Posted on 07/14/2008 12:55:15 PM PDT by tobyhill
CNN) -- Federal officers charged with keeping terrorists off planes are now searching their own ranks for staff who told CNN that few flights were protected by air marshals.
The Transportation Security Administration rejected as a "myth" CNN's report that less than 1 percent of the nation's daily flights carry armed federal air marshals. Now the agency is conducting an investigation into who talked to CNN and who encouraged other agents to do the same.
A spokesman for the TSA confirmed the investigation.
Spokesman Christopher White said a TSA investigator is looking into the "possible unauthorized release of sensitive and classified information to the news media by covered parties."
"As part of this ongoing investigation, several individuals, both current and former employees, have been contacted as is typical in any investigation," he said in an e-mail to CNN.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
TSA launches leak investigation (Prosecute to the fullest extent of the law!)
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Yikes! Who leaked this?
20 years minumum sentence
When we guys fly we should travel in jacket and tie, with shined shoes and a fresh haircut. That way the air marshals won’t be so obvious.
Obviously they are on to the leaker pretty hard now. Even though their numbers were false some of the info given to CNN was classified.
I’m all for exposing government wrongdoing, corruption and ineptitude, but this doesn’t qualify. Part of the securit of the Air Marshal system was that the enemy not only didn’t know whether there’s an air marshal on board, he didn’t know the chances of having one on board. Now he does and can calculate his odds appropriately.
Jail time.
Unless the number is a lot higher and this was a purposeful leak. Talk about sly misdirection. Or do I credit the government with too much intelligence?
Even if the information seems harmless, it's not up to those individuals to determine what material they think is safe to leak and what isn't.
Our government leaks like a sieve, and we need to start aggressively plugging those leaks.
What I find HILARIOUS is that the TSA was giving numbers a couple of years back giving us the impression that 98% (or some number, I forget exactly) was COVERED by Marshals.
I think if they are telling people something like that and they aren’t actually covering the flights - but are getting funding (they are) then they are at fault.
Yes, I agree that CNN ought not be telling everyone in the world, but at the same time... TSA should be putting their money where their mouth is and protecting the flights.
Barring that, every FReeper that flies ought to be allowed to carry their side arm.
If it isn’t true then what does it matter? (Answer is in the question.)
Proud not to have flown since November 2001.
If the Air Marshal wants to have their opinions heard on issues related to their work, they can come up with a statement and ask for it to be verified not to contain confidential information. The lose their ability to criticize their superiors autonomously, but anonymous criticisms of superiors are rarely of much value anyway. It such a person needs to blow the whistle on something, there are ways to do so internally.
The other option the agent has, which is still somewhat risky is to provide vague overall opinions and refer the reporter to the TSA for any details they might want.
For example, the agent could complain that he didn't feel that there were enough agents on flights to be as effective as they should be. It's a vague opinion, it has some value because of who is expressing it, but it gives away pretty much nothing. The reporter has to go to an official source to get the solid details that the agent is not permitted to divulge.
If they find out who leaked the information now, they may have trouble making a criminal case against the agent, but the agent will lose their security clearance. No clearance, no job as an Air Marshal.
You can get more accomplished talking with a cleared committee member, especially if you are a constituent—but you can still get someone to listen if you aren’t. I’ve been there and would NEVER go to the press regardless of whether classified info was involved or not. This guy was wrong going to CNN.
You can get more accomplished talking with a cleared committee member, especially if you are a constituent—but you can still get someone to listen if you aren’t. I’ve been there and would NEVER go to the press regardless of whether classified info was involved or not. This guy was wrong going to CNN.
If losing their clearance is the least that can happen then it should happen because that lying whiner shouldn’t be pretending to be a protector of the public.
Why don’t the air marshals travel in sandals and shorts with all of their toiletries in 3oz bottles like the rest of the hoi polloi?
lol.
They act surpised that we know this.
I thought it was common knowledge that having a flight marshall on a flight is actually exceedingly rare.
Do you have any idea how many flights there are in the average day? There is no way there are anywhere close to enough Air Marshals to have them present on more than a small portion of the flights.
I had never heard anyone at the TSA claim that there were Air Marshals on a large percentage of the flights. I've heard the opposite many times. I don't know where you might have heard that they had agents on most flights, but they simply don't have the manpower to do that.
"It's a pain in the neck, and significantly interferes with my travel arrangements," said Robinson, the head of the Justice Department's criminal division during the Clinton administration.
He believes his name matches that of someone who was put on the list in early 2005, and is routinely delayed while flying — despite having his own government top-secret security clearances renewed last year.
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