Such murky stuff, as is typical with the CIA. How do you begin to untangle criminal actions like this? When does spying for the opposition outweigh participation in genocide? Does one cancel out the other?

These aren't rhetorical questions, because we have a web of similar interests all over the world:

For eight years, Stanisic was the CIA's main man in Belgrade. During secret meetings in boats and safe houses along the Sava River, he shared details on the inner workings of the Milosevic regime. He provided information on the locations of NATO hostages, aided CIA operatives in their search for grave sites and helped the agency set up a network of secret bases in Bosnia.

At the same time, Stanisic was setting up death squads for Milosevic that carried out a genocidal campaign, according to prosecutors at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, which was established by the U.N. Security Council in 1993 to try those responsible for serious human rights violations in the Balkan wars.

Now facing a trial at The Hague that could send him to prison for life, Stanisic has called in a marker with his American allies. In an exceedingly rare move, the CIA has submitted a classified document to the court that lists Stanisic's contributions and attests to his helpful role. The document remains sealed, but its contents were described by sources to The Times.

The CIA's Lofgren, now retired, said the agency drafted the document to show "that this allegedly evil person did a whole lot of good." Lofgren, however, doesn't claim to disprove the allegations against Stanisic.

"But setting the indictment aside," he said, "there are things this man did that helped bring hostilities to an end and establish peace in Bosnia."

According to Glenn, and anyone who follows American politics, this is the Democrats' grand strategy: Give Bush everyone he wants so that the Republicans can't attack them as weak and spineless. How's that working out so far?

Salon:

Historians writing about the Bush era were given a great gift yesterday -- an iconic headline that explains so much of what has happened in this country over the last seven years:

Their rationale for doing that is that it prevents the Republicans from depicting them as "weak," because nothing exudes strength like bowing. Here's more evidence of the brilliance of the Democratic strategy to show how "strong" and "tough" they are by bowing to Bush and all of his demands, from this morning's New York Times article by Eric Lichtblau:

WASHINGTON — The Senate gave final approval on Wednesday to a major expansion of the government's surveillance powers, handing President Bush one more victory in a series of hard-fought clashes with Democrats over national security issues...

There comes a point when you have to wonder whether or not the Democrats actually support some of these disastrous bills they help usher through Congress. President Bush is the most unpopular President since the advent of polling, yet time after time they cave and give in to every one of his demands, despite overwhelming opposition to the policies he seeks. Save for the few in Congress who actually vote against these monstrosities, it's hard to deny that the majority of them actually think things like telecom immunity are a bad idea. After all, as we learned last week, it pays off.

American Civil Liberties Union: The Senate passed an unconstitutional spying bill and granted sweeping immunity to phone companies. Obama had promised to filibuster this measure. He didn't. Let's do something!

Freewayblogger: Gas pump blogging

Mugsy's Rap Sheet: High gas prices may prove to be just another tool for stealing elections.

Consortiumnews: Mukaskey is Bush's new Mr. Coverup. He acts more like a crime family consigliere than the chief law enforcement officer of the US.

Where's the Outrage? For everyone over the age of 25, we've been here before. In late 1970s, as oil prices began to skyrocket, we had a debate in this country over oil and energy independence.

Blue Jersey: More confirmation that the GOP and cohort aren't merely insensitive to overt racism when lauding Helms. It's a defining characteristic of the party.

War and Piece: G-Dub to close Gitmo?

William K. Wolfrum: Christopher Hitchens lets Vanity Fair blow off his legs, kill his entire family, destroy his home; he writes about it

MediaBloodhound: PBS and NBC's symbiotic sins of omission, and Fox's thirteeen-year-olds.

TalkLeft: Is the government tracking you? At least one Federal Judge still believes warrantless spying is illegal.

David E's Fablog: The newspaper of record's fawning profile of professional liar Limbaugh made me sick. Imagine how David E. felt when he noticed his name in the article!

Angry Bear: Republicans warn that Democrats will cause a difference

Senator Russ Feingold joined Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! Tuesday to speak out about the reprehensible FISA "compromise" brokered by House Leader Steny Hoyer. Feingold has always been the most articulate and outspoken voice on Constitutional liberties, and he sure didn't hold back.

Download | play Download | play (h/t Heather)

SEN. RUSS FEINGOLD: It's not even a fig leaf; it's a joke. It does not in any way prevent the ruling from that court, basically automatically, of immunity, because it just involves saying, "Look, they've got a piece of paper from the government." This is nothing but Democrats trying to pretend that they're doing something here. They are doing nothing. They're giving in. [Missouri Republican] Senator Kit Bond is basically giggling at the fact that the Republicans and the administration got essentially everything they want on this. It's sadly a great failure on the part of the Democratic majority that was elected in 2006 primarily to get us out of Iraq, but also significantly to protect the Constitution of the United States. This is not a proud moment.

Do you hear that, Democrats? The GOP is laughing at your craven weakness. Hell, your approval numbers are higher with Republicans than they are with the people who put you in power to supposedly protect their rights. Do what you were elected to do and filibuster this bill until the real intelligence gaps are closed and the telecoms are compelled to prove they didn't violate federal law by helping the most unpopular President in American history spy on us.

When, precisely, did it become unfashionable (even taboo) to stand strong on protecting core American values? Have we really allowed George Bush to fundamentally alter the character of our country? Be sure to tune into CSPAN-2 tomorrow to see whether or not there are any true leaders in the Democratic party willing to fight the good fight.

ACLU:

The American Civil Liberties Union responded today to a stunning new report that the NSA has effectively revived the Orwellian "Total Information Awareness" domestic-spying program that was banned by Congress in 2003. In response, the ACLU said that it was filing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for more information about the spying. And, the group announced that it was moving its "Surveillance Clock" one minute closer to midnight.

"Congress shut down TIA because it represented a massive and unjustified governmental intrusion into the personal lives of Americans," said Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the Washington Legislative Office of the ACLU. "Now we find out that the security agencies are pushing ahead with the program anyway, despite that clear congressional prohibition. The program described by current and former intelligence officials in Monday's Wall Street Journal could be modeled on Orwell’s Big Brother."

The ACLU said the new report confirmed its past warnings that the NSA was engaging in extremely broad-based data mining that was violating the privacy of vast numbers of Americans.

TPM has more...

Wired:

The Supreme Court turned down Tuesday a request to take up a challenge to the Bush Administration's warrantless wiretapping program, adding to the Administration's string of legal victories in challenges to the controversial, five-year-long program.

The ACLU, representing lawyers, journalists and Muslim groups, challenged the program in 2006, arguing that the warrantless spying on international communications violated the Fourth Amendment and put a chill on the free speech of journalists.

The suit started in a Detroit federal court room, where in 2006 Judge Anna Diggs Taylor issued an injunction against the spying, which she found to be unconstitutional.

In July 2007, the Sixth Circuit reversed that decision simply on the issue of standing -- in layman's terms, having the right to sue. The court found that the plaintiffs couldn't prove they were spied on, so therefore could not sue.

In October, the ACLU asked the Supreme Court to review that 2-1 decision, which it called a Catch-22.

However, the Supreme Court declined, without comment, to hear the case, effectively blessing the appeals court decision.

It's a little difficult to prove you're an injured party (in this case, that you've been spied upon) if the government won't release the information, isn't it? Here's the appeal filed by the ACLU (.pdf) Christy @ FireDogLake:

Ultimately, it looks as though SCOTUS found the standing argument compelling enough here not to delve more deeply into the issues involved which, sadly, is not at all a surprise considering this particular court's record on national security cases.

This decision does not, however, negate the pending case(s) in San Francisco in which the EFF and ACLU, among others, represent the interests of plaintiffs who discovered their phones had been monitored through whistleblower information that the government inadvertently produced in discovery -- those cases are ongoing.

[..] John Dean had a fantastic discussion of "state secrets" and why it shouldn't be used to cloak potential wrongdoing in this case.

And Glenn Greenwald doesn't spare anyone:

That's exactly how our country operates now. When high political officials here are accused of breaking the law, they need not defend themselves. Congress acts to protect and immunize them. The courts refuse even to hear the lawsuits. And executive branch officials are completely shielded from the most basic mechanics of the rule of law.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, under the chairmanship of Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), has sent out a fundraising letter using the City of Berkeley's decision to call Marines trying to recruit within city borders "unwelcome" and Code Pink protestors having a parking spot outside the recruiting office once a week for six months as the justification for a return to a Republican majority. That's the dizzying logic of the rightwing for you.

Liberal extremists on the City Council of Berkeley, California recently passed a resolution labeling brave United States Marines as unwelcome and uninvited visitors within the city's boundaries. According to the Sacramento Bee, "... City Council ... labeled military recruiters stationed [in Berkeley] as 'intruders' and pronounced them a 'violent influence' on the city's youth"

Additionally, the Sacramento Bee reported, "It [the Berkeley City Council] also gave the anti-war group Code Pink a permanent parking space in front of the recruiting office, from which it could stage its frequent protests." (Sacramento Bee, 2/12/08)

Senate Democrats are blocking the Senate from saying anything official about this situation and allowing this outrageous insult by the city of Berkeley to go unanswered.

Do you still need a reason to vote for a Republican Senate? The importance of regaining the Senate Majority is clear to me. Is it to you? What do you think will happen with a Democrat-controlled Congress and a Democrat President?

That's right. The most CRITICAL thing to consider is parking spots for protesters and non-binding resolutions from the most liberal city in the US and that's why we MUST have a Republican-controlled Congress. Rubber-stamping reckless borrow and spend tactics that are driving the economy into an abyss? That's a-okay. Protecting the President as he shreds the Constitution, spying on American citizens and torturing innocent people because they are guilty of being Muslim? Hunky dory. Blindly cheerleading a war waged on false pretenses and with no clear exit policy and abdicating your Constitutionally-mandated responsibility of oversight? Fantastic!

But dammit, don't let those hippy anti-war types exercise their right to free speech. That's just going too far.

What does it say about the quality of news being given to the American public when Charles Gibson talks about "Rent-A-Pet" but ignores the FISA proceedings yesterday?

The media wants you to care more about how not to commit to a Pomeranian than the fact that your government is spying on you.

Democrats.com

On Thursday, Chairman John Conyers' House Judiciary Committee held a hearing at which Attorney General Michael Mukasey said that he would not investigate torture (video) or warrantless spying (video), he would not enforce contempt citations (video), and he would treat Justice Department opinions as providing immunity for crimes (report).

None of this was new, but perhaps it touched something in Conyers that had not been touched before. Following the hearing, he and two staffers met for an hour and 15 minutes with two members of Code Pink to discuss impeachment.

Conyers expressed fear of what might happen following an impeachment, fear of installing a Bush replacement or losing an election. The "corporate power structure", he said, would not allow impeachment without unleashing "blowback." Conyers told Ellen Taylor and Manijeh Saba: "You need to be more than brave and courageous. You need to be smart."

Their response? They are asking people who care about justice to help them let Conyers know that the smart thing right now would be bravery and courage.

On Rosa Parks' birthday last week, Leslie Angeline began a fast for impeachment. Taylor and over 20 other activists have joined the fast. Conyers has agreed to meet with Angeline to discuss impeachment on Tuesday.

The Chairman told Taylor and Saba that he is listening to several advocates for impeachment, including Liz Holtzman and this author, and asked "So how would it look if I allowed two women to push me over the edge?" Conyers leaned out of his chair for dramatic effect.

A number of organizations will be sending their members this alert Monday morning:
Let's push Conyers over the edge by flooding his office with phone calls, faxes, and Emails on Monday and Tuesday. Let him know that only impeachment hearings

1-will make it on TV,
2-will force compliance with subpoenas by eliminating "executive privilege",
3-will hold brazen criminals accountable, and
4-will convince voters that Democrats care about the Constitution.
Call 202-225-5126
Fax 202-225-0072
Email john.conyers@mail.house.gov