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A former CIA officer accused of revving an electric drill near the head of an imprisoned terror suspect has returned to U.S. intelligence as a contractor, training CIA operatives after leaving the agency, The Associated Press has learned. The CIA officer wielded the bitless drill and an unloaded handgun – unauthorized interrogation techniques – to

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Federal regulators are seeking public input on what rules should apply to wireless Internet access and specialized services that aren’t part of the Internet but are delivered over wired broadband connections. The move by the Federal Communications Commission marks the next step in the agency’s long-running effort to adopt so-called “network neutrality” regulations to prevent

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The CIA is making payments to a significant number of officials in Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s administration, The Washington Post reported on Friday. Citing current and former U.S. officials, the paper said the payments were long-standing in many cases and intended to help the agency maintain a source of information within the

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Massive egg recall dramatizes need for agency to have greater regulatory authority Food and Drug Administration chief Margaret Hamburg said Monday her agency is limited by law to a mostly reactive stance on food safety and argued that it needs a more “preventive approach.” Giving a series of network interviews in the wake of the

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Obama nominates candidate for CIA inspector general, agency watchdog position President Barack Obama has nominated a veteran investigator to be the next CIA inspector general, a crucial position that has remained vacant for more than a year. David B. Buckley, currently a senior manager for Deloitte Consulting, will have to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate before he can fill the watchdog post charged with unearthing abuses inside the spy agency. The nomination comes after months of congressional frustration with the White House about not putting forth for a candidate for the job. Several candidates had previously been mentioned but none made the cut. Because the CIA’s activities are mostly conducted in secrecy, the position is one of the most important at the agency. The government’s inspectors general are charged with rooting out corruption, fraud and other abuses. Story continues below… “It’s great to see that the administration has finally nominated someone to serve as permanent IG at CIA, but it shouldn’t have taken this long,” said Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight. “Given the recent history of abuse and misconduct, the CIA is clearly in need of independent and aggressive oversight. We hope Buckley is up to the task.” John Helgerson, the agency’s previous inspector, stepped down in March 2009. His former deputy, Patricia A. Lewis, has run the office since then. In April, the Senate’s intelligence leadership — Democrat Dianne Feinstein of California and Republican Kit Bond of Missouri — pressed President Barack Obama to find a replacement for Helgerson. Buckley has a long history conducting investigations in the U.S government. He has more than 30 years of experience working in the federal government. He has served as minority staff director of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and chief investigator for the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. He was also the special assistant for the inspector general at the Department of Defense, and special agent for the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations after eight years on active duty with the Air Force. Source: AP News Mochila insert follows… Powered by Mochila

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A new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association reveals that physicians with the CIA’s Office of Medical Services (OMS) played an even greater role in facilitating the torture of detainees than was previously recognized. As described in the (subscription required) study , “In 2003, partially in response to a CIA Inspector General investigation that questioned the use of enhanced interrogation methods and criticized the agency’s failure to consult with OMS about the risks to detainees of waterboarding, OMS physicians assumed another role, providing opinions to the agency and lawyers whether the techniques used would be expected to cause severe pain or suffering and thus constitute torture.” This advisory function came in addition to the physicians’ previous involvement in the torture of detainees through performing medical evaluations before and after interrogation, monitoring waterboarding sessions, and collecting information on the effectiveness and risks of various techniques. The study, titled “Roles of CIA Physicians in Enhanced Interrogation and Torture of Detainees,” was authored by Leonard S. Rubinstein, the president of Physicians for Human Rights, and Brig. Gen. (ret.) Stephen N. Xenakis, a former Army psychiatrist who is now with the Center for Public Health and Human Rights. It is based on a previously secret document from 2004, laying out OMS guidelines for detainee interrogation, which was released by the Obama administration. In an article for Harper’s, human rights lawyer Scott Horton notes that the JAMA study makes it apparent that the OMS physicians did not merely offer a medical opinion as to what constituted torture but “gave their bosses exactly what was expected of them: a green light to torture.” Story continues below… The study emphasizes that even though OMS approved the use of enhanced interrogation methods subject to “medical limitations,” those limitations took no account of actual pain and suffering and were merely calculated to minimize the chances of doing permanent physical damage. They “included durational limits for exposure to a specified temperature, either up to the time hypothermia would be expected to develop or on evidence of hypothermia; body weight loss of 10% or evidence of significant malnutrition as a result of dietary restrictions; and exposure to noise just under the decibel levels associated with permanent hearing loss. Stress positions were permitted for up to 48 hours provided the detainee’s hands were no higher than the head, weight was borne by lower extremities, and preexisting injuries were not aggravated. … The OMS guidelines also advised that emergency resuscitation equipment be available when waterboarding was used.” Although the guidelines specify that “the detainee’s physical condition must be such that these interventions will not have lasting effect,” they ignore professional literature on the potential health risks of the techniques, citing instead such sources as “‘Wilderness Medicine’ 4th Ed., Ch 6 — Accidental Hypothermia.” “The duplicity in this affair is amazingly circular.,” Horton writes. “The Justice Department’s torture lawyers relied on the CIA’s torture doctors for the conclusion that specific techniques did not produce ’severe pain’ that ran afoul of the criminal law prohibition on torture; the CIA doctors relied on the Justice Department lawyers for the same conclusion. It looks like a compact, and an alert prosecutor would no doubt call it a joint criminal enterprise. … It’s hard to see at this point whose behavior was the more ethically odious, though evidence suggests that both engaged in professional misconduct so egregious as to warrant formal disciplinary proceedings.” “The torture doctors expect to have their identities protected, and thus to escape the natural consequences of their gross professional misconduct,” Horton concludes. “This helps us understand why senior figures in the intelligence community are today ferociously pressuring the Justice Department to criminalize anyone who attempts to discover the identities of those involved. They assert that those identified would be terrorist targets. In fact, those who are unmasked face likely professional ethics proceedings, as well as the long-term risk of criminal prosecution, particularly if they ever venture beyond the borders of the United States.”

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History of pipeline problems follows Canadian company at center of huge Mich. river oil spill. A Canadian company at the center of a huge oil spill in southern Michigan has a history of pipeline problems, including leaks, an explosion and dozens of regulatory violations. Enbridge Inc. or its affiliates have been cited for 30 enforcement actions since 2002 by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which is the U.S. Department of Transportation’s regulatory arm. In a warning letter sent Jan. 21, the agency told the company it may have violated safety codes by improperly monitoring corrosion in the pipeline responsible for the massive spill Monday in Talmadge Creek. The creek feeds into the Kalamazoo River, which eventually flows into Lake Michigan. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that more than 1 million gallons may have spilled into the waterway, but Enbrige estimates the spill at closer to 820,000 gallons. Cleanup efforts could take several weeks, possibly two months, officials said. Story continues below… The EPA says the oil had traveled 25 miles downstream, but state officials estimate it has traveled 35 miles. Gov. Jennifer Granholm warned of a “tragedy of historic proportions” should it travel another 80 miles and reach Lake Michigan, but EPA officials don’t expect that to happen. Steve Wuori, an Enbridge executive vice president, said the company was doing maintenance all along the pipeline this year, but the section at the leak site was not scheduled for replacement. Enbridge CEO Patrick D. Daniel again apologized Thursday to the residents “for the mess that we have made.” Hundreds of workers and contractors went to work on the oil Thursday with more than 12,000 feet of containment and absorption boom, 14 skimmers, 43 vacuum trucks and a number of tanker trucks, excavators and other trucks, he said. Health officials went door-to-door, telling Calhoun County residents in about 30 to 50 homes near the spill to evacuate because of air quality concerns. Others were told to use bottled water for drinking and cooking. About 20 injured animals — mostly birds — were being treated Thursday at a wildlife rehabilitation center, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service said. The center refused to admit an Associated Press reporter, saying officials didn’t want to further traumatize the animals by allowing in more people, but planned a media tour for Friday. According to the government agency’s letter sent Jan. 21 to Enbridge, the company was implementing an alternate way of monitoring corrosion in the pipeline, and had detailed to regulators the steps it was taking to track corrosion in the interim. But the agency warned the company that it was violating code by not using a sufficient amount of certain chemicals to protect pipe interiors, not using proper monitoring equipment to determine if those chemicals were working, and not examining its monitoring equipment at least twice a year. Two years ago, Enbridge was cited for committing eight probable violations that may have contributed to an explosion that killed two people working Nov. 28, 2007, on a 34-inch pipeline near Clearbrook, Minn. Among its findings, the regulatory agency said Enbridge failed to follow written procedures for couplings on the pipeline, didn’t make the repairs in a safe manner and didn’t make sure workers had adequate training for that job. Such violations aren’t uncommon for pipeline companies, said Jeff Share, editor of the Pipeline & Gas Journal. An Enbridge affiliate, Houston-based Enbridge Energy Co., spilled almost 19,000 gallons of crude oil onto Wisconsin’s Nemadji River in 2003. Another 189,000 gallons of oil spilled at the company’s terminal two miles from Lake Superior, though most was contained. And in 2007, two spills released about 200,000 gallons of crude in northern Wisconsin as Enbridge was expanding a 320-mile pipeline. The Michigan leak came from a 30-inch pipeline, which was built in 1969 and carries about 8 million gallons of oil daily from Griffith, Ind., to Sarnia, Ontario. Bruce Bullock, director of Maguire Energy Institute at Southern Methodist University’s Cox School of Business, said Enbridge is similar to many other pipeline companies. Noting the age of Michigan’s pipeline, Bullock said that like the rest of the industry, Calgary, Alberta-based Enbridge is dealing with aging infrastructure. “They don’t have a reputation of being particularly a star player in terms of their profile or anything like that, but they certainly have a good reputation in terms of delivering for their shareholders,” Bullock said. “They certainly don’t have a bad reputation.” But Andy Buchsbaum, director of the National Wildlife Federation’s Great Lakes office, said Enbridge has a history of spills — including two major leaks in the past year. He said those leaks, coupled with the fatal blast in Minnesota, are problematic. “This is a company whose safety record is very definitely suspect and cause for concern,” Buchsbaum said. ___ Runk reported from Detroit. Associated Press writers Corey Williams and Mike Householder in Detroit contributed to this report. Source: AP News Powered by Mochila

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