By Eric Lichtblau
The New York Times
Thursday 14 February 2008

Washington - Broad spying powers temporarily approved by Congress in August appear likely to lapse this week after a daylong game of chicken on Wednesday between the White House and House Democrats produced no clear resolution.
At a morning appearance in the Oval Office, President Bush pressed the House to adopt quickly a plan that the Senate approved on Tuesday to broaden the government's spying powers and give legal immunity to telephone companies.
The plan is essential, Mr. Bush said, because terrorists are planning attacks on American soil "that will make Sept. 11 pale in comparison."
House Democratic leaders tried to obtain a 21-day reprieve to allow more time to negotiate before the temporary measure expires on Friday night. But the proposal was defeated in the face of opposition from liberals who are against the surveillance plan and conservatives who favor it.
House Democrats now say they may simply let the deadline pass without acting on the Senate plan.
Mr. Bush maintained on Wednesday that letting the broadened surveillance powers lapse "would jeopardize the security of our citizens."
Democrats insisted that a lapse would have no real effect.
The expiration of the powers "doesn't mean we are somehow vulnerable again," said Representative Silvestre Reyes, Democrat of Texas and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
The lapsing of the deadline would have little practical effect on intelligence gathering. Intelligence officials would be able to intercept communications from Qaeda members or other identified terrorist groups for a year after the initial eavesdropping authorization for that particular group.
If a new terrorist group is identified after Saturday, intelligence officials would not be able to use the broadened eavesdropping authority. They would be able to seek a warrant under the more restrictive standards in place for three decades through the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
The White House-backed plan that the Senate approved would broaden the spying powers for six years and provide legal immunity to the utilities that helped in the eavesdropping without warrants that Mr. Bush approved after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001.
AT&T and other major carriers face about 40 multibillion-dollar suits from customers who say the utilities' participation broke the law.
The passage of the Senate measure, a major victory for Mr. Bush on a crucial national security question, inflamed the oratory on Wednesday. Mr. Bush accused the Democratic-led House of needlessly prolonging the debate at the expense of the country's safety.
"At this moment," he said, "somewhere in the world terrorists are planning new attacks on our country. Their goal is to bring destruction to our shores that will make Sept. 11 pale by comparison."
To stop an attack, he urged, Congress must act immediately to strengthen the eavesdropping.
In the House, which passed a more restrictive surveillance plan in November that intentionally left out protection for the utilities, Democratic leaders were not swayed.
"The president's presentation this morning was, I think, basically dishonest," said Representative Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the majority leader.
Intelligence officials could continue intercepting suspect communications even if the deadline passes, Mr. Hoyer said. In pushing so hard for immunity for the utilities, he added, the Bush administration is "very nervous about what might be disclosed" if the lawsuits against the companies are allowed to continue.
"To some degree, therefore, I think it is a cover-up," Mr. Hoyer said.
Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Republican presidential hopeful, weighed in on the debate. When Mr. McCain learned that the House had voted down a 21-day extension and that the powers were likely to lapse at midnight Friday, he said: "That's too bad. That's very unfortunate. It's symptomatic of the gridlock of partisanship here in the Congress."
To break the gridlock, Mr. McCain said, "people that are patriotic Americans need to sit down together and work this out."
"It's clearly an absolute necessity to protect this nation," he said. "Unfortunately, we can't seem to do that."
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David M. Herszenhorn and Carl Hulse contributed reporting.

House Leaves Surveillance Law to Expire
By Carl Hulse
The New York Times
Friday 15 February 2008
Washington - The House broke for a week's recess Thursday without renewing terrorist surveillance authority demanded by President Bush, leading him to warn of risky intelligence gaps while Democrats accused him of reckless fear mongering.
The refusal of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, to schedule a vote on a surveillance measure approved Tuesday by the Senate touched off an intense partisan conflict over the national security questions that have colored federal elections since 2002 and are likely to play a significant role again in November.
Trying to put pressure on Democrats, Mr. Bush offered to delay a trip to Africa to resolve the dispute and warned that failure to extend the expanded power under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which expires Saturday, could hamper efforts to track terrorists.
"Our intelligence professionals are working day and night to keep us safe," Mr. Bush said, "and they're waiting to see whether Congress will give them the tools they need to succeed or tie their hands by failing to act."
But Ms. Pelosi and other House Democrats said Mr. Bush and Congressional Republicans were at fault because they had resisted temporarily extending the bill to allow disagreements to be worked out. Democrats would not be bullied into approving a measure they considered flawed, she said.
"The president knows full well that he has all the authority he needs to protect the American people," said Ms. Pelosi, who then referred to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's admonition about fearing only fear itself. "President Bush tells the American people that he has nothing to offer but fear, and I'm afraid that his fear-mongering of this bill is not constructive."
The decision by the House Democratic leadership to let the law lapse is the greatest challenge to Mr. Bush on a major national security issue since the Democrats took control of Congress last year.
Last summer, Democrats allowed the surveillance law to be put in place for six months although many of them opposed it. They have also relented in fights over spending on the Iraq war under White House pressure. But with Mr. Bush rated low in public opinion polls as he enters the last months of his presidency, Democrats are showing more willingness to challenge him.
Republicans say House Democrats are taking a risk, especially in light of the strong bipartisan Senate vote for the bill.
"They can't pass a Mother's Day resolution and got 68 votes for this bill," said Representative Adam H. Putnam of Florida, chairman of the House Republican Conference.
The battle over the surveillance bill was also tangled up in the rancor over a House vote to hold in contempt Joshua B. Bolten, the White House chief of staff, and Harriet E. Miers, the former White House counsel, for refusing to testify about the firing of United States attorneys. Republicans said the House was devoting time to that issue when it could be considering the surveillance program, and they staged a walkout in protest.
The main sticking point is a provision in the Senate bill that provides legal immunity for telecommunications companies that, at the Bush administration's request, cooperated in providing private data after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Many House Democrats oppose that immunity.
Surveillance efforts will not cease when the law lapses. Administration intelligence officials said agencies would be able to continue eavesdropping on targets that have already been approved for a year after the initial authorization. But they said any new targets would have to go through the more burdensome standards in place before last August, which would require that they establish probable cause that an international target is connected to a terrorist group.
Intelligence officials also told reporters Thursday that they were worried that telecommunications companies would be less willing to cooperate in future wiretapping unless they were given immunity.
Ben Powell, general counsel for the director of national intelligence's office, said some carriers had already asked whether they could be compelled to cooperate even without legal protection, although he indicated that none had actually threatened to halt operations.
Ms. Pelosi said that she believed that the differences could be resolved within three weeks and that she had told the chairmen of the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees to work with their counterparts in the Senate to seek a compromise.
Congressional Republicans sharply criticized Democrats for not moving on the final measure.
"I think there is probably joy throughout the terrorist cells throughout the world that the United States Congress did not do its duty today," said Representative Ted Poe, Republican of Texas.
Democrats said Republicans, struggling politically, were trying to create an air of crisis.
"This is a manufactured political crisis," said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat. "They want something to put in front of the American people to take their minds off the state of the economy."
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Eric Lichtblau contributed reporting.

Senate Votes for Expansion of Spy Powers

By Eric Lichtblau
The New York Times
Wednesday 13 February 2008

Washington - After more than a year of wrangling, the Senate handed the White House a major victory on Tuesday by voting to broaden the government's spy powers and to give legal protection to phone companies that cooperated in President Bush's program of eavesdropping without warrants.
One by one, the Senate rejected amendments that would have imposed greater civil liberties checks on the government's surveillance powers. Finally, the Senate voted 68 to 29 to approve legislation that the White House had been pushing for months. Mr. Bush hailed the vote and urged the House to move quickly in following the Senate's lead.
The outcome in the Senate amounted, in effect, to a broader proxy vote in support of Mr. Bush's wiretapping program. The wide-ranging debate before the final vote presaged discussion that will play out this year in the presidential and Congressional elections on other issues testing the president's wartime authority, including secret detentions, torture and Iraq war financing.
Republicans hailed the reworking of the surveillance law as essential to protecting national security, but some Democrats and many liberal advocacy groups saw the outcome as another example of the Democrats' fears of being branded weak on terrorism.
"Some people around here get cold feet when threatened by the administration," said Senator Patrick J. Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who leads the Judiciary Committee and who had unsuccessfully pushed a much more restrictive set of surveillance measures.
Among the presidential contenders, Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, voted in favor of the final measure, while the two Democrats, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, did not vote. Mr. Obama did oppose immunity on a key earlier motion to end debate. Mrs. Clinton, campaigning in Texas, issued a statement saying she would have voted to oppose the final measure.
The measure extends, for at least six years, many of the broad new surveillance powers that Congress hastily approved last August just before its summer recess. Intelligence officials said court rulings had left dangerous gaps in their ability to intercept terrorist communications.
The bill, which had the strong backing of the White House, allows the government to eavesdrop on large bundles of foreign-based communications on its own authority so long as Americans are not the targets. A secret intelligence court, which traditionally has issued individual warrants before wiretapping began, would review the procedures set up by the executive branch only after the fact to determine whether there were abuses involving Americans.
"This is a dramatic restructuring" of surveillance law, said Michael Sussmann, a former Justice Department intelligence lawyer who represents several telecommunication companies. "And the thing that's so dramatic about this is that you've removed the court review. There may be some checks after the fact, but the administration is picking the targets."
The Senate plan also adds one provision considered critical by the White House: shielding phone companies from any legal liability for their roles in the eavesdropping program approved by Mr. Bush after the Sept. 11 attacks. The program allowed the National Security Agency to eavesdrop without warrants on the international communications of Americans suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda.
AT&T and other major phone companies are facing some 40 lawsuits from customers who claim their actions were illegal. The Bush administration maintains that if the suits are allowed to continue in court, they could bankrupt the companies and discourage them from cooperating in future intelligence operations.
The House approved a surveillance bill in November that intentionally left out immunity for the phone companies, and leaders from the two chambers will now have to find a way to work out significant differences between their two bills.
Democratic opponents, led by Senators Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, argued that the plan effectively rewarded phone companies by providing them with legal insulation for actions that violated longstanding law and their own privacy obligations to their customers. But immunity supporters said the phone carriers acted out of patriotism after the Sept. 11 attacks in complying with what they believed in good faith was a legally binding order from the president.
"This, I believe, is the right way to go for the security of the nation," said Senator John D. Rockefeller, the West Virginia Democrat who leads the intelligence committee. His support for the plan, after intense negotiations with the White House and his Republican colleagues, was considered critical to its passage but drew criticism from civil liberties groups because of $42,000 in contributions that Mr. Rockefeller received last year from AT&T and Verizon executives.
Senator Olympia J. Snowe, a Maine Republican on the intelligence panel, said the bill struck the right balance between protecting the rights of Americans and protecting the country "from terrorism and other foreign threats."
Democratic opponents, who six months ago vowed to undo the results of the August surveillance vote, said they were deeply disappointed by the defection of 19 Democrats who backed the bill.
Mr. Dodd, who spoke on the floor for more than 20 hours in recent weeks in an effort to stall the bill, said future generations would view the vote as a test of whether the country heeds "the rule of law or the rule of men."
But with Democrats splintered, Mr. Dodd acknowledged that the national security argument had won the day. "Unfortunately, those who are advocating this notion that you have to give up liberties to be more secure are apparently prevailing," he said. "They're convincing people that we're at risk either politically, or at risk as a nation."
There was a measure of frustration in the voice of Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, as he told reporters during a break in the daylong debate, "Holding all the Democrats together on this, we've learned a long time ago, is not something that's doable."
Senate Republicans predict that they will be able to persuade the House to include immunity in the final bill, especially now that the White House has agreed to give House lawmakers access to internal documents on the wiretapping program. But House Democrats vowed Tuesday to continue opposing immunity.
Congress faces a Saturday deadline for extending the current law, but Democrats want to extend the deadline for two weeks to allow more time for talks. The White House has said it opposes a further extension.
Meanwhile, Senate Democrats hope to put some pressure on Republicans on Wednesday over another security-related issue by bringing up an intelligence measure that would apply Army field manual prohibitions against torture to civilian agencies like the Central Intelligence Agency.
Republicans plan to try to eliminate that provision, a vote that Democrats say will force Republicans to declare whether they condone torture. Democrats also say it could show the gap between Mr. McCain, who has opposed torture, and the administration on the issue.
"We know how we would feel if a member of the armed services captured by the enemy were, for example, waterboarded," Mr. Reid said. "So I think that we're headed in the right direction, and I hope that we'll get Republican support on this."
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Carl Hulse contributed reporting from Washington.

Gang-Rape Victim Says She and Others Silenced by Halliburton

By Maddy Sauer
ABC News
Tuesday 12 February 2008

Jones says they are forced to argue their sexual assault cases in secretive arbitration.
A Houston, Texas woman, who says she was gang-raped by her co-workers at a Halliburton/KBR camp in Baghdad, says 38 women have come forward through her foundation to report their own tragic stories to her, but that many cannot speak publicly due to arbitration agreements in their employment contracts.
Jamie Leigh Jones is testifying on Capitol Hill this afternoon. She says she and other women are being forced to argue their cases of sexual harassment, assault and rape before secretive arbitration panels rather than in open court before a judge and jury.
Jones returned from Iraq following her rape in 2005. She was the subject of an exclusive ABC News report in December which led to congressional hearings.
After months of waiting for criminal charges to be filed, Jones decided to file suit against Halliburton and KBR.
KBR has moved for Jones' claim to be heard in private arbitration, instead of a public courtroom, as provided under the terms of her original employment contract.
Halliburton, which has since divested itself of KBR, says it is improperly named in the suit and referred calls to KBR.
In arbitration, there is no public record or transcript of the proceedings, meaning that Jones' claims would not be heard before a judge and jury. Rather, a private arbitrator hired by the corporation would decide Jones' case.
In fact, Tracy Barker, who says she was sexually harassed and sexually assaulted while working for Halliburton/KBR in Iraq, also recently tried to file suit against the companies. She was forced into arbitration last month.
Jones will tell Congress today that she was not aware that when she signed her employment contract, she was effectively signing away her right to bring a lawsuit.
"When I decided to pursue a civil suit, I was informed that within my 13-page employment contract that had an additional five pages attached, [there was] included an arbitration clause," Jones says in her prepared statement to the committee.
Jones didn't know much about arbitration when she signed the contract and was shocked to learn what she had done.
"I learned that I had signed away my right to a trial by jury," she said.
Congressman Ted Poe, R-Texas, who has been involved in the Jones case since the beginning, will also appear at today's hearing. He disagrees with the arbitration solution.
"Air things out in a public forum of a courtroom," said Rep. Poe in an earlier interview with ABC News. "That's why we have courts in the United States."
More than two years since her attack, no criminal charges have been brought in the matter, and legal experts say that it is highly unlikely that Jones' alleged assailants will ever face a judge and jury.
Jones says that the arbitration clauses are letting her rapists and other criminals off the legal hook.
"The forced arbitration clause in Army contractor's contracts prove to protect the criminals of violent crimes, rather than enforce they be held accountable by a judge and jury," Jones says in her remarks. "My goal is to ensure all American civilians who become victims of violent crimes while abroad have the right to justice before a judge and jury."
KBR said in a statement to ABCNews.com, "Arbitration is the last step of KBR's Dispute Resolution Program. The vast majority of employment disputes at KBR, approximately 96 percent, are resolved through this program without resort to arbitration. KBR remains committed to ensuring the arbitration process is fair to all employees."
Since the attacks, Jones has started a nonprofit foundation called the Jamie Leigh Foundation, which is dedicated to helping victims who were raped or sexually assaulted overseas while working for government contractors or other corporations.
"I want other women to know that it's not their fault," said Jones. "They can go against corporations that have treated them this way." Jones said that any proceeds from the civil suit will go to her foundation.
"There needs to be a voice out there that really pushed for change," she said. "I'd like to be that voice."
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Jump to today's Truthout Features:

No. 08-028 February 12, 2008
NRC PURSUES ENHANCEMENTS OF ITS ALLEGATION AND INSPECTION
ACTIVITIES FOLLOWING SECURITY OFFICER ISSUES
AT PEACH BOTTOM NUCLEAR POWER PLANT
Printable Version

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Dale Klein said today agency management has directed the staff to pursue recommended enhancements to its allegation and inspection programs based on a lessons-learned review that followed an agency investigation into reports of inattentive security officers at the Peach Bottom nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania.
“The NRC has no tolerance for sleeping or inattentive security officers,” Klein said. “When these allegations arose, we investigated but did not reach the right outcome. Upon learning the full extent of the problem, we looked at our own system for examining these situations, found areas for improvement and are making changes. This is an ongoing process, and there may be more changes in the future.”

He said the agency’s Executive Director for Operations Luis Reyes has directed a group of senior agency officials to evaluate the recommendations of the lessons-learned review group created in the wake of the Peach Bottom case, and propose appropriate follow-up actions. The officials were given a deadline of two weeks to report back on how changes were being implemented. Senior agency officials told by Reyes to find the most appropriate manner to implement recommendations were Deputy EDO Martin Virgilio, Deputy EDO Bruce Mallett, Nuclear Reactor Regulation Office Director Jim Dyer, and Office of Enforcement Director Cynthia Carpenter.
The lessons-learned review was conducted by a team from the NRC’s Region I. The review team developed recommendations for improvements to allegation procedures, practices and policies, and to the inspection program aimed specifically at enhancing the NRC’s ability to identify conditions of inattentiveness. The recommendations are under management review and focus on:
· Enhancing NRC processes for forwarding allegations to a licensee, evaluating licensee responses and documenting NRC evaluation of the licensee's response;
· Reviewing NRC procedures for communications and interactions with concerned individuals; and
· Improving NRC inspection processes for detecting inattentiveness and inspector awareness of allegations.
The NRC had launched a range of inspections and investigations after video recordings of inattentive security officers in a “ready room” at the plant came to light in September. These actions were taken to determine the extent of the problem, and to ensure prompt and effective corrective action was taken by the plant owner, Exelon, and its security contractor, Wackenhut. The inspections confirmed there had been several occasions on which security officers were inattentive. However, the NRC also determined the plant’s security program was not significantly degraded as a result. Earlier in the year there had been an allegation that guards were sleeping in guard towers at Peach Bottom. Based on the information provided at the time, the NRC was unable to substantiate that information.
Immediately after seeing the video, the NRC reminded all operators of nuclear reactors of the importance of maintaining an alert guard force, conducted surprise overnight spot checks and, at Peach Bottom, conducted additional security inspections. The agency noted that nuclear plant security is based on layers of defensive capabilities and security was not compromised at Peach Bottom, or other plants where sleeping or inattentive guards have occasionally been found.
The EDO’s memorandum and the full report is available through the NRC’s ADAMS electronic document database by entering ML080420580 on this Web page: http://adamswebsear ch.nrc.gov/ dologin.htm.

NRC news releases are available through a free listserv subscription at the following Web address: http://www.nrc. gov/public- involve/listserv er.html. The NRC Home Page at www.nrc.gov also offers a Subscribe to News link in the News & Information menu. E-mail notifications are sent to subscribers when news releases are posted to NRC's Web Site.

By Mary Beth Sheridan
Friday, February 15, 2008

A U.S. appeals court ordered a federal merit board yesterday to consider whether former Park Police chief Teresa C. Chambers was unfairly targeted as a whistleblower when she was fired in 2004.
Chambers was ousted after telling The Washington Post that her police force was strained by providing stepped-up protection for national monuments after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, in addition to its work patrolling parks and highways.
A federal civil service merit board upheld her removal in 2006. Chambers then took her case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.
In its decision yesterday, the court upheld the merit board's findings of several charges of misconduct against Chambers. It also said that removing her from her job was "a reasonable penalty" for such actions as failing to follow the chain of command.
But it also ruled that the merit board had erred in deciding that the Whistleblower Protection Act didn't apply to her case and sent it back for reconsideration. The appeals court said that the merit board must consider a broader standard, reviewing the public safety issues Chambers raised with the media as well as her disagreements with Park Police budget policy. Chambers contends she was protected as a whistle-blower for flagging dangers.
"While Chambers certainly expressed a disagreement with a policy decision, she also potentially disclosed a danger to public safety that may have resulted from that decision," the decision said.
Chambers said she was heartened by the decision, although it wasn't a reversal of the Merit Systems Protection Board's ruling.
"I think it's critical for all of us that our federal employees can have some measure of protection when they speak out about issues that affect our safety," she said.
A National Park Service spokesman, Dave Barna, declined to comment, saying the matter involved a personnel issue in litigation.
Chambers, the first woman to head the Park Police, led the force from February 2002 until she was suspended in December 2003 and subsequently fired. She recently became police chief in Riverdale Park in Prince George's County.
A recent report by the Interior Department's inspector general said the Park Police is still plagued by some of the problems Chambers highlighted.
Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/14/AR2008021403431_pf.html