Karl Rove's Least Likely Interrogator: Scott Bloch and the Office of Special Counsel

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Wed May-07-08 10:30 PM
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Karl Rove's Least Likely Interrogator: Scott Bloch and the Office of Special Counsel

Bottom line, whistleblowers are trying to enforce the law. People who stop them are obstructing justice.

That is in a nation of law. For Bush and his cronies, those who protect lawbreakers are the Department of Justice.

Great reporting and background on the Bloch Thing from Daniel Schulman of Mother Jones:

Office of Special Counsel's War On Whistleblowers

News: OSC is investigating Karl Rove's political machine. But until recently OSC head Scott Bloch's policy was to ignore whistleblowers' tips on murder, espionage, and terrorism, while vigorously rooting out any signs of the "homosexual agenda."

By Daniel Schulman
Mother Jones
April 24, 2007

it looked as if leroy smith was going to get some recognition after all. A safety manager at a federal prison in California, he had challenged his bosses, risked his job, and endured threats of retaliation to expose hazardous conditions in a prison computer recycling program where inmates were smashing monitors with hammers, unleashing clouds of toxic metals. Now the federal government was flying him to Washington, D.C., as a whistleblowing hero. The Office of Special Counsel (osc), the federal agency charged with protecting government employees who expose waste, fraud, and abuse, had scheduled a catered event honoring Smith as "Public Servant of the Year." The office's director, Scott Bloch, had prepared a flowery speech that was later posted on the agency's website, referencing Sophocles and The Shawshank Redemption: "In the end, Morgan Freeman's character truly becomes what his name implies�a Free man," it read. "One person can root out corruption and abuse of power. Once he understands this, he is redeemed and can break out of the trap of fear, and break free into the light of integrity and justice. That is the effect of seeing a brave whistleblower stand up and win; it inspires the rest of us."

Only Bloch never delivered that speech. Just minutes before the September 7 ceremony was to begin, Smith received word that the event was off because a relative of an osc staffer had died. It seemed "kind of fishy" to Smith; indeed, an osc source told me the excuse was so transparent as to be "ludicrous." The real problem, the source said, was that Bloch�a Bush appointee who, employees say, shares his boss' antipathy for dissent�had learned that Smith was planning to speak at a press conference sponsored by the whistleblower group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (peer), a persistent critic of the osc. The peer event went forward as planned, and at it Smith told the press that he felt the osc "bears some examination." True, he had been vindicated, but many of his colleagues who'd made similar disclosures had been ignored, and the prison conditions had not changed. "I cannot help but feel that my experience is a beacon of false hope for public servants who are trying to correct wrongdoing," he said.

Then again, given the current climate for whistleblowers, false hope might be all the hope there is. A series of court rulings, legal changes, and new security and secrecy policies have made it easier than at any time since the Nixon era to punish whistleblowers; the climate has deteriorated in recent years with the Bush administration's emphasis on plugging leaks and locking down government information. Bloch's tenure�he is the first director of the whistleblower office to face a whistleblower complaint of his own�has only added insult to injury.

It's come to the point where some advocates now counsel federal employees against coming forward, period. "When people call me and ask about blowing the whistle, I always tell them, 'Don't do it, because your life will be destroyed,'" says William Weaver, a professor of political science at the University of Texas-El Paso and a senior adviser to the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition. "You'll lose your career; you're probably going to lose your family if you have one; you're probably going to lose all your friends because they're associated through work; you'll wind up squandering your life savings on attorneys; and you'll come out the other end of this process working at McDonald's."

CONTINUED...

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/05/dont_whistle_while_you_work.html

Gee. Clobbering whistleblowers makes more than good sport. It's great practice for firing honest U.S. Attorneys.

Karl Rove's Least Likely Interrogator: Scott Bloch and the Office of Special Counsel

The controversial director of the OSC is launching the most high-profile (and politically fraught) investigation of his stormy, three-year tenure. Is it a courageous effort to expose White House malfeasance, or a last ditch attempt to save his own hide?

By Daniel Schulman
Mother Jones
April 25 , 2007"

He's been accused of rolling back protections for federal workers who face sexual-orientation discrimination; installing staffers in key posts who share his religious-conservative worldview; wielding his prosecutorial power for partisan purposes; and turning his agency into a "black hole" for whistleblower disclosures and complaints of reprisal. Welcome to Scott Bloch's stormy, three-year tenure at the helm of the Office of Special Counsel (OSC), the federal government's obscure whistleblower-protection agency, which is also in charge of policing whether federal employees are engaging in political activity on the job.

Though he's long been in the crosshairs of watchdog groups and watched closely by Congress, Bloch may have just picked the biggest fight of his tenure�and it's not the one anyone expected him to take on. In a move that has shocked even his own staffers, Bloch is gearing up for a large-scale investigation into the administration's political operation, zeroing in on the man who has turned that operation into a veritable satellite office of the Republican National Committee: Karl Rove.

OSC will also probe the disappearance of an untold number of emails that were sent by White House officials using nongovernmental, RNC-issued email addresses and the circumstances behind the firing of at least one U.S. Attorney, New Mexico's David Iglesias. "I've never seen this done before," an OSC investigator told me today, referring to the scale of the investigation. "I think this is a first." He told me, however, that questions remain about whether the agency has the "legal authority to look to the depth that he says we're going to look. I haven't a clue whether we do or not. But I'm sure that will be tested."

In an ironic twist, Bloch is the first OSC chief to face a whistleblower complaint of his own, one filed by a group of career OSC staffers who allege, among other things, that he engaged in the very retaliatory practices his agency is charged with investigating. In connection with this, Bloch has been the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Office of Personnel Management's inspector general that has been in the works for well over a year. Judging from my conversations with current and former OSC employees, OPM investigators are likely getting an earful. "Everybody that I talk to is incredibly unhappy and just waiting until heads out," one senior OSC staffer told me not long ago. "Everyone has the same feeling that he's just destroyed the agency."

Despite the controversy that has surrounded Bloch during his time at OSC, it's possible the hallmark of his tenure could be the high-stakes case he's currently pursuing�an investigation that may have been prompted, in part, by Iglesias. One of eight U.S. Attorneys forced out by the Justice Department under dubious circumstances, he filed two separate complaints with the office in early April, one of them alleging violations of the Hatch Act�a law that prohibits federal employees from engaging in political activity on the job�by administration officials, including Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, Gonzales' former chief of staff Kyle Sampson, and Monica Goodling, once the Justice Department's White House liaison.

Goodling stepped down from her post in April as the controversy over the prosecutor firings reached a boil, promptly invoking her Fifth Amendment right to avoid testifying before Congress. The House Judiciary Committee today announced that it is issuing a subpoena and will grant her immunity in exchange for her testimony. (The Senate Judiciary Committee, meanwhile, is considering authorizing a subpoena for Rove deputy Sara Taylor.)

Iglesias himself thinks Goodling's testimony is key to determining the potential role of the White House in the prosecutor firings. "I think Monica Goodling holds the keys to the kingdom," he told Chris Matthews on Hardball last night. "I think if they get her to testify under oath, with a transcript, and have her describe the process between the information flow between the White House counsel, the White House and the Justice Department, I believe the picture becomes a lot clearer."

CONTINUED...

http://www.motherjones.com/washington_dispatch/2007/04/bloch.html

Of course, this puts the Siegelman case into much clearer focus.

Special Counsel shut down probe of Siegelman case last year

5/7/2008, 7:50 p.m. ET
By BEN EVANS
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) � The U.S. Office of Special Counsel last year shut down a previously undisclosed investigation into the federal prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, according to an internal memo made public Wednesday.

The investigation was being conducted by a task force formed at the agency a year ago to pursue high-profile political investigations in Washington, most notably whether the White House played politics in firing U.S. attorneys. It began gathering information on the Siegelman case in September and was planning to request documents from the Justice Department in October before Special Counsel Scott Bloch ordered the case closed, according to the Jan. 18 draft memo, made public by the Project on Government Oversight, a watchdog group.

The investigation was one of many that the task force had taken up, and the memo shows that Bloch frequently differed with investigators about which cases to pursue.

SNIP...

Siegelman, a Democrat, said the memo suggests further political interference in his case and reiterated his call for the Justice Department to appoint a special prosecutor to take up the matter.

"The question is who told them to shut it down," Siegelman said Wednesday when told of the memo. "Why would you start an investigation and let it proceed and then shut it down? The logical conclusion is that somebody intervened and told them to shut down the investigation."

SNIP...

"I'm stunned by all this," said Vince Kilborn, one of the former governor's attorneys. "If an ongoing government investigation was shut down, I would say it's potential obstruction of justice."

CONTINUED...

http://www.al.com/newsflash/regional/index.ssf?/base/news-35/121019664657870.xml&storylist=alabamanews

Infinite thanks to DUers Maddezmom and kpete for getting this news out. They are Truth Tellers.

It's easy to figure in whose pocket Corporate McPravda lies. Like Bush, Rove and the rest of these the media are Liars and Traitors.