza Rice did a little saber-rattling on Iran, in a tone the New York Times described as "unusually sharp":

"We would be willing to meet with them but not while they continue to inch toward nuclear weapons under the cover of talks," she told the group, a pro-Israel lobby known by its acronym, Aipac. "The real question isn't why won't the Bush administration talk to Iran. The real question is why won't Iran talk to us."

How much do Rice's comments reflect President Bush's views? It's long been known that few senior officials have the ear of the President like his secretary of state and former national security adviser. But former presidential press secretary Scott McClellan put a finer point on it in little noticed but exceptional criticisms of Rice in his new memoir, What Happened, published this week:

My later experiences with Condi led me to believe she was more interested in figuring out where the president stood and just carrying out his wishes while expending only cursory effort in helping him understand all the considerations and potential consequences.

McClellan marveled at her ability to remain at the center of the Iraq-policy decision makers since the administration's earliest days, yet rarely receive much criticism about the handling of the war.

Over time, however, I was stuck by how deft she is at protecting her reputation. No matter what went wrong, she was somehow able to keep her hands clean, even when the problems related to matters under her direct purview, including the WMD rationale for war in Iraq, the decision to invade Iraq, the sixteen words in the State of the Union address, and postwar planning and implementation of the strategy in Iraq.

Although she had been the presidents top foreign policy advisor and coordinator of his national security team, she has largely allowed responsibility for all these matters to fall on people like former CIA Director George Tenant, Paul Bremer and Don Rumsfeld.

But it was her relationship with the President that was the controlling influence on her own decision-making, McClellan asserts:

In private she complimented and reinforced Bush's instincts rather than challenging and questioning them. As far as I could tell from internal meeting and discussions, Condi invariably fell in line with the president's thinking.

As a result, McClellan suggests historians may not be kind to Rice.

If, as president Bush likes to say, results really do matter, then history will likely judge her harshly as the person responsible for overseeing a number of the defining -- and, at least in the short term, ill-fated -- policies of the Bush administration.

Guantanamo

Army Gets Defensive about Gitmo Judge's Removal

Andrew Tilghman | June 3, 2008, 6:52PM

A lot of eyebrows were raised by the Pentagon's decision last week to remove a judge presiding over a key war crimes tribunal at Guantanamo Bay.

Defense attorneys say the military judge was removed because he'd made several rulings in favor of the defendant, a Canadian national named Omar Khadr who was detained at the age of 15 in Afghanistan in 2002.

The military may also be pushing to convene Guantanamo's first terrorism trial -- sure to be a cable TV news event -- at the height of the presidential election season this fall, defense attorneys say.

Now the military brass is getting defensive about the judge's removal.

The Miama Herald reports:

Chief judge Marine Col. Ralph Kohlmann said he was making the rare public statement because last week's dismissal of Col. Peter Brownback raised questions about the independence of military officers presiding over tribunals at the Guantanamo Bay Navy base in Cuba.

"Any suggestion that my detailing of another military judge was driven by or prompted by any decisions or rulings made by Colonel Brownback is incorrect," Kohlmann said in the statement e-mailed to reporters.

Kohlmann said the Army decided by February to let Brownback's active-duty service orders expire.

But that struck many observers as odd, since Brownback had offered to remain on the case as long as needed and had received three annual extensions during the past few years.

Kohlmann said the Army made its decision "based on a number of manpower management considerations" unrelated to the tribunals.

The Herald also notes the rising tension between the judge and the military prosecutors in the case.

At a May 8 hearing, Brownback said that he had "badgered, beaten and bruised" by prosecutors to set a trial date. But he refused to do so before they satisfied defense requests for access to potential evidence, even threatening to suspend the proceedings unless the detention center provided records of Khadr's confinement.

The judge's removal and the taint of political interference has sparked a lot of controversy in Canada, where there is growing pressure for the government to demand Khadr's repatriation if the case is not soon resolved.

Editorial writers at the Globe and Mail, a Toronto-based national newspaper, appeared skeptical of the Army's explanation.

Given what is at stake for the United States in this trial that is to test the new military-commissions process, given the request from the chief judge that Col. Brownback stay on, and given the strange timing after years of extensions, this explanation is not enough to allay the impression of political interference.

The [Canadian Prime Minister] Stephen Harper government insists it wants to let the process work, but as the judge's removal suggests, this is a questionable process.

Bob Schaffer

Bob Schaffer's Still Not Talking About that $3.6 Million Earmark

Andrew Tilghman | June 3, 2008, 6:48PM

We're still at it trying to figure out which lawmaker was behind that $3.6 million earmark that led to last week's conviction of a Denver businessman on charges of criminal fraud.

As we told you last week, we think it might have been Colorado Republican Senate candidate Bob Schaffer.

Schaffer was in Congress when the earmark was awarded to the little-known not-for-profit founded by Bill Orr, who was convicted last week. And when Schaffer left Congress, he went on to become a director for Orr's group, the National Alternative Fuels Foundation, where his political buddy Scott Shires was treasurer. Shires pleaded guilty and testified against Orr.

Today we called Thomas Vanek, a former staffer for the House Science Committee's subcommittee on energy and environment, who testified at Orr's trial. He oversaw the authorization of the $3.6 million earmark back in October 2000.

I asked Vanek whether Orr received any help from members of Congress in securing the earmark.

"He may have gotten a member of Congress or two involved to get a thumbs up. I don't recall," said Vanek, who is now a senior policy advisor at the Department of Energy in Washington.

More specifically, I asked, do you think Bob Schaffer could have been involved in the earmark?

"He may well have been involved. Typically there would be a member involved. I'd say it's certainly possible. Likely? Who knows," Vanek said.

There's not much documentation tagged to earmarks, especially back then. Often influence is excercized verbally rather than on paper. With almost eight years distance, determining precisely who was involved back then is tough.

Usually, lawmakers are eager to take credit for bringing millions of dollars back home. But that's not the case here. We've contacted all eight members of the Colorado Congressional delegation from 2000, including the two we couldn't track down last week: former Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell and former Rep. Joel Hefley, both Republicans.

None of the lawmakers recalled any involvement with the National Alternative Fuels Foundation or its $3.6 million earmark.

So that leaves Schaffer. We've been calling everyday for a week now, but nobody from his campaign has gotten back to us.

Why doesn't Bob Schaffer want to talk about that earmark?

Jack Abramoff

Istook: I'm Not the Target of an Investigation

Andrew Tilghman | June 3, 2008, 4:27PM

Former Rep. Ernest Istook (R-OK) says he was "as surprised and as shocked as anyone" to learn that his former chief of staff pleaded guilty yesterday in Jack Abramoff's lobbying ring.

The Washington Post reports:

"I have not seen the charges and I have no information about them," said Istook, who left the House to launch an unsuccessful bid for governor of Oklahoma in 2006. He is now a fellow at the Heritage Foundation. "I have met with the FBI. They did not share any details about the case, but they told me I am not a target of their investigation. I will continue to cooperate with them fully."

That's interesting, since prosecutors say Istook, the former chairman of the appropriations subcommitee for transportation, got on the phone with Jack Abramoff and, according to Abramoff, "basically asked what we want in the transportation bill."

A preliminary analysis by Taxpayers for Common Sense found at least six of Abramoff's firm's clients received earmarks from the 2004 transportation appropriations bill, which was written by Istook's subcommittee.

Valerie Plame

Congress Watchdog Wants Documents from Bush, Cheney Interviews.

Andrew Tilghman | June 3, 2008, 1:25PM

It's been several years since President Bush, Cheney and others sat down with investigators to talk about who leaked the cover of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

And Congress is still trying to find out what they said.

In the wake of former White House press secretary Scott McClellan's book published this week, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is reiterating his request for access to documents related to those interviews.

Waxman writes a letter today to Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey:

New revelations by fonner White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan raise additional questions about the actions of the President and the Vice President. Mr. McClellan has stated that "[t]he President and Vice President directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby." He has also asserted that "the top White House officials who knew the truthincluding Rove, Libby, and possibly Vice President Cheney - allowed me, even encouraged me, to repeat a lie." It would be a major breach of trust if the Vice President personally directed Mr. McClellan to mislead the public. ... The Committee is conducting an important investigation to answer questions that Mr. Fitzgerald's criminal inquiry did not address. As I explained at the Committee's hearing last year, the purpose of the Committee's investigation is to examine:

(1) How did such a serious violation of our national security occur?
(2) Did the White House take appropriate investigative and disciplinary steps after the breach occurred?
And
(3) what changes in White House security procedures are necessary to prevent future violations of our national security from occurring?

Read more for the complete text of the letter.

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Global Warming

Today's Must Read

Andrew Tilghman | June 3, 2008, 10:02AM

Remember that young Bush campaign worker who landed a job in the NASA public affairs office, where he was accused of blocking the country's top scientists from talking publicly about global warming?

His name was George C. Deutsch and he was one of several officials accused a couple years ago of manipulating the public disclosure of scientific research about climate change.

Well, NASA's own inspector general looked into the matter and -- whaddya know -- the Bush administration's critics were right.

A 48-page report from the agency's own watchdog, released yesterday, concluded that political appointees in the NASA press office were downplaying scientific conclusions about global warming by withholding certain press releases and limiting reporters' access to top scientists who might veer off message.

"Our investigation," the report said, "found that during the fall of 2004 through early 2006, the NASA Headquarters Office of Public Affairs managed the topic of climate change in a manner that reduced, marginalized or mischaracterized climate change science made available to the general public."

The report said most evidence supported contentions that politics was "inextricably interwoven" into operations at the public affairs office in that period and that the pattern was inconsistent with the statutory responsibility to communicate findings widely, "especially on a topic that has worldwide scientific interest."

The NASA press office came under scrutiny a couple years ago after the agency's leading climate scientist, James E. Hansen, and other agency employees, publicly complained about restrictions imposed on their public comments and distortions of their scientific conclusions.

What today's story leaves out are some great details about the characters involved in shielding the public from the taxpayer-funded science.

Deutsch, who got his job at age 23 and once told a Web designer to add the word "theory" at every mention of the Big Bang, resigned after revelations the he had lied on his resume and did not, in fact, graduate from Texas A&M University.

How'd he get such a prominent position? According to the Times:

Mr. Deutsch, 24, was offered a job as a writer and editor in NASA's public affairs office in Washington last year after working on President Bush's re-election campaign and inaugural committee, according to his résumé.

Another political appointee, Dean Acosta, who was NASA's deputy assistant administrator for public affairs and now works in the private sector of the aerospace industry, criticized the IG's report about his former office.

"My entire career has been dedicated to open and honest communications," Mr. Acosta, who now is director of communications for the Boeing space-exploration business, wrote in an e-mail message. "The inspector general's assertions are patently false. The report itself does nothing but raise questions about a three-year investigation that has yielded nothing but flimsy allegations aimed at hard-working public servants."

And the Mystery Lobbyist is ... Kevin Ring

Andrew Tilghman | June 2, 2008, 6:58PM

In the federal court papers, he's known only as "Lobbyist C."

But prosecutors description of the man who funneled illegal favors to John Albaugh, the former chief of staff for U.S. Rep Ernest Istook (R-OK), sounds pretty familiar.

After checking our records, we'd say that lobbyist is most likely Kevin Ring, the former Abramoff underling who took the Fifth Amendment before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee in 2005 rather than answer a series of questions from lawmakers. (The AP agrees.)

Ring worked for Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA) from 1993 to 1998 and later worked for the Senate Judiciary Committee, then the Conservative Action Team (co-founded by Doolittle), before he joined Jack Abramoff at Greenberg, Traurig LLP in 2001.

Ring quit is lobbying post the same day the FBI raided Doolittle's home in April 2007.

Allegations Extend to Former Oklahoma Congressman

Andrew Tilghman | June 2, 2008, 6:31PM

Federal prosecutors may have their sites on former Rep. Ernest Istook (R-OK) after getting a guilty plea from his former chief of staff.

Istook was not accused of any criminal conduct. But the court papers charging Istook's former chief of staff, John Albaugh, portray Istook as an apparent participant in Abramoff's influence peddling scheme.

From the federal information court document:

On or about March 19, 2003, at the suggestion of defendant ALBAUGH, [Istook] called Abramoff, thanking him in advance for use of one of his FedEx suites for an upcoming fundraising event. During that call, [Istook] also asked Abramoff which particular projects Firm B's clients wanted in the transportation bill. Abramoff thereafter sent an email to the lobbyists on his team telling them that [Istook] had "basically asked what we want in the transportation bill" and instructed the lobbyists to "make sure we load up our entire Christmas list."

The alleged telephone call is at odds with Istook's own account of his contacts with Abramoff. He told a reporter in April 2006 that he'd never spoken to Abramoff on the phone:

In response to the Abramoff association, Istook referred to the Abramoff scandal as "shameful, pure and simple" and said Abramoff was never in his office, spoke to him on the phone, or had any relationship with him other than a few conversations.

"Jack Abramoff is a criminal," Istook said. "When I found out he was a criminal, not only did I give away what he had personally donated to me, I went the extra mile. I gave away any money from anyone that had any vague sort of connection to him."

"The point is, I don't think you can judge people by the fact that someone who contributed to them was a wrongdoer," Istook said. "The question is, did I do anything improper, and I did not."

The court papers charging Albaugh include several instances where Istook, referred to as "Representative 4," received benefits from Abramoff's lobbying firm.

At Albaugh's request, the prosecutors said, a lobbyist from Abramoff's firm hosted a fundraising dinner for Istook at Abramoff's Signatures restaurant. The congressman's campaign did not reimburse the lobbyist or disclose the cost -- about $10,000 -- as an in-kind contribution on financial disclosure forms, prosecutors said.

At Albaugh's request, Jack Abramoff provided $5,000 "to satisfy the initial funding obligation of a political action committee established by [Istook]," according to the filing.

Also at Albaugh's request, lobbyist from Abramoff's firm helped arrange for Istook to use luxury suites an American Idol concert event and later for a Washington Redskins football game. Itsook's campaign did not reimburse the lobbyists until more than two years later, after the Abramoff scandal was attracting attention in the press, prosecutor noted.

Istook left the House in 2007 after an unsuccessful bid for the Oklahoma governor's office.

Jack Abramoff

Former Chief of Staff Pleads Guilty in Abramoff Case

Andrew Tilghman | June 2, 2008, 5:35PM

Federal prosecutors have a new helper in their investigation of the Jack Abramoff scandal.

The former chief of staff to Rep. Ernest Istook (R-OK) pleaded guilty in federal court today and agreed to cooperate.

According to a Department of Justice press release:

John C. Albaugh, 41, entered his plea to a one count criminal information today in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, before Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle. At sentencing on Sept. 17, 2008, Albaugh faces up to five years in prison, a fine of $250,000, and supervised release following his release from prison. As part of a plea agreement, Albaugh has agreed to cooperate with the ongoing investigation into the activities of former Washington, D.C., lobbyist Jack Abramoff and others.

Jack Abramoff

Another Congressional Aide Charged in Abramoff Scandal

Andrew Tilghman | June 2, 2008, 3:35PM

A former chief of staff for an Oklahoma congressman is the latest figure caught up in prosecution of Jack Abramoff's lobbying ring.

John Albaugh, the former chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Ernest Istook (R-OK), has been charged with a conspiracy to defraud the House of Representatives, taking perks and doling out official favors:

John Albaugh is accused of accepting gifts in return for official favors. The charge is outlined in a criminal information filed in federal court on Friday. Such documents are normally entered as part of a plea deal. A court hearing was set for Monday afternoon.

According to the criminal information, Albaugh accepted tickets to George Strait and Tim McGraw concerts.

In one email, a lobbyist from Abramoff's firm told Albaugh: "You're going to eat for free off our clients"

After Istook was named chairman of the Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee, a fellow lobbyist emailed a lobbyist from Abramoff's firm (identified in the Information only as Lobbyist C) and said "[t]hat's good for us!! Hello Albaugh,' according to the court papers.

Iraq

Today's Must Read

Andrew Tilghman | June 2, 2008, 10:40AM

Could the U.S. ultimately end up privatizing its entire mission in Iraq?

That's what the latest round of contracts the U.S. government plans to let out in the coming months might suggest.

As Walter Pincus reports in today's Washington Post, the new contracts underscore the non-military involvement the U.S. is undertaking as public pressure mounts to reduce troop numbers

One contract could essentially begin to privatize the process of training the Iraqi security forces by hiring "mentors" to do what the U.S. military has struggled unsuccessfully to do for the past five years.

The proposals reflect multiyear commitments. The mentor contract notes that the U.S. military "desires for both Ministry of Interior and Ministry of Defense to become mostly self-sufficient within two years," a time outside some proposals for U.S. combat troop withdrawal. ... The mentors will assist an U.S. military group that previously began to implement what are described as "core processes and systems," such as procurement, contracting, force development, management and budgeting, and public affairs.

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