Congressional Glance
The Philip Morris Company did not like to talk about what went on inside its lab in Cologne, Germany, where researchers secretly conducted experiments exploring the effects of cigarette smoking.
So when the Justice Department tried to get its hands on that research in 1996 to prove that tobacco industry executives had lied about the dangers of smoking, the company moved to fend off the effort with the help of a highly regarded young lawyer named Kirsten Rutnik.
Ms. Rutnik, who now goes by her married name, Gillibrand, threw herself into the work. She traveled to Germany at least twice, interviewing the lab’s top scientists, whose research showed a connection between smoking and cancer but was kept far from public view.
The House Judiciary Committee chose to interview former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove behind closed doors because they wanted more time to question him, and not as a concession to Bush Administration representatives, sources say.
The wording in too many provisions of these bills are simply too VAGUE and open the door WIDE for some government bureaucrat on the state of federal level to decide what farmers can or cannot use to grow food, and how that food will be handled--all under the benign guise of "protecting" the public. Where have we heard that before?
President Obama is set to convene a summit on reforming healthcare Thursday, and some Republicans are already taking shots. Rep. Zach Wamp (Rep-Tenn) told MSNBC's Tamron Hall that Obama's proposed healthcare plans would be a "fast march to socialism", and that he believes that healthcare is not a right because many choose not to have insurance.
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) -- which has yet to complete a program designed to properly store electronic records even in the shadow of millions of missing White House emails sent during the presidency of George W. Bush -- apparently feels a World War II probe is more important.
