One of the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations (PDF) called for the establishment of a board to monitor how civil liberties issues were being dealt with at the various federal intelligence and law-enforcement agencies. Today’s Washington Post reports that the board, later established by Congress as the and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, hasn’t met once since formally constituted in June. Of course, it’s also under-funded and over-mandated. And as TalkLeft pointed out a while back, Bush’s board appointments, including Ted Olsen (who as Solicitor General argued the administration’s “enemy combatant” position before the Supreme Court), are conservative and don’t exactly inspire confidence as civil libertarians. Oh well. At least it was a nice idea.
