U.S. Attorney Nominee Under Ethical Cloud

Colorado's would-be U.S. attorney is not setting good example for candor or transparency that would be expected of a state's top federal law enforcement official:

President Barack Obama's nominee as Colorado's next U.S. attorney told the FBI two years ago that she never spoke to anyone in the Denver District Attorney's Office about an illegal immigrant who became a controversial figure in the 2006 gubernatorial race.

FBI interview summaries describe Stephanie Villafuerte as saying she had "no conversations" with anyone at the DA's office about the illegal immigrant, Carlos Estrada-Medina.

But the FBI apparently never asked Villafuerte, the former chief deputy DA who was then working for Bill Ritter's campaign, why she left a phone message for DA spokeswoman Lynn Kimbrough that Kimbrough noted was about Estrada-Medina. The FBI also apparently never asked her about the nature of a series of phone calls she exchanged over the next two days with Kimbrough and First Assistant DA Chuck Lepley. Those calls came both before and after an order by Lepley to a subordinate to run a criminal history check of Estrada-Medina in a restricted federal database.

It can be a crime to access the National Crime Information Center computer for a non-law-enforcement purpose.

Update:Villafuerte withdrew her nomination.

Federal Govt. Warns Dr. Weil About Supplement Recommendation

As reported on the NaturalNews website by Mike Adams, the self-named Health Ranger, the feds are threatening legal action against Andrew Weil, a prominent MD (and frequent Larry King guest) who also supports some natural remedies, simply for recommending the herb astragulus. Adams adds the following:

When true statements about botany are outlawed, and the only statements allowed to be made about H1N1 flu protection are based on profit-driven lies, and the very leaders who try to help the People (like Dr. Weil) are threatened with being arrested as criminals and having their companies shut down at gunpoint, that's when you know you live in a "1984"-style medical police state.

When true statements about botany are outlawed, and the only statements allowed to be made about H1N1 flu protection are based on profit-driven lies, and the very leaders who try to help the People (like Dr. Weil) are threatened with being arrested as criminals and having their companies shut down at gunpoint, that's when you know you live in a "1984"-style medical police state.

For all those who voted for Obama, by the way, keep in mind this criminal FDA racket continues to operate in full swing under the Obama administration, just as it did under the Bush Administration. Sadly, Obama has done absolutely nothing to halt the tyranny against natural product companies. In fact, under Obama, this action has been accelerated by the FTC and FDA. It's worse now than ever before, and with Big Government getting even bigger -- and more lawmakers calling for increased FDA funding -- this problem is only bound to get worse.

Click here for the FDA/FTC warning letter to Weil.

As we've blogged previously, "heathcare" is more than just about drugs and surgery.

Swedish Court Upholds Charges Against Animal Rights Activist

Sweden's high court establishes a legal precedent for protection of the workplace in that country:

Sweden's Supreme Court has upheld a landmark ruling in which a 30-year-old animal rights activist was convicted for his involvement in storming the premises of four companies and harassing members of staff.

The 30-year-old Malmö resident was sentenced on charges of aggravated unlawful entry by the Swedish Supreme Court.

Officials Warn of Homegrown Radicals Trained in Overseas Terrror Camps

According to the Washington Post, the number of recruited terrorists from the West going overseas for paramilitary training is on the increase:

U.S. and European counterterrorism officials say a rising number of Western recruits -- including Americans -- are traveling to Afghanistan and Pakistan to attend paramilitary training camps. The flow of recruits has continued unabated, officials said, in spite of an intensified campaign over the past year by the CIA to eliminate al-Qaeda and Taliban commanders in drone missile attacks.

Since January, at least 30 recruits from Germany have traveled to Pakistan for training, according to German security sources. About 10 people -- not necessarily the same individuals -- have returned to Germany this year, fueling concerns that fresh plots are in the works against European targets.

...European security officials have warned for many years of the threat posed by homegrown radicals who have gone to Afghanistan and Pakistan to wage jihad. Officials in some countries, such as Britain, said they have successfully cracked down on the number of would-be fighters going to South Asia. But others, such as Germany, are seeing a significant increase and struggling to contain it.

Meanwhile, the New York Times has an interesting piece about the Taliban's fundraising techniques:

The Taliban in Afghanistan are running a sophisticated financial network to pay for their insurgent operations, raising hundreds of millions of dollars from the illicit drug trade, kidnappings, extortion and foreign donations that American officials say they are struggling to cut off.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban have imposed an elaborate system to tax the cultivation, processing and shipment of opium, as well as other crops like wheat grown in the territory they control, American and Afghan officials say. In the Middle East, Taliban leaders have sent fund-raisers to Arab countries to keep the insurgency’s coffers brimming with cash.

Estimates of the Taliban’s annual revenue vary widely. Proceeds from the illicit drug trade alone range from $70 million to $400 million a year, according to Pentagon and United Nations officials. By diversifying their revenue stream beyond opium, the Taliban are frustrating American and NATO efforts to weaken the insurgency by cutting off its economic lifelines, the officials say.

CIA Surfin' The Web For Open Source Intelligence

An "exclusive" from Wired.com's national security blog:

America’s spy agencies want to read your blog posts, keep track of your Twitter updates — even check out your book reviews on Amazon.

In-Q-Tel, the investment arm of the CIA and the wider intelligence community, is putting cash into Visible Technologies, a software firm that specializes in monitoring social media. It’s part of a larger movement within the spy services to get better at using ”open source intelligence” — information that’s publicly available, but often hidden in the flood of TV shows, newspaper articles, blog posts, online videos and radio reports generated every day.

Visible crawls over half a million web 2.0 sites a day, scraping more than a million posts and conversations taking place on blogs, online forums, Flickr, YouTube, Twitter and Amazon. (It doesn’t touch closed social networks, like Facebook, at the moment.) Customers get customized, real-time feeds of what’s being said on these sites, based on a series of keywords.

Homeland Security Can't Trace Visa Holdovers

Even the New York Times, despite its absolutist open-borders philosophy, thinks this is bad:

Eight years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and despite repeated mandates from Congress, the United States still has no reliable system for verifying that foreign visitors have left the country.

New concern was focused on that security loophole last week, when Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, a 19-year-old Jordanian who had overstayed his tourist visa, was accused in court of plotting to blow up a Dallas skyscraper.

Last year alone, 2.9 million foreign visitors on temporary visas like Mr. Smadi’s checked in to the country but never officially checked out, immigration officials said. While officials say they have no way to confirm it, they suspect that several hundred thousand of them overstayed their visas.

Over all, the officials said, about 40 percent of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States came on legal visas and overstayed.

Mr. Smadi’s case has brought renewed calls from both parties in Congress for Department of Homeland Security officials to complete a universal electronic exit monitoring system.

DHS also has problems closer to home--the vulnerability of its own website to a cyberattack:

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) public-facing websites present a highly accessible point of entry and attack to its information resources, according to an Office of Inspector General report released last Thursday.

The report titled Vulnerabilities Highlight the Need for More Effective Web Security Management evaluated nine of DHS’ most frequently visited public-facing websites to determine whether DHS has implemented effective security controls and practices, examining the implementation of DHS’ required configuration settings and patch management practices.

The report was heavily redacted in order not to divulge details that could help would be malicious intruders.

Net Neutrality--A Backdoor Fairness Doctrine?

At the moment, it's difficult to make heads or tails about the proposed "net neutrality" rules. However, given this administration's minimal regard for free speech and the marketplace of ideas, we're suspicious. For what it's worth, Sen. McCain has registered his opposition:

U.S. Senator John McCain has introduced legislation that would block the U.S. Federal Communications Commission from creating new net neutrality rules, on the same day that the FCC took the first step toward doing so.

McCain on Thursday introduced the Internet Freedom Act, which would keep the FCC from enacting rules prohibiting broadband providers from selectively blocking or slowing Internet content and applications. Net neutrality rules would create "onerous federal regulation," McCain said in a written statement.

...McCain called the proposed net neutrality rules a "government takeover" of the Internet that will stifle innovation and depress an "already anemic" job market in the U.S.

More on the net neutrality pushback here. Visit the FCC's website for the full text of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking.