Constitutional Law

Inside information from BATFE

1. Deputy Director Edgar Domenech just got a government "golden parachute" out. It's impossible to sort out the internal politics involved, but he'd been demoted and said it was a result of exposing wasteful spending by the prior director. (GIven the byzantine politics of ATF higher levels, it's hard to sort out who is a whistleblower and who's back-stabbing, except that a lower level agent is always doing to be treated as the latter. Report fraud, waste, or abuse as a street level agent, and you're toast. Do it as a high enough guy to get WashPo coverage, and you have a shot).

2. The ATF director has just been given a report from the Inspector General that is pretty devastating. MAJOR screwups, their internal affairs refusing to check out complaints about those, etc.. So now offices are being told to generate favorable publicity, quickly, because this is going to get out sometime soon.

Full post as published by Of Arms and the Law on October 16, 2008 (boomark / email).