Holte's corner

When Democracy is imperiled

The President and Vice President, and indeed the entire cabal of neo-con-artist sycophants who surround him falsely accused the New York Times of leaking classified information last week and the week before. Of course with the confusing and confused laws we have, almost anything can be labelled "classified" -- even long after it has become public knowledge. The administration has been up in arms about "leaks" of "classified information" for months now. They justify it on the grounds that "loose lips sink ships." But this is a lie according to research done by Larry C Johnson and documented in his blog entry "What Secret".

The fact is that most of what is left of the mainstream media in this country (forget Fox) is so cautious about releasing information that it won't leak the kinds of things that cause toy boats to leak (much less sink) -- unless the Vice President himself -- as happened with the Plame case, leaks the information. The information they were complaining about was public knowledge and had never been a secret. The US has quite openly been trying to track down terrorism (and other miscreants) through financial records since 9/11 and before. The only difference is that this particular program was so brazenly broad and scope and un-monitored, that it provided a potential for spying on non-Terrorists Americans and people world wide and the people who gave this information to the press said so. This administration doesn't want people thinking for themselves down in the "ranks".

The Vice President said:
on June 30:
"Some in the press, in particular The New York Times, have made it harder to defend America against attack by insisting on publishing detailed information about vital national security programs."

The President called it "disgraceful"

Cheney went on:

"First they reported the terrorist surveillance program, which monitors international communications when one end is outside the United States and one end is connected with or associated with al Qaeda. Now the Times has disclosed the terrorist financial tracking program. On both occasions, the Times 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 to our national security. 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."

But is this true? Was it a real leak?
Read the article:
Article:http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/23/washington/23intel.html?ex=1308715200&en=4b46b4fd8685c26b&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss
Okay the program was classified. But the only thing that was (sort of) news from the report was this part of the report:

"That access to large amounts of confidential data was highly unusual, several officials said, and stirred concerns inside the administration about legal and privacy issues."

"The capability here is awesome or, depending on where you're sitting, troubling," said one former senior counterterrorism official who considers the program valuable. While tight controls are in place, the official added, "the potential for abuse is enormous."
and later:

...."But L. Richard Fischer, a Washington lawyer who wrote a book on banking privacy and is regarded as a leading expert in the field, said he was troubled that the Treasury Department would use broad subpoenas to demand large volumes of financial records for analysis. Such a program, he said, appears to do an end run around bank-privacy laws that generally require the government to show that the records of a particular person or group are relevant to an investigation."

"There has to be some due process," Mr. Fischer said. "At an absolute minimum, it strikes me as inappropriate."

The New York times defended releasing the story on these grounds:
Letter from Bill Keller:

"Since September 11, 2001, our government has launched broad and secret anti-terror monitoring programs without seeking authorizing legislation and without fully briefing the Congress. Most Americans seem to support extraordinary measures in defense against this extraordinary threat, but some officials who have been involved in these programs have spoken to the Times about their discomfort over the legality of the government's actions and over the adequacy of oversight. We believe The Times and others in the press have served the public interest by accurately reporting on these programs so that the public can have an informed view of them."

This seems to be what bothered Cheney. Because the rest of the information has been pretty much public for some time. The only people they seem interested in keeping them secret from are the terrorists. Larry Johnson on his blog titled "What Secret" writes:

"If you still labor under the fantasy that the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal divulged "classified information" that put U.S. lives at risk or hampered our ability to track terrorist financial assets, you are willfully ignorant or have been living in a sensory isolation tank."

"Starting in the immediate aftermath of the 9-11 attacks, the Administration took up the hue and cry of the need to track terrorist finances. Congressman Michael Oxley, Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, speaking at the outset of a public congressional hearing on 3 October 2001:"

"I applaud the president and our distinguished witness today, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, for taking swift action to block terrorist assets that may be located here in the United States and to warn foreign banks that the U.S. is poised to block their assets in this country and deny them access to U.S. markets that refuse to freeze terrorist assets overseas. The secretary is also to be commended for setting up a new foreign terrorist asset tracking center which I hope will become a model for interagency cooperation in law enforcement and in the sharing of financial intelligence."

"The information provided to the public went well beyond general platitudes. In fact, U.S. officials provided specific information that anybody, including members of Al Qaeda, who read the testimony would learn what the United States Government was doing and how it was doing it. Here is the public record on what the U.S. Government has been doing to track terrorist finances."

Al Qaeda has known of these efforts for years, in February 12 2002:

"The third lesson in the manual, entitled Counterfeit Currency and Forged Documents, discusses financial security precautions that Al Qaeda members should take to secure their operations. It reads as follows: One, dividing operational funds into two parts; one part is to be invested in projects that offer financial return, and the other is to be saved and not spent except during operations; two, not placing operational funds all in one place; three, not telling the organization members about the location of the funds; four, having proper protection while carrying large amounts of money; five, leaving the money with nonmembers and spending it as needed."

You can read the entire blog here:
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/What_secret_0705.html

What it tells us is that Dick Cheney and the President aren't after "plugging leaks" -- or else Dick Cheney would have had to resign over the Valery Plame affair -- which his advisor Scooter Libby is about to be tried over lying about. They are after a state controlled, nationalized and docile press, so that they can substitute overt and obvious propaganda for genuine news.

Go back to the rest of Cheney's speach:

"There's still hard work ahead in the war on terror, because we are dealing with enemies who have declared an intention to bring great harm to any nation that opposes their aims. And their prime targets are the United States and the American people."

He is outlining the case he made in his "one percent solution" analysis several years ago.

"after this conflict began nearly five years ago, with a merciless attack on this very city, President Bush told Congress and the country that we were in a different kind of struggle. He said we "should not expect one battle, but rather a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we've ever seen." This war may, he said, "include dramatic strikes, visible on television and covert operations, secret even in success."

His case rests on convincing people that we are involved in a life and death struggle with Islamofascists:

"So it's critically important to remember that this nation is fighting a war. And as we make our case to the voters in this election year, it's vital to keep issues of national security at the top of the agenda. The President and I welcome the discussion, because every voter in America needs to know where the President and I stand, as well as where the leaders of the Democratic Party stand, and how they view the global war on terror."

This is all for the sake of re-election.

But if this is so, why does the administration consistently concentrate its efforts on things that are guaranteed to inflame Islamofascism? Why do they continuously sabotage efforts to actually bring to justice Bin Laden and these people promising to bring us harm? It is because the fear is useful to them. That is the only reason to explain this attack on the New York Times, the closing of the Bin Laden unit, and the gap between rhetoric -- which is entirely aimed at inflaming fear and anger -- and reality; which seems to be to engage in a tame pursuit of Sunni Islamo-fascists, while turning a blind eye to their operations in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates -- where most of them have come from. It's an incredible explaination, but all the other alternative explainations don't fit the facts. They are not incompetant.

Closing the Bin Laden Unit:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/04/washington/04intel.html

So why close the Bin Laden unit if the effort needs to continue for a long time? If rolling up terrorists is so important, why continuously divert energy to where it cannot but create more terrorists (Iraq) from where it might just achieve results (Pakistan)? The reason is that fear sells. If the New York Times can be painted as enemies and traitors, and anyone who looks too closely at this administration as "fellow travellors"(a term the Communists used to use), then these folks can literally get away with murder. And they can turn entire theatres of the world into new Abu Gharaib's:
More: http://www.fraughtwithperil.com/blogs/holte/archives/001099.html

warning requires strong stomach:
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/richard_nortontaylor/2006/06/the_untaught_lessons_of_my_lai.html
This guy uses our bad behavior to pin his own propaganda on:
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/haifa_zangana/2006/07/the_personality_disorder_of_th.html
http://www.airamerica.com/randirhodes/live/

Posted by cholte at July 6, 2006 08:29 PM