WaPo: Dragnet wiretapping conflict in the White House

[libertypirate]

Of all the tidbits of information that has come out I think a single piece of information is very telling.

This is James Comey acting Attorney General and Frances Fragos Townsend. Townsend was deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism, which means she directly reported to the National Security Adviser Condi.

What is so obvious is that they are not using the program to combat terrorism, because the top terrorism advisers did not have access to the program.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/13/AR2008091302284_5.html?hpid=topnews&sid=ST2008091302818&s_pos=

......

"If I say a word, would you tell me whether you recognize it?" he asked quietly.

He did. She didn't. The program's classified code name left her blank. Comey tried to talk around the subject.

"I think this is something I am not a part of," Townsend said <23>. "I can't have this conversation." Like John Gordon and deputy national security adviser Steven J. Hadley and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, she was out of the loop <24>.

Oh, God, Comey remembers thinking. They've held this so tight. Even Fran Townsend. The president's counterterrorism adviser is not read in? Comey towered over his diminutive friend. He chose his words carefully.
....

[Fiendish Thingy]

1. Chilling- too bad impeachment's off the table- Thanks, Nancy

Pelosi, Reid, Rockefeller and Harman(?) were in the loop and too cowardly to put their necks on the line for the Constitution.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Truth2Tell]

8. Here's a few links to start you off... and may I suggest The Google.

Plenty out there on this.

The Bush Administration smartly kept a number of key Democrats in the loop on the illigal and unconstitutional wiretapping. The strategy worked. The same Democrats have worked their butts off to keep this all under wraps, because their own asses are on the line along with Bush's.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8EK2VEO7&show_article=1

Rockefeller is among a small group of congressional leaders who have received briefings on the administration's four-year-old program to eavesdrop—without warrants—on international calls and e-mails of Americans and others inside the United States with suspected ties to al-Qaida.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/weekend/hottopic/?id=110007783

But some in Congress were informed of the wiretaps and did nothing to stop them. Instead, the ranking Democrat on Senate Intelligence, Jay Rockefeller, wrote a private letter to Vice President Dick Cheney expressing his "lingering concerns" and saying he'd keep it on file for posterity--or more precisely, for posterior-covering.

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/02/sen-rockefeller.html

In a Senate floor speech, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-West Virginia) inadvertently made plain that the proposed changes to the nation's spying laws radically expand how the government wiretaps inside the United States. Rockefeller was decrying an amendment that would require the government to discard non-emergency evidence if a court later finds that the spying methods violate the law.

Rockefeller makes clear that the impending changes to the law aren't about making it easier for the National Security Agency to listen in on a particular terrorism suspect's phone calls. Instead, the changes are about letting the nation's spooks secretly and unilaterally install filters inside America's phone and internet infrastructure.

Rockefeller, the chief Democratic architect of the changes, explains:

Unlike traditional Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act application orders which involve collection on one individual target, the new FISA provisions create a system of collection. The courts role in this system of collection is not to consider probable cause on individual targets but to ensure that procedures used to collect intelligence are adequate. The courts' determination of the adequacy of procedures therefore impacts all electronic communications gathered under the new mechanisms, even if it involves thousands of targets.

[libertypirate]

11. That is so Dickish of you!

We have already parsed this puppy to bed they knew of some wiretapping. NOT dragnet surveillance.

And WAPO article states implicitly that the White House top terrorism adviser was unaware of the depths of surveillance of terrorist.

Are you kidding me, the President's own adviser not privy to how they were tracking and catching terrorists; RED FUCKING FLAG!!!

None of what you implied as such actually states dragnet surveillance. They are about wiretapping which is a bit different then copying all the data because you know there is a terrorist in there somewhere.

Let me call that what it is FISHING!!!!!

[Truth2Tell]

13. Actually, I think it was dickish

of Bush and his Democratic cronies to driftnet vast amounts of information from Americans in defiance of the Constitution and the law.

Believe it or not, news can exist prior to appearing in the WaPo. They are actually quite late to the party on this. It has been well reported in the alternative media for quite some time that the Government was slurping up vast sums of info with no warrants and that a number of Dems were fully in the loop.

My post was not "fishing." Did you read the whole Wired article I linked? Rockefeller spilled the beans himself on the Senate floor.

You may not like it but it's the truth. Deal with it.

[bluesmail]

3. Lots of insights into how Darth's been getting his way,

aside from murder, blackmail and veiled threats. A good read.

[bleever]

4. An INCREDIBLE article.

Highly recommended reading for anyone interested in how Cheney operates, and how little stands between American democracy and what borders on totalitarianism.

[libertypirate]

7. There is quite a depth of insight on many levels.

How about this bit?

"They were geniuses at this," Goldsmith said. "They could divide up all these problems in the bureaucracy, ask different people to decide things in their lanes, control the facts they gave them, and then put the answers together to get the result they want."

[bleever]

10. Yes indeed.

The single-mindedness with which they subverted all the structures they were elected to uphold is breathtaking.

[WhiteTara]

5. Is it time to call the police?

We need to get this man in jail! Send him to the Hague and then try him for treason!

[Klukie]

6. Wow....

I can't wait for tomorrows piece. Excellent.

[libertypirate]

9. Should be out tonight! /nt

[scorpiogirl]

12. K & R! n/t