Does this represent a tiny speed bump on the road to impeaching George Bush?
After a delay of more than a year, a government board appointed to guard Americans' privacy and civil liberties during the war on terror has been told the inner workings of the government's electronic eavesdropping program.
Members say they were impressed by the protections.
The briefing for the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board had been delayed because President Bush was concerned -- after several media leaks -- about widening the circle of people who knew exact details of the secret eavesdropping program.
The board, created by Congress and appointed by Bush, focused on other classified work since it was named in spring 2005, but continued to press for a formal briefing by the National Security Agency.
A breakthrough was reached in recent days, and the five members were briefed by senior officials last week.
Board members said that they were impressed by the safeguards the government has built into the NSA's monitoring of phone calls and computer transmissions, and that they wished the administration could tell the public more about them to ease distrust.
"If the American public, especially civil libertarians like myself, could be more informed about how careful the government is to protect our privacy while still protecting us from attacks, we'd be more reassured," said Lanny Davis , a former Clinton White House lawyer who is the board's lone liberal Democrat.
More info on the Privacy Board is here. Left unanswered - what terrible hold does Karl Rove have over Lanny Davis?
Unfortunately for you guys, I don't think Lanny Davis is representative of the new congress' "oversight". Buckle up! :)
Posted by: TexasToast | November 28, 2006 at 05:01 PM
Fortunately for terrorists, I don't think Lanny Davis is representative of the new congress' "oversight". Buckle up! >:(
Apparently the Constitution is a mutual suicide pact.
Posted by: Barney Frank | November 28, 2006 at 05:10 PM
Unfortunately for you guys, I don't think Lanny Davis is representative of the new congress' "oversight". Buckle up! :)
Unfortunately for all of us, al-Qaeda doesn't care.
Repeat after me: The enemy is Islamic radicalism; not George Bush.
SMG
Posted by: SteveMG | November 28, 2006 at 05:19 PM
I don't think ...
That part is correct.
... Lanny Davis is representative
Maybe not, but he's a pretty good indication that the administration has in fact been crossing the Ts and dotting the Is. IOW the BDSers have been making sh!t up. Keep looking for that blue dress though, it's bound to be in there somewhere.
Posted by: boris | November 28, 2006 at 05:39 PM
Greenwald's going to have to tie himself in a pretzel to explain this.
Not that he hasn't had plenty of practice.
Posted by: Slartibartfast | November 28, 2006 at 05:42 PM
Well, when will the NYT explain its actions of leaking NSA and SWIFT?
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 05:46 PM
BTW, how come American Thinker is not updating its pages? I am still seeing the old page / format.
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 05:48 PM
I see the new format, lurker.
Posted by: clarice | November 28, 2006 at 05:50 PM
Warrantless wiretapping is another matter. The "program" is a significant (and likely unconstitutional) assertion of executive power at the expense of the legislature - and Harman's support of it without legislative oversight seems to be a disqualification for the chair of the committee responsible for any such oversight.
Who earlier wrote these words of wisdom on a different thread? Hint the first poster above . Apparently Lanny Davis is not representative of him either. Not that surprising really though.
Posted by: Gary Maxwell | November 28, 2006 at 06:04 PM
Most Americans support this program and if the Democrats kill it and there is any kind of attack, guess who will get blamed?
Posted by: Terrye | November 28, 2006 at 06:25 PM
Unfortunately for you guys, I don't think Lanny Davis is representative of the new congress' "oversight". Buckle up! :)
Posted by: TexasToast | November 28, 2006 at 02:01 PM
*******************************************
Really!
Well, according to this article, between 10-25-01 and 7-8-02 when the Democrats controlled the Senate, Nancy Pelosi was briefed four separate times about the NSA program and SSCI Chairman Bob Graham was also briefed four times. There is a big D after both names. Graham couldn't be bothered to hold oversight hearings that he had every right and power to do, and apparently Pelosi couldn't be bothered to ask him to do it as she was in the minority and couldn't.
Sounds like the Democrats have some 'splainin' to do before anybody buckles up now.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-17-nsa-briefings_x.htm
Posted by: Campesino | November 28, 2006 at 06:27 PM
"Most Americans support this program and if the Democrats kill it and there is any kind of attack, guess who will get blamed?"
Exactly. Lanny Davis knows this and knows that the Dems would be crucified if they killed the program and we were subsequently attacked. Even if the attack was in no way related to the program's dismantling the Dems could be blamed for it. The political risk is to high.
Posted by: Paul | November 28, 2006 at 06:43 PM
The Dems have framed the NSA program as 'warrantless domestic surveillance' which makes it really really hard for them to accept the legality of it.
Their emphasis on 'warrantless' implies that warrants (which require probable cause) are possible, mandated, and desired. It also implies that the criminal justice system is the only way to handle these issues.
Their emphasis on 'domestic' implies a program whose target is American citizens.
What the Dems are really trying to do is innoculate us against the future need of an actual domestic surveillance program. Remember the Brits were totally taken by surprise when British citizens were suicide bombers. We may not have that problem ourselves, now, but who is to say that we won't have US citizen suicide terrorist hitting inside America in the future? In five years?
If it's just the old terrorism that plagues us and other nations as a criminal nuisance, that's one thing, but chem, bio, and nuclear technology is advancing so rapidly that we cannot afford to wait until an attack happens then react to it.
The new terrorism is somewhat between what can be handled by the criminal justice system (arrest after crime occurs, system weighted to let guilty go free) and war. And our system is not set up to handle this new type of threat.
Seems to me this is a really big problem. Also consider that FISA is only about thirty years old. Before then, the government had no compunctions about spying on Americans. Unfortunately the FBI abused its powers and we are now all paying the price.
And the fact that FISA claims it is the sole law on these matters is construed by many as unconstitutional in itself because of the powers of the executive in regards to national security and foreign intelligence.
So if Congress doesn't wish for Hillary to usurp too much power through executive authority when it's her turn, they better get cracking and give the executive the authority to do what it's doing and leave it at that.
Then better minds than ours have to sit down and figure out how to handle future domestic threats.
Posted by: Syl | November 28, 2006 at 07:04 PM
Thanks, Clarice. I can see the new format at work but not at home with either IE 6.0 (?) and Mozilla.
Shame regarding the Democrat's deliberate deceptions during their campaign prior to the 11/7 elections.
Shame that Pelosi had to have serious thoughts against nominating Hastings regardless of her pre- and post-11/7 comments. She shows extreme lack of ethics principles in making the right decisions. And we haven't seen Pelosi much under the public light, haven't we? Who is going to respect her after this?
And Pelosi getting mad at Bush for blaming AQ for the current Iraqi problems.
Guess if we are going to push and shove against the insurgents, we're gonna have to go after Sadr and his army.
I hate that judge that ruled in requiring the change in our US currency. And appointed by Carter at that! GRRR
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 07:05 PM
Lanny Davis was part of an administration that had to deal with the reality of all of this. He knows that posturing isn't going to do us any good, as politically satisfying as that seems to be for some.
Posted by: MayBee | November 28, 2006 at 07:10 PM
I hope he has not been duped in his view that the program has been executed with care. Based upon the obfuscations, almost pathological secrecy, and parsing of this admin, it is reasonable to expect the worst. Having said that, I hope the info was not
spoon-fed to an infant lacking the power to
discern the ingredients.
Posted by: Semanticleo | November 28, 2006 at 07:15 PM
I'm sure Davis wishes he had your knowledge of the program, Seman.
Posted by: MayBee | November 28, 2006 at 07:16 PM
Sem
Your side won the election, you can stop spinning now.
Posted by: Syl | November 28, 2006 at 07:20 PM
"Your side won the election, you can stop spinning now."
You mean, un-spinning what has been spun?
It's going to be a long, hard slog. You ain't seen nothin' yet.
Posted by: Semanticleo | November 28, 2006 at 07:25 PM
Having said that, I {semanticleo} hope the info was not spoon-fed to an infant lacking the power to discern the ingredients.
That would be Joe Wilson.
This story is about Lanny Davis.
Just to clarify.
Cheers.
Posted by: BumperStickerist | November 28, 2006 at 07:26 PM
--It's going to be a long, hard slog. You ain't seen nothin' yet.--
HAH. I almost feel sorry for Seman now. High Hopes eh?
Posted by: topsecretk9 | November 28, 2006 at 07:29 PM
HAH. I almost feel sorry for Seman now. High Hopes eh?
Posted by: topsecretk9 | November 28, 2006 at 04:29 PM
********************************************
Just like Fitzmas - keep hope alive!
Posted by: Campesino | November 28, 2006 at 07:44 PM
Lanny Davis "played on our fears" (all caps, exclamation point, exclamation point, blue in the face, huff, puff).
Posted by: Crew v1.0 | November 28, 2006 at 08:04 PM
"played on our fears"
There are all kinds of fears being played. The fear of terrorism, the fear of destroyed civil liberties, the fear of executive power, the fear of Bush, the fear of NeoCons, the fear there are innocent terrorists, the fear of 'torture', the fear of global warming, the fear of gays destroying marriage, the fear of not being liked, the fear of taxes, the fear of spending, the fear of Rush Limbaugh, the fear of FoxNews, the fear of Hillary, the fear of the Jooos, the fear of China, the fear of outsourcing, the fear of free trade, the fear of carbon, the fear of corporations, the fear of the military, the fear of a draft, the fear of failure, the fear of success, the fear of deficits, the fear of Christians, the fear of capitalism, the fear of free markets, the fear of the white male, the fear of video games, and most pernicious of all the fear of sock puppets!
Take yer pick, but ISTM there is more fear mongering on the Left than on the Right.
Posted by: Syl | November 28, 2006 at 09:19 PM
Another stupid judge ruling...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061129/ap_on_re_us/terrorist_designation
ali cleown has absolutely no idea what it was like living as a dhimmitude under Sharia law. Once she's been subjected as a dhimmitude, she'll eat crow over her posts at this site.
Seriously, do read Robert Spencer's "The Myths about Islam Tolerance". There is absolutely NO Islam Tolerance. This is not a religion of peace. Christians and Jews are not allowed to own land property under the Sharia law.
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 09:25 PM
fear of Wal Mart.
Posted by: topsecretk9 | November 28, 2006 at 09:27 PM
Lurker, clear your browser cache, or force the page to reload. In firefox, you can force a reload by holding the SHIFT key down while clicking the reload button.
Posted by: Charlie (Colorado) | November 28, 2006 at 09:35 PM
Fear? Maybe so. Lets see...
We have
1. "bipartisan" Bush asking the lame duck congress to act to legitimize the program;
2. the Inspector General of the Justice Department opening a new investigation of the program (after the first investigation was closed down after the White House refused security clearances); and
3. the "report", after a long delay, of the "Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board".
Isn't it amazing how an election can "unleash the hounds", so to speak? That's three new roadblocks to "oversight" in the two weeks since the election. I don't believe that I have ever seen the bureaucracy move with such dispatch! Now lets see if they can string it out for two years.....
Posted by: TexasToast | November 28, 2006 at 09:47 PM
FN 18 in Judge Collin's Order in Case # 2:05-cv-08047-ABC-RC (Humanitarian Law Project et al v. United States Department of the Treasury et al)
That is a reference to enjoining enforcement of Sec 1(d)(ii) of EO 13224, where assets are blocked or they are designated as SDGT's for being "otherwise associated with" the PKK or the LTTE.
SDGT = Specially Designated Global Terrorist
The Opinion and Order is a scanned document, not amenable to conversion to plaintext. I may dink around with conversion to graphic form - it's an interesting opinion, not nearly as lopsided as news reports paint it.
Posted by: cboldt | November 28, 2006 at 10:12 PM
Waste of time. They are going to find nothing or make up lies like they did with the SSCI report, part II. This is mostly all they are going to get accomplished...and with our own tax money. EGADS.
Anyone notice that Bush praised Estonia for setting up its own flat tax rate program. He knew how successful Estonia's tax program has been, is, and will be. He knows that USA needs some serious tax reform but the democrats are the famous obstructionists that we know so well.
Oh, damn that Reid for accusing the GOP for the "financial mess". He needs to learn to wash his own mouth with soap and begin representing his people and the country as a professional.
Charlie (Colorado), thanks but it did not work in Mozilla firefox.
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 10:29 PM
Text of EO 13224 and AnnexSept 24, 2001
And that's the easy part. Treasury regulation build up from the EO (licenses are granted to entites that want to provide private foreign assistance), and there are statuory props for the EO.
Posted by: cboldt | November 28, 2006 at 10:32 PM
TT
Speaking of fear, I fear your problem is that you believed your own fear mongering re NSA.
And you're already misconstruing Bush's actions. The Republicans were in power and were not making demands of him re NSA. The Democrats and the press were.
Now that the Dems have Congress, Bush is being an exceptionally good democratic American and conceding to the wishes of the Dems! And all he gets for his actions is contempt and cynicism.
I also think there's less chance of leakage of details now (which was Bush's main fear before) because the Dems and the press don't have the same motivation for leaking.
Which in MY cynical view means that the criticism of the NSA program was only political.
Posted by: Syl | November 28, 2006 at 10:52 PM
I ended up rebooting my computer, which reloaded the new American Thinker. Thanks!
Syl, good summary, which I abhor the democrats' behavior. I'm so sick of their partisan games. The Republicans do not play these games as much as the dems do. At least, in number.
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 11:00 PM
So--it seems, Syl, was the criticism of the SWIFT (banking) program:
"WASHINGTON, Nov. 28 — A civil liberties panel appointed by the White House received a classified briefing Tuesday on the Bush administration’s program to monitor international banking transactions, and several members said they had come away impressed with the privacy controls in place to prevent abuses against Americans. The program, which gives American intelligence officials access to large volumes of banking data... "
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/29/washington/29nsa.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin> no more Bushitler
Posted by: clarice | November 28, 2006 at 11:04 PM
Remember the Brits were totally taken by surprise when British citizens were suicide bombers. We may not have that problem ourselves, now, but who is to say that we won't have US citizen suicide terrorist hitting inside America in the future? In five years?
Yeah, well, not so fast there sparky.
http://chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4365086.html
Posted by: Pofarmer | November 28, 2006 at 11:18 PM
Clarice
Amazing, isn't it?
What the electorate took as a 'New Direction' was 'The only way to make the Dems shut up is to elect them'.
Seems America is not against rewarding bad behavior. Heh.
Posted by: Syl | November 28, 2006 at 11:24 PM
It is forcing them between a rock and a hard place, heh?
And as the "trustworthy" democrats see more of the classified data, then they begin supporting the war against terrorism, huh?
Mac Ranger says that Pelosi is in a quagmire now that she decided against Hastings.
Why do you think Jane Harmon kept her mouth shut? Why do you think Jane Harmon supported the war against terrorism? Why do you think Lanny ended up agreeing with Jane Harmon after all? Was she happy about her staffer leaking the information?
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 11:28 PM
Yeah--and yet another miracle: The medicare drug benefits program which Pelosi wants to change, suddenly lost its doughnut hole, came in $14 billion under estimate and is really liked by 80% of those covered by it.
Elect Dems and the press starts to see a golden lining..PHEH
Posted by: clarice | November 28, 2006 at 11:29 PM
And they are not even in the office....yet
Yeah...PFFFTTTT!!
Posted by: lurker | November 28, 2006 at 11:30 PM
LOL. A 45 page opinion that amounts to housekeeping for the language of the EO, and preparation of written justification for the roughly 350 SDGT's identified by Treasury, as well as the original 25 or so identified in the Appendix prepared in September 2001.
This case is pretty much a yawner.
Posted by: cboldt | November 28, 2006 at 11:42 PM
Good. Now I don't have to read it. But could you summarize the ruling?
Posted by: clarice | November 28, 2006 at 11:53 PM
Capt Ed notes this judge seems to find all anti-terrorism laws "too vague" for her taste:
"Collins, a Clinton appointee, gained notoriety two years ago when she became the first federal judge to strike down provisions of the Patriot Act. Interestingly, she found that act, passed by Congress, also to be too vague to be constitutional. In that case, one of the plaintiffs was -- the PKK again, which got its terrorist designation not from the Bush administration under the Patriot Act or this executive order, but by Madeline Albright's State Department in 1997.
Nor was that the first time Collins has had a problem with anti-terrorist legislation. During the Clinton administration, she struck down the 1996 anti-terrorism law passed by Congress in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing. Collins seems to have trouble reading the law, finding all counterterrorism legislation too vague to be understood. Perhaps the problem lies with Collins more than the laws themselves"
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/008591.php
Posted by: clarice | November 28, 2006 at 11:56 PM
-- "But could you summarize the ruling?" --
The government is enjoined from denominating the plaintiff a SDGT under the EO. The EO needs some housekeeping to remove its vagueness infirmities (e.g., import language used by Treasury, to justify denominating as SDGT, to the EO). The plaintiff can't engage in the activity it wants to (assisting PKK and LTTE), unless it obtains the requisite license from Treasury.
The opinion reads okay to me - but them again, my reading has been harshly criticized around these parts.
Posted by: cboldt | November 29, 2006 at 12:07 AM
The opinion says nothing that removes PKK from list of terrorist organizations. It is plaintiff "Humanitarian Law Project" who wants to avoid being so labeled, and so treated.
Perhaps Captain Ed could take the time to read the opinion before opining on it. But then again, maybe not.
Posted by: cboldt | November 29, 2006 at 12:10 AM
Thanks..The opinion has generated a great deal of heat all around the web.
Posted by: clarice | November 29, 2006 at 12:21 AM
-- "The opinion has generated a great deal of heat all around the web." --
News reports about the opinion are generating the heat. That's why I bothered to search out the opinion and read it for myself.
Posted by: cboldt | November 29, 2006 at 12:25 AM
And I'm grateful you did.
Posted by: clarice | November 29, 2006 at 12:30 AM
The judge didn't find the word "services" to be vague. It bars humanitarian aid and engineering assitance relating to rebuilding civilian infrastructure. In fact, everything that plaintiff wanted to do? It's a "service" says the judge - no vagueness infirmity there.
Don't take my word for it - read the thing for yourself. It's pretty easy going. Plus, you neve know when I'm going to off on a spoof ;-)
Posted by: cboldt | November 29, 2006 at 12:30 AM
http://d.turboupload.com/d/1268307/eo-13224-061121.pdf.html
About 1.3 Mb PDF file.
Posted by: cboldt | November 29, 2006 at 12:47 AM
"If the American public, especially civil libertarians like myself, could be more informed about how careful the government is to protect our privacy while still protecting us from attacks, we'd be more reassured," said Lanny Davis , a former Clinton White House lawyer who is the board's lone liberal Democrat."
Lets see. This paragraph calls Lanny the lone liberal democrat on this board. Hmm do you think the board could be a little biased! And then, read more carefully, Lanny calls himself a "civil libertarian". He's also a frat boy buddy of uncurious George.
Kids, you are grasping at the thinnest of reeds these days. The BushCo members are going to swing from the end of a rope when America gets through with them.
Posted by: stan | November 29, 2006 at 01:07 AM
So much for the smallest of speed bumps. Read on.
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A federal judge in Los Angeles, who previously struck down sections of the Patriot Act, has ruled that provisions of an anti-terrorism order issued by President George W. Bush after September 11 are unconstitutional.
U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins found that part of the law, signed by Bush on September 23, 2001 and used to freeze the assets of terrorist organizations, violated the Constitution because it put no apparent limit on the president's powers to place groups on that list.
Ruling in a lawsuit brought against the Treasury Department in 2005 by the Center for Constitutional Rights, Collins also threw out a portion of Bush's order which applied the law to those who associate with the designated organizations.
Reuters Pictures
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"This law gave the president unfettered authority to create blacklists, an authority president Bush then used to empower the Secretary of the Treasury to impose guilt by association," said David Cole of the Washington-based Center for Constitutional Rights.
"The court's decision confirms that even in fighting terror, unchecked executive authority and trampling on fundamental freedoms is not a permissible option," he said in a statement
The 45-page decision, made public on Monday, came in response to petitions by both sides to throw out the lawsuit and rule in their favor. The judge allowed to stand part of the order that would penalize those providing services to groups on the list.
The lawsuit was brought on behalf of five organizations, including the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam, which wants to create a separate state for the Tamil people in Sri Lanka, and Partiya Karkeran Kurdistan, which represents Kurds in Turkey.
Both groups had been designated by the United States as foreign terrorist organizations.
In 2004 Collins struck down a section of the Patriot Act that prohibited lawyers from providing expert advice to groups suspected of having terrorist links.
Posted by: stan | November 29, 2006 at 01:23 AM
Stan
You just made a fool of yourself. Read the thread.
Posted by: Syl | November 29, 2006 at 03:13 AM
HHHmmm....
the plaintiffs looked around and prayed for Collins?
Can her ruling be appealed and overturned?
Yeah, it's getting plenty of heat...
I agree that Stan made a fool of himself.
Posted by: lurker | November 29, 2006 at 08:02 AM
No, Bush has ended up the strongest in the end.
BTW, Captain's Quarters just reported that Syria planned wave of political assassinations in Lebanon.
Sounds like 1938 all over again.
Ya think Iran and Syria are the Germany of 2006. The only difference is that Iran is waiting until it has nuclear weapons.
Posted by: lurker | November 29, 2006 at 08:05 AM
NSA Program Has Impressive Safeguards
Looks like Captain's Quarters is reading this correctly - unlike Stan.
Posted by: lurker | November 29, 2006 at 08:09 AM
Would it be so hard for Bush-haters to simply own up to the fact that no matter what happens, their hate for Bush is eternal?
You want oversight, review, whatever. But no matter what anyone says, you will hate Bush and want him swinging from a tree.
It is emotional, not logically based.
If Kos himself declared love for Bush, you would claim that Rove had 'gotten to him' by threatening his family. If Murtha claimed that we should stay in Iraq for another decade, you would claim he was poisioned by Polonium 209 (offshoot of the 210 variety that kills, this one just turns your brain into a neoconservative). If Rangel said he had conducted a thorough investigation and found nothing wrong with Bush's handling of pre-war intelligence, you would claim that he always was a closet neocon profiteer that finally had his price met by Halliburton bribe money. If Schumer came out and said that Bush really was trying to appoint competent and moderate judges, you would claim that he had been killed and replaced by a robot look-alike.
You have started with a premise of Bush=evil.
And any and all evidence to the contrary is summarily dismissed.
That is called a faith-based initiative.
Posted by: hit and run | November 29, 2006 at 08:14 AM
Syl:
Stan
You just made a fool of yourself.
Sorry to be a stickler, but I thought some editing might be in order to make the statement more broadly applicable.
Stan
You
justhave never failed to makemadea fool of yourself.Posted by: hit and run | November 29, 2006 at 08:18 AM
The NSA has always monitored ALL communications. Domestic or foreign. It's in their charter. It's in the book 'The Puzzle Palace(code breaking contests).'
The board is just checking what the intelligence ocmmittee and the DOD have already done from day 1.
There is a movie that explains the program. It was orignally developed, like SWIFT, for drug programs. A guy says a word and it is intercepted. A guy's voice is heard and it is intercepted. There really is no warrant. Warrants are for land lines. Cell phones technically don't need warrants. It is not a land line, but a radio. The CDMA code is known and was broken the day it came out. Radio.
Dems have tried to destroy a program that produces more intelligence than the doubled number of Plames Bush hired. Maybe it was Plame who complained originally? Her dad was Air Force and worked there.
The NSA is DOD and never was subject to traditional law enforcement. It is a mistake to domesticate a program that is DOD like the new Air Force Director at CIA is doing with CIA-moving the analysts to DOD/NSA. They are not needed or wanted. They are destroying traditional military intelligence and should have been let go.
The NSA thing and the CIA plane thing and the other leaks for Plame really have nothing to do with Bush and alot to do with CIA getting out of line. They have used Bush in the past and continue to use him to sell off their mistakes. It's not Bush's mistakes, it's theirs hidden in dem agendas.
NYT newest leak is the military SC memo. JAM----Jaish al-Mahdi’s (JAM) [the Arabic name for the Mahdi Army] ------— and JOM?
SDGT. Notice it also says asset. Special designation may be that they a 'run' by 'CIA' operations officers. So, when they actually do the terror, we know they were working with CIA at the time.
This reminds me of the new Director of MI5/6 and her history as an operations officer admitting she committed treason to protect a Russian asset. London bombers were probably assets and SDGTs the day they did the bombing, while a private security company ran an exercise that day looking for exactly what happened.
So, SDGT means asset or not 'run' by US intelligence?
Posted by: FoolA | November 29, 2006 at 08:55 AM
I'm sure it has been this way since 1952 and no one objected to it until NYT's false leaks.
And no one should have objected to it post NYT false leaks.
It is a military operation and under the auspices of Article 2 of the US Constitution.
It was the Gorelick wall that allowed 9/11 to happen.
Posted by: lurker | November 29, 2006 at 09:11 AM
I actually think it will be better for conservatives and people who care about the security of america for dems to hold hearings and investigate absolutely everything Bush has done to try to protect America for the last 6 years.
That way, Americans will realize, once again, that dems are utterly unserious about national security and their majority will be short lived.
Moreover, what would they run on in 2008 - as all they have run on for the past 2 cycles is how evil and bad Bush is. When Bush's term is over, what is left for dems to run on?
Let them be petty and backward looking, and go about foolish witch hunts. I even encourage such behaviour. In the end, it can only help conservatives.
- GB
Posted by: Great Banana | November 29, 2006 at 09:28 AM
Who will they hate when Bush is out of office.
OT - Jim Webb is a total embarrassment to Virginia.
Posted by: SunnyDay | November 29, 2006 at 09:29 AM
Lanny Davis is telling it like itis. I have said from day one that the NSA program is fine as it stands. It protects us and prevents terrorist attacks. Dems used the issue to get some libertarians and independents on their side in the last election. It worked; now the smart ones have no use for this red herring because it makes them look soft on terrorism.
In regard to stan:
On another thread you accused me of being a guy-tell that to my two children that I not only gave birth to but also breast-fed. The degree of your cluelessness is unfathomable. You sound like some of the high school kids I've had with a big fat chip on their shoulder. Maybe a stint in the army would shape you up. Your level of disrespect is disappointing. Remember when you personalize it you weaken your argument.
Posted by: maryrose | November 29, 2006 at 09:34 AM
Great Banana and Sunnyday:
I agree totally with your assessments of the situation. I read an article today where both President Bush and Webb were at a new Senator reception. Bush asked Webb how his son was doing in Iraq. Webb answered" he wants to come home" President Bush then answered "that's not the question I asked you" Webb will push hisown anti-Iraq partisan agenda and Virginians will experience "buyer's remorse" for the next 6 years. Too bad Allen ran such a lousy campaign. There was no excuse for losing his Virginia seat.
Posted by: maryrose | November 29, 2006 at 09:40 AM
Yes, Webb will embarrass us all, and probably be a PITA to the dems. Haha.
I understand Senator Warner plans to stay on because of Webb's election - if he retired it would leave us with only junior senators.
It's hard to believe that Webb has no manners - this was a social situation. He can fight all he wants on the senate floor (if they let him talk at all). I didn't vote for him, but now he is my senator, and he has to represent me too.
I will burn up his fax machine, for sure.
I agree about Allen, and IMO he has disqualified himself as a presidential candidate ever again. As much as I like him personally, he did everything wrong. Better find out now than later.
Posted by: SunnyDay | November 29, 2006 at 09:55 AM
Thought the public hated Reagan for more than they hated Bush?
Posted by: lurker | November 29, 2006 at 10:04 AM
From NRO on the Webb thing.
heh
Posted by: hit and run | November 29, 2006 at 11:00 AM
Actually, I find Webb fascinating. I don't agree with his views on getting out of Iraq now. But Webb is a full-blown Jacksonian and to him you don't go to war unless you use all the power available to wipe out the enemy--no mercy at all.
Since we've been conducting PC wars for a while now, Webb thought Iraq was a useless, mindless, endeavor. Unless we could beat them all into pulp there was no point. He is not a pacifist or peacenik.
(No, he never used words such as those.)
He's also a populist though which I don't especially care for. But there is a group of people he wishes to fight for, a new victim class so to speak, and they are the rednecks. Isn't that a bit of shocker!
Webb is certainly different from most politicians we're used to. For sure. I think he's a bit of a hothead, on the other hand I think he will be interesting to watch.
Posted by: Syl | November 29, 2006 at 11:32 AM
Syl:
I agree wholeheatedly with you Fear List. On Webb I'm not so sure... If he is pro-life I might give him more of a chance. He does bear watching. I guess I'm still disappointed about the repubs losing the Senate. Let's see if he has a litmus test for judges.
Posted by: maryrose | November 29, 2006 at 11:40 AM
Well, you can have Webb, if you like him. ;)
Posted by: SunnyDay | November 29, 2006 at 12:08 PM
I'll trade Sherrod Brown for Webb. At least Webb pays his taxes.
Posted by: maryrose | November 29, 2006 at 02:30 PM