Oversight? What oversight?
First things first. Thanks to Crooks and Liars for finding the following and bringing them to my attention.
The classified intelligence/NYT resolution passed 227-183, but the Democrats recognised this shabby resolution as the diversion that it was.
Leader Pelosi: "Continue its oversight of the program? There's never been any oversight of the program. The fact is that because there has never been any oversight of the program, there isn't one person in this body, who will vote on this resolution, who can attest to this statement. They're asking us to vote on something that we absolutely cannot attest to. Not any one of you can attest to this as a fact, because it isn't a fact.
Rep. Maloney: "The Republican party has become masters of cut and run, cutting from the issues so that they can run for re-election in november. This resolution is a diversion. If it was really about condemning leaks of classified information, it would also mention Valerie Plame, Karl Rove, and Scooter Libby. As the Member of Congress representing the district that suffered the greatest loss of life on 9/11, I believe that combating terrorism is a serious bipartisan issue, not a one-sided, last-minute, take it or leave it, Republican-only, political campaign stunt."
Rep. Slaughter: "Let me be very clear. On this day the Republican majority shamelessly played politics with our most cherished principles. From the very beginning this resolution and this so-called debate has been about one thing and one thing only, election politics. Six months before our midterm elections Republicans are falling back on the one play that has worked for them time and time again. They are putting fear in the hearts of the American people and labeling any individual or organization that doesn't take its marching orders from the white house as a threat to our nation. Think of what we heard from leading Republicans over the past few days. They've called the disclosure of the swift anti-terrorist program a disgrace, they've accused a newspaper that first wrote it, the ""the new york times,"" of forcing its, quote, arrogant elitist left-wing agenda, end quote, on the rest of the country. If all of this is true, I have no choice but to conclude that our President, President bush himself, is a disgraceful, arrogant left-wing elitist, because it was Mr. Bush who leaked the story."
Rep. Conyers: "Well, there may be some motive that is political about the selective crying out about information. The swift story bears no resemblence to security breaches, disclosure of troop locations or anything that would compromise the security of individuals."
Rep. Dingell: "They tell us that they're protecting our civil liberties while they're tapping our phones and spying in our libraries and looking into our bank accounts. They tell us to trust us on everything. They tell us to trust us on -- trust them on everything because they're protecting their civil liberties. Well, I don't think I can trust this administration to protect my civil liberties and those of the people that I serve."
13 comments:
Um...this is unbelievable. The Democrats somehow grew spines? I wonder how? Did they put a stem cell into a petri dish somewhere? This is amazing and also somewhat heartening. I won't try to second-guess them today...I'll just be happy they're learning how to disagree with fascists. Thanks for posting these videos, Kel.
It is astonishing stuff isn't it?
If they showed this much balls the rest of the time they would be the party of government.
Sorry. But facts are facts. Terrorists have been successfully located on multiple occasions using this program.
Kel, you might think that this whole affair is laughable but then you seems to think all counterterrorism efforts are a joke.
The administration strongly urged the New York Times not to expose this classified program, and for good reason. According to the Times itself, the program has proven vital in hunting down international killers. The Indonesian terrorist Hambali, who orchestrated the Bali resort bombings in 2002, was captured through the Swift program; a Brooklyn man who laundered $200,000 for al Qaeda through a Karachi bank was tracked via the program. The Wall Street Journal adds that the July 7, 2005, London subway bombings were fruitfully investigated through the Swift initiative and that a facilitator of Iraqi terrorism has been apprehended because of it.
Source:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/012/386syqsr.asp
The only sham logic is the New York Times line that argues that it needed to expose this 'secret and dangerous' program to the American people on the one hand while, at the same time, arguing that everyone knows about these kind of things so it isn't a big deal on the other hand. Sorry, can't have it both ways.
I would personally never venture to doubt that governments might be watching international transfers of money but sometimes the terrorists think they are smarter than the governments and they may think they know something about what governments do and don't watch with such transfers. If they had any doubts, the NYT has went a long way towards removing them. We need to take advantage of every opportunity we have where a terrorist slips up and eliminating such opportunities is stupid.
BTW, even John Murtha(!) attempted to get the NYT not to run with the story.
So why did the NYT do it?
Ace says it best:
It’s blackmail, pure and simple. Either let a Democrat into the White House, or we will continue to sabotage American security and, in effect, kill Americans. We will keep secrets when a Democrat is in office, but not a Republican. So we offer the American people a choice: Let the politicians we favor run the country, or we will help Al Qaeda murder you.
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/183161.php#183161
I'm with musclemouth..wow..those comments were clear and to the point. As for the supposed intention of the NYT..it all boils down to the freedom of the press. If NYT or some other mainstream media would publish some of the very critical (and often quite intelligent) discourse that has been going on in the blogosphere..the Administration would really be getting up in arms.
Maybe this cut and run for the election fear mongering on the part of the Republicans (well put) might be the final kick in the 'bleep' that the Dems need. Can't believe I'm saying that as an Independent, ha!
Ingrid
The only sham logic is the New York Times line that argues that it needed to expose this 'secret and dangerous' program to the American people on the one hand while, at the same time, arguing that everyone knows about these kind of things so it isn't a big deal on the other hand. Sorry, can't have it both ways.
No, Tommy. The story was that they were going through the bank accounts of American citizens, not that they were chasing terrorists money.
They've never made any secret of the fact that they were chasing the money of terrorists, Bush has mentioned this many times.
The story was that they were going through the bank accounts of American citizens, not that they were chasing terrorists money.
The story was an expose of the essential nature of the entire program, both its functions (to catch terrorists) and what the NYT claimed were its risks to Americans. If the New York Treason wanted to make the case that their needed to be more Congressional oversight of international money transfers (a completely legal form of surveillance and one which the times would argue everyone already knew anyway) they could have done so by describing the issue in more carefully worded terms.
If there basic
Times has argued that it went further and revealed the details of the Swift program because of two things:
1) Terrorists don't employ this sort of money transfer so no harm is done to national security by revealing it.
This is easily contradicted by the fact that terrorist have been caught using Swift; the most prominent being Hambali.
2) Americans' privacy is being jeopardized by counterterrorism measures in this area...or if not jeopardized...it could be jeopardized eventually.
I see absolutely no reason why Swift would need to be described to make that point. If the monitoring of international money transfers is well known to everyone as the Treason has argued in subsequent pieces, then why not make the point that such measures, whatever they may be, could eventually effect Americans' financial privacy.
Again, Ace said it best:
It’s blackmail, pure and simple. Either let a Democrat into the White House, or we will continue to sabotage American security and, in effect, kill Americans. We will keep secrets when a Democrat is in office, but not a Republican. So we offer the American people a choice: Let the politicians we favor run the country, or we will help Al Qaeda murder you.
BELGIUM (AP) The New York Times today learned that something is going on. Some people are doing it and some people are not doing it. Their methods involve a certain number of steps, or maybe none, but perhaps an infinite number, that will further the cause of something that is doubleplusgood. Dozens of certain people from somewhere have come forth, or come back, to report on the matter.
"It's ultra rad," said an unnamed source, who initially wished to be referred to as John Doe, until the editors totally blackmailed him by saying that we were going to be making references to something or other either way.
The (name withheld for security reasons) Administration has neither confirmed nor denied the existence, or lack thereof, of any program that has to do with anything, anywhere. When asked to expand on this statement, the (name withheld for security reasons) Administration evaporated. Dentifrice. Dentifrice. Dentifrice. Dentifrice. Dentifrice. Dentifrice.
(Michael Moore contributed to this report.)
Please, musclemouth. It isn't that hard to come up with a viable story with sources that talks about dangers to Americans' financial privacy without blowing the cover of secret programs.
There whole crux of the New York Treason's article was "here we have a program that tracks international transfers of money in an effort to nab terrorists and here are all the details as to how it works, now ya know, one day, not today but someday, somehow, they might go further than just tracking international transfers and look into your bank account too! Ohhh better be scared!"
The antecedent (Swift) and consequent (financial privacy of an average American's personal finances) of this story are barely even related. There was absolutely no need to give the name of the company or go into the actual details as to how Swift operated since those details have virtually no bearing on the supposed privacy dangers that the New York Treason argued might someday occur.
If NYT was really so concerned about domestic financial privacy, they could have easily penned an editorial stating that counterterrorism efforts have led to increased monitoring of international financial transactions and that the American people should be wary that this surveillance does not extent into their domestic finances.
Among other things, they could have included reasons why we should be so concerned about the encroachment into our finances: something they didn't bother with since they were too busy spelling out details of Swift pertinent to our national security but irrelevant to their stated premise.
Instead they chose to blow the cover of a useful program while talking out of both sides of their mouth in a sorry attempt to justify such a disclosure.
"financial privacy of an average American's personal finances"
I made an obvious boo-boo here. I meant "privacy of an American's personal finances."
But if they did NOT give details, then most conservatives would accuse them of making stuff up. You know that's true.
Musclemouth, my point is that they don't need to make anything up. The Bush administration has already indicated in public statements that they are going after terrorists' finances though, of course, they haven't provided details on things like Swift.
If they want to make their point about Americans' financial privacy being potentially jeopardized, they could mention these public statements (and public actions - such as those laws passed since 9/11) as examples. There was no need to out the Swift program.
It seems it's a "risk" the media have to take. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Any amount of vague wording would only add up to so much fearmongering. It's irresponsible journalism to not include details. If, in fact, the government is doing something wrong, then the only way to catch them and keep them accountable is to show them we know who they are. You know what I'm saying? Like, if there was a murder in the neighborhood, it wouldn't exactly stop the murdering if the media said "There is killing going on." No accountability there. You gotta name names.
I still believe it comes down to whether you are biased in favor of the government or biased in favor of The People. I am in the latter category. I am anti-big government. I am a libertarian, and for good reason. The government lies. CEOs lie. It's the way of the world. They have to lie to stay in power. Also, they have to do evil things to stay in power. They couldn't care less about their so-called constituents. That's why we have the media. That's why the loudmouths are our only defense against despotism.
If the government can't keep a secret, that's their own fault. It's not up to the media to serve as lapdog. We are not in a war. We are in an insane campaign to swat every mosquito on earth. It's an impossible task, and insane at its root. That's why the New York Times should actually be increasing their level of investigative journalism, not decreasing it.
I myself have worked as a journalist in D.C. And I quit because I saw what was happening. It's a revolution from free media to state press. It's Stalinist and it's terrifying.
However, I do appreciate this dialogue, Tommy. Even if nothing gets resolved. We're both human here. I'm sorry I spoke dismissively towards you a couple of times...it was misplaced anger.
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