The Daily MuckJohn Rizzo, President Bush’s choice for the CIA general counsel, has gotten opposition for standing by a 2002 memo that defined torture as pain “equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of body function, or even death.” Now the Senate intelligence committee has requested that Rizzo’s name be withdrawn for the nomination.
The day after Norman Hsu turned himself in to California authorities he penned a suicide note that he sent to several acquaintances and charitable organizations. The note apologized for putting people “through inconvenience or trouble.” This afternoon he faces a Mesa County judge. (WSJ)
Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell has been forced to withdraw his assertion that a new electronic surveillance law was instrumental in the recent uncovering of a terror plot in Germany. However, four intelligence-community officials, who came forward anonymously to refute McConnell, insisted that the new law played little if any role in the unraveling of the German plot. Instead, the U.S. military should have been credited for the surveillance work they completed months before the new law was enacted. (Newsweek)
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is waxing nostalgic for Abramoff (sub. req.). Led by Chairman Henry Waxman, the committee is poised to dive back into the lobbying scandal. Sources for Roll Call say that Waxman has issued letters to a Abramoff associates seeking information about his contacts with the White House. The committee has also sought e-mails and other White House documents relating to the disgraced lobbyist. (Roll Call)
Indicted Texas oil man Oscar S. Wyatt Jr. has been greasing the political machinery with more than $22,000 in political donations to a number of high profile politicians. Wyatt, who’s been accused by the federal government of paying millions of dollars in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein and making illegal payments for oil contracts from the Hussein-led Iraqi government under the United Nationsâ oil-for-food program, gave generously to both presidential candidate Bill Richardson and Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-N.J.). Both said that they would donate Wyatt’s contributions to charity. (Politico)
The US Attorney’s office in Milwaukee has secured a guilty plea in a campaign finance scandal involving “truckloads” of illegal campaign cash,. John Erickson admitted to controlling a cash fund that was illegally used to “reimburse more than $250,000 in campaign contributions to more than 20 candidates on the federal, state and local level.” He now faces up to two years in prison and a $200,000 fine. The conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws was run out of the Kenosha, Wisconsin office of trucking company, JHT Holdings Inc. Erickson worked with Dennis Troha who pleaded guilty in July to making illegal campaign donations both to the Democratic Party and President Bush. (WTMJ)
