Free Republic

WASHINGTON – Once, California Democrats led the way to a year of the women. Now, nearly two decades later, Republicans hope it's their turn. Meg Whitman won the party's nomination for California governor on Tuesday and Carly Fiorina will carry the GOP banner into the fall campaign for a Senate seat, a pair of wealthy businesswomen and first-time candidates running against veteran politicians in a year of palpable anti-establishment sentiment. In next-door Nevada, a third woman contender, Sharron Angle, won the right to oppose Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in the fall. And hundreds of miles to the east, South...

Congresswoman Jane Harman caught on video calling for higher taxes and defense cuts. Her constituents will not be pleased. LINK TO THE VIDEO

In a move that bolsters her civil liberties bona fides, South Bay Rep. Jane Harman is trying to shut down a controversial office that would give local police officials access to information from spy satellites. The program, which was introduced under the Bush administration, is part of a broader effort to secure the United States by making it easier to share information between federal and local authorities. But civil liberties advocates say that giving police chiefs and county sheriffs access to sophisticated spy imagery takes it a step too far. Responding to critics, Congress last year restricted funding for the...

The infamously wiretapped Jane Harman wants to shut down the federal agency slated to oversee the use of satellites for spying on U.S. residents suspected of terrorism and other evildoing. The California Democrat, who was wiretapped talking about the fate of two Israel lobbyists suspected of espionage, has introduced two bills that would shutter the Department of Homeland Security's innocuously-named National Applications Office.

California Democrat Jane Harmon tried to sell her influence to end an espionage case against to spies in return for help becoming House Intelligence Committee chairwoman. In a newly released NSA wiretap report, Harmon has been exposed negotiating a quid pro quo deal with an official of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The agreement apparently called for Harmon to sell the influence of her Congressional office by lobbying the Justice Department to reduce espionage charges against two AIPC operatives. In return AIPAC would lobby then minority leader Democrat Nancy Pelosi to name Harmon as the Chair of the...

Despite the makings of a juicy political blow-up, official Washington stayed largely mum on the mess of allegations that erupted from the pages of the typically staid Congressional Quarterly yesterday. The allegations are explosive: in 2006, a senior Democratic lawmaker cut a secret deal with an alleged Israeli spy; the NSA recorded the conversation and gave it to the FBI; and the former Attorney General quashed the probe to protect the pol, a political ally. Was the Republican House leadership, dependably eager to make hay out of Democrats' misfortunes, willing to comment? Not today, thanks. What about House Speaker Nancy...

The U.S. government may abandon espionage-law charges against two former lobbyists for a pro-Israel advocacy group, officials said yesterday, as a prominent House lawmaker denied new allegations that she offered to use her influence on their behalf. SNIP With the trial set to begin June 2, the Justice Department is reviewing whether to proceed as planned or withdraw the indictments after a series of adverse court rulings, according to law enforcement sources and lawyers close to the case. Defense attorneys recently subpoenaed a number of senior Bush administration officials, including former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, former national security adviser...

Major scandal erupts involving Rep. Jane Harman, Alberto Gonzales and AIPAC [updated below - Update II (Interview w/Jeff Stein)] Other obligations prevent me from writing until later today -- and I intend to focus on Rahm Emanuel's war-crimes-protecting proclamation that Obama's desire for immunity extends beyond CIA officers perpetrating torture to the "policy makers" who ordered it (watch today as the hardest-core Obama loyalists start explaining how the UN doesn't matter, international treaties are irrelevant, and war criminals need not be held accountable) -- but, until then, I wanted to highlight this extremely important and well-reported story from CQ's Jeff...

>Harman Vehemently Denies Bribery Allegations Allegedly Caught on NSA Tapes [California Democratic Congresswoman] Jane Harman says she never offered to help a "suspected Israeli agent" in exchange for the agent lobbying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for a key chairmanship for Harman. [California Democratic Congresswoman] Jane Harman vehemently denied on Monday allegations published in a congressional magazine that she had offered to help a "suspected Israeli agent" seek reduced charges for two men accused of espionage in exchange for the agent lobbying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for a key chairmanship for Harman. ,,, Harman, a California Democrat, was overlooked by Pelosi...

Rep. Jane Harman , the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington. Harman was recorded saying she would "waddle into" the AIPAC case "if you think it'll make a difference," according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript. In exchange for Harman's help, the sources said, the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy...

Congressional Quarterly just reported a highly secret National Security Agency wiretap report on Rep. Jane Harman. Wait. Before we get to the content of the wiretap, all you ACLU types should be hitting the ceiling in rage. Because NSA wiretaps are the most carefully protected, super-secret operations carried on by the Federal government. Even during the Bush Administration, when the CIA carried on an unconcealed war on the Bush policy in the War on Terror through selective and politically damaging leaks to the New York Times, no wiretap recordings were released. Wiretaps of Members of Congress are even more sensitive,...

Report: Jane Harman recorded vowing take action for AIPAC on wiretap @ 9:33 am by Jeremy P. Jacobs Congresswoman Jane Harman was recorded on a NSA wiretapped conversation agreeing to work to downgrade espionage charges against two officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in return for help securing the chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee, according to Jeff Stein's anonymously sourced column in Congressional Quarterly. Harman, a California Democrat, was allegedly recorded in a conversation with a suspected Israeli agent. The conversation reportedly took place before the 2006 election, when Democrats seized control of the chamber and, therefore,...

Yeah, bummer that guy we released from Gitmo has become an al Qaeda biggie. Disappointing, really. But hey, let the Saudis worry about it. Nothing for us to fret about here in America. As we all know, al Qaeda terrorists based in the Middle East pose no threat to the United States! That, in a mind-numbing nutshell, was the reaction of Rep. Jane Harman to the New York Times report that Said Ali al-Shihri, released from Gitmo in 2007, has become the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s branch in Yemen. Harman made her mind-boggling statement under questioning from CBS Early...

If U.S. lawmakers have their way, the lights may soon go out on Thomas Edison's greatest invention -- the incandescent light bulb. The 19th-century inventor brought illumination to the world's fingertips, but according to Congress, his invention isn't efficient enough for an age anxious about energy supplies. "Only 10% of the power used by today's incandescent bulbs is emitted as light, while the other 90% is released as heat," Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., said when she introduced her legislation to ban standard light bulbs. To eliminate this waste, Harman has proposed legislation that would effectively eliminate incandescent light bulbs from...

Have you ever had a teacher in school who was just so flat out nuts that her/his decisions made no sense whatever? I know I did. In the ninth grade I had a wacko Spanish teacher who perceived all sorts of minor slights she was receiving from both the school and society in general. She never ceased blabbering about how horrible the USA was and how WONDERFUL Fidel's Cuba was in comparison. What made this especially NUttie is that the teacher was a Cuban-American. Anyway, we students kept telling her that if she thought things were so great in...

Pelosi, Hastings and the Future of House DemocratsNovember 17th, 2006 There have been but 17 federal officials impeached by the House of Representatives since 1787 when the framers included the process in the U.S Constitution.  Of these were two presidents, one cabinet member, one senator, and one Supreme Court Justice.  The remaining defendants were all federal judges, seven of whom were subsequently convicted by the Senate and removed from the bench.  Statistically, in a field of thousands of past and present federal judges, this represents quite the rare and dubious distinction, indeed.And yet, one of the mere 7 federal judges...

Today, press reports indicate that it is Larry Hanauer, Rep. Jane Harman’s staffer, that Chairman Hoekstra has barred from seeing classified materials because he is suspected of having leaked the classified National Intelligence Estimate to the New York Times, in order to affect the election. This story is only beginning, and a fascinating backstory remains to be told about the Democrats in the House.

As reported Friday, a Democrat staffer was suspended last week over possibly being the source of the recently leaked National Intelligence Estimate to the New York Times. New reports from the Los Angeles Times and Fox News identified the name of the staffer in question, and that he has ties to Rep. Jane Harman (D-California) who expressed such outrage over the incident (hat tip to Michelle Malkin): The aide was identified by other congressional officials as Larry Hanauer. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of a pending investigation into the leak, said Hanauer had held positions with...

<p>The case is a spin-off of a probe that has already led to charges under the Espionage Act against two AIPAC lobbyists, whose case is still pending, and to a 12-and-a-half-year prison sentence for former Defense Intelligence Agency official Lawrence A. Franklin. Franklin pleaded guilty a year ago to three felony counts involving improper disclosure and handling of classified information about the Middle East and terrorism to the two lobbyists, who in turn are accused of passing it on to a journalist and a foreign government, widely believed to be Israel. The two lobbyists, who have denied any wrongdoing but were dismissed by AIPAC in April of 2005, were indicted on felony counts of conspiring with government officials to receive classified information they were not authorized to have access to and providing national defense information to people not entitled to receive it.</p>

Has Rep. Jane Harmen, a member of the House Intelligence Committee been divulging information to the MSM? Yesterday we learned that an unnamed democratic staffer had been suspended by House Intel Committee Chairman, Rep. Pete Hoekstra for possibly leaking a National Intelligence Estimate to the Ny Times. Of course the first to complain was in fact Jane Harman, who just happens to have been the one who pushed for it’s release from John Negreponte, and is even now pushing for a second NIE. The fact is that the staffer had been asked by someone, most likely Harmen to request the...