Links and Minifeatures 08 22 Monday (Part I?)

RINO Sightings is up! Recommended: Argghhh!, INDC Journal, Dean's World, Tinkerty-Tonk



Please check back here tomorrow for Carnival of Liberty VIII!

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Captain's Quarters has the money quote on the whole "wall" issue:

...I assert that the main point about the Wall is that it was not a memo or a directive — it was a culture. There were many walls, throughout the Intelligence Community, as well as between the Intelligence Community and Law Enforcement. Most of these were of long standing and existed for good reasons — security and protecting civil liberties. But under Clinton, all the walls got taller and new ones were added...



Not believing there were critical national security issuses for which the support the Intelligence Community was vital; acutely concerned about the potential for scandals and political embarassements [as only so scandel-plagued an Adminisrtation could be], and having a strong personal distaste for the whole business, Clinton set out to reduce the risk that the Intelligence Community could do him harm by making it as difficult as possible for the Intelligence Community to do anything. He did this thru his appointments, seeing to it that political animals and risk-adverse adminstrators got key postions; by changing the rules by which intelligence could be collected — for example, banning using people with crimnal associations or "human rights abusers" as HUMINT sources, which meant that no one in the Intelligence Community could talk to a disaffected terrorist; a huge blow that badly hurt our ability to keep tabs on terrorist organiszation after 1998 — and by building walls.

This dates back to my first (limited circulation, in a 1992 APA) assessment of Clinton's character: that he would do literally anything if he saw a way to take advantage for personal gain, there was no principle he would not sacrifice for a 3% gain in an opinion poll (or to avoid a 3% loss). We have learned the hard way many times since exactly how correct that assessment was. He has spent his whole life gaming the system, and he's done well, but what about everyone else around him? How about the system itself?



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Michelle Malkin directs us to Professor Bainbridge, who agrees that the transfer of Air America was likely a fraudulent transfer. Ms. Malkin also brings a comment up about Air America lasting until the judgement is rendered, but as I have said repeatedly, I don't think they'll last that long.



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Utterly cool! Original Einstein Manuscript Discovered



I'll do some more later if I am able.