The Secret Service, which normally tries to stay in the background and garner as little attention as possible, is causing an international stir.

CBS News reports that a dozen Secret Service agents were sent home from Colombia before the President arrived Friday for the Summit of Americas. The New York Times later reported the number as being 11. It reported that it included agents and officers.

A Secret Service source told CBS News that one or more of the officers were involved with prostitutes and that there was a dispute over payment.

CBS reported that one prostitute went to the police, who notified the State Department. CBS reported that two were supervisors and the other were assigned to logistics.

Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan confirmed the removal of personnel, according to CBS News and said in a statement: “There have been allegations of misconduct made against Secret Service personnel in Cartagena, Colombia prior to the President’s trip. Because of this, those personnel are being relieved of their assignments, returned to their place of duty, and are being replaced by other Secret Service personnel.”

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Keith Prewitt/secret service photo

After 29 years with the agency, U.S. Secret Service Deputy Director Keith L. Prewitt is hanging it up. He’ll retire April 7.

“It’s truly been an honor to work with the dedicated men and women of the Secret Service and serve as Director Sullivan’s deputy,” said Prewitt in a statement. “It’s been a privilege to contribute to the rich tradition and history of the most respected law enforcement agency in the world.”

Since 2008,Prewitt oversaw the protection of the U.S. President and Vice President and visiting heads of state. Additionally, he led the Secret Service’s investigative mission enforcing counterfeiting laws and criminal investigations into a wide range of financial and computer-based crimes

“Keith’s contribution to the agency has been invaluable,” said Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan in a statement. “His experience, judgment and management skills have brought our agency much growth and success through the years. His outstanding leadership and friendship have meant a lot to me.”

John Edwards may have cheated on his dying wife, but he won’t be cheated out of a criminal trial.

A U.S. District Judge in North Carolina on Thursday denied a request by the two-time presidential candidate to dismiss the criminal charges against him, the Associated Press reported. Trial is set for January.

He’s charged with using campaign funds to cover up an affair with campaign videographer Rielle Hunter, and submitting false campaign finance reports as part of the cover up. Hunter had a child with Edwards.

AP reported that Edwards was in the courtroom, but displayed no visible reaction to the decision.

AP reported that Edward’s defense team argued that the fed’s case depends on novel legal arguments, which have never been validated by the court.

Eric Holder Jr./ticklethewire.com file photo

WASHINGTON – Because Congress has blocked Gitmo detainees from being prosecuted in civilian court, Atty. Gen. Eric Holder Jr. said Monday that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others will stand trial in a military court in Gitmo.

The announcement marked a sharp reversal of his announcement in November 2009 that the men would be prosecuted in federal court in New York.

“Unfortunately, since I made that decision, Members of Congress have intervened and imposed restrictions blocking the administration from bringing any Guantanamo detainees to trial in the United States, regardless of the venue,” he said in a statement. “As the President has said, those unwise and unwarranted restrictions undermine our counterterrorism efforts and could harm our national security.”

“After thoroughly studying the case, it became clear to me that the best venue for prosecution was in federal court. I stand by that decision today.

“As the indictment unsealed today reveals, we were prepared to bring a powerful case against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four co-conspirators – one of the most well-researched and documented cases I have ever seen in my decades of experience as a prosecutor.

“We had carefully evaluated the evidence and concluded that we could prove the defendants’ guilt while adhering to the bedrock traditions and values of our laws. We had consulted extensively with the intelligence community and developed detailed plans for handling classified evidence.

“Had this case proceeded in Manhattan or in an alternative venue in the United States, as I seriously explored in the past year, I am confident that our justice system would have performed with the same distinction that has been its hallmark for over two hundred years.

“Decisions about who, where and how to prosecute have always been – and must remain – the responsibility of the executive branch. Members of Congress simply do not have access to the evidence and other information necessary to make prosecution judgments. Yet they have taken one of the nation’s most tested counterterrorism tools off the table and tied our hands in a way that could have serious ramifications. We will continue to seek to repeal those restrictions.”

(Read more of his statement)

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Ousted Pres. Ben Ali

The FBI is trying to figure out if ousted Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali and other officials have assets in the U.S., the Wall Street Journal reports.

Agents, along with a new Justice Department team, are looking for “proceeds of theft by foreign officials,” the Journal reported.

The paper reported that European nations have moved to freeze funds of Ben Ali they believe were stolen from his country.

Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia after he was ousted.

By Allan Lengel

Ronald Kessler of Newmax.com writes that Secret Service agents on President Reagan’s detail say the 40th president “was sharp until several years after he left the presidency”, contrary to what son Ron wrote in his latest book.

“We had a hundred twenty agents on his detail, and he seemed to remember everyone’s name,” former agent Glenn Smith said of Reagan when he was in the White House, according to Kessler. Kessler authored the book “In the President’s Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents They Protect.”

The President’s son Ron Reagan claims in his just-released book “My Father at 100″ that his father showed signs of Alzheimer’s Disease in his second term.

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By The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — SECRETARY OF STATE Hillary Rodham Clinton caused a stir last week by suggesting that Mexico’s drug-trafficking gangs were beginning to resemble an insurgency, like that which has plagued Colombia.

She’s right in the sense that the cartels have come to effectively control parts of the country, where they “attempt to replace the state,” as Mexican President Felipe Calderón put it last month. Like most insurgencies, the Mexican drug armies also have an external source of funding and weapons. Shamefully, that is the United States.

A new report details the abundance of U.S. weapons delivered to the cartels — and the inadequacy of U.S. efforts to stop the illegal trafficking.

According to authors Colby Goodman and Michel Marizco, at least 62,800 of the more than 80,000 firearms confiscated by Mexican authorities from December 2006 to February 2010 came from the United States. Guns are being smuggled across the border at a rate of up to 5,000 per year. The top two varieties are assault rifles: Romanian-made AK47s and clones of the Bushmaster AR-15.

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J. Edgar Hoover/fbi photo

WASHINGTON– J. Edgar Hoover for president?

Well, Joseph Kennedy, the patriarch of the Kennedy political dynasty, apparently thought it was a good idea in the 1950s, according to an essay Hoover wrote that was included in the newly released FBI files on the late Sen. Ted Kennedy.

In a letter dated Oct. 13, 1964, Ted Kennedy wrote Hoover to say he was “putting together a short book of recollections of my father” and wanted his father’s good friends like Hoover to contribute. Hoover agreed, and a month later sent off the seven-page essay to Kennedy.

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