FROM THE ARCHIVE

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In The Hoop
THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 2002

Welcome to In The Hoop, Indianz.Com's occasional column about assorted Indian issues.

There's No Place Like Home
If U.S. District Judge Lamberth decides to send top Department of Interior officials to jail for their handling of the Individual Indian Money (IIM) trust -- and many in Indian Country believe he should -- In The Hoop has a good idea of where they might end up should they be forced to don those tasty orange outfits.

It turns out a jail in Alexandria, Virginia, houses all the infamous criminals, including, but not limited to: CIA spies Aldrich Ames and Harold James Nicholson, former United Way chief William Aramony, and politician Lyndon H. LaRouche Jr. It's a local facility but the U.S. Marshals Service, which conveniently has offices in Lamberth's courthouse, has a deal to put federal inmates there.

In fact, according to The Washington Post, federal authorities just kicked convicted Robert "The Spy That Loved Strippers" Hannsen from his cell to make way for alleged September 11 hijacker Zacarias Moussaoui. But while Moussaoui spends most of his time reading the Koran, Norton would probably pass the hours by reading the 8th quarterly report she was ordered to sign after she tried to thwart a court requirement.

Ooops, Sorry, Forgot
But Norton might also want to read special master Alan Balaran's report on her non-existent information technology security measures and ask herself why a Congressional report detailing numerous vulnerabilities was hidden from the court.

For an as yet-undeterminead reason (incompetence being the most likely explanation), Norton and her top aides failed to submit the General Accounting Office document that was the subject of Indianz.Com's lead story today to Balaran. All sorts of other reports, pleadings, letters, prayers and smallpox security plans had been sent to him, but the July 3, 2001, report wasn't among them.

Accenturate the Negative (No, that isn't a Bushism)
The Department of Interior's ties to embattled Arthur "Shredder" Andersen don't end with the dismal accounting the "Big Jive" firm performed on the tribal trust during the 90s.

A consulting company which was once part of Andersen but had to be separated after an international arbiter more accustomed to resolving disputes between warring nations came to fix the mess has been "helping" the Minerals Management Service (MMS) with its computer security woes. Formerly known as Andersen Consulting, the company rebranded itself Accenture last year.

But the change didn't appear to have an affect on the arrogance long associated with the Cult of Andersen. Accenture is refusing to release its security plans for a key MMS system -- one that process payments to Indian Country -- over an alleged work product concern.

But don't count on Associate Deputy Secretary James Cason to tell you that. He's too busy avoiding Senate committees and carrying out the duties of Deputy Secretary J. Steven Griles, who is so "in charge" of trust reform that he can pawn his work off on subordinates.

In Your Hoop
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