Free Republic

[Snip] The shredded files, which any good German bureaucrat knows as vorvernichtete Akten or pre-destroyed files -- fill a staggering 16,000 mail sacks that contain about 45 million individual pages, or 600 million scraps. Thus far, the puzzlers are 440 sacks into the process. [Snip] "However many documents I piece together, it'll never cease to amaze and shock me the extent to which friends, colleagues, even husbands and wives, went to betray each other. It shows you what a poison regime it was," she says.

So as it turns out, even the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has its own SWAT team. You don’t need to know. You can’t know.” That’s what Kathy Norris, a 60-year-old grandmother of eight, was told when she tried to ask court officials why, the day before, federal agents had subjected her home to a furious search. The agents who spent half a day ransacking Mrs. Norris’ longtime home in Spring, Texas, answered no questions while they emptied file cabinets, pulled books off shelves, rifled through drawers and closets, and threw the contents on the floor. The six agents, wearing...

Russia pays tribute to East German spymaster MOSCOW, Russia (Reuters) -- Russia paid lavish tribute to dead East German spymaster Markus Wolf on Friday, playing up his Russian background and recalling past espionage triumphs over the United States and its allies. "The memory of this wonderful, steely person will forever stay in our hearts," the Defense Ministry newspaper Red Star said. Wolf, who masterminded some of the Cold War's biggest spying coups at the head of 4,000 spies for the Stasi secret police, died on Thursday in his sleep in Berlin. Moscow's lavish praise for Wolf reflects a newly-awakened admiration...