More Desperation At The Gray Lady
By Captain Ed on War on Terror
Captain's Quarters
The New York Times leads with yet another update on its NSA-intercept program, which has shown more holes than substance once subjected to review. Its latest installment proves no different, as the paper attempts to pump a bit of adrenaline back into the story with the breathless headline,
<< "Justice Deputy Resisted Parts of Spy Program" >>
It sounds very damning, until readers make it through the entire article -- and realize that Eric Lichtblau and James Risen once again fail to even allege a single act of wrongdoing.
Here's the core of the story:
<<< A top Justice Department official objected in 2004 to aspects of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program and refused to sign on to its continued use amid concerns about its legality and oversight, according to officials with knowledge of the tense internal debate. The concerns appear to have played a part in the temporary suspension of the secret program.
The concerns prompted two of President Bush's most senior aides - Andrew H. Card Jr., his chief of staff, and Alberto R. Gonzales, then White House counsel and now attorney general - to make an emergency visit to a Washington hospital in March 2004 to discuss the program's future and try to win the needed approval from Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was hospitalized for gallbladder surgery, the officials said.
The unusual meeting was prompted because Mr. Ashcroft's top deputy, James B. Comey, who was acting as attorney general in his absence, had indicated he was unwilling to give his approval to certifying central aspects of the program, as required under the White House procedures set up to oversee it. ...
What is known is that in early 2004, about the time of the hospital visit, the White House suspended parts of the program for several months and moved ahead with more stringent requirements on the security agency on how the program was used, in part to guard against abuses.
The concerns within the Justice Department appear to have led, at least in part, to the decision to suspend and revamp the program, officials said. The Justice Department then oversaw a secret audit of the surveillance program. >>>
Hmm. We have Ashcroft going to the hospital for a serious medical condition in 2004 after having signed off on the NSA intercept program every 45 days since 9/11, and after ranking members of Congressional intelligence committees from both parties had received numerous briefings on the efforts. With Ashcroft in the hospital, the administration went to James Comey, who had some concerns about the program. The White House went to Ashcroft afterwards, who concurred with Comey. The White House then voluntarily suspended the program and worked with the DoJ to revamp the program to satisfy their concerns and once again get the necessary sign-off for its resumption, and the DoJ then started doing regular audits to ensure that its concerns remained addressed.
So what's the problem? It doesn't appear that the White House did anything remarkable. They followed the FISA law in getting the certification of the Attorney General, and when that couldn't be done, they stopped the program. They proved willing to make adaptations that would satisfy the AG, who then certified the program for a restart. The administration continued briefing Congressional committees on the program and its progress, and except for one note from John Rockefeller, never received any objections. To this day, not one of the people briefed on the NSA intercepts has called for cancellation of the program.
Lichtblau and Risen continue to push this as a major criminal enterprise without producing even the hint of a crime. They want to paint the White House as an imperial Presidency, running roughshod over the law, when their own account shows the White House following procedure, maintaining the necessary approvals, and suspending the program when it couldn't secure the approvals. So far, the only story here is that the New York Times has apparently gone into business to shill books written by its reporters, and that the editors of the paper won't even hold themselves accountable to their own ombudsman, let alone their readers.
This meme has become pathetic.
CQ reader and commenter Coldwarrior left some interesting comments in this thread regarding the possible origin of the leak. His information centers around disaffected Air Force personnel who had an axe to grind for the prosecution of an AF officer in a vandalism case; the officer defaced cars with pro-Bush bumper stickers. It doesn't have anything to do directly with whistleblowing but rather just an attempt to embarrass the White House. He predicts that we will see this resolved very quickly -- perhaps within a week.
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