The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is in the process of hiring a company to assist it in coordinating the exchange of information about criminal suspects and terrorists. After reading this AP article, we'd say it's something desperately needed:

A man implicated two decades ago in a Bahamian drug smuggling ring has been hired to help create a 13-state anti-terrorism network, a newspaper reported Saturday.

Hank Asher is the founder of Seisint Inc., an information technology company with a $1.6 million contract with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to work on a pilot program for the Matrix network, through which sensitive information on terrorism and other crime suspects would be exchanged.

The Boca Raton millionaire, a member of Seisint's board of directors, friend of recently retired FDLE director James ''Tim'' Moore and a major political contributor, was never charged with drug smuggling. He served as an informant and witness in several trials, and was identified by other FDLE informants as someone who provided police protection for smuggling operations, the St. Petersburg Times reported.

Asher's first company, DBT Online Inc., bought him out for $147 million in 1999 after the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration suspended its contracts over Asher's past and concerns that the company could potentially monitor targets of investigations, the Times reported.

Interim FDLE head Daryl McLaughlin called Friday for a complete assessment of Asher's background, saying previous checks were inadequate.

''You have told me stuff we didn't know,'' McLaughlin told the Times for its Saturday editions. ''We should know more about a company we are doing business with.'' (emphasis supplied.)

You can read more in the St. Petersburg Times, here.

In the past five years he's donated more than $735,000 to Democratic and Republican parties and candidates. Most of his money has gone to Democrats: $505,000 in the past five years and $65,000 to U.S. Sen. Bob Graham's 2002 initiative campaign to re-establish the state Board of Regents.

"He's a good fella," said Moore, who retired Thursday from FDLE.

Update: The 'Former Drug Smuggler' language is that used in the headline of the St. Petersberg Times Article.

We've been busy all day with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers--the annual meeting is in Denver this year and it began last night. It's been fun, informative and hectic so far. We'll save our Kobe comments for tv tonight, but here's what else we've noticed going on:

John Poindexter is resigning from the Pentagon over the terrorism futures fiasco:

The Pentagon official who oversaw the development of a plan for the military to operate a terrorist futures-trading market is resigning under pressure, a senior defense official said today.

John M. Poindexter, a retired rear admiral who was President Ronald Reagan's national security adviser, is stepping down "in the next few weeks," the official said, following disclosure of a proposal that outraged lawmakers and embarrassed senior Pentagon officials. The plan was to create in essence an online betting parlor that would have rewarded investors who forecast terrorist attacks, assassinations and coups.

Still no decision by Arnold as to whether he's running or not running for Governor of California.

Our go-get-'em Attorney General John Ashcroft arrested 240 people today in an alleged Mexican-U.S. drug ring. The code name for the effort: Operation Trifecta.

Joe Lieberman is the latest democratic contender to oppose gay marriage.

The best news of the day: Atrios is back!

The ACLU has announced it will file lawsuits challenging the Patriot Act in Portland, Oregon and Detroit, Michigan. The suit will, among other things, seek to overturn Section 215 of the Patriot Act which grants the FBI greater access to personal and business records under FISA.

Oregon was chosen because Ashcroft has a multi-defendant case pending there that he thinks is solid. One of the defendants is Mike Hawash. Detroit is an area in which the FBI has concentrated its terror war by assigning 50 agents to work with state and local law enforcement agents. The U.S. Attorney has called the war against terror his top priority and has six AUSA's assigned to an anti-terrorism task force.

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Steve Perry of BushWars brings you the Bush Administration's Top 40 Lies about war and Terrorism.

Civil Liberties watchdog Elaine Cassel continues her relentless pursuit of John Ashcroft.

If you're not familiar with Twin Cities Babelogue which hosts both of the the above blogs, you're really missing something.

One of our favorite fiction authors, Walter Mosley, writes in the Independent today that Ignorance is not Bliss. His theme:

The Race Riots of the 1960s Civil Rights Struggle Were Motivated by the Same Alienation That Fueled the September 11 Attacks

Definitely a good read.

It's not just members of Congress that want the classified portion of the 9/11 report made available to the public. The Saudi Government does too. They issued a formal request to Bush to declassify the report. Bush has refused the request.

In an interview this morning on "Good Morning America," [Sen. Bob] Graham said he believed the section of the report was being withheld "for political reasons — a key political reason being not to disturb the relationship between the United States and some foreign countries."

The Saudis have made it clear that they intend to fight back against any assertion that they were involved in the attacks. Some Saudi officials have said the organization behind them, Al Qaeda, is as hostile to Saudi Arabia's rulers as it is to the United States, or nearly so.

After the Congressional report was released last week, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, called the accusation that his country had helped pay the terrorists "outrageous" and added, "The idea that the Saudi government funded, organized or even knew about Sept. 11 is malicious and blatantly false."

Bush's reasons: Ongoing investigations and national security. His answer to everything these days.

New information has come to light about Al Qaeda and its capabilities since the congressional committee finished its 800 page report on intelligence failures and whether 9/11 could have been prevented. As a result, another probe is expected to begin shortly--this time focusing on the Government's responses to the terrorism threats. It will cover both the Bush and Clinton administrations.

The bipartisan commission appointed by Congress and President Bush is conducting what participants believe is the most ambitious government investigation in history, looking not only into intelligence failures, as the congressional committee did, but much more broadly at how the U.S. government responded to the terrorist threat.

"There is new information that has come to us, both classified and unclassified, since Congress finished its work," said commission Chairman Thomas H. Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey. The new information, he said, may provide new facts and lead to some recommendations that are different from those of the joint committee, but he declined to reveal specifics.

In addition to looking at the intelligence and law enforcement agencies, the commission is examining anti-terrorism policies across the board, including in immigration, border control and aviation.

The commission will also examine the actions of Congress, both in terms of its responses to agency funding requests and in fulfillment of its oversight responsibilities.

If you're interested in story of the sealed pages of the 9/11 report, and you should be as they contain information embarassing to Bush about his prior statements about the Saudi connection to 9/11, go right over to Media Horse--they have it all, including this Washington Post article and this one and Joe Conason.

Bush's comment on the Saudis on Sept. 20, accompanying White House Photo:

The President, from the first day, has been very satisfied with the actions of the Saudi government and the Saudi people," said White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.

Again, a big thanks to the Horse for assembling all this in one place.

Update: The pages themselves have not been released.

More violence is predicted in Iraq following the killing of Saddam's sons. In related news, the U.S. says it has captured the sons' bodyguards who are now talking about the sons' lives on the run since Saddam's defeat. The real question, of course, is whether the bodyguards will lead the U.S. to Saddam. Will Saddam stick around to find out?

Andrew Marshall, a Reuters journalist writes this first hand account of being one of fifteen reporters allowed into an air-conditioned tent to view the restored bodies of Uday and Qusay. According to Marshall, here's what is causing the conspiracy theorists to say the bodies are not really those of Saddam's sons:

U.S. military official said "facial reconstruction" was used to repair wounds, particularly to the face of the elder son Uday, which had disfigured the bodies shown originally to the public in photographs taken by soldiers after the battle.
An uncharacteristic beard on the body of Qusay, seen in those U.S. pictures, had been shaved off, leaving a mustache.

nside the tent, U.S. officials said it was standard practice to use morticians putty to prepare bodies for viewing and was not intended to fool the Iraqi people.

But while it may be common in the United States, the move is unheard of in the Arab world. That could affect Washington's efforts to quash Iraqi conspiracy theories that the bodies are not in fact those of the once powerful and hated sons of Saddam, who is believed to be still in hiding in Iraq.

We're not doubting that those are Saddam's sons. People look different in death and particularly after being embalmed. We've seen too many Six Feet Underepisodes to be repelled or think it's unusual. Not to mention, DNA tests were reportedly done on the pair.

There's lots of good articles on the Senate panel's 900 page report on intelligence lapses by the CIA and FBI.

If you have the time, here is the link to the full report. If you want the shorthand version, here are some key excerpts. All of the New York Times coverage is accessible in one place, here.

David Corn in the Nation provides this analysis, conlcuding that the report is an Indictment of both the intelligence agencies and the Administrations charged with their oversight. Financial Times asks about the Saudi Connection.

By a vote of 309-118, the House of Representatives voted today to add a provision repealing Patriot Act secret searches, called "sneak and peaks," to a $37.9 million funding bill.

The move would block the Justice Department from using any funds to take advantage of the section of the act that allows it to secretly search the homes of suspects and only inform them later that a warrant had been issued to do so.

Supporters of the change say that violates both the U.S. Constitution and the long-standing common law "knock and announce" principle -- which states the government cannot enter or search private property without first notifying the owner.

"Not only does this provision allow the seizure of personal and business records without notification, but it also opens the door to nationwide search warrants and allowing the CIA and NSA to operate domestically," said the amendment's sponsor, Idaho Republican Rep. C.L. "Butch" Otter.

The provision is Section 213 of the Patriot Act, "Authority for delaying notice of the execution of a warrant."

Section 213 is often referred to as the “sneak and peek” section. It authorizes surreptitious search warrants , seizures upon a showing of “reasonable necessity” and eliminates the requirement of Rule 41, Fed. R. Crim.P. that immediate notification of seized items be provided.

Update: It's official - Saddam's sons are dead.

"The two sons of fomer Iraqi president Saddam Hussein were killed today by U.S. troops in a firefight in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, Gen. Richard Sanchez announced this afternoon in a press briefing in Baghdad."

...Before the attack, U.S. troops from the Army's 101st Airborne Division had targeted the home in Mosul, which some wire reports said may have been owned by a Hussein relative. The target was chosen because of information from intelligence agencies who suspected high ranking members of Hussein's inner circle were there.

....U.S. officers told the Reuters news agency that as many as 200 U.S. soldiers had attacked the villa with machine guns and rockets during a four-hour battle.

***************

NBC just issued a breaking news alert saying that credible reports say that both of Saddam Hussein's sons were killed during the military's shootout Tuesday near Mosul. Reuters has more. Here's an update from USA Today .