Simple answer:
Posted on 06/26/2006 2:11:34 PM PDT by pissant
THE VICE PRESIDENT: "In the decade prior to 9/11, we spent more than $2 trillion on national security. Yet we lost nearly 3,000 Americans at the hands of 19 men armed with box cutters and airline tickets. In the case of al Qaeda we are not dealing with large armies that we can track, or uniforms we can see, or men with territory of their own to defend. Their preferred tactic, which they boldly proclaim, is to slip into countries, blend in among the innocent, and kill without mercy and without restraint. They have intelligence and counterintelligence operations of their own. They are using the most sophisticated communications technology they can get their hands on.
"In pursuit of their objectives, they have carried out a number of attacks since 9/11 – in Casablanca, Jakarta, Mombassa, Bali, Riyadh, Baghdad, Istanbul, Madrid, London, Sharm al-Sheikh, and elsewhere. Here in the U.S., we have not had another 9/11. Obviously, no one can guarantee that we won't be hit again. But the relative safety of these past nearly five years now did not come about by accident. We've been protected by sensible policy decisions by the President, by decisive action at home and abroad, and by round-the-clock efforts on the part of the people in our armed forces, law enforcement, intelligence, and homeland security.
"Some in the press, in particular The New York Times, have made the job of defending against further terrorist attacks more difficult by insisting on publishing detailed information about vital national security programs.
"The first was the terrorist surveillance program. Sometimes the press calls it domestic surveillance, it is not domestic surveillance. It's a program aimed at the communications that are international in nature – at least one end of the communication has to be outside the United States, and one end has to be affiliated with or associated with al Qaeda.
"The second program that The New York Times has now disclosed is the terrorist financial tracking program, just within about the last week or so. These are both good programs. They provide valuable intelligence. They are very carefully managed to safeguard the civil liberties of the American people. They have been successful in helping break up terrorist plots. They are done in accordance with the Constitution, and there has in both cases – both programs have been properly notified to the appropriate officials in the United States Congress.
"The New York Times has now twice – two separate occasions – disclosed programs; both times they had been asked not to publish those stories by senior administration officials. They went ahead anyway. The leaks to The New York Times and the publishing of those leaks is very damaging. The ability to intercept al Qaeda communications and to track their sources of financing are essential if we're going to successfully prosecute the global war on terror. Our capabilities in these areas help explain why we have been so successful in preventing further attacks like 9/11. The New York Times has now made it more difficult for us to prevent attacks in the future. Publishing this highly classified information about our sources and methods for collecting intelligence will enable the terrorists to look for ways to defeat our efforts. These kinds of stories also adversely affect our relationships with people who work with us against the terrorists. In the future, they will be less likely to cooperate if they think the United States is incapable of keeping a secret.
"What is doubly disturbing for me is that not only have they gone forward with these stories, but they've been rewarded for it, for example, in the case of the terrorist surveillance program, by being awarded the Pulitzer Prize for outstanding journalism. I think that is a disgrace."
I am sorry but I must completely disagree with you. If the NYTs received child porn would they have a right to publish it? I don’t think so.
Unambiguously taking within its reach the publication of the NSA terrorist surveillance story (though arguably not the Times's more recent terrorist banking story), Section 798 reads, in part:
Whoever knowingly and willfully communicates, furnishes, transmits, or otherwise makes available to an unauthorized person, or publishes, or uses in any manner prejudicial to the safety or interest of the United States or for the benefit of any foreign government to the detriment of the United States any classified information . . . concerning the communication intelligence activities of the United States . . . shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both [emphasis added].
The law is clear and the NYT must be brought to justice along with the leaker.
Bush condemns leak of terror finance info
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060626/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_terrorist_financing
President Bush on Monday sharply condemned the disclosure of a program to secretly monitor the financial transactions of suspected terrorists. "The disclosure of this program is disgraceful," he said.
"For people to leak that program and for a newspaper to publish it does great harm to the United States of America," Bush said, jabbing his finger for emphasis. He said the disclosure of the program "makes it harder to win this war on terror...."
"Congress was briefed and what we did was fully authorized under the law," Bush said, talking with reporters in the Roosevelt Room after meeting with groups that support U.S. troops in Iraq.
"We're at war with a bunch of people who want to hurt the United States of America," the president said. "What we were doing was the right thing."
"The American people expect this government to protect our constitutional liberties and at the same time make sure we understand what the terrorists are trying to do," Bush said. He said that to figure out what terrorists plan to do, "You try to follow their money. And that's exactly what we're doing and the fact that a newspaper disclosed it makes it harder to win this war on terror."
Granted, but Prez Bush could've had an internal assessment of facts, before barking at the NYT for publishing it!
Prez Bush should've known that NYT will publish everything that will put his image in a negative way! Find the leaker and hang him/her!
I've been thinking along those same lines lately. Just out of curiosity, what book are you reading?
bookmarking this thread
Simple answer:
I retired from the USAF in 1981. At the time of my retirement, a Colonel briefed me that I was sworn to secrecy for life concerning ALL aspects of the information that I had previously been cleared to handle. He further explained the punishments that I could expect, should I ever divulge any classified information.
I would never, under any circumstances, discuss or divulge the info that I had been privy to. Not because of the possible punishment. Rather, because taking an oath to keep my mouth shut means something to this former "Blue Suiter"!
Why in hell should the NYT be allowed to publish, against the CINC's request, Top Secret information with impunity? I would still be in Leavenworth, had I chosen to run my mouth! Close the NYT, LAT, and other TREASONOUS friggin old media down immediately!!! Arrest their owner, editors, reporter. Try them for treason!!! When their fair trial is over, jail their asses!!!
Its' really so simple, "W". Just do it!
P.S. Find the leakers and hang them!
I notice Starbucks sells the NYT accross the nation in their coffee shops. Maybe giving up Starbucks would be a good move. Plus they are so liberal-hypocritical: They rail on about being environmentally conscious, but the sell their stuff in throwaway paper and plastic cups. They could save resources by encouraging bottled-water-drinking liberals to bring reusable cups. And those little coffee stirrers, what's up with them? When you get down to it, every cup of coffee uses a bleached-white paper cup, a white plastic lid made from petroleum, a paper insulating sleeve (which is a nod at conservation by being unbleached and made from recycled paper) and a little plastic or wooden coffee stirrer. If you add sugar, then its 2 to 5 little paper packages of sweetener.
My suggestion which I have posted before is to divert the remainder of New York's Homeland security grants to the capture of the person/persons who leaked this information to the New York Times.
The congressmen/women who were briefed about the money trail operationshould be interrogated first.
The editorial at this link is must reading re NYT.
http://isteve.blogspot.com/2005/04/history-is-written-not-so-much-by.html
Excerpt:
[Buried by the Times makes the most persuasive case against the paper, arguing that it failed in its journalistic mission by not explaining that Hitler was killing Jews because they were Jews. Leff counts 1,186 stories about the Jews of Europe in the paper between the war's start in 1939 and its conclusion in 1945. Only 26 of those stories made it to Page One, and only six of them explicitly stated that Jews were the main target of the Nazis.]
And:
[If not giving enough publicity to the Holocaust was "the century's bitterest journalistic failure," then what do you call the long series of outright lies the New York Times published denying Stalin's even more deadly campaigns of mass murder in the Thirties? The Times still takes credit for this pro-Stalin fiction every time it prints the list of Times writers to have won the Pulitzer Prize. Right there at the top of the list is Walter Duranty - 1932. Isn't it time to renounce that Pulitzer and issue an apology to the millions of surviving relatives?]
They gave Duranty a Pulitzer for lies. Duranty was supposedly a Satanist, btw. I kid you not.
Yesterday I typed keywords "New York Times Treason" on Google and all I got was references to Bush committing treason.
Then I used Netscape and the entire first page was loaded with New York Times commits treason stories.
"I do find it interesting that the President authorized the leak of Plame to contest the validity of Wilson. It was a waste of assets to formulate a weak retaliation of Wilsons repudiation of the administrations use of faulty intelligience."
I believe you have taken great liberties with facts. Therefore, all the rest of your tripe is discounted. Thanks for stopping by and good luck to you in the next terror attack on our (at least my) homeland.
You obviously come from a long line of Democrats who read the New York Times.
Take a hike.
You are a quisling, and spent too much time on your knees in front of Pinchy...
First word that popped into my mind upon gazing on this pig: PINKO.
He needs his you know what thrown in jail!
Oh, potlatch!
What a wonderful post!
It is as true today, as it was then.
Thank you so much.
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