The Daily Muck

The Washington Post takes a four-part look into sub-standard health care offered to detainees held in prisons across the United States made for certain indigent laborers awaiting trial for minor offenses, or those waiting for political asylum from their home countries. They have less access to legal protection than convicted felons, and some prisons they must endure resemble Gitmo. (Washington Post)

It may not be a comeback when nothing changes, but it seems defense contractor Blackwater has done just that as the State Dept. recently renewed their contract. No charges have been brought against Blackwater despite the unprovoked, mass-killing of 17 Iraqi citizens at the hands of Blackwater guards and repeated calls from Iraqi officials for the U.S. to outlaw the group’s security influence in the country. (New York Times)

According to a memo from seven employees of the Office of Special Counsel, department head Scott Bloch, whose office was raided last week during an investigation into whether his office was used for political motivations, ordered the closing of an investigation into allegations that former White House adviser Karl Rove attempted to make the frontrunner candidate for governor in Alabama Don Siegelman (D) a target for prosecution. (Washington Post)

The next alarming step in rigorous voter ID-demands may take place in Missouri, as legislators are expected to up the ante on identification requirements to vote that go beyond what the Supreme Court recently upheld in the last month. (New York Times)

E-mail records revealed in court have show a bevy of racist and crude sexual messages passed amongst members of the Secret Service between 2003 and 2005. The court case stems from a discrimination lawsuit filed by black Secret Service agents. (New York Times)

The hole gets deeper for Rep. Vito Fossella (R-NY) following a recent arrest for driving under the influence, the exposure of his affair with a Virginia woman that resulted in a child and, the latest, new focus on a trip to France he supposedly took alone to tour a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant. His mistress, Laura Fay, is suspected of joining him on the taxpayer-funded trip, raising red flags. (New York Daily News)

The Army Corps of Engineers lacks an adequate inventory of thousands of levees across America, says a levee expert for the corps. The confusion has been highlighted by numerous storms and flooding in many areas of the country this season. (Associated Press)