So you remember those hearings where our brave Democratic Congressmen, armed with Super Subpoena Power, were going to “get to the bottom of things”?
The oversight joke
Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com
Tuesday Sept. 16, 2008 11:21 EDT
Vividly illustrating this impotence in the anthrax context, Rep. Jerry Nadler of New York used his five minutes to ask Mueller about several of the most glaring holes in the FBI’s case against Bruce Ivins. Nadler specifically focused on the fact that scientists (including in the FBI) had long claimed that the anthrax sent to Sen. Daschele was dried anthrax that had been coated with silica and was thus far too sophisticated for Ivins to have prepared, only for the FBI suddenly to reverse itself recently and claim that the anthrax was not coated with silica but had, instead, simply naturally absorbed silicon from the air.
Nadler had various good questions about that — including wanting to know the level of concentration of silica found in the anthrax (since, if it were higher than 1/2 of 1%, it would mean it was impossible for it to have been naturally absorbed). Mueller’s response: I don’t know the answers to those questions. I’ll have to get back to you at some point.
Nadler than asked one of the most central questions in the anthrax case: he pointed out that the facilities that (unlike Ft. Detrick) actually have the equipment and personnel to prepare dry, silica-coated anthrax are the U.S. Army’s Dugway Proving Ground and the Battelle Corporation, the private CIA contractor that conducts substantial research into highly complex strains of anthrax. Nadler asked how the FBI had eliminated those institutions as the culprits behind the attack. After invoking generalities to assure Nadler that the FBI had traced the anthrax back to Ivins’ vial (which doesn’t answer the question), Mueller’s response was this: I don’t know the answers to those questions as to how we eliminated Dugway and Battelle. I’ll have to get back to you at some point.
…
Nadler then ended by asking whether Mueller would object to an independent commission or other body to review the FBI’s evidence and its accusations against Ivins and whether the FBI would cooperate with such an independent inquiry. Mueller pretended to answer by telling Nadler that the FBI intended to ask some members of the National Academy of Science to review the FBI’s scientific claims, but that didn’t answer the question as to whether the FBI opposed a full-scale independent review of the FBI’s case and whether the FBI would cooperate with it. Nadler then noted his time was up and a Republican member then began asking about The Grave Threats Posed by The Terrorists in order to justify the FBI’s imminent, new domestic surveillance powers, with not a single new fact — literally not one — disclosed about the anthrax investigation, despite Nadler’s perfectly relevant questions.
I’ll note for my own reputation that the circular link is Greenwald’s.
But I forgive him.
3 comments
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This is what bloggers need to keep doing. Holding our Representatives feet to the fire and criticizing those dimwitted blow dried butt puppets in the traditional media.
just as soon as he has the FBI’s imminent new domestic surveillance powers, to explain how it came about that he, being FBI Director, doesn’t know how the FBI under his direction doesn’t know how he doesn’t know how the FBI under his direction eliminates suspects or what evidence the FBI has against someone else who they presumably didn’t know how to eliminate as a suspect. And he’ll immediately file charges against himself for aiding and abetting terrorism? Unless of course he slaps his forehead, says what an idiot I’ve been, we got the wrong guy, and drops any charges filed against Ivins. Which of course will mean that he’ll have to file another set of charges against himself. If he can remember how.
This could be a problem. A terrorist might get away.
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, it seems.