Attorney General Michael Mukasey released a legal opinion saying that interviews between Vice President Dick Cheney and the FBI regarding the Valerie Plame affair will remain confidential. Mukasey cited a concern that releasing the interviews would discourage White House officials from participating in future interviews. Cheney reportedly asked his deputy, Lewis Libby, to reveal Plame’s name to a reporter. (Legal Times)
Roland Burris, Governor Rod Blagojevich’s pick to replace President-elect Obama in the Senate, once sought the death penalty for a man wrongly accused of murder. As Illinois Attorney General in 1992, Burris continued the prosecution of a man charged with rape and murder despite a confession from another man and the objections of his top prosecutors. (ProPublica)
A response from the Treasury Department to questions posed in a COP report last month acknowledges that it is hard to estimate the specific impact of TARP funds, but that they are helping ease credit markets. The response notes that credit default swaps between banks have gone down 240 basis points and that much bailout money has yet to make it into the financial system. (Portfolio)
A senior adviser to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA) has close ties to a firm that could benefit from public-private partnerships in California infrastructure projects, according to the Los Angeles Times. David Crane still receives income for 25 years work with Babcock & Brown, a financial services firm that would benefit from state public works projects. Private-sector involvement in public projects has become a major sticking point in the debate over California’s budget. (Los Angeles Times)
Nine Muslim passengers were removed from an AirTran Airlines flight from Washington, D.C. to Florida on Monday after other passengers reportedly heard a suspicious remark. The passengers say that after being removed from the flight the airline wouldn’t rebook them and they had to instead purchase new tickets with another carrier. An AirTran spokesperson insists that the company strictly followed federal guidelines. (Associated Press)
