Bad Deeds for 3-19-07

White House Did not probe Plame leak as promised by Bush – James Knodell, Director of the Office of Security at the White House, revealed that the administration had never launched an internal probe to determine the source for the outing of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame in 2003. In addition to revealing a deep reluctance on the part of the administration in determining the party responsible for the leak, Knodell’s testimony directly contradicted a prior statement from President Bush promising a full internal probe.

Republican stacks global warming panel with climate skeptics – The six Republican Congressional members chosen by Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) to sit on a panel chosen to deliberate on policy responses to global warming have all expressed significant skepticism over the human impact on the Earth’s climate.

Fake news is everywhere – Fake news arrives on doorsteps around the world every day, paid for by You, Time magazine Person of the Year, a.k.a. Joe and Jane Citizen, in one way or another. Take for instance, the U.S. government’s 2005 initiative to plant “positive news” in Iraqi newspapers, part of a $300 million U.S. effort to sway public opinion about the war. And remember Armstrong Williams, the conservative columnist who was hired on the down low to act as a $240,000 sock puppet for the president’s No Child Left Behind program? Williams’s readers had no idea he was a paid propagandist until the Justice Department started looking into allegations of fraud in his billing practices.

Attorney firing tied to CIA probe – Fired San Diego U.S. attorney Carol Lam notified the Justice Department that she intended to execute search warrants on a high-ranking CIA official as part of a corruption probe the day before a Justice Department official sent an e-mail that said Lam needed to be fired, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Sunday.

Former U.S. attorney David Iglesias says My firing was ‘political hit’

FBI’s ‘questionable methods’ on records – The US Federal Bureau of Investigation ignored warnings by lawyers and continued using questionable procedures to obtain the telephone records of thousands of Americans as part of its counterterrorism probes.

Utility scandal growing in Tennessee – Memphis Light, Gas and Water placed prominent politicians on a “List” to prevent their having power cut off in case of non-payment.

The price of White House ineptitude – And soon it’s probably going to look even worse. Read on…

Video: How Bush privatization push led to Walter Reed woes – Allowing private companies to bid on the Walter Reed contract “was a contributing factor in terms of how far things had deteriorated.”

Regards,

Jim