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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (18834)	5/16/2006 3:53:22 PM
From: John Carragher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543615

i believe when congress is being informed of various checks it is not secret. if congress felt the actions were a threat to civil freedom they have the authority to take action. Why haven't any of them done it? why was it necessary for cia to leak to washington post vs going to one of the over sight committees. if these leaks damage security then it is wrong. this could have and should have been handled by our representatives in congress.

To: JohnM who wrote (18834)	5/17/2006 7:27:05 AM
From: John Carragher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543615

story on reporters calls seems to have died for now no coverage in latest review of nyt, washington post or latimes. this is a recap posted by slate on these newspapers. Everybody mentions that Verizon became the second company in two days to deny USAT's report that the company gave the NSA customers' phone records. USAT responds with…a letter from its chief of communications. In any case, there seems to be some exquisitely crafted spin going on. Because as the NYT puts it, a "senior government official confirmed" that the NSA has "access to records of most telephone calls in the United States." The Times hints at a possible explanation for the discrepancy: The spooks are only tracking long-distance calls and Verizon and BellSouth hand those calls off to other providers, such as, say, AT&T, which is the one company named that has stayed mum. Only the LAT fronts the White House agreeing to briefly the full Senate and House intel committees on NSA's domestic operation. Far down the Times notices a potential "ancillary benefit" for the administration: Because of classification rules, those briefed on the program "will likely have to be more circumspect in their public discussions of it, blunting their ability to criticize it." As one Republican aide put it, "When they know about it, they are obligated to be quiet." The story's headline: "BUSH BACKS OFF WIRETAP SECRECY."