[Steve_Seattle]

The other day Maureen Dowd predictably wrote a woman smart/men dumb column, contrasting the brilliant Rowley with the dumb-ass good-old-boys club. This article makes it clear that there was far more to it than that, that there were LAWS whose criteria had to be met in order to gain a warrant, and it was not at all clear that the FBI had sufficient evidence to obtain a warrant. The position vacancies - not mentioned in any other reports I have seen - were apparently also a major factor in the intelligence not getting more attention.

[Howlin]

I wish you could have seen her. Whew. Took her an hour who type 60 names and Schumer paid 1400 for a computer for his 7th grade daughter. That's the SUM total of what we learned from this hearing.

[Paul Ross]

Yes the positional vacancies were a factor, but that should not have kept the substantive request from being properly acted upon. The system is broken if you need 'good shepherds' who the high gods of the DOJ and FBI will entrust to draft their warrant requests.

Granted, there were some rotten apples, such as Michael Resnick but in typical Clintonian and Reno fashion, they made it almost impossible to get the FISA Warrants according to that report...totally contrary to their purpose. And there is no indication anywhere that Rowley is a loose cannon such as Resnick.