Several things to comment on.
1. Prosecuting leakers is hard because of the difficulty in proving that someone deliberately leaked classified information to hurt the country rather than to "inform" us as to what the govt is doing in the name of national security.
In other words, our laws stink, are inadequate, outdated, and based on the wrong premises. We need a complete overhaul of our internal security laws to meet present and future threats and violations, esp. in the cybeworld. This AIN'T gonna happen under the Democrats, esp. when the House Judiciary Committee is run by a veteran red, and the Sen. Judiciary Committee is led by an idiot (Leahy), aided and abetted by Ted "Moscow" Kennedy and other excuses for human excrement and ignorance.
2. The govt has almost always failed to mount really quality prosecutions against leakers and have caved in to the ACLU and their communist counterparts in the NLG, NECLC, and CCR. Taking them on in every case where there is a good chance of winning is crucial to beating the crap out of the Left.
3. As a journalist of almost 40 years, I appreciate the confidentiality of sources, but when it comes to national security, screw it. Our country comes before anything else and our sources must understand it. I'm talking about the stealing and leaking of confidential information which undermines our morale, exposes our plans, strategies, troop movements, weapons developments/testing, etc. This does not apply to documentation about who is ripping off the govt thru fraudulent bids and payoffs.
Fedora: Thanks for providing the Jack Anderson infor. I suspect that his files will be a goldmine of journalist scandal and illegalities if they are obtained intact. Barnes and Pearson's ties to the far-left have not yet been documents enough. A book is clearly necessary to show that they often collaborated to protect the Communists, no matter what their motives might have been.
Ah, Tommy the Cork, Cochoran. met him a long time ago. Could charm the clothes off a woman in five minutes. The whole issue of the "Red China Lobby" is worth another book updating how it has worked since the 1940's thru the Clintonistas/Gore fundraising illegalities.
The failure of the mainstream media to explore any of these issues is indicative of their bias and selectivity. Thanks to www.frontpagemagazine.com, Ron Radosh, Dave Horowitz & Dave Collier, Steven Powell, Mitrokhin, Herb Romerstein/Eric Breindel, John Haynes and Harvey Khler, etc. we are beginning to get a better documented insight into how Communism operated around the world and here in the U.S. Getting the liberals to accept the truth is another herculean task, but we must try.
It is through good, documented scholarship, often from communist archives (USSR, E. Germany Stasi, Czech STB, Poland - just being released), etc), that the truth will findly come out (Sorry, Mulder, but this is a great line for our side to use).
Also, thanks to FreeRepublic for publishing so many useful articles, links, and readership posts, because they all add to our knowledge in our fight for survival.
When all is said and done, use good documentation and take no prisoners.
Thanks for your reply. Here are a few responses to your comments:
1. It should not be necessary to prove that a leak of classified information was deliberate, or that it was intended to hurt the country. The fact that national security was broken should be sufficient to prove those who leaked the information knew what they were doing.
2. I know the government routinely caves in to the ACLU and their comrades. I don't understand why they do that, but I suppose it is because there are so many left-wing judges who routinely decide cases in favor of the ACLU.
3. "Confidentiality of sources" should not be allowed to protect any perpetrator of a crime. There is precedent for over-ruling confidentiality. For example, even the confidentiality of what a priest hears in confession is over-ruled by the law that requires priests to report any indication of child sexual abuse.