CIA has made errors on at least six different briefings, there are at least two briefings for which some of the attendees contest the CIA’s version, and CIA claims to be unable to provide full details on seven other briefings. No wonder Leon Panetta continues to say that “it is up to Congress to evaluate all the evidence and reach its own conclusions about what happened.” The CIA’s own version of when it briefed and whom is riddled with errors.

Now we know why wingnut bloggers have such a tough time understanding finance, and are so easily duped by banks trying to guarantee their own profit margins by waging class warfare. They’re illiterate.

The New York Times quotes lobbyist EdWard Yingling of the American Bankers Association (you know, the ones Dick Durbin says “own the place”) as saying that if banks can’t spuriously gouge people with credit card fees, they’re

One of the most shocking quotes from the Senate Armed Services torture report came from Jonathan Fredman, then the Counsel for CounterTerrorism Center at CIA, now working for the Director of National Intelligence, told some interrogators at Gitmo, “It is basically subject to perception. If the detainee dies you’re doing
it wrong.” Fredman is reported to have said that on October 2, 2002.

Since “the honeymoon” consisted of party-line rejection of pretty much everything Obama does, while calling him everything from a “Democrat Socialist” to Hitler, I can’t wait to see this new “head-on” approach.

make of that what you will

Many of the NRSROs were passing out AAA ratings like Pez, without ever looking at the underlying mortgage documents. Part of the problem was the “moral hazard” built into a system where the agencies are paid by the bond issuers they’re rating (see Bil Black’s work). But reforming them is not going to be easy — see Tyler Durden’s post on how the government chose to bypass Moody’s when they wouldn’t give certain TALF deals a AAA, but went with S&P, Fitch and DBRS who would.

Paul Kanjorski’s Subcommittee on Capital Market, Insurance and Government Sponsored Enterprises is holding a hearing on credit ratings agencies today, which starts at 2pm ET.

Pharaoh Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota governor and would-be Republican presidential candidate, has made it clear that he values the good opinion of Grover Norquist and Republican primary voters more than he values his own state.

According to House Appropriations Chair David Obey, the CIA interrogation list records a Democratic Appropriations staffer attending a September 19, 2006 torture briefing, when all the staffer did was walk John Murtha and Bill Young to the briefing, but was turned away at the briefing.

It’s no wonder Republicans like Sen. Ron Wyden’s health reform proposal; it forces everyone to buy private insurance, but denies everyone the option of signing up for a public plan. Why is Wyden fronting this?

Lieberman took over as chair of the committee in 2006, promising on the campaign trail to get to the bottom of what happened. Of course, once he was elected, he abandoned those promises, saying he didn’t want to “play gotcha anymore.”  Which was one of the very substantive reasons why liberals objected to him retaining his gavel in 2008, it wasn’t a “purge” as some of his apologists liked to pretend.