Usually you can pretty much take it for granted that Rep. Don Young (R-AK) is the most outspoken lawmaker around. After all, it's not every congressman who threatens to bite a member of his own party like a mink.

But perhaps Young has met his match. During his speech on the House floor Wednesday, Young did his best to distance himself from his infamous Coconut Road earmark in every way he could. He didn't make the change after the bill passed both houses of Congress -- somebody in some secluded office did. And he he'd only supported the earmark, he said, because the community and its representative had supported it. Young even devoted a page of his official web site to back up his story.

Well, that lawmaker is Rep. Connie Mack (R-FL). And Mack was none too happy and approached Young after the speech to tell him as much. Mack says that he did not initially support the earmark and only supported it after he discovered that the money could not be redirected. Or as Mack put it to Young on the floor, Young is a "liar." Young professed confusion as to how he could think such a thing: "I don't understand because I've got all the letters. Pull them up on the Web site. He's running away from an issue because he's got political heat."

Mack's chief of staff was no more restrained in his criticism:

Jeff Cohen, Mack's chief of staff, said Thursday that it was clear his boss was being singled out.

Young's speech to the House was "absurd" and "inaccurate," Cohen said. "Perhaps we don't just need a committee on ethical standards, but one on psychological standards as well," he added.

It's not the first time that the politicization of the Environmental Protection Agency has forced comparisons to Alberto Gonzales' Justice Department, and it surely won't be the last.

On the Senate floor this afternoon, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee (where he joined in the interrogations of Gonzales and other Department officials) as well as the Senate environmental committee (where he's sharply questioned EPA chief Stephen Johnson), said the comparison is inevitable. Yesterday's news that the EPA's top environmental regulator in the Midwest had been fired over her efforts to force Dow Chemical to clean up chemical spills, he said, "looks like déjà vu all over again from an administration that values compliance with its political agenda more than it values the trust or best interests of the American people." Here's video:

Whitehouse said that the Senate environmental committee will be holding a hearing on EPA oversight next Wednesday.

Earlier this week, ABC reported that the investment firm Cerberus Capital was in talks to buy Blackwater for around $200 million, but Cerberus, which had apparently been exploring the deal since the beginning of this year, got cold feet as soon as the news went public.

It turns out that it's part of a concerted push, The Times reports, to expand Blackwater's business because "whatever the outcome of the US presidential election Blackwater, run by Erik Prince, the Republican former Navy Seal, may find itself without friends in Washington." So there's an effort to prepare for the future, when all those federal investigations and scandals might actually affect the bottom line:

Blackwater has advertised in security industry journals repositioning itself as a peacekeeping force. The adverts show mothers feeding babies and Blackwater guards smiling as children play in a street. It has also set up a division called Greystone, which is seeking to win protection work from the UN, aid organisations and foreign companies.

A defence industry source said: "Theirs is nearly all US government work and if that goes they are in trouble."

(Here's more on Greystone from Mother Jones.)

Following reports of over 300,000 Iraq and Afghanistan vets in need of treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, and allegations from former troops that the Department of Veterans Affairs is unequipped to handle such demands, Defense Secretary Robert Gates acknowledged Thursday that the military has been substandard in the treatment of returning soldiers. He is calling for procedural change in access to PTSD treatment, as well as the improvement of housing throughout the ranks. (Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle and Reuters)

Detained in December 2001 by Pakistani security on his way to a reporting assignment, then held the next six years at Guantanamo Bay by the U.S. government, Al Jazeera cameraman Sami al Hajj was released recently, his attorneys say. The Pentagon declard Hajj an "enemy combatant," not believing he was a journalist as he claimed. (McClatchy)

A Senate panel has voted to ban defense contractors from engaging in CIA interrogations of detainees. The bill approved in the Senate Intelligence Committee would also give the Red Cross access to prisoners now deemed "ghost detainees," as well as limiting the CIA to interrogation tactics only approved by the U.S. military's Army Field Manual. (Associated Press)

Read more »

Can it really be true? Will the high priest of executive privilege actually submit to a Congressional subpoena?

When House Judiciary Committee Chair John Conyers (D-MI) invited a slate of current and former administration officials to testify about the authorization of torture, I was skeptical that he would meet much cooperation. But when it came to David Addington, Dick Cheney's chief of staff and longtime consigliere, the idea seemed downright ludicrous. If Addington has spoken publicly or even given an interview in the last eight years, I'm unaware of it.

But in a letter (pdf) to the committee yesterday, the vice president's counsel Kathryn Wheelbarger signaled a willingness to cooperate. It was, for sure, a long way from the original reply, which I summarized at the time as, "You're asking the wrong person, but even if you were asking the right person, you couldn't make him show up, and even if he did show up, he wouldn't say anything."

Yesterday's letter is a change of tone. Because the committee has signaled that it will limit the range of its inquiries (this is Addington only speaking for himself, he can't speak about communications with the Vice President or President, he has the right to invoke "applicable legal privileges), Addington seems to be leaning towards showing up.

That doesn't mean that the vice president's office has changed their mind about whether he has to show up, mind you. The courts would agree that Addington is "immune from compulsion," Wheelbarger writes. But Addington might show up out of the goodness of his heart, "as a matter of comity," as the letter puts it.

The letter falls short of saying that Addington will definitely show up to Tuesday's hearing, but Wheelbarger does write that "the Chief of Staff to the Vice President is prepared to accept timely service of a Committee subpoena for testimony for a hearing on May 6, 2008." When the Politico asked Cheney's spokeswoman whether this meant that Addington would comply, she said "Since he hasn't been issued a subpoena, it would be a little premature to comment on whether he would comply." He is a coy one, that Addington.

From The Chicago Tribune:

The Bush administration forced its top environmental regulator in the Midwest to quit Thursday after months of internal bickering about dioxin contamination downstream from Dow Chemical's world headquarters in Michigan.

In an interview with the Tribune, Mary Gade said two top political appointees at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency headquarters in Washington stripped her of her powers as regional administrator and told her to quit or be fired by June 1.

It appears that the relationship between the EPA political appointees and the career employees is not getting any better.

It's deja vu all over again.

House Judiciary Committee Chair John Conyers (D-MI) says that if Karl Rove won't agree to testify before his committee about his involvement in the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman (D), then he'll be forced to consider issuing a subpoena. You can read his letter to Rove's lawyer Robert Luskin below.

In response to Conyers' initial request for Rove to testify, Luskin offered to have Rove speak to the committee behind closed doors, without a transcript and not under oath -- the same offer administration lawyers made to Congress in the U.S. attorney firings investigation. And you know where that went: the House is currently suing to enforce those subpoenas after finding former White House counsel Harriet Miers and chief of staff Josh Bolten in contempt of Congress.

Rove was subpoenaed by the Senate Judiciary Committee as part of that investigation and refused to show up to testify. That committee subsequently voted to find him in contempt, but the full Senate never voted on the citation.

Read more »

Since we last posted this morning, there are number of other things to update you on those calls by Women's Voices Women Vote.

First off, North Carolina officials were not the first to specifically object to the group's failure to identify themselves and instead use "Lamont Williams" on the calls. As Facing South points out, back in February, after Virginia police investigated the calls and mailings as a possible identity theft scam, the group's spokeswoman told The Virginian-Pilot that "not including information about the source of the voter registration effort was 'absolutely an accidental omission.'" She also said that the group would be changing the calls so that the group was identified as the source.

Obviously, that didn't happen. When I asked the group about that, a spokesperson told me that the failure to change the script was a "mistake" and added "we're doing our best to figure out how the old script got used."

Meanwhile, a group spokeswoman Sarah Johnson explained in a Q&A at DailyKos that the name Lamont Williams was used because that was the name of the actor reading the script. The calls using Williams' voice went to men -- because she said while the group mainly concentrates on unmarried women, they also target "African Americans, Hispanics and young people" -- and a call using a woman's voice went to women.

And finally, anti-robo call activist Shaun Dakin provides some context for the North Carolina attorney general's accusation that the group's calls were illegal because the group was not identified and did not provide a call back number. Dakin, who heads up Stop Political Calls, a group devoted to combating automated calls by establishing a National Political Do Not Contact Registry, writes that Women's Voices Women Vote is breaking the law, but pretty much everybody else does too:

The reality is that there are more than likely several campaigns and other non-profit organizations that are "failing to disclose who sponsored the call" and "failing to offer the org's contact information to get the calls to stop".

In fact, I know of no political campaign at the national level that offers voters a way to opt out of further calls.

From The Washington Post:

Rep. Vito J. Fossella (R-N.Y.) was arrested overnight in Alexandria and charged with driving while intoxicated, court records showed today.

Fossella is scheduled to appear in Alexandria General District Court on May 12 for an advisement hearing, the records said.

From Government Executive:

Doan's unconventional tactics were on display last Wednesday at a GSA conference in Anaheim, Calif. At a dinner sponsored by a contractor trade group, she appeared on stage with arrows sticking out of her head, shoulders, arms and legs, according to a transcript of the speech posted on GSA's Web site. Using the arrows to illustrate her challenges at GSA, Doan said she had been taking shots from the media, Congress and those who represented the "status quo."

I believe that's what's called a martyr complex.

Government Executive also reports that Doan's ongoing feud with the GSA's inspector general really was the reason for her firing, citing a number of sources including Doan. When the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency dismissed whistleblower complaints against the inspector general, Doan very publicly and stridently criticized the panel as a "hollow shell" that's "real purpose is to whitewash any wrongdoing." She also vowed to continue pressing those complaints.

From Fox News:

Police say DC Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey has committed suicide in Florida.

Police were called to the home of Palfrey's mother on Thursday to investigate the suicide.

Palfrey was convicted on all counts a couple of weeks ago.

Today, two more board members from Women's Voices Women's Vote have released statements offering support of the group, which apologized yesterday for its misleading and illegal robo calls to North Carolina residents.

The first is president of USAction William McNary, who in apparent response to the reported myriad connections between the group and the Clinton campaign, makes a point of saying that he's an Obama supporter while vouching for the group. The voter registration campaign, he says, was a "mistake," but not a "malicious" one.

And John Podesta, President Bill Clinton's former chief of staff and currently the president of the Center for American Progress, has sent us this statement:

Women's Voices. Women Vote has a strong record of registering disenfranchised people so that they can participate in the political process. As a board member, I was aware of the general parameters of the group's voter registration program, but not the details of its execution. With respect to the calls and mailings made in North Carolina, I understand that remedial action is being undertaken. I agree with fellow board member William McNary that the North Carolina state calling program was a mistake of judgment and execution, and not an attempt to disenfranchise voters, and have been assured by Page Gardner, President of WVWV, that the organization will conduct a full and prompt accounting of the circumstances of the voter registration program for its board of directors.

Yesterday Tim Lux, another board member, made a similar statement.

Meanwhile, here's what the Obama campaign had to say about it:

Bob Bauer, an attorney for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's campaign, said the calls were "extremely disturbing" and fit "the classic model of voter suppression" by sowing confusion just before the May 6 primary.

But he stopped short of saying the calls were designed to discourage voters.

"They have said it's inadvertent, and I understand it will not happen again," he said.

From Newsweek:

The Bush administration is refusing to disclose internal e-mails, letters and notes showing contacts with major telecommunications companies over how to persuade Congress to back a controversial surveillance bill, according to recently disclosed court documents....

One court declaration, for example, confirms the existence of notes showing that a telecom representative called an Office of Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) lawyer last fall to talk about "various options" to block the lawsuits, including "such options as court orders and legislation....

The declarations were filed in court by government lawyers only after U.S. Judge Jeffrey White in San Francisco, who is overseeing the case, ordered them to fully process the Electronic Frontier Foundation's FOIA request for documents showing lobbying contacts by the telecoms. The government initially resisted even responding to the FOIA request, but White found that disclosure was in the public interest because it "may enable the public to participate meaningfully in the debate over" the pending surveillance legislation.

You can put this in the known unknowns category.

It's apparent that Jack Abramoff's crew was really thankful for the help of key Justice Department officials in helping out their client, the Mississippi Choctaw. One of those officials, Robert Coughlin, has pleaded guilty. Others are apparently under investigation.

But when it comes to brainstorming among the lobbyists on just how they ought to show their appreciation, I think this takes the cake:

Kevin Ring was exuberant. It was Feb. 4, 2002, and Ring, a young member of Jack Abramoff's lobbying team at Greenberg Traurig, was laying plans to attend a Dave Matthews Band concert at the MCI Center. It was to be a celebration.

"I have the suite filling up with DOJ staffers that just got our clients $16 million," he gushed in an e-mail to his colleague, Padgett Wilson. "Come to the show, baby."

"Are there any tickets left?" asked Wilson, now director of governmental affairs for Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue. He then submitted: "And as for those DOJ staffers, those guys should get anything they want for the rest of the time they are in office -- opening day tickets, Skins v. Giants, oriental massages, hookers, whatever."

A recent report by the RAND Corporation found the numbers of Iraq and Afghanistan vets with post traumatic stress disorder to number over 300,000. Now the Disabled American Veterans is calling for budget reform within the underfunded Dept. of Veterans' Affairs to combat "devastating mental health consequences" that have resulted from the war. (Associated Press and The Hill)

Salim Ahmed Hamdan, alleged former driver of Osama bin Laden, has repeatedly denounced and refused to participate in the military tribunals. Imprisoned for the past seven years, he rejected the notion that he should be judged by officers of the military that detained him. (Washington Post)

The Pentagon has caught fire for using its lineup of retired military officials to give talking points to national media outlets. Nearly two weeks after the story broke, a reporter got around to asking White House Press Secretary Dana Perino about it. Despite what the story reported, Perino claims "it's absolutely appropriate to provide information to people who are seeking it and are going to be providing their opinions on it." (Think Progress)

Read more »

You know those secret legal opinions by the Justice Department that tell the administration how far it can go without breaking the law? After all the hullabaloo over John Yoo's five year-old torture authorization memo, Attorney General Michael Mukasey assured Congress that the Justice Department really was working on releasing other memos. But he made no promises.

And yesterday, during a hearing on secret law held by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) before the Senate Judiciary Committee, an official from the Office of Legal Counsel promised that the Department would allow members of the intelligence committees to see them -- but lawmakers won't be able to keep paper or electronic copies. The Department says that it's thinking really hard about whether the Senate Judiciary Committee can see them as well. For some reason, Feingold and his peers didn't seem satisfied.

The man who was the top classification official until January of this year appeared at the hearing and testified that the Department's decision to mark Yoo's torture memo "secret" and keep it classified for years after it was withdrawn showed "either profound ignorance of or deep contempt for" classification rules.

But as Donald Rumsfeld put it, there are known unknowns and unknown unknowns. And with this group, it's always a toss-up which is more worrying:

At the hearing, a department official, John P. Elwood, disclosed a previously unpublicized method to cloak government activities. Mr. Elwood acknowledged that the administration believed that the president could ignore or modify existing executive orders that he or other presidents have issued without disclosing the new interpretation.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, challenged Mr. Elwood, saying the administration's legal stance would let it secretly operate programs that are at odds with public executive orders that to all appearance remain in force....

Mr. Whitehouse, who sits on the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, has said the administration's contention that it can selectively modify executive orders "turns The Federal Register into a screen of falsehoods behind whose phony regulations lawless programs can operate in secret."

Mr. Elwood said publicly available legal opinions dating from 1987 make clear the Justice Department's view that the president has the power to change executive orders.

Mr. Whitehouse said, "There's an important piece missing from that, which is not telling anybody and running a program that's completely different from the executive order."

Only seven more months of the Bush administration to go, and plenty more to find out.

And yet another development on those calls by Women's Voices Women Vote.

North Carolina's attorney general has just put out a press release (pdf) saying that he's investigating the calls and taking credit for having them stopped. "Regardless of the motivation, the robo-calls violated the law and they needed to stop," Roy Cooper said. He also includes a correspondence with the group's lawyer. In the letter, Cooper requests a variety of information about the calls.

Sarah Johnson, the group's spokeswoman declined to comment on the correspondence, referring questions to the group's lawyer. But she did say that the calls occurred last Thursday and Friday in North Carolina as they did in all the other 24 states (pdf) targeted by the group this April.

In the clearest language he's used yet, Rep. Don Young (R-AK) disclaimed responsibility for changing the language of the Coconut Road earmark after it had cleared both houses of Congress on the House floor today. He also repeated his earlier criticism of the Senate's vote to require a Justice Department investigation, calling it a "slippery, slippery road." You can see his comments here:

All this notwithstanding, Young supported the overall bill, which contained a fix to change the earmark's language back to the way it was before the infamous change. The bill passed easily today.

Young's spokeswoman had earlier called the change a "correction" by staff, but Young was more specific on that point today. Young said that the "enrollment" process, where technical changes are made by the House clerk to tidy up the bill that Congress passed, "is not a process I own or control." He added: "I have never been in an enrollment office." The ambiguity remains, however, of whether anyone on Young's staff urged the change.

And he went on to say that it was nothing remarkable that there had been a change. For instance, he said, there had been an earmark for a Jacksonville in the bill, but that the enrollment clerks had changed the language to specify for which of the six U.S. Jacksonvilles it was intended.

As we explained at length in this post, minor changes are regularly made to bills in the enrollment process. But Young's earmark was unique of the 6,371 earmarks in that underwent such a substantive change. It was originally for the widening of I-75 in Collier and Lee counties in Florida, and it was changed to concern only the Coconut Road interchange in Lee County. So he's being more than a little slippery here.

As an update to my earlier post on the Women's Vote Women's Voices calls, we can show you an example of the voter registration packet the group has been sending out.

Thanks to TPM Reader PC, here is a mailer received by a reader in Oregon, one of the 24 states (pdf) where the group has sent mailers.

The mailer was addressed to PC's wife, and he says she received not one but two copies. He also notes that the mailer arrived just as the deadline to register in Oregon's presidential primary passed. That's been a persistent problem for the group, not only in North Carolina, but also in Virginia and Wisconsin. Wisconsin officials even issued a press release lecturing the group on its methods, saying that the forms would create more confusion and that voters who needlessly registered twice would have to re-register at the polling place because they'd registered past the primary deadline (Wisconsin allows same-day registration). "It's unfortunate that such groups do not inform voters of our deadlines," said Kevin Kennedy, director of the state Government Accountability Board.

So while the spokeswoman for the group told me that the North Carolina calls and mailers were a mix up, it seems that the group has gotten mixed up a number of times before.

Update: As Facing South notes, the mailers originally had language saying that recipients were "required" to mail back the form. That language was dropped after complaints in a number of states and from a number of state officials.

Yesterday we posted about suspicious calls being made in North Carolina. The calls purported to be from a man who identified himself only as "Lamont Williams" and told people to wait for a vote registration packet in the mail and said, "All you need to do is sign it, date it and return your application. Then you will be able to vote and make your voice heard."

Democracy North Carolina, a government watchdog, cried foul, saying that the calls went out to "black neighborhoods" and was evidently a vote suppression tactic since the registration deadline for the presidential primary has already passed. The North Carolina state elections board got involved and asked for the public's help in determining the source of the calls, which apparently blocked caller ID from showing the number. You can listen to the call here (wav).

Now Facing South reports that a Washington nonprofit called Women's Voices Women Vote is behind the calls.

The group's spokeswoman Sarah Johnson confirmed to me that those were the group's calls and said that they were part of an effort to register three million women voters in 24 states. The fact that the calls came shortly before the North Carolina primary, potentially confusing voters, was unfortunate mistake, she said. We're "incredibly apologetic about the timing of this." The group was simply working at such a "high volume" that it was "extremely difficult to tailor the mailing to every single state's schedule," she said. The calls precede the mailers, she said, because it increases the rate of response.

The group had also let the state board of elections know prior to sending out the mailings that they would be doing so, but the letter to the board did not mention the calls. You can read that letter, provided by the group, here.

The group is currently in the process of halting the mailed packets, she said, at the request of the Democracy North Carolina and the state board of elections. The calls have also stopped.

As for why the group's calls had used an apparently fictitious persona named "Lamont Williams," Johnson first said, "as far as I know, it is a recorded message." But when I asked why the group had used that name when there is no such person working with the group, she said she did not know why the name had been used.

The group also used a female caller named "Julie," Johnson said (although she was not sure of the name). She told me that she would check to see if there was any particular reason why certain calls were made by Julie and others by Lamont.

But that practice would stop, she said. "This not identifying ourselves on the call, that's not something that is going to continue as we move forward. Our phone calls in the future will correct any confusion about the calls." When I asked if there had been any particular strategy behind not identifying the group as making the calls, she said no.

A statement released by the group's executive director is below.

Update: As Facing South notes in detail, this is not the first time that there have been complaints about WVWV's activities. There have been complaints in several states.

And in Virginia this February, the state police there even investigated the calls as a possible identity theft scam, only to find that WVWV was behind them. The calls had gone out shortly before the Virginia presidential primary.

Read more »

The latest contribution to good government from Vice President Dick Cheney: preventing the implementation of rules to protect the endangered right whale.

This comes from a letter House sleuth Henry Waxman (D-CA) sent to the White House today, requesting that the administration quit delaying the rules, which would restrict the speed of ships near American ports. Faster moving ships hit the whales, causing injury or death, scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration say.

But not so, says Cheney's office and other White House officials, who have delayed approving the NOAA's submitted rules. One exchange Waxman obtained is typical, he says (pdf):

Another internal document shows that the officials working for the Vice President also raised spurious objections to the science. According to this document, the Vice President's staff "contends that we have no evidence (i.e., hard data) that lowering the speeds of 'large ships' will actually make a difference. NOAA rejected these objections, writing that both a statistical analysis of ship strike records and the peer-reviewed literature justified the final rule. In its response to the objections from the Vice President's staff, NOAA reported that there is "no basis to overturn our previous conclusion that imposing a speed limit on large vessels would be beneficial to whales.

In his conclusion, Waxman wonders why Cheney's office seems so invested in the topic:

While I appreciate the value of vigorous scientific debate, I question why White House economic advisors are apparently conducting their own research on right whales and why the Vice President's staff is challenging the conclusions of the government's scientific experts. The appearance is that the White House rejects the conclusions of its own scientists and peer-reviewed scientific studies because it does not like the policy implications of the data. This is not how the review process is supposed to work.

In his letter, Waxman requests copies of White House communications about the rule and that the White House allow the rule to go forward.

As generous as Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) is with earmarks, it's natural for beneficiaries to occasionally get carried away with their gratitude. From Roll Call (sub. req.):

The Interior Department inspector general has opened an investigation into whether federal money was inappropriately used to pay for a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Alaska Volcano Observatory that recognized its chief patron, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), according to information obtained by Roll Call.

Sources say the IG is looking into the funding behind the event at the Russell Senate Office Building....

At issue is whether federal dollars were used in connection with a lobbying event. Federal law prohibits the use of federal funds for such an activity, either directly through the Geological Survey or indirectly through the observatory, which receives much of its funding from Stevens' earmarks....

The April 2 event was an "education opportunity and event," [lobbyist Martha Stewart] said, adding that the sponsors also used it as a chance to offer Stevens a "thank you" for his work.

Of course, with a federal grand jury digging into Uncle Ted's ties to Veco, this is the least of his worries.

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff Christine Beatty have been accused of perjury, misconduct and obstruction of justice after lying about their relationship to officials. Text messages the two sent each other on city-owned pagers prove their relationship, as well as Kilpatrick's role in the firing of a Detroit police officer. Now even more messages have been released. (New York Times)

As federal earmarks continue to be a hot topic in this election season, congressional records show Sen. Hillary Clinton leading the pack in requested handouts for 2009 at nearly $2.3 billion, almost three times more than any other senator. (The Hill)

Former defense contractor Mitchell Wade will finally receive sentencing from a federal judge in December for bribing former Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham. Cunningham is currently serving jail time, as is fellow Cunningham-briber Brent Wilkes who worked with Wade. (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Read more »

It's the Bush administration's special approach to accountability: stand staunchly beside an administration official as the allegations pile up and his or her credibility dwindles to nothing, and then months later -- long after the administration could derive any credit for the deed, and it is widely assumed that they are content to let the official fester in office for the duration -- the official abruptly and inexplicably resigns. So it was with Donald Rumsfeld and Alberto Gonzales. And yesterday General Services Administration chief Lurita Doan stepped down.

But Doan, who gained mucky prominence for her clueless cronyism, wants everybody to know that she's not stepping down voluntarily. She was fired. And not only was she fired, but she was fired because she refused to cave to political pressure. Or something.

"I would rather get fired for something I believe in, and a cause I was willing to fight for, rather than to believe in nothing worth being fired for." That's what Doan told Government Executive in an email last night. It's far from clear precisely what this "something" she believes in is.

What we do know is that last June, the Office of Special Counsel recommended to the White House that Doan be fired for violating the Hatch Act. And that same month, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) told Doan to her face during a House oversight committee hearing that she should resign. And now, nearly a year later, the White House summons her for a meeting and asks for her resignation.

To refresh your memory on Doan's parade of horribles: her Golden-Duke-nomination-worthy testimony came in response to a meeting in early 2007, where Karl Rove's aide Scott Jennings came to brief GSA staff on the prospects for Republicans in the 2008 elections. The PowerPoint presentation detailed which seats were "House Targets" and which "Senate Targets", which states were "Republican Offense," and which "Republican Defense." For those who've never witnessed this proud moment in administration history, Doan's initial blubbering testimony on the topic is worth a watch:

After the presentation, Doan asked Jennings in front of everyone how GSA projects could be used to help "our candidates." Jennings replied that topic should be discussed "off-line," the witnesses said. Doan then replied, "Oh, good, at least as long as we are going to follow up." At least, that's the version given by "half a dozen witnesses" to The Washington Post and the Office of Special Counsel. Doan just couldn't remember saying anything like that.

And then there was Doan's alleged retaliation against employees who gave information to the Office of Special Counsel. Those were poor performers, she told investigators, and "[u]ntil extensive rehabilitation of their performance occurs, they will not be getting promoted and will not be getting bonuses or special awards or anything of that nature." In another cringe-inducing turn before Waxman's committee, Doan tried to explain away that comment by saying she had been employing the "hortatory subjunctive" -- an explanation remarkable for not only failing to exculpate her, but also being grammatically incorrect.

We'll miss you, Lurita.

Update: Government Executive reports that the timing of Doan's resignation might have something to do with her ongoing feud with the GSA's inspector general.

In this morning's writeup of Supreme Court's decision on Indiana's voter ID law, The New York Times quoted someone familiar to TPM readers:

"This decision not only confirms the validity of photo ID laws, but it completely vindicates the Bush Justice Department and refutes those critics who claimed that the department somehow acted improperly when it approved Georgia's photo ID law in 2005," said Hans A. von Spakovsky, a former member of the Federal Election Commission and a former Justice Department official.

It's a reaction laden with a number of distortions. But the key one has to do with a crucial difference between Georgia's 2005 law and Indiana's law, as Joe Rich, the former chief of the voting section in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, told me. Rich, who last year opposed Spakovsky' nomination to the FEC along with a group of other former voting section professionals, called Spakovsky's contention that yesterday's ruling vindicated his actions "disingenuous."

"The Georgia law reviewed by the Justice Department required voters seeking the required voter ID to pay a fee that a federal court found created an unconstitutional poll tax," Rich said. "But in Indiana the Supreme Court explicitly noted that photo identification cards 'issued by Indiana's [Bureau of Motor Vehicles] are . . . free' and thus there was no issue of creating an unconstitutional poll tax."

Spakovsky and other political appointees overruled staff attorneys who'd recommended against approving Georgia's voter ID law, because of concerns that the law would discriminate against poor and minority voters. It was just a part of Spakovsky's legacy of ignoring and intimidating section employees, and generally doing what he could to effect policies that would disenfranchise voters.

Under the Voting Rights Act, parts of the country with a history of discrimination must demonstrate to the Justice Department that new legislation does not discriminate against minority voters. In the case of Georgia's law, supporters of the law didn't do much of anything to demonstrate that the law wouldn't discriminate against African-Americans.

In fact, quite the opposite. Georgia state Rep. Sue Burmeister, the sponsor of the bill, told voting section staff that "if there are fewer black voters because of this bill, it will only be because there is less opportunity for fraud," and that "when black voters in her black precincts are not paid to vote, they do not go to the polls."

Indiana's law had not required review by the Justice Department, Rich said. "Therefore, there was no issue in review of the Indiana law concerning whether the state could meet its burden of demonstrating that the law did not hurt minority voters, as is required by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. That was the only issue before Justice Department in its review of the Georgia law and career attorneys, in an in-depth memo, found that the law did hurt minority voters and accordingly recommended an objection to the law."

So I think it's fair to say that Spakovsky has yet to be "completely vindicated."

From Roll Call (sub. req.):

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) shipped to the White House on Tuesday a compromise plan on Federal Election Commission nominees, a deal that is likely dead on arrival because it does not meet GOP demands on Hans von Spakovsky.

"You are aware that Mr. von Spakovsky does not have majority support to win confirmation," Reid wrote Tuesday in a letter to White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten. "It is my understanding that you have two additional Republican FEC candidates cleared for nomination.

"One would fill Mr. von Spakovsky's seat should he be defeated or withdrawn, and the other would fill the vacant Republican seat," Reid continued. "You already have the non-controversial re-nomination of sitting commissioner David Mason pending."

You can read Reid's letter to White House chief of staff Josh Bolten here. But as Roll Call says, Republicans have thus far refused to budge on any deal that doesn't include Spakovsky getting packaged in a vote with the other less controversial nominees. And so the FEC remains officially dormant and the complaints against allegedly outlaw campaign activity continue to pile up.

Here's another for the annals of vote suppression. Calls have gone out to an untold number of North Carolina voters telling them that they need to fill out a registration form before they vote. Democracy North Carolina, a government watchdog that has posted audio (wav) of the call, says that the calls went out to "black neighborhoods."

It seems not to be a scheme limited to North Carolina. As Facing South reports, the same call evidently went out to some voters in Columbus, Ohio two days before municipal elections there last November, and also in Virginia the week before the Democratic primary there this February.

Here's how one reader of the Buckeye State Blog described the Ohio call back in November:

From memory, a stentorian voice reminiscent of James Earl Jones says: "Hello. This is Lamont Williams. In a few days you should be getting a voter registration form in the mail. Please fill it out and return promptly and you will be able to vote. Thank you."

Since the election is Tuesday, the message is nonsensical. Also, I can't find any information on this Lamont Williams. The caller ID was blocked ("unknown caller").

A transcript of the call released by the North Carolina State Board of Elections matches that description:

"Hello, this is Lamont Williams. In the next few days, you will receive a voter registration packet in the mail. All you need to do is sign it, date it and return your application. Then you will be able to vote and make your voice heard. Please return the voter registration form when it arrives. Thank you."

And in Virginia, the Washington, DC NPR affiliate WAMU reported in February that "at least a dozen people in central and southern Virginia have received automated phone calls this week telling them to expect a voter registration packet in the mail." Facing South reports that the a state elections board spokeswoman said the matter had been referred to state police, and that it wasn't clear whether the calls also claimed to come from a Lamont Williams. But certainly the parallels are suspicious.

If Lamont has popped up anywhere else or pops up anywhere else, let us know.

Last month, Democrats, with the help of a few crossover Republicans (but not Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)), passed a bill that would have limited the CIA's interrogation techniques to those authorized by the Army Field Manual. Waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation" techniques (use of hoods or duct tape over the eyes, inducing hypothermia, etc.) would have been specifically and unambiguously outlawed.

President Bush, as promised, vetoed that bill, saying that restricting CIA interrogators "could cost American lives." An override vote failed in the House.

Now Senate Democrats are going to try again. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) says that she'll introduce the measure as an amendment to 2009's Senate intelligence authorization bill, because "at the time [of the veto] we vowed to come back - again and again if necessary - to ensure that torture by U.S. intelligence agencies is outlawed for good." Sens. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), John Rockefeller (D-WV), Russ Feingold (D-WI), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), and Ron Wyden (D-OR) are also sponsoring the amendment. Over the weekend, Wyden released correspondence from the Justice Department showing how lawyers there dealt with current ambiguity in the relevant laws. What counted as an "outrage upon personal dignity," a DoJ official wrote, depended on whether "an act is undertaken to prevent a threatened terrorist attack."

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) knew he was going to get a fight. And he's getting one.

Earlier this month, he scheduled a hearing for next week on the administration's authorization of torture, and along with John Yoo, has invited former Attorney General John Ashcroft, former CIA Director George Tenet, former Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, Chief of Staff to the Vice President David Addington, and former Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin.

Yesterday Conyers released some of the correspondence he's been having with lawyers for Addington, Yoo, and Ashcroft. As expected, none of them want to testify, and they're not short on reasons.

Both Yoo and Ashcroft say that they have not been authorized by the Department of Justice to discuss the context of the key torture memos, internal discussions about them, and the like. And both say that they are the subject of lawsuits, and so it would be "inappropriate" to testify.

But it won't surprise anyone that the letter from Kathryn Wheelbarger, Vice President Dick Cheney's counsel, is the real masterpiece. It is by now common knowledge that Addington is by far the most powerful and influential lawyer in the administration, particularly with regard to the controversial counterterrorism policies such as torture and the warrantless wiretapping program. But Wheelbarger says that Conyer's got the wrong guy. If you're looking to discuss presidential powers in war time, then you really ought to be bugging a presidential aide, she writes. And if it's interrogation you want to talk about, then "the Director of National Intelligence or his designee and the Secretary of Defense or his designee, respectively, would be the appropriate witness." From there, it's on to an argument about how the power of Congress to investigate is limited, so Addington cannot be compelled to show. And then on to an argument about how Addington, due to privilege concerns, wouldn't be able to say much even if he did show voluntary.

So to sum up, that's: You're asking the wrong person, but even if you were asking the right person, you couldn't make him show up, and even if he did show up, he wouldn't say anything.

As for Conyers, he says he will issue subpoenas to those who do not agree to appear by this Friday.

Soldiers coming back from World War II were greeted with the GI Bill, giving opportunity and promise to begin anew. Now over 800,000 young men and women are returning from war fronts looking to make their own fresh start, but they are finding the modern version of the GI Bill is insufficient, barely covering half of today's skyrocketing college tuition. (Washington Post)

By allowing outside influence to affect policy and protocol,the Bush administration has severely watered down the clout of the Environmental Protection Agency, reports a Government Accountability Office finding. The EPA's duty of assessing cancerous hazards in chemicals, specifically, has been curbed by non-scientific reviews and involvement from White House budget officials, the Energy Dept, and the Pentagon to name a few. (Associated Press)

Ashley Dupre, known as "Kristen" to former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, is now suing the founder of the video franchise "Girls Gone Wild" for $10 million. Dupre was featured in one of the company's videos during a drunken spring break foray in 2003. She says she was only 17 at the time, too young to sign a binding agreement to use the footage of her. Dupre "did not understand the magnitude of her actions ..." at the time, her lawsuit claims. (LA Times)

Read more »

Just another day at Guantanamo, I guess.

On the witness stand was the former chief prosecutor for the tribunals, Col. Morris Davis. Called to testify by defense lawyers, he told the court what he'd told the press -- that he'd quit after becoming convinced that the political appointees overseeing the system were about politics first and justice second, that he was told "we can't have acquittals," and that he was pushed to land indictments or plea deals before the election. He also said that his superiors saw no problem with using confessions obtained through torture, including waterboarding. Everything is "fair game," he says he was told, "let the judge sort it out."

And then there's Salim Ahmed Hamdan, the alleged driver for Osama bin Laden. Hamdan's lawyers say that interrogators beat him and sexually humiliated him, among other things, and are arguing that he's unfit to stand trial because he's essentially been driven crazy by spending 22 hours in solitary confinement for the past several years. His lawyers say "he is suicidal, hears voices, has flashbacks, talks to himself and says the restrictions of Guantánamo 'boil his mind.'"

Nevertheless, Hamdan was there yesterday -- sort of:

But Hamdan, during the morning session, also appeared to show some evidence of mental deterioration, which his attorneys have ascribed to mistreatment and lengthy solitary confinement. He seemed in a daze as he was led into court in his khaki detention uniform.

He then engaged in a short, subdued rant to Allred about how he believes he is not being afforded human rights and would like to use the bathroom without soldiers watching him. He also tried at one point to get up from the defense table to leave the room. "I refuse participating in this, and I refuse all the lawyers operating on my behalf," Hamdan said. He returned for the afternoon session in traditional Yemeni garb and a sport coat and agreed to continue.

And just to complete the context for the scene, the Post notes, is the fact that the Supreme Court is nearing "a decision on whether the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that laid the legal foundation for these hearings violates the Constitution by barring any of the approximately 275 remaining Guantanamo Bay prisoners from forcing a civilian judicial review of their detention." In the meantime, the ugliness of Gitmo is on full display.