Matt wrote:

Why open the door to them? I have a few friends who as a matter of principle do not open their doors to people they do not know. Letting a Fedgoon in is akin to inviting a vampire into your house.

I was expecting someone else at about the same time. True, I could have refused entry after the agent showed his ID. However, it seemed too good an opportunity to pass up: it is pretty common for Cryptome to get unexpected contributions. We try to remain open lines of communication to unknown sources, if not a goodly amount of info would never come out way. For all I knew, and now know, the Special Agents were frauds, of which Cryptome gets a taste regularly, perhaps more than we know. As discussed here, spoofing is trivial to do. Toward the end of the visit I asked SA Kelly to see his ID up close and he displayed a wallet with a brass badge on the left and a two-leaf ID on the right: flip left, then flip up. Was it real? The two-leaf ID looked like the version SA Renner showed at the door. Trim haircuts and dark suits, healthy-looking young Caucasians, no facial hair, shined shoes, clean teeth, no noticeable mouth or body odor, no obvious weapon bulges, polite, actually not polite all the time: there were a few instances when mild friction occurred, low-key warnings sent my way about inadvertent threats to the nation with too much information like that on Cryptome. SA Renner was cooler than Kelly during questioning -- Kelly slightly bristled when I made a comment about free flowing information making the US stronger, the agent saying, yes, but information can be misused. He bristled a lot more when I said I would publish their names, "make them famous." At the word "famous" Kelly said, smiling "really, I haven't had that before." Renner was quieter on naming names, knowing that there was a CNN story out about him. But he too mildly protested with the "hazard to the family" shtick. Kelly said, "you know we can be found by knowing our names, get shot for what we do." That reminded me of Jeff Gordon, but I didn't snort. Kelly leaned forward in his wing-back chair, slightly aggressive, whereas Renner sat upright at a table, case file in front, posing most of the questions to me. Now, if I had refused the agents entry could I be telling this dinky inside story? Perhaps better will be the second visit, or door-busting and marching downstairs in handcuffs, or dark-van-snatch on the street, or my family and customers and friends questioned and warned, my assets seized and listed in the New York Times, gosh, what notoriety being a questionable patriot can lead to -- maybe right up there at the foot soles of the Special Agents, real or fraudulent. Confirming the allegation about idiot witnesses, I am sure I would not recognize either agent if I saw them again. The IDs yes, and the questions, but not the bland biometrics.