Civil rights groups struggle to stop Bush administration efforts to knock tens of thousands of Floridians off the voter rolls in advance of next year’s election.
The Department of Homeland Security has completed its “investigation” of that fake FEMA press conference about the California wildfires:
FEMA’s press secretary encouraged, and in some cases instructed, employees to pose as reporters and ask questions at a fake news conference last month, an internal investigation has found.
At the same time, the investigation, which was conducted by Homeland Security Department spokesman Russ Knocke, concluded that officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, did not set out to deceive the public. Knocke blamed bad decision-making and a rush to get out information about wildfires that were raging in southern California.
That must have been some investigation, what with DHS’s own press secretary overseeing it and all.
Crazy stuff happens over there at TPMCafe. Case in point: this week in the Book Club, renowned cultural critic Susan Faludi is going blow for blow with a 17-year-old.
Seriously. Check it out.
The Post‘s Dana Milbank, umbrella in hand, dips his toe into the sea of online video with a walking tour of DC scandal.
From TPM Reader DR:
Here’s an obvious talking point for the Dems that I’m sure they won’t exploit.
Back in August, the administration suggested that if Congress didn’t pass the “terrorist surveillance” eavesdropping bill before going into recess, the country would actually be in danger of attack. Now, though, Bush says he’ll veto the renewal bill if it lacks retroactive telco immunity. So Bush is now holding the country’s security hostage to get telco immunity?! Why is telco immunity more important than listening to terrorists?
Or, put more bluntly, what’s he trying to hide?
Rudy: Our military is too small to deal with Islamo-terrorism–and it’s all Bill Clinton’s fault.
Late Update: Oh, and Giuliani calls for a massive military buildup to thwart China and Russia.
There are two stories we’re working on today where we need your help.
First, our reporters are digging into the Mukasey confirmation story, trying to find out just what went down yesterday, what the deal was that Reid held out for, how it was exactly that the presidential candidates didn’t get back or weren’t given enough time to get back for the vote. So this one’s particularly for our regulars up on Capitol Hill. Drop us a line, confidentiality guaranteed, and let us know what you know. I hear that at least some of the presidentials got little or no warning that the vote was imminent.
Then there’s Bernie Kerik. I had a kind of trip down memory lane last night reading over my posts on the K-man from December 2004 — one of a few events in the late winter of 2004 that helps salve the pain of the election result. Anyway, one thing I realized or rather remembered was that there were so many scandals, hijinks and misdeeds Kerik had in his closet that peoples’ minds quickly reached a saturation point. There was just too much to remember. For instance, you know of course that Kerik took the apartment donated by a wealthy real estate developer as a place for 9/11 relief workers to rest and used it as his own personal love shack to boff celeb book editor Judith Regan. That of course was before the other city employee he was doing there left a love note that Regan found. But did you know that after Regan bailed on him she had to get protection because Kerik was apparently stalking her and her kids? Great guy.
With all that going on it’s hard to remember that the woman who left the love note was City Corrections Officer Jeannette Pinero. Kerik and the City of the New York were sued by Deputy Warden Eric DeRavin III because Kerik blocked DeRavin’s promotions after he reprimanded Pinero. There was apparently another lawsuit connected to the Pinero-Kerik relationship that the city had already settled. But back in late 2004 TPM was still a one man operation and I confess I don’t think I ever figured out what that suit was about.
City Corrections Officer Jeanette Pinero, meanwhile, should not be confused with former Westchester DA Jeanine Pirro. As far as we know, Kerik never did the wild thing with Pirro. Rather Pirro went to Kerik for help bugging her husband’s boat to catch him having sex with his mistress.
Like I said it’s very hard to keep track of it all. So we’re going to put together what we hope will be a definitive list of Kerik criminality and ridiculousness. So send in your favorite Kerik scam or scandal for inclusion in our list. You can also post your entries in this discussion we’ve just started over at TPMmuckraker.com.
TPM Reader RM on Mukasey …
It’s probably true that the Mukasey nomination could have been blocked, but surely that’s not the same as “should have.” I don’t know, obviously it is disgusting to have an AG who won’t say that waterboarding = torture. But it’s not like the Democrats’ choice was between Michael Mukasey and Patrick Fitzgerald, or Michael Mukasey and David Iglesias. Wasn’t the real choice pretty much Michael Mukasey and Acting AG Peter Keisler? Is it crazy to think Mukasey will do a better job overall of beginning to pick up the pieces at Justice?
It’s the Schumer line, I guess, but it is a real option: Dems should pass a bill that explicitly bans waterboarding while not implicitly allowing other forms of torture.
This is a very good point and one I’ve given a lot of thought to. I don’t think there’s any question that President Bush will not allow an AG to be seated during his administration who will not at least tacitly okay the use of torture. If he didn’t get Mukasey we more than likely would have stuck with the even worse choice of Keisler. The contrary argument would be that the Senate did not need to affirm lawlessness in principle as it arguably now has.
The other issue though is that I’m surprised and disheartened that insisting on the appointment of a special prosecutor as a condition of confirmation went by the wayside with the water-boarding issue. I can’t help thinking this would have been a better ground on which to approach the vote in as much as it may well have yielded a more productive, more practical result.