Obama's Passport File ALREADY Searched by GOP

UPDATED with new info, and post edited to remove information that has been overtaken by events:

Does anyone really think this wasn't a coincidence?

On January 9, 2008 - a contractor accessed Barack Obama's passport file.

Media Matters - Anatomy of a Smear: January 9*

On January 9, eight days before the InsightMag.com story was posted, Chicago Tribune metro columnist Eric Zorn wrote on the Tribune's Change of Subject weblog, "The crazies are sending around an e-mail that attempts to establish that Barack Obama is actually a Muslim who masquerades as a Christian for political advantage. It goes under the heading 'The Enemy Within' and 'Be Careful, Be Very Careful.' "

The always brilliant friend of this blog named Windhorse chimes in with this story:

Dec. 29, 2007 |

Doubts about Barack Obama's presidential credentials have crystallized during the past two weeks over his stewardship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Subcommittee on European Affairs, which has convened no policy hearings since he took over as its chairman last January. That startling fact, first uncovered by Steve Clemons, who blogs on the Washington Note, prompted acid comment in Europe about the Illinois senator's failure to visit the continent since assuming the committee post, and even speculation that he had never traveled there except for a short stopover in London.

But why should those questions matter to Americans who consider Senate hearings so much useless verbiage? And why does anyone care whether and where a would-be president has traveled, on official or personal visits?

So, based on that story, there HAD to have been more than just an innocent amount of interest in Obama's passport file.
-----------------------------

Two contract employees of the State Department were fired and a third person was disciplined for accessing passport records of Sen. Barack Obama "without a need to do so," State Department officials confirmed to NBC News.

The three people who had access to Obama's passport records were contract employees of the department's Bureau of Consular Affairs, NBC News has learned. The unauthorized activity concerning Obama's passport information occurred in January.

"A monitoring system was tripped when an employee accessed the records of a high-profile individual,” a department official told NBC News. "When the monitoring system is tripped, we immediately seek an explanation for the records access. If the explanation is not satisfactory, the supervisor is notified."

Explaining why the contractors had access to the files, the official said: "The State Department uses cleared contractors to design, build and maintain our systems and cleared contract employees provide support to government employees and several steps of passport processing including data entry, file searches, customer service and quality control.

"Each time an employee logs on, he or she acknowledges the records are protected by the privacy act and that they are only available on a need-to-know basis," the official added.

This breaking news story will be updated

.
UPDATE I - PALE RIDER

Based on everything I've seen, I stand by my own, personal assertion that what was in his file was either searched by GOP operatives and/or transferred to those operatives.

It's my hunch, nothing more.

Why?

Precedent. Oh, and the Madrassa story that was circulated months ago.

AND, based on what I've seen tonight, there HAS BEEN NO INVESTIGATION AS OF YET. This was covered up by low level management in the State Department by people who were afraid they were going to lose their jobs. The State Dept. IG just found out about this today--so whether you believe it was an accident or not, you are safe to assume this info is already in the hands of the GOPs extensive opposition research wing.

Why?

Precedent. You can't assume the bright and rosy and the innocent when it comes to GOP dirty tricks. This is a highly politicized, poorly managed and barely capable agency in the hands of Condoleeza Rice--the chief surviving confidante of President Bush. I think they have run the Department of State into the ground on purpose and I think they are willfully trying to destroy the prestige of that once-proud agency to support a GOP contention that "Foggy Bottom" is full of anti-American liberals who represent what the GOP sees as a threat to their ideology.

Hell, hasn't anyone been paying attention for the last 7 years?