Knowing Tony Shaffer as I do (albeit in a limited fashion) I have tried to keep my distance from the Able Danger controversy. Generally speaking in the spooky business one likes to keep a stiff-arm out for those in the spotlight, though there is a lot of quiet cheering (or jeering) in private. Giving his…

A very interesting report from the USMA CTC on what can be learned from captured documents: One of the best ways to learn about al-Qa’ida is to read the papers, manuals, and other documents which al-Qa’ida leaders have written to guide and discipline their own enterprise. Many of these documents have been captured by military…

This needs no further elaboration.

Able Danger Blog points out a significant development: We had testimony that all of the Able Danger data-mining material was destroyed. I [Rep. Curt Weldon R-PA] now know that that’s not the case. In fact, I now know there’s data still available. And I am in contact with people who are still able to data…

In Slate Eric Weiner beats me to the punch on comparing wiretapping in the US and Europe: For Europeans, scolding the Bush administration for everything from Guantanamo to the Iraq War to secret CIA prisons has become a full-time job. But when it comes to the American scandal over President Bush’s warrantless wiretaps, there’s been…

I shake my head ruefully at the thought of those I have left behind that are now likely to face still more hours away from the job learning how to love and respect one another: John Robinson was appointed the first chief of equal employment opportunity for U.S. intelligence by the Director of National Intelligence…

Newsweek, the magazine that was so sure that we were flushing Korans down toilets, now uses its mind reading powers to explain away content it hasn’t heard. There are plenty of other sites that address journalists as political hacks and MSM bias, so I won’t try to replicate that here. Let’s just take a minute…

While pulling diaper duty I listened to Gibson of Fox News rip Pillar a new one and lambaste his Federal Reserve idea. The angle was political, and the workability of such an approach may be debatable, but I think the larger issue of getting a handle on who works what for how long needs to…

(Yes, I stole the title from Steve Hayes) ;- ) Under normal circumstances blue-collar IOs like myself would never go up against an NIO, but seeing as how we can both append “former” to our old titles – and we’re thousands of miles apart – I don’t mind taking a crack at Paul Pillar’s Foreign…

DCIA Goss in the NY Times on leaks and leakers: At the Central Intelligence Agency, we are more than holding our own in the global war on terrorism, but we are at risk of losing a key battle: the battle to protect our classified information. […] As a member of Congress in 1998, I sponsored…