FBI Agents Raid Special Counsel’s Home, Office In Corruption Investigation
FBI Agents Raid Special Counsel’s Home, Office In Corruption Investigation
Today, FBI agents raided the home and office of federal Special Counsel Scott Bloch, seizing computers and documents in relation to a corruption investigation. The Wall Street Journal reports:
More than a dozen FBI agents served grand jury subpoenas shortly after 10 a.m., shutting down the agency’s computer network and searching its offices, as well as Mr. Bloch’s home. Employees said the searches appeared focused on alleged obstruction of justice by Mr. Bloch during the course of an 2006 inquiry into his conduct in office.
Bloch was charged with looking into whether Karl Rove used government resources to help elect Republicans in 2006. Yet Bloch has engaged in his own Rove-like behavior and has been under investigation since 2005. A look at some of the charges against Bloch:
– In April 2005, government watchdogs complained that the Bush appointee had allowed his office to “sit on” a complaint that Condoleezza Rice, then National Security Adviser, had “used government funds to travel in support of President Bush’s re-election bid.” By contrast, Bloch had ordered an immediate investigation into whether Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) had “improperly campaigned in a government workplace,” even though the complaints had been filed around the same time.
– The Office of Personnel Management’s inspector general has been “looking into claims that Mr. Bloch improperly retaliated against employees” who disagreed with his policies, such as that “federal employees are not protected from discrimination based on sexual orientation.” He has also reportedly “dismissed whistleblower cases without adequate examination.”
– In 2006, Bloch “erased all the files on his office personal computer,” potentially as part of a cover-up. To do so, Bloch bypassed the Office of Special Counsel’s technicians and phoned Geeks on Call, the mobile PC-help service.
Bloch has angrily responded to the investigations against him by noting that the White House and the Office of Personnel Management “have conflicts of interest making impartiality unlikely in their investigation.”
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“FBI Agents Raid Special Counsel’s Home, Office In Corruption Investigation”
Special Counsel bloching justice!
May 6th, 2008 at 2:48 pmEXCUSE ME
Just what is Bloch supposed to do without his computer tonight? Imagine himself as a troll on progressive sites?
May 6th, 2008 at 2:54 pmThis has been a long time in coming. To all those employees of Bloch who were retaliated against over the years, my heart goes out to you.
May 6th, 2008 at 2:56 pmYeah, “they did it too” is always a great excuse, buddy.
Nice try.
May 6th, 2008 at 2:56 pmYou know, it’s gonna be really interesting to see shrubs pardon list.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:01 pmIgnoranceIsNotBliss Says:
You know, it’s gonna be really interesting to see shrubs pardon list.
They’ll be needing lots of paper and ink for that list.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:08 pmExit Stage Left Says:
IgnoranceIsNotBliss Says:
You know, it’s gonna be really interesting to see shrubs pardon list.
They’ll be needing lots of paper and ink for that list.
It might be easier to determine who in this administration WON’T get their offices searched. That would actually be a very small number.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:13 pmExit Stage Left Says:
IgnoranceIsNotBliss Says:
You know, it’s gonna be really interesting to see shrubs pardon list.
They’ll be needing lots of paper and ink for that list.
Some reason when I read this I had a vision of Mel Brooks in “Blazing Saddles” playing the governor signing papers, “Work, work, work, work…”
May 6th, 2008 at 3:20 pmAfro-Mex sez: Hopefully it won’t be as long as Clintons
it’ll need to be long as a capitol hill phone book, just to cover the political appointees. aWol’ll just have to issue blanket pardons to every GOPuke in the RNC, just to keep his own satchel ass outta jail…
May 6th, 2008 at 3:21 pmIgnoranceIsNotBliss Says:
————————————————————–
You know, it’s gonna be really interesting to see shrubs pardon list.
Hopefully it won’t be as long as Clintons
How many of these people were in Clintons Cabinet?
Jeez
May 6th, 2008 at 3:21 pmStrat-Rat. I think Annie has never read my posts. How you doing?
May 6th, 2008 at 3:23 pmCorrection #11
May 6th, 2008 at 3:23 pmAfricanMexican said:
Frigging bush is responsible for thousands of deaths and you have the nerve to compare it to odometer fraud?
Even by the troll standard that post is really “lame”.Or in legal speak kind of reaching arent’ we?
May 6th, 2008 at 3:24 pmtake care
tony and guidedog Lido
leftcoast Says:
Strat-Rat. I think Annie has never read my posts. How you doing?
Hey there…I saw you asked her if she was referring to your post. I certainly can say you are on our side – no question about that. The ‘left’ in leftcoast should be a clue.
I’m doin’ great. Staying busy and practicing lots and lots…
May 6th, 2008 at 3:27 pmBloch has that Hans Von Spasky look, eh?
He also appears to be as corrupt as he is incompetent, so I can certainly see why Genghis Chimp anointed, err, appointed him.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:32 pmStratRat Says:
May 6th, 2008 at 3:36 pmI’m doing fine. Would like to play some guitar before my fingers have lost their “chops”. Still singing and doing sound for CEBC in Clairemont.
leftcoast Says:
StratRat Says:
I’m doing fine. Would like to play some guitar before my fingers have lost their “chops”. Still singing and doing sound for CEBC in Clairemont.
Keep at it. I made the mistake of spending a couple weeks only playing my nylon string classical guitar. Now I am afraid to pick up anything with steel strings :) OUCH!
May 6th, 2008 at 3:45 pmSo we have a case of the fox watching the fox who’s supposed to watch another fox watching the henhouse. We’re screwed.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:46 pmDitto to comment # 3! And it is about time that the FBI nabbed Bloch. A long time coming: finally, the investigator investigating the investigation is now under investigation. I call that poetic justice.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:50 pmtratRat Says:
Keep at it. I made the mistake of spending a couple weeks only playing my nylon string classical guitar. Now I am afraid to pick up anything with steel strings :) OUCH!
I picked up a new toy, a Fernandes electric/acoustic someone was selling at a garage sale for $50. I got it for the sweeeeet tone. Checked list for the model and it is worth about a thousand bucks. Sweet guitar.
I stay away from nylon, have to keep my fingers tough, lol
May 6th, 2008 at 4:05 pm“What’s more, everybody is probably guilty.”
Oh my – such truthiness!! They’re all guilty as sin.
And Leftcoast, please don’t be so overly sensitive. I was grousing about the troll infestation in general – not about you, OK?
May 6th, 2008 at 4:05 pmI believe the time has come for an ‘Independent Investigation’.
Not Ken Starr, mind you, but someone intelligent, apolitical and loyal to the Constitution, not their Party.
May 6th, 2008 at 4:10 pmI stay away from nylon, have to keep my fingers tough, lol
Yeah, thanks…Now you tell me :). Cool deal on the Fernandes (love the sustainer – cause it goes on foreverrrrrrrrrrr).
May 6th, 2008 at 4:34 pmanymouse19 Says:
Maybe we should investigate the investigators that are investigating the investigators.
Frankly, after 7 years of the Bush adnministration, it has come to that. Makes you kinda sad for our country, doesn’t it? It should.
May 6th, 2008 at 4:36 pmWhy bother with investigating anything? Just torture em. Everyone always tells the truth then, right?
May 6th, 2008 at 4:38 pmCan anyone think of such a scandal ridden administration. Just today we have the raid on Bloch’s office and the administration admitting that they failed to archive over 10 million e-mails from the run up to the Iraq war. Look at the AG, HUD and SBA leaders leaving because of their unethical/criminal activities. Look at the Abramoff scandal. It just goes on and on. Yet, the Democrats have failed to make this the central issue of the campaign season. Hit McCain on his flip-flops. Note that he cannot control the Republicans (NC ads) and tar and feather the entire party with the simple battle cry: TIME TO THROW THE BUMS OUT
May 6th, 2008 at 4:48 pmMeanwhile, Washington DC police have put out an all-points bulletin on Scott Bloch’s chin.
May 6th, 2008 at 5:19 pmI am surprised that this has happened only because it was so colossally predictable.
I remember the very threads, right here on ThinkProgress where we called it.
THEN the doofus calls the gawd damned Geek Squad to zero out his hard drives!?!
Does this man’s ineptitude know no bounds?
So, now we find ourselves sitting and watching in a state of semi-satisfied disgust hoping that, “Yes, he really IS that F’in stupid…”
Welcome to America, May 2008
May 6th, 2008 at 11:44 pmIs this the Bushies throwing Bloch under the bus before he spills the beans?
May 7th, 2008 at 12:55 am