Lost in Translation

[Theophylact]

From CBS News:

Because she is fluent in Turkish and other Middle Eastern languages, Edmonds, a Turkish-American, was hired by the FBI soon after Sept. 11 and given top-secret security clearance to translate some of the reams of documents seized by FBI agents who, for the past year, have been rounding up suspected terrorists across the United States and abroad.

Edmonds says that to her amazement, from the day she started the job, she was told repeatedly by one of her supervisors that there was no urgency - that she should take longer to translate documents so that the department would appear overworked and understaffed. That way, it would receive a larger budget for the next year.

“We were told by our supervisors that this was the great opportunity for asking for increased budget and asking for more translators,” says Edmonds. “And in order to do that, don't do the work and let the documents pile up so we can show it and say that we need more translators and expand the department.”

Edmonds says that the supervisor, in an effort to slow her down, went so far as to erase completed translations from her FBI computer after she'd left work for the day.

“The next day I would come to work, turn on my computer and the work would be gone. The translation would be gone,” she says. “Then I had to start all over again and retranslate the same document. And I went to my supervisor and he said, ‘Consider it a lesson and don't talk about it to anybody else and don't mention it.’”

The lesson was don’t work, and don’t do the translations.

People are rotting in jail, with no charges filed, while the FBI is (supposedly) building a case against them.

The FBI is part of the Department of Justice.

[Epidemic]

Sweet.

Now we know why Social Security has a budget of 8 billion just to supervise the billions of money going out.

I hate government bureaucracy, I hope that the people in this story are now looking for work in this tough economy. that is the only thing that would bring a smile to my face

This translator should be given a promotion on the spot.

But bureaucracy works damn fast when Bush wants immediate information on WOMD from CIA.

Its all selective.