Free Republic

FBI Director James Comey is being thrust into the spotlight as the controversy surrounding Hillary Clinton’s personal email server intensifies. The FBI is investigating the security of Clinton’s email setup, including if classified information was mishandled. The probe is putting the nation’s top law enforcement agency at the center of a political battle leading into the 2016 election. Comey has long shown an independent streak that's gained him wide bipartisan praise and helped him sail to a 93-1 confirmation vote in the Senate. That independence will be tested with Republican lawmakers demanding answers and the Clinton team dismissive of a...

Federal authorities investigating Gov. Rod Blagojevich have intercepted thousands of phone calls, interviewed a number of new cooperating witnesses and targeted several potential defendants in the case, according to a court filing released Wednesday. The motion was made in federal court by prosecutors who are seeking an extra three months to formally indict Blagojevich and his former chief of staff, John Harris. The move was expected because the deadline for handing up an indictment had been set for Jan. 7. The extension would give U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald's office until April 7. Fitzgerald's office cited the complexity of the case...

GRAND JURY SUBPOENAS ISSUED ON REZKO/OBAMA LAND DEAL

With the sure hand for snatching at defeat we’ve seen working ever since George W. Bush long ago alluded to all the accrued political capital he was going to spend on Social Security reform, the behind-the-scenes political savants of the Bush White House this Sunday gave the Times a story, which undoubtedly brought a smile to the face of every one of the president’s and the administration’s adversaries from Berkeley to Babylon. All members of the Presidential staff members are going to be required this week to attend “refresher lectures” on ethics and the handling of classified material. What could...

Well, Joseph C Wilson IV's 15 minutes is now in its third year, and judging from the pass given to him by the major newspapers and TV networks there's no end in sight. Why would the media collude in this fraudulent buffoon's self-aggrandization? After all, the first folks he lied to were them. But they seem to have decided their investment in him is now so deep, they're stuck with him. This is what I wrote a year and a half ago, in the fond belief that the chapter-and-verse exposure of his falsehoods would finally drive Wilson from public life....

Open Up, Mr. President [snip]...It is not surprising that your White House distrusts and/or despises the media, the CIA, the State Department's career officers, the United Nations and a host of other institutions that you could not control...People in those institutions were out to defy and/or get you.But you and yours helped them accomplish the mission. One lesson available in this story is that amateurs are no match for the CIA in disinformation campaigns. The spies are far better at operating in the shadows than you politicians will ever be. They have a license to dissemble.The hidden management of...

In an Oct. 10 editorial titled "The Promise of the First Amendment," the publisher and chief executive of the New York Times opined that for a federal judge to imprison their reporter Judith Miller for contempt of court violates the press freedoms guaranteed in the First Amendment. This argument misstates existing law and misunderstands the issues at stake.... The Times argues that "the press cannot perform its intended role if its sources of information -- particularly information about the government -- are cut off." Hence, Ms. Miller has a First Amendment right to refuse to respond to the subpoena. This...

A prosecutor's investigation into an apparent attempt by the Bush administration to punish a political opponent by revealing classified information has veered terribly off course. It threatens grievous harm to freedom of the press and the vital protection it provides against government misconduct. The reality of the threat was driven home, quite personally for us, last week, when a federal judge in Washington sentenced a Times reporter, Judith Miller, to up to 18 months in prison for refusing to testify before a grand jury. The panel is looking into who gave Robert Novak the name of a covert Central Intelligence...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15 - President Bush's chief political adviser, Karl Rove, testified on Friday to a federal grand jury investigating whether it was anyone at the White House who had illegally disclosed the name of a C.I.A. undercover officer to a newspaper columnist, a lawyer for Mr. Rove said. "He answered fully and truthfully every one of their questions," the lawyer, Robert Luskin, said. Mr. Luskin added that Mr. Rove, who testified for more than two hours, did not seek to avoid answering any question on legal grounds. A spokesman for the White House, Scott McClellan, said the testimony demonstrated...