Hi Rambi...Yes, I think there are two issues as well. One is understanding the authority of the President per the Constitution is one thing, and the other is to see what was leaked and how it might affect the US and our Military who are serving in foreign lands.
Frederick Kagan's piece that c2 linked is interesting in that it shows some of the differences in the Iraq war versus Vietnam...Our Military and the techniques used seem to be vastly different than they were 40 years ago. We are probably using more human intel now than we were during the previous Adm, when the budgets were cut and people pulled back in....
It is my concern that our people don't get hurt or killed because someone someplace who has a top secret clearance has leaked anything that would endanger these people. Plus, did anything that was leaked tell AQ or other murdering terrorist groups anything that would enable them to know how we would react in any given circumstance...i.e. beheading our people, or kidnapping them, etc...I feel sure you are concerned about those and other issues as well.
IF the NYT hadn't been so blatently biased both on their editorial page, in the numbers of columnists, and throughout their "paper", it might not have struck a cord with me, and probably most of us who consider the source to be important.
And if Risen and the co-author hadn't relied on all the "unknown" sources...perhaps we all could believe them more. BUT they didn't. Anyone can say ANYTHING these days, and some people will believe them. But thinking people won't. They will ask questions, as most here are....
In the book out Tuesday by Risen, and advertised heavily by the NYT...at the very bottom of the yahoo article says these few sentences....
IF this is true, and IF something like this is leaked, what happens to any Americans who are in the hands of our enemy?
In another chapter on a "rogue operation," the book said a CIA officer mistakenly sent one of its Iranian agents information that could be used to identify virtually every spy the agency had in Iran. The book said the Iranian was a double agent who turned over the data to Iranian security officials.
The book said the information severely damaged the CIA's Iranian network, and quoted CIA sources as saying several of the U.S. agents were arrested and jailed.
news.yahoo.com
Then Time Mag says:
time.com
And the Washington Times says the Dems will hit the WH, and Republicans on privacy issues....while Michael O'Hanlon says this:
Democratic aides say privately that while it remains a high goal to win control over the House or Senate in the November elections, they think the issue will resonate with voters.
Centrist Democrats, however, warn that such a strategy could backfire.
"I think when you suggest that civil liberties are just as much at risk today as the country is from terrorism, you've gone too far if you leave that impression," Michael O'Hanlon, a national security analyst at the Brookings Institution who advises Democrats on defense issues, told The Washington Times last week.
"I get nervous when I see the Democrats playing this [civil liberties] issue out too far," he said. |
