Project365 day 018

Project365 day 018

Originally uploaded by thepetecom.

On the way back from The(Coffee)Bean with my favorite bevvy, the classic iced coffee. Oh, I'm awake now! Oh yeah and in the BG you can see a couple palm trees and the standard LA blue sky. No snow today, that's for sure. Not that I saw any yesterday but the news said it snowed in my neighborhood so IT MUST BE TRUE! :)

IT'S THE OIL AFTER ALL

Remember those tired old slogans seen on placards at anti-war protests?

"NO BLOOD FOR OIL"

As someone who actually bothered to go to a bunch of these events I got bored of this sentiment especially since we never really saw much evidence of the oil being the motivation for the Iraqattack. Well, after almost 4 years, there finally is some pretty stunning evidence of America's corporatist motivations to go after that tasty Iraqi oil. Check out a few cuttings from [http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2979/|this January 15, 2007 article] at InTheseTimes.Com:

As the Bush administration stepped up its war planning, the State Department began preparations for post-invasion Iraq. Meeting four times between December 2002 and April 2003, members of the State Department’s Oil and Energy Working Group mapped out Iraq’s oil future. They agreed that Iraq “should be opened to international oil companies as quickly as possible after the war” and that the best method for doing so was through Production Sharing Agreements (PSAs).

PSAs are considered “privatization lite” in the oil business and, as such, are the favorite of international oil companies and the worst-case scenario for oil-rich states. With PSAs, oil ownership ultimately rests with the government, but the most profitable aspects of the industry—exploration and production—are contracted to the private companies under highly favorable terms.

...

When Bremer left Iraq in June 2004, he bequeathed the Bush economic agenda to two men, Ayad Allawi and Adel Abdul Mahdi, who Bremer appointed interim Prime Minister and Finance Minister, respectively. Two months later, Allawi (a former CIA asset) submitted guidelines for a new petroleum law to Iraq’s Supreme Council for Oil Policy. The guidelines declared “an end to the centrally planned and state dominated Iraqi economy” and advised the “Iraqi government to disengage from running the oil sector, including management of the planned Iraq National Oil Company (INOC), and that the INOC be partly privatized in the future.”

Allawi’s guidelines also turned all undeveloped oil and gas fields over to private international oil companies. Because only 17 of Iraq’s 80 known oil fields have been developed, Allawi’s proposal would put 64 percent of Iraq’s oil into the hands of foreign firms. However, if a further 100 billion barrels are discovered, as is widely predicted, foreign companies could control 81 percent of Iraq’s oil—or 87 percent if, as the Oil Ministry predicts, 200 billion barrels are found.

...

The Bush administration and U.S. oil companies have maintained constant pressure on Iraq to pass the petroleum law. The administration appointed an advisor to the Iraqi government from Bearing Point to support completion of the law. And in July 2006, U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman announced in Baghdad that oil executives told him that their companies would not enter Iraq without passage of the new oil law. Petroleum Economist magazine later reported that U.S. oil companies considered passage of the new oil law more important than increased security when deciding whether to go into business in Iraq.

The Iraq Study Group, recognizing as it did the primacy of oil in its Iraq calculations, recommended that the U.S. “assist Iraqi leaders to reorganize the national oil industry as a commercial enterprise” and “encourage investment in Iraq’s oil sector by the international community and by international energy companies.”

Put simply, U.S. oil companies want access to as much of Iraq’s oil as they can get and on the best possible terms. The fact that Iraq is a war-ravaged and occupied nation works to the companies’ benefit. As a result, the companies and the Bush administration are holding U.S. troops hostage in Iraq until they get what they want. Once the companies get their lucrative contracts, they will still need protection to get to work. What better security force is there than 144,000 American troops?

...

The law adopts PSAs and not only opens Iraq to private foreign companies, but permits “for the first time—local and international companies to carry out oil exploration in Iraq.”

So, in other words, the Iraqi government is passing a law that would allow foreign companies to control most of Iraq's oil. In [http://uprisingradio.org/home/?p=1106|an interview] with Uprising Radio the author of the above-linked article explained that foreign oil companies would get 75% of the profits from the oil and not get taxed on any of it. The reason for the Iraqi government passing this clearly harmful law? The IMF will refuse to give the country the loans they need to rebuild their country unless this law is passed. Turning down the International Monetary Fund is indeed an impossible mission for any country in desperate need of funds.

OH YEAH, and isn't cool how the mainstream news isn't touching this story with a ten-thousand-foot pole?

Project365 day 017

Project365 day 017

Originally uploaded by thepetecom.

Me at the "Name of Show" stand-up comedy showcase tonight at the Westwood Brew Co.


...sort of...


http://www.myspace.com/nameofshow

TED KOPPEL: BUSH MAKES IRAN SOUND ALL NEXTY

So, one of the things that's been rumbling around since the beginning of the Iraquagmire is a possible attack on Iran or Syria. Because of their close proximity to Iraq it makes sense from a lot of angles to consider them as possible next targets. The thing is that the US Military is stretched fairly thin. Most experts agree that an attack on Iran would be foolish--Syria not as bad, but not much smarter than attacking Iran.

But is there evidence of such an attack out there for us to see? You bet and this doesn't come from some crazed Internet-type. This comes to us from veteran newsman Ted Koppel. Check out this cutting from [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6836561|his NPR commentary from January 16, 2007] available over at NPR.org:

It was easy enough to miss — buried, as it was, almost two-thirds of the way through the president's speech the other evening — but I think the United States is actively preparing for the possibility of war with Iran.

...

He said that success in Iraq requires taking steps against Iran and Syria:

"These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. Add we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."

Now, that is hardly a declaration of war; but then President Bush went on to list some of the other steps he has ordered: the deployment, to the region, of an additional aircraft carrier and the strike group that goes with it, and also the deployment of Patriot air-defense systems — none of it particularly useful for fighting insurgents in al-Anbar province or Shiite militias in Sadr City. But if you were expecting a showdown with Iran, now that's another matter.

Makes some scary sense, doesn't it? Now I'm not thinking a war with Iran and/or Syria is a good thing. I'm just saying it makes sense from a strategic/tactical standpoint. Too bad it doesn't make any sense at all from a logistical standpoint. Well, when I say "too bad" I mean to say "thank God." Sadly, it's also too bad that Bush won't let a stretched-to-thin-military stop him from invading a country.

Scuttlebutt is that we'll see an Iranattack before April.

OH YEAH, almost forgot to mention this. [http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-01/17/content_5615540.htm|A January 16, 2007 article] at Xinuanet.com (the Chinese government's news service) reported that:

Iranian troops have shot down a U.S. pilotless spy plane recently, an Iranian lawmaker announced on Tuesday as the Islamic Republic was facing increasing military pressure from its arch rival -- the United States.

The aircraft was brought down when it was trying to cross the borders "during the last few days," Seyed Nezam Mola Hoveizeh, a member of the parliament, was quoted by the local Fars News Agency as saying.

The lawmaker gave no exact date of the shooting-down or any other details about the incident, but he said that "the United States sent such spy drones to the region every now and then."

Unmanned drones, I would think, would be used to get high resolution photos from closer than satellites could give you high resolution photos. In other words, the US is serious about surveillance when they send unmanned drones over not-yet-enemy territory.

Project365 day 016

Project365 day 016

Originally uploaded by thepetecom.

This is what I look like waiting for the next bus after missing my actual bus by literal seconds. I was a half-block away when it passed. I need a motorcycle. :(

BLACK CHRISTMAS (1974)

[asin: B000IMUYJM]

Positive Experience/Entertaining? Yeah--big time. I saw this film for the first time back in college and seemed to remember it being just "eh." I don't know what I was thinking because it's actually pretty good. It's nothing like today's idea of "horror" and bares little resemblance to films like Hostel or Saw. This movie is actually a bit more realistic.


Technically any good? This is clearly a pretty low budget movie and it's lack of overt violence and gore make it come across pretty dated even when compared to the early modern horror films it obviously inspired (like Halloween and Friday the 13th). However, if you ignore the almost complete absence of blood this movie is pretty damn scary. Also, it's scary in a way that almost anyone can identify with. After watching Black Christmas I immediately checked the deadbolt lock on my front door and was conscious of being happy our windows are too small for anyone to climb in through. Acting was perfectly believable (aside from one scene, anyway) and the cinematography was STUNNING. The direction was the best kind--invisible and the music was nearly perfect, though sometimes (rarely) it wasn't needed.


How did it leave me feeling? Creeped out--in a very good way. This movie is a great old film and something you should see if you're interested in good old fashioned scares.


Final Rating? GSN - Go See Now (Netflix it!! It's great!)

Wait--I Thought Competition was Good

So, America rules, right? I mean, seriously. We rule. There's no more powerful a country that the US and there's no country on the planet that can truly challenge us. Or will is done in just about every country we want it to be done (yes, even in Iraq) and in countries where that doesn't happen? We don't really care that much. This brings me to the premise of this post: I thought competition was a good thing.

Growing up, capitalism was spun as this 100% perfectly positive thing. Competition was one of the things that made capitalism so good. No one person could take advantage of a customer because he had competition. This would keep prices down and the people happy. So, what happens when there is no competition? Capitalists can charge as much as they want for their product. They don't have to listen to anyone because as long as they have something everyone wants they'd pay through the nose to get it. That's where we are now. Everyone wants America as a friend. As a result we can do what ever the fuck we want and it doesn't matter.

Of course, with this absolute power comes absolute corruption, evidenced by the Bush 43 Admin's [http://thepete.com/the-decider-try-the-dictator/|recent extreme lack of respect for the other branches of government]. Something else that comes with absolute power is absolute paranoia. There is an old Twilight Zone episode starring Peter Falk as a Castro-esque type character who is able to look in a mirror and see his enemies plotting against him. The catch is, his enemies get closer and closer to him until he's killing his own supporters--the mirror is a metaphor for his own paranoia. He's so enamored with power he is certain everyone and anyone is trying to steal it from him.

Enter Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. The guy is a populist and happens to have been elected democratically by his people. Yet the CIA is said to have helped a coup ty to overthrow him a few years back. Why? Because he has oil and he doesn't like us.

Enter Iran's drive to have nuke power. The US is probably going to attack Iran to stop them from using nuke power as a stepping stone to nuke weapons. Why? Because nuke weapons are a threat to the US and they don't like us. Sure, the US has nukes and sure so do other countries, but Iran doesn't like us, so therefore it can't have nukes. That would allow them to have power over us. Just like Venezuela has oil to hold over us.

So, naturally, when Hugo and Iranian figurehead Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (remember, he's got a more supreme leader above him) get together to start talking about how sucky America is, the West freaks out!

Why?

Because they are competition, of course! Being anti-American is EVIL and WRONG and that's all the thinking you need to do about it! Even if they have good reason for not liking us and our ways.

Check out this cutting from [http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3351871,00.html|a January 14, 2007 article] from AP.org and YNetNews.Com:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said they were ready to spend billions of dollars (euros) financing projects in other countries to help thwart US domination.

The anti-US Presidents whose efforts to extend their influence have alarmed Washington met Saturday in Venezuela’s capital, the first stop on Ahmadinejad’s tour of Latin America that will also see him visit newly elected leftist leaders in Nicaragua and Ecuador.

Of course, the West won't like their partnership in the least.

And here I thought competition was a good thing...

From AP.org and YNetNews.Com:

Iran, Venezuela agree to thwart ‘US domination’

Presidents Chavez, Ahmadinejad say ready to spend billions of dollars to finance projects in other countries to help thwart US domination. ‘We’ll underpin investments in countries whose governments are making efforts to liberate themselves from the (US) imperialist yoke,’ Venezuelan leader says

Associated Press
Published: 01.14.07, 08:05

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said they were ready to spend billions of dollars (euros) financing projects in other countries to help thwart US domination.


The anti-US Presidents whose efforts to extend their influence have alarmed Washington met Saturday in Venezuela’s capital, the first stop on Ahmadinejad’s tour of Latin America that will also see him visit newly elected leftist leaders in Nicaragua and Ecuador.


The oil-rich nations had previously announced plans for a joint USD 2 billion fund to finance investments in Venezuela and Iran, but Chavez and Ahmadinejad said Saturday that the money would also be used for projects in friendly third countries.

“It will permit us to underpin investments ... Above all in those countries whose governments are making efforts to liberate themselves from the (US) imperialist yoke,” said Chavez.


“This fund, my brother,” Chavez said referring to Ahmadinejad, “Will become a mechanism for liberation.” “Death to US imperialism!” he said. Ahmadinejad called it a “very important” decision that would help promote “Joint cooperation in third countries,” especially in Latin American and African countries.


It was not clear if the leaders were referring to investment in infrastructure, social and energy projects - areas that the two countries have focused on until now - or other types of financing.


Before his meeting with Ahmadinejad, Chavez said in his state of the nation address that he had personally expressed hope to Thomas Shannon, head of the US State Department’s Western Hemisphere affairs bureau, for better relations between their two countries.


Chavez said he spoke with Shannon on the sidelines of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega’s inauguration earlier this week, saying, “We shook hands and I told him: ‘I hope that everything improves.”’ Chavez - a close ally of Cuban leader Fidel Castro whom Washington sees as a destabilizing influence - has pledged billions of dollars (euros) of help to the region in foreign aid, bond buyouts and preferentially financed oil deals.



'Champion of struggle against imperialism'

Iran, meanwhile, is allegedly bankrolling militant groups in the Middle East like Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, as well as insurgents in Iraq, in a bid to extend its influence.


Ahmadinejad’s visit Saturday - his second to Venezuela in less than four months - comes as he seeks to break international isolation over his country’s nuclear program and possibly line up new allies in Latin America.


After Venezuela, Ahmadinejad will visit newly elected leftist governments in Nicaragua and Ecuador that are also seeking to reduce Washington’s influence in the region. Bolivian President Evo Morales, another critic of US policy, said he plans to meet with Ahmadinejad while both are in Ecuador Monday.


Chavez and Ahmadinejad have been increasingly united by their deep-seated antagonism to Washington. Chavez has become a leading defender of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, accusing the United States of using the issue as a pretext to attack a regime it opposes and promising to stand with Iran.


Ahmadinejad, meanwhile, has called Chavez “The champion of the struggle against imperialism.”


On Saturday, he congratulated Chavez on his December re-election and said the Venezuelan people were wise to choose “A person as important on the world stage, a person so wise as Hugo Chavez.”

The increasingly close relationship has alarmed some, and critics of Chavez accuse him of pursuing an alliance that does not serve Venezuela’s interests and jeopardizes its ties with the United States, the country’s top oil buyer. Venezuela is among the top five suppliers of crude to the US market.


Both countries are members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Chavez said Saturday that they had agreed to back an oil production cut in the cartel in order to stem a recent fall in crude prices.


“We know today there is too much crude in the market,” Chavez said. “We have agreed to join our forces within OPEC ... To support a production cut and save the price of oil.”


The two governments, which already plan to jointly produce everything from bricks to bicycles and develop oil fields in Venezuela, signed another 11 accords Saturday to explore further opportunities for cooperation in areas like tourism, education and mining.


Ahmadinejad is set to travel to Nicaragua to meet on Sunday with Ortega, a former Marxist guerrilla. On Monday, he travels to Ecuador for the inauguration of President-elect Rafael Correa, another outspoken critic of the administration of US President George W. Bush and Washington’s policies in Latin America.

Copyright © Yedioth Internet

Project365 day 015

Project365 day 015

Originally uploaded by thepetecom.

X-TREEEM CLOSE UP!!!



Be glad I didn't use the flash...

THE DECIDER? TRY THE DICTATOR

Holy crap--take a look at the caption of this screencap I grabbed off of CNN yesterday. When someone in Bush's position says that Congress doesn't have a say he is now officially a dictator.

Anyone who doesn't agree with this is out of touch with reality.

See, there's a little something called "checks and balances" where no one branch of government can totally get away with anything. Each branch has a way to exercise some control over any other branch. When anyone in any branch says that another branch's opinion doesn't matter, that's a dictator.

"I'm going to do X--it doesn't matter what Congress thinks."

Regardless of what "X" is stating that you're going to do it anyway is quite literally dictating what you will do.

Hence the term: "dictator."

If the above isn't enough to convince you we're living in a dictatorship, check this cutting from [http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/washington/14spy.html?ei=5065&en=d84fecd8f4b5e4cf&ex=1169355600&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print|a January 14, 2007 article] at NYTimes.com that talks about more surveillance of American citizens by their government:

The Pentagon has been using a little-known power to obtain banking and credit records of hundreds of Americans and others suspected of terrorism or espionage inside the United States, part of an aggressive expansion by the military into domestic intelligence gathering.

...

Banks, credit card companies and other financial institutions receiving the letters usually have turned over documents voluntarily, allowing investigators to examine the financial assets and transactions of American military personnel and civilians, officials say.

So, email, phone calls, and now even more banking records than before, apparently. You can read more about it in [http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/01/13/pentagon.bank.records.ap/index.html|this January 13, 2007 article at CNN.com].

This was dictatorship looks like, folks!

I don't know what else to say about it. When a leader can do whatever he wants (sending troops against the will of Congress, dig into your previously private personal information, etc) without any sort of oversight, there's really nothing else to call it.

From NYTimes.Com:

Military Is Expanding Its Intelligence Role in U.S.
By ERIC LICHTBLAU and MARK MAZZETTI

WASHINGTON, Jan. 13 — The Pentagon has been using a little-known power to obtain banking and credit records of hundreds of Americans and others suspected of terrorism or espionage inside the United States, part of an aggressive expansion by the military into domestic intelligence gathering.

The C.I.A. has also been issuing what are known as national security letters to gain access to financial records from American companies, though it has done so only rarely, intelligence officials say.

Banks, credit card companies and other financial institutions receiving the letters usually have turned over documents voluntarily, allowing investigators to examine the financial assets and transactions of American military personnel and civilians, officials say.

The F.B.I., the lead agency on domestic counterterrorism and espionage, has issued thousands of national security letters since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, provoking criticism and court challenges from civil liberties advocates who see them as unjustified intrusions into Americans’ private lives.

But it was not previously known, even to some senior counterterrorism officials, that the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency have been using their own “noncompulsory” versions of the letters. Congress has rejected several attempts by the two agencies since 2001 for authority to issue mandatory letters, in part because of concerns about the dangers of expanding their role in domestic spying.

The military and the C.I.A. have long been restricted in their domestic intelligence operations, and both are barred from conducting traditional domestic law enforcement work. The C.I.A.’s role within the United States has been largely limited to recruiting people to spy on foreign countries.

Carl Kropf, a spokesman for the director of national intelligence, said intelligence agencies like the C.I.A. used the letters on only a “limited basis.”

Pentagon officials defended the letters as valuable tools and said they were part of a broader strategy since the Sept. 11 attacks to use more aggressive intelligence-gathering tactics — a priority of former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. The letters “provide tremendous leads to follow and often with which to corroborate other evidence in the context of counterespionage and counterterrorism,” said Maj. Patrick Ryder, a Pentagon spokesman.

Government lawyers say the legal authority for the Pentagon and the C.I.A. to use national security letters in gathering domestic records dates back nearly three decades and, by their reading, was strengthened by the antiterrorism law known as the USA Patriot Act.

Pentagon officials said they used the letters to follow up on a variety of intelligence tips or leads. While they would not provide details about specific cases, military intelligence officials with knowledge of them said the military had issued the letters to collect financial records regarding a government contractor with unexplained wealth, for example, and a chaplain at Guantánamo Bay erroneously suspected of aiding prisoners at the facility.

Usually, the financial documents collected through the letters do not establish any links to espionage or terrorism and have seldom led to criminal charges, military officials say. Instead, the letters often help eliminate suspects.

“We may find out this person has unexplained wealth for reasons that have nothing to do with being a spy, in which case we’re out of it,” said Thomas A. Gandy, a senior Army counterintelligence official.

But even when the initial suspicions are unproven, the documents have intelligence value, military officials say. In the next year, they plan to incorporate the records into a database at the Counterintelligence Field Activity office at the Pentagon to track possible threats against the military, Pentagon officials said. Like others interviewed, they would speak only on the condition of anonymity.

Military intelligence officers have sent letters in up to 500 investigations over the last five years, two officials estimated. The number of letters is likely to be well into the thousands, the officials said, because a single case often generates letters to multiple financial institutions. For its part, the C.I.A. issues a handful of national security letters each year, agency officials said. Congressional officials said members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees had been briefed on the use of the letters by the military and the C.I.A.

Some national security experts and civil liberties advocates are troubled by the C.I.A. and military taking on domestic intelligence activities, particularly in light of recent disclosures that the Counterintelligence Field Activity office had maintained files on Iraq war protesters in the United States in violation of the military’s own guidelines. Some experts say the Pentagon has adopted an overly expansive view of its domestic role under the guise of “force protection,” or efforts to guard military installations.

“There’s a strong tradition of not using our military for domestic law enforcement,” said Elizabeth Rindskopf Parker, a former general counsel at both the National Security Agency and the C.I.A. who is the dean at the McGeorge School of Law at the University of the Pacific. “They’re moving into territory where historically they have not been authorized or presumed to be operating.”

Similarly, John Radsan, an assistant general counsel at the C.I.A. from 2002 to 2004 and now a law professor at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, said, “The C.I.A. is not supposed to have any law enforcement powers, or internal security functions, so if they’ve been issuing their own national security letters, they better be able to explain how they don’t cross the line.”

The Pentagon’s expanded intelligence-gathering role, in particular, has created occasional conflicts with other federal agencies. Pentagon efforts to post American military officers at embassies overseas to gather intelligence for counterterrorism operations or future war plans has rankled some State Department and C.I.A. officials, who see the military teams as duplicating and potentially interfering with the intelligence agency.

In the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has complained about military officials dealing directly with local police — rather than through the bureau — for assistance in responding to possible terrorist threats against a military base. F.B.I. officials say the threats have often turned out to be uncorroborated and, at times, have stirred needless anxiety.

The military’s frequent use of national security letters has sometimes caused concerns from the businesses receiving them, a counterterrorism official said. Lawyers at financial institutions, which routinely provide records to the F.B.I. in law enforcement investigations, have contacted bureau officials to say they were confused by the scope of the military’s requests and whether they were obligated to turn the records over, the official said.

Companies are not eager to turn over sensitive financial data about customers to the government, the official said, “so the more this is done, and the more poorly it’s done, the more pushback there is for the F.B.I.”

The bureau has frequently relied on the letters in recent years to gather telephone and Internet logs, financial information and other records in terrorism investigations, serving more than 9,000 letters in 2005, according to a Justice Department tally. As an investigative tool, the letters present relatively few hurdles; they can be authorized by supervisors rather than a court. Passage of the Patriot Act in October 2001 lowered the standard for issuing the letters, requiring only that the documents sought be “relevant” to an investigation and allowing records requests for more peripheral figures, not just targets of an inquiry.

Some Democrats have accused the F.B.I. of using the letters for fishing expeditions, and the American Civil Liberties Union won court challenges in two cases, one for library records in Connecticut and the other for Internet records in Manhattan. Concerned about possible abuses, Congress imposed new safeguards in extending the Patriot Act last year, in part by making clear that recipients of national security letters could contact a lawyer and seek court review. Congress also directed the Justice Department inspector general to study the F.B.I.’s use of the letters, a review that is continuing.

Unlike the F.B.I., the military and the C.I.A. do not have wide-ranging authority to seek records on Americans in intelligence investigations. But the expanded use of national security letters has allowed the Pentagon and the intelligence agency to collect records on their own. Sometimes, military or C.I.A. officials work with the F.B.I. to seek records, as occurred with an American translator who had worked for the military in Iraq and was suspected of having ties to insurgents.

After the Sept. 11 attacks, Mr. Rumsfeld directed military lawyers and intelligence officials to examine their legal authorities to collect intelligence both inside the United States and abroad. They concluded that the Pentagon had “way more” legal tools than it had been using, a senior Defense Department official said.

Military officials say the Right to Financial Privacy Act of 1978, which establishes procedures for government access to sensitive banking data, first authorized them to issue national security letters. The military had used the letters sporadically for years, officials say, but the pace accelerated in late 2001, when lawyers and intelligence officials concluded that the Patriot Act strengthened their ability to use the letters to seek financial records on a voluntary basis and to issue mandatory letters to obtain credit ratings, the officials said.

The Patriot Act does not specifically mention military intelligence or C.I.A. officials in connection with the national security letters.

Some F.B.I. officials said they were surprised by the Pentagon’s interpretation of the law when military officials first informed them of it. “It was a very broad reading of the law,” a former counterterrorism official said.

While the letters typically have been used to trace the financial transactions of military personnel, they also have been used to investigate civilian contractors and people with no military ties who may pose a threat to the military, officials said. Military officials say they regard the letters as one of the least intrusive means to gather evidence. When a full investigation is opened, one official said, it has now become “standard practice” to issue such letters.

One prominent case in which letters were used to obtain financial records, according to two military officials, was that of a Muslim chaplain at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, who was suspected in 2003 of aiding terror suspects imprisoned at the facility. The espionage case against the chaplain, James J. Yee, soon collapsed.

Eugene Fidell, a defense lawyer for the former chaplain and a military law expert, said he was unaware that military investigators may have used national security letters to obtain financial information about Mr. Yee, nor was he aware that the military had ever claimed the authority to issue the letters.

Mr. Fidell said he found the practice “disturbing,” in part because the military does not have the same checks and balances when it comes to Americans’ civil rights as does the F.B.I. “Where is the accountability?” he asked. “That’s the evil of it — it doesn’t leave fingerprints.”

Even when a case is closed, military officials said they generally maintain the records for years because they may be relevant to future intelligence inquiries. Officials at the Pentagon’s counterintelligence unit say they plan to incorporate those records into a database, called Portico, on intelligence leads. The financial documents will not be widely disseminated, but limited to investigators, an intelligence official said.

“You don’t want to destroy something only to find out that the same guy comes up in another report and you don’t know that he was investigated before,” the official said.

The Counterintelligence Field Activity office, created in 2002 to better coordinate the military’s efforts to combat foreign intelligence services, has drawn criticism for some domestic intelligence activities.

The agency houses an antiterrorist database of intelligence tips and threat reports, known as Talon, which had been collecting information on antiwar planning meetings at churches, libraries and other locations. The Defense Department has since tightened its procedures for what kind of information is allowed into the Talon database, and the counterintelligence office also purged more than 250 incident reports from the database that officials determined should never have been included because they centered on lawful political protests by people opposed to the war in Iraq.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

From CNN.Com and AP.org:

Pentagon, CIA check U.S. suspects' bank records
POSTED: 10:30 p.m. EST, January 13, 2007

STORY HIGHLIGHTS:

• Records legally obtained without a judge's approval or grand jury subpoena
• It is unusual for Pentagon, CIA to investigate domestic cases
• Move called part of a post-9/11 strategy to be aggressive in intelligence-gathering

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon and to a lesser extent the CIA have been using a little-known power to look at the banking and credit records of hundreds of Americans and others suspected of terrorism or espionage within the United States, according to a published report.

"It is our understanding that the intelligence community agencies make such requests on a limited basis," said Carl Kropf, a spokesman for the Office of the National Intelligence Director, which oversees all 16 spy agencies in the government.

The so-called national security letters permit the executive branch to seek records about people in terror and spy investigations without a judge's approval or grand jury subpoena. Government lawyers maintain the legal authority for such tactics is years old and was strengthened by the Patriot Act.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the lead agency on domestic counterterrorism and espionage, has issued thousands of national security letters since the attacks of September 11, 2001.

That has prompted criticism and court challenges from civil liberties advocates who claim they invade the privacy of Americans' lives, even though banks and other financial institutions typically turn over the financial records voluntarily.

The New York Times, in an article posted Saturday on the Internet, said the Pentagon and CIA also have been using their own versions of the letters to aid investigative work.

Congressional officials said members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees had been briefed on the Pentagon and CIA's use of the letters, the newspaper said.

The vast majority of national security letters are issued by the FBI, but in very rare circumstances they have been used by the CIA before and after 9/11, said a U.S. intelligence official who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity.

The CIA has used these non-compulsory letters in espionage investigations and other circumstances, the official said.

"It is very uncommon for the agency to be issuing these letters," the official said. "The agency has the authority to do so, and it is absolutely lawful."

A government official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said one example of a case in which the letters were used was the 1994 case of CIA officer Aldrich Ames, who eventually was found to have been selling secrets to the Soviet Union.

Neither official commented about the extent of possible use by Defense Department agencies, but Pentagon officials defended their use to the Times, saying they were part of a post-September 11 strategy to use more aggressive intelligence-gathering techniques.

Kropf's remarks to the AP did not address specifics of the Times story, which said military intelligence officers have sent letters in up to 500 investigations.

"There's a strong tradition of not using our military for domestic law enforcement," said Elizabeth Rindskopf Parker, a former general counsel at both the National Security Agency and the CIA and dean at the McGeorge School of Law at the University of the Pacific told the Times. "They're moving into territory where historically they have not been authorized or presumed to be operating."

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press.

Project365 day 014

Project365 day 014

Originally uploaded by thepetecom.

So, today was spent doing chores mostly, but in the evening I went to my

friend Paul's bday shindig. I did take a picture of myself there but it was

just me with his ceiling in the background. Very bleh. So I took a pic of

me in front of my desk after getting home. If you squint you can make out

some Ghost in the Shell trading figs as well as my favorite Gamera toys on

the top shelf there. I'm a geek!