The Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank, has issued a 165 page report that concludes the Bush Administration's Post-9/11 immigrant roundup backfired. The report is available here.

Thinking of going to London or France? Get ready. They may be looking at your underpants.

The Administration continually intones the national security mantra when trying to justify its secret policies. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court said that's okay in the case of the detainees, Center for National Security Studies v. DOJ . More caution is needed.

Via Victor at Balasubramania's Mania:

Timothy Lynch has an interesting Wash Post piece about a bid to reopen a half-century old case involving the government's withholding of information based on the national security rationale. The long and short of the story is that in that case a plaintiff sued under the Federal Tort Claims Act. In refusing to turn over certain documents the U.S. government claimed a national security privilege. The case resulted in a Supreme Court decision reaffirming the national security privilege (the government's right to withhold information based on national security interests). Years later, the national security claim was found to have been bogus (the documents contained nothing that could be reasonably characterized as classified). And now the plaintiffs are seeking to reopen the case. Interesting story that should serve to caution the courts and citizens against blindly accepting the national security rationale. According to Mr. Lynch, "[t]he only way to minimize . . . abuses is to treat legal claims of national security with a healthy dose of skepticism."

Where does science end and science fiction begin in the Adminstration's War on Terror? Get ready for lie-detecting dogs and radar-detecting bullets, courtesy of the anti-terror agency Technical Support Working Group.

What is this group? From its " about page":

The Technical Support Working Group (TSWG) is the U.S. national forum that identifies, prioritizes, and coordinates interagency and international research and development (R&D) requirements for combating terrorism. The TSWG rapidly develops technologies and equipment to meet the high-priority needs of the combating terrorism community, and addresses joint international operational requirements through cooperative R&D with major allies.

Mission Statement

Conduct the National Interagency research and development program for Combating Terrorism through rapid research, development, and prototyping.

Identify requirements, develop solutions, and execute projects. Customize technology to specific user needs.

According to the Wired News article referenced above:

"TSWG is, in effect, a kind of mini-DARPA, except it is more clearly focused on a counterterrorism mission," according to Stephen Aftergood, a senior research analyst at the Federation of American Scientists (FAS).

TSWG funds projects that range from the commonsensical, like better chemical weapons sensors, to the far out, like intelligent video camera arrays.

...TSWG's budget has grown from $8 million in 1992 to $111 million in 2002 and to over $200 million in 2003. Still, TSWG, under the joint control of the Pentagon and the State Department, remains a tiny operation when compared to DARPA, which will spend almost $2.8 billion dollars on research this year.

Some of the proposals make good sense. Others are way out there. Among the currently funded projects are " bullet-detecting radar to prevent assassinations, a project to extract DNA from fingerprints, a cooling system for body armor and a mass transit surveillance camera system. "

Xymphora has made a list 20 things we still don't know about 9/11. Xymphora's conclusion:

This case is remarkable for the fact that we know almost nothing about what happened. The United States has embarked on two dreadful and unsuccessful wars based on the excuse of these attacks, and turned the country into a fascist security state. You would think there might be the slightest effort to answer some of these questions. The Bush Administration is stonewalling on even the most basic documents, and appears to have gotten away with one of the greatest cover-ups yet devised. The most striking thing is that most if not all of these issues could easily be resolved if the right people were forced to answer some rather simple questions.

We think declaring the U.S. a fascist state is a bit of a hyperbole, but there's no question our fundamental liberties have been eroded. We agree that the secrecy in which the Bush Administration has been permitted to operate must end. We need an enlightened citizenry that can properly assess the freedoms that are being taken away, and that can only happen with an unfettered and fully informed press.

We're heartenend to see major media like the New York Times pay some attention to the inequities in the feds' immigrant roundup policies.

The Times reports that the FBI has relied on dubious tipsters for information that has led to the arrests and detention of many immigrants. The problems aren't over for the immigrants when they are released, because their names are still entered in a national crime registry as having been arrested for terrorism, even if they were never charged with a crime, which in turn results in their being denied housing, employment and even airplane tickets.

It's a long article, with lots of horror stories.

The FBI has been undergoing internal changes--many of its drug agents have been moved into the terrorism unit and some members of Congress are upset.

The General Accounting Office, in testimony Wednesday to a House committee, found that the number of FBI field agent positions dedicated to drug crimes had dropped from about 1,400 in fall 2001 to just over 800 today.

The number of new drug investigations has fallen from 1,825 in 2000 to 944 last year and just 310 in the first half of this year. At the same time, new FBI counterterrorism investigations have risen from just over 1,000 prior to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to 4,408 by early this year.

....36 percent of the FBI's field agent positions are now working on either counterterrorism or counterintelligence, compared with 26 percent shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks. The report says that the FBI faces challenges in finding enough agents to meet the terror threat without further siphoning off resources from other criminal investigations.

The solution, according to FBI director Robert Mueller, is for Congress to fund more agent positions.

Our favorite investigative reporter on the Patriot Act in recent months has been Chisum Lee of the Village Voice. In his current article, The Devil is In The Details, he confirms that the Bush Administration is sneaking Patriot Act II past us in small doses, almost imperceptibly.

Both Patriot Act II and the means for evaluating it have begun to materialize, in scattered pieces. On June 5, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft slipped a wish list of major new anti-terrorism powers into a day of congressional testimony that ranged widely from Al Qaeda to intellectual property to DNA evidence. A wealth of revelations about the Bush administration's anti-terrorism conduct has also emerged, not in one grand exposé but sprinkled among various reports, court outcomes, and congressional Q&As.

Lee cites two developments in recent weeks which should have been, but were not, reported as Patriot Act-related--both could help Congress and the public decide whether Ashcroft should get new powers:

Ashcroft urged Congress to boost anti-terrorism powers in three major ways: make more acts punishable as terrorism under a broadened definition of providing "material support" to suspect groups, allow longer pre-trial detention for people accused of a terrorism-related offense, and make it easier to sentence people accused of "terrorist acts" to death. Asked last Friday whether these would make it into a final White House request, and what other ideas would be added in the end, Justice Department spokesperson Mark Corallo would not specify, saying only, "There will be a package of legislation sooner rather than later."

Although Ashcroft's pitch for new powers made headlines, unreported were parts of his testimony that might help Americans decide whether he should get them. For one, there was his understated slant on death sentences. The possibility of execution would be most valuable as a way to "encourage cooperation" in suspects, he said, not dwelling on the more concrete result of such a sentence.

Remember the Judge who asked the woman appearing before him if she was a terrorist--causing her to faint? He's stepped down.

"The Bush administration has concluded that stun guns, which inflict a disabling electric shock, can be used for security by crew members on commercial planes, a homeland security official said on Monday."

We think this is downright barbaric, dangerous and unnecessary. What if they stun the wrong person? In prisons, inmates have died from stun gun attacks.*

By the way, the reaction of the airline pilots association has been just swell--they think the usage should be extended to flight attendants in the cabin to quell disturbances. Just what we need. How long before a flight attendant overreacts and stuns a non-threatening but complaining passenger?

An article in the October 8, 2001 Air Safety Week (available on Lexis.com) pointed out:

What emerges is the potential for an arms race in the sky. If pilots start carrying stun guns, so may the "perps" (perpetrators). If the pilots are packing pistols, the perpetrators may escalate from knives and box-cutters to firearms, also. A 4-shot firearm disguised as a working mobile phone (supposedly undetectable) can be had, raising the prospect that even cell phones may have to be consigned to checked baggage. On the other hand, if the terrorists escalate to more lethal weapons, it may be entirely appropriate to pre-emptively increase the level of protection.

If armed sky marshals are deployed, and pilots are deputized and armed,
the terrorists may increase their numbers. One former airline pilot paints this scenario: "When there are multiple terrorists, historically they often operate with a 'caboose,' the guy in reserve if a sky marshal turns up. Now that will be true more than ever. Even with a gun in the cockpit, five terrorists run you out of ammunition in a hurry. Then the pilots get to beg for mercy before they die."

*Two examples: The family of Lawrence Frazier, a Connecticut inmate who died in June 2000 after guards shocked him with stun guns at Wallens Ridge State Prison, filed a $204 million lawsuit against the Virginia Department of Corrections last year in U.S. District Court in Richmond. (Roanoke Times & World News, 1/15/03); Three prison guards were charged with second degree murder in an inmate death in Florida in which a stun gun was used after the inmate was subdued (Orlando Sentinel, Feb. 13, 2002.)

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Another reason to be skeptical of our government's ability to ferret out terrorists:

Feds: Bomb-Sniffing Dogs Didn’t

A L E X A N D R I A, Va., June 9 — A dog trainer is scheduled to go on trial today in Alexandria federal court, charged with providing the federal government with bomb-sniffing dogs that couldn't do their jobs.

Russell Ebersole, 43, who owns a kennel in Stephenson, is accused of defrauding the government of more than $700,000 and putting at risk the lives of thousands of federal workers whose workplaces his dogs guarded. Prosecutors claim that in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Ebersole provided federal agencies with bomb dogs that couldn't find bombs.

Shouldn't the feds have tested the dogs' abilities or required some kind of independent certification before putting them to work?

The two reputedly highest Al Qaeda operatives in U.S. custody have denied working with Iraq. Bush has not released their statements.

Abu Zubaydah, a Qaeda planner and recruiter until his capture in March 2002, told his questioners last year that the idea of working with Mr. Hussein's government had been discussed among Qaeda leaders, but that Osama bin Laden had rejected such proposals, according to an official who has read the Central Intelligence Agency's classified report on the interrogation.

In his debriefing, Mr. Zubaydah said Mr. bin Laden had vetoed the idea because he did not want to be beholden to Mr. Hussein, the official said.

Separately, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Qaeda chief of operations until his capture on March 1 in Pakistan, has also told interrogators that the group did not work with Mr. Hussein, officials said.

[link via Daily Kos, who by the way, along with his partner, has just been hired by the Howard Dean campaign. Dean's lucky to get them.]