The National Security Agency (NSA) is purging what appears to be hundreds of millions of phone records collected by U.S. telecom companies that the agency had acquired since 2015.
The agency released a statement on Thursday saying it began deleting records in May after “analysts noted technical irregularities in some data received from telecommunications service providers.”
In testimony and reports this week, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has emerged as the Hamlet of the Potomac, an increasingly tortured and conflicted figure who is both misunderstood and misunderstanding. According to the New York Times, Rosenstein swayed between angst and anger in the aftermath of the firing of FBI Director James Comey. In conversations with both friends and colleagues, he reportedly “expressed anger” and “remorse” while appearing “conflicted,” “shaken,” “unsteady” and “overwhelmed.”
The reports only magnified prior concerns of the ethical basis for the deputy attorney general to appoint and supervise special counsel Robert Mueller. Rosenstein has long maintained that he can handle such concerns. The suggestion is that, as with Hamlet, “there is method” to any “madness” that he might have displayed.