This is a few days old, but it’s Christmas and I was sick anyway. Anyway, this is going to be an issue next year:
Sources on Capitol Hill and in the intelligence community say Alissa Starzak, a majority staffer on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) who has been nominated for the position of general counsel to the U.S. Army, is one of two SSCI employees accused by the panel’s Republicans, and by career intelligence officers, of having “stolen” the so-called Panetta Review: a classified study of the agency’s treatment of detainees prepared by former CIA Director Leon Panetta.
Basically, Ms. Starzak had been approved on the committee level by the old Armed Services committee, but that’s expired; and while a Democrat hoping that John McCain comes to your rescue might not be the most unlikely thing in the world, alas – it may not be sufficient, in this case. This issue has been seething just under the surface of Beltway politics for several years now – the CIA even called for a criminal investigation into how Starzak and fellow Feinstein staffer Daniel Jones got access to the document in question in 2010 – and it’s almost certain to flare up in 2015. Continue reading Alissa Starzak should NOT be confirmed as US Army General Counsel.