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Cox & Forkum: Scuttle
Cox & Forkum: Scuttle
TIA Daily‘s Robert Tracinski had a great round-up of links and commentary (under the apt title “Fourth Estate, Fifth Column”) regarding the latest New York Times breach:
Last week, the mainstream media continued its policy of declassifying America’s anti-terrorism intelligence gathering tactics. You didn’t think that the editors of the New York Times had the legal authority to declassify national security secrets? Neither did I. In fact, publishing these life-or-death secrets is a crime.
Michael Barone offers a general argument in favor of cracking down on these national security leaks, while the Weekly Standard provides a specific legal justification for a criminal prosecution of the editors of the New York Times and at least one congressman has called for such a prosecution.
As Barone points out, the most recent New York Times exposure of a national security secret is particularly egregious because there is no suggestion that the intelligence program it reveals is illegal the (dubious) argument the Times used to justify its previous exposure of a wire-tapping program.
So the Times cannot claim that it has revealed this information in order to blow the whistle on an abuse of presidential power. That moves their actions into the realm of treason: the editors of the Times published information that they knew would aid the enemy and did so without being able to claim any legitimate motive.
Technorati Tags: Cox&Forkum, NewYorkTimes, LosAngelesTimes
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Global War on Terror Watch: Chairman of the Senate Select Committe on Intelligence Pat Roberts Writes Director of National Intelligence Negroponte
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., right, asks a question during a Senate Agriculture hearing in Albany, Ga., Friday, June 23, 2006, while Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., looks on. The senators came to Albany to hold the first of a series of field hearings on the 2007 farm bill. Chambliss chairs the committee and Roberts is a member who has helped to draft six previous farm bills.Hugh Hewitt: Chairman Roberts Writes DNI Negraponte
Captain Ed: The Roberts Letter And Its Lack Of Significance
June 27, 2006 The Honorable John D. Negroponte Director of National Intelligence Washington, D.C. 20511
Dear Mr. Director:
Unauthorized disclosures of classified information continue to threaten our national security – exposing our sensitive intelligence sources and methods to our enemies. Numerous, recent unauthorized disclosures of sensitive intelligence programs have directly threatened important efforts in the war against terrorism. Whether the President’s Terrorist Surveillance Program or the Department of Treasury’s effort to track terrorist financing, we have been unable to persuade the media to act responsibly and protect the means by which we protect this nation.
To gain a better understanding of the damage caused by unauthorized disclosures of this type, I ask that you perform an assessment of the damage caused by the unauthorized disclosure of some of our most sensitive intelligence programs. While your assessment may range beyond the President’s Terrorist Surveillance Program and Treasury’s Terrorist Finance Tracking Program, I am particularly interested in the damage attributable to these two unauthorized disclosures.
Sincerely,
Pat Roberts
ChairmanThis is a WEAK SAUCE response by the Chairman of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee. My God, Roberts should be asking the Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to begin an investigation of the source of the SWIFT Program leaks published by the New York Times.
Roberts should call for Senate hearings and subpoena Keller, Lichtblau and Risen. Ask them who their sources are under penalty of contempt.
Roberts nees to grow some “COJONES.”
Graphic courtesy of Michelle MalkinPrevious:
Global War on Terror Watch: Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times Explains SWIFT Scoop
Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog Trainer
Global War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Technorati Tags: PatRoberts, NewYorkTimes, GlobalWaronTerror, SWIFT, HughHewitt, CaptainsQuarters
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Global War on Terror Watch: Eric Lichtblau of the New York Times Explains SWIFT Scoop
Graphic Courtesy of Rick A Michelle MalkinEditor & Publisher: Lichtblau of ‘NYT’ Explains Attempt to Halt His Bank Records Scoop
Eric Lichtblau, one of two New York Times’ reporters who broke today’s story of a secret government monitoring of private banking records – which the Bush Administration sought to block – said the White House arguments to halt the story were not as strong as those
that had kept a previous report on secret wiretapping out of the paper for a year.
“They were similar in terms of the objections raised not to publish,” Lichtblau told E&P today. “That the bad guys knew we were listening to them, but they don’t know exactly how.” But he
said the objections “did not rise to as high a level as last time.”And so this was an “EXCUSE” for revealing national security secrets? Or was it a rationalization for your hopeful Pulitzer Prize nomination as a result of your treasonous and anti-American expose?
Or was it because President Bush wasn’t directly involved that this “secret program” merited an “outing”? And didn’t give you HIS personal disdain?
Lichtblau, who co-wrote both stories with Times reporter James Risen, said that in each case the newspaper believed that the information it was reporting would not put anyone in harm’s
way. “I think we came down on the same side in both questions,” he said of the two stories. “That this is not giving away information that is tangibly helping terrorists know what they don’t already know.”Flap says BULL.
Lichtblau, you have no idea what potential harm or deaths you may have caused with writing and publishing this piece.
You, Risen and Keller could give a DAMN as long as you published a “scoop” and served your own parochial needs – certainly needs above American interests.
Flap asks you, Lichtblau, how many Americans have to die?
Graphic Courtesy of Darleen’s PlaceHugh Hewitt has Lichtblau of ‘NYT’ Explains Attempt to Halt His Bank Records Scoop
The national security cannot possibly come before the race for the next Pulitzer:
“I don’t think we could reasonably be accused of moving too quickly,” he said. “We waited so long that the competition caught up to us.” This comment referred to the Los Angeles Times’ posting a story about the bank records program on its Web site last night.
Previous:
Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog Trainer
Global War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Technorati Tags: EricLichtblau, NewYorkTimes, JamesRisen, BillKeller, HughHewitt, SWIFT
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Global War on Terror Watch: Dean Baquet – Why the Los Angeles Times Published the Secret Details of SWIFT Bank Data Anti-Terrorism Program
Los Angeles Times: Why we ran the bank storyMANY READERS have been sharply critical of our decision to publish an article Friday on the U.S. Treasury Department’s program to secretly monitor worldwide money transfers in an effort to track terrorist financing.
They have sent me sincere and powerful expressions of their disappointment in our newspaper, and they deserve an equally thoughtful and honest response.
The decision to publish this article was not one we took lightly. We considered very seriously the government’s assertion that these disclosures could cause difficulties for counterterrorism programs. And we weighed that assertion against the fact that there is an intense and ongoing public debate about whether surveillance programs like these pose a serious threat to civil liberties.
We sometimes withhold information when we believe that reporting it would threaten a life. In this case, we believed, based on our talks with many people in the government and on our own reporting, that the information on the Treasury Department’s program did not pose that
threat. Nor did the government give us any strong evidence that the information would thwart true terrorism inquiries. In fact, a close read of the article shows that some in the government believe that the program is ineffective in fighting terrorism.In the end, we felt that the legitimate public interest in this program outweighed the potential cost to counterterrorism efforts.
Some readers have seen our decision to publish this story as an attack on the Bush administration and an attempt to undermine the war on terror.
We are not out to get the president. This newspaper has done much hard-hitting reporting on terrorism, from around the world, often at substantial risk to our reporters. We have exposed terrorist cells and led the way in exposing the work of terrorists. We devoted a reporter to covering Al Qaeda’s role in world terrorism in the months before 9/11. I know, because I made the assignment.
But we also have an obligation to cover the government, with its tremendous power, and to offer information about its activities so citizens can make their own decisions. That’s the role of the press in our democracy.
The founders of the nation actually gave us that role, and instructed us to follow it, no matter the cost or how much we are criticized. Thomas Jefferson said, “Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.” That’s the edict we followed.
This was a tough call for me, as I’m sure it was for the editors of other papers that chose to publish articles on the subject. But history tells us over and over that the nation’s founders were right in pushing the press into this role. President Kennedy persuaded the press not to report the Bay of Pigs planning. He later said he regretted this, that he might have called it off had someone exposed it.
History has taught us that the government is not always being honest when it cites secrecy as a reason not to publish. No one believes, in retrospect, that there was any true reason to withhold the Pentagon Papers, although the government fought vigorously to keep them from being published by the New York Times and the Washington Post. As Justice Hugo Black put it in that case: “The guarding of military and diplomatic secrets at the expense of informed representative government provides no real security for our Republic.”
I don’t expect all of our readers to agree with my call. But understand that it was one taken with serious reflection and supported by much history.
Flap promised the links to the interview of Doyle McManus, Washington Bureau Chief of the Los Angeles Times yesterday.
The Transcript is here and read it all.
It is obvious from Baquet’s and McManus’s statements that neither appreciated or understood the seriousness of printing this story. National security experts they are not and both are barely able successful journalists (notwithstanding the declining circulation of the Los Angeles Times).
Simply said: They printed the story because the New York Times did and they were “scooped.”
Hugh Hewitt has an analysis here.
But the reactions of Americans across the country is one of disgust. The media elite crossed a line, and its indifference to the threat of terrorism defined it in a way that a thousand columns will not undo.
Patterico has his analysis here.
Notably missing from your piece, Mr. Baquet, is any true justification for printing the article. We learn that you supposedly agonized over the decision, and that the Founding Fathers loved a free press, and that you really, really aren’t out to get Bush.
But what is the affirmative argument for publication? Surely you see that publishing such sensitive details requires one. But I don’t see it.
Your Washington Bureau Chief has said that the key factors he looked at in making the decision to publish were: “Is this legal? Are there safeguards?â€
Yet, as I have demonstrated, the evidence in all the articles suggests that the program is legal, that it does have adequate safeguards, and that key Congressional committees were briefed.
Given these facts, where is the compelling public interest in revealing classified details of a legal and effective anti-terror program?
If this is the best you have to offer as a justification, Mr. Baquet, then you have made a terrible mistake, that may have tragic consequences for our country.
And Flap will ask Dean Baquet as he asked Bill Keller, how many Americans have to die?
Dean and Bill, you made a poor call and America will suffer from your mistakes.
Disgraceful conduct by the American Press.
Previous:
Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog Trainer
Global War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Technorati Tags: BillKeller, HughHewitt, NewYorkTimes, GlobalWaronTerror, Swift, JohnSnow, DoyleMcManus
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Global War on Terror Watch: United States Treasury Secretary Snow Responds to Bill Keller of the New York Times
President George W. Bush (2nd R) speaks to the press at the end of a Cabinet meeting, in the Cabinet Room of the White House in Washington June 1, 2006. With Bush are U.S. Secretary of HHS Mike Leavitt (L), U.S. Secretary of Interior nominee Dirk Kempthorne (2nd L), U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales (3rd L) and U.S. Secretary of Treasury John Snow.
The Department of the Treasury: Letter to the Editors of The New York Times
by Treasury Secretary SnowMr. Bill Keller, Managing Editor
The New York Times
229 West 43rd Street
New York, NY 10036
Dear Mr. Keller:
The New York Times’ decision to disclose the Terrorist Finance Tracking Program, a robust and classified effort to map terrorist networks through the use of financial data, was irresponsible and harmful to the security of Americans and freedom-loving people worldwide. In choosing to expose this program, despite repeated pleas from high-level officials on both sides of the aisle, including myself, the Times undermined a highly successful counter-terrorism program and alerted terrorists to the methods and sources used to track their money trails.
Your charge that our efforts to convince The New York Times not to publish were “half-hearted” is incorrect and offensive. Nothing could be further from the truth. Over the past two months, Treasury has engaged in a vigorous dialogue with the Times – from the reporters writing the story to the D.C. Bureau Chief and all the way up to you. It should also be noted that the co-chairmen of the bipartisan 9-11 Commission, Governor Tom Kean and Congressman Lee Hamilton, met in person or placed calls to the very highest levels of the Times urging the paper not to publish the story. Members of Congress, senior U.S. Government officials and well-respected legal authorities from both sides of the aisle also asked the paper not to publish or supported the legality and validity of the program.
Indeed, I invited you to my office for the explicit purpose of talking you out of publishing this story. And there was nothing “half-hearted” about that effort. I told you about the true value of the program in defeating terrorism and sought to impress upon you the harm that would occur from its disclosure. I stressed that the program is grounded on solid legal footing, had many built-in safeguards, and has been extremely valuable in the war against terror. Additionally, Treasury Under Secretary Stuart Levey met with the reporters and your senior editors to answer countless questions, laying out the legal framework and diligently outlining the multiple safeguards and protections that are in place.
You have defended your decision to compromise this program by asserting that “terror financiers know” our methods for tracking their funds and have already moved to other methods to send money. The fact that your editors believe themselves to be qualified to assess how terrorists are moving money betrays a breathtaking arrogance and a deep misunderstanding of this program and how it works. While terrorists are relying more heavily than before on cumbersome methods to move money, such as cash couriers, we have continued to see them using the formal financial system, which has made this particular program incredibly valuable.
Lastly, justifying this disclosure by citing the “public interest” in knowing information about this program means the paper has given itself free license to expose any covert activity that it happens to learn of – even those that are legally grounded, responsibly administered, independently overseen, and highly effective. Indeed, you have done so here.
What you’ve seemed to overlook is that it is also a matter of public interest that we use all means available – lawfully and responsibly – to help protect the American people from the deadly threats of terrorists. I am deeply disappointed in the New York Times.
Sincerely,
[signed]
John W. Snow, Secretary
U.S. Department of the Treasury
Flap agrees with Hugh Hewitt in that John Snow has called Bill Keller, Executive Editor of the New York Times OUT as a LIAR. Flap has just finished listening to Keller on CNN’ Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer and will try to get the video to post up here tonight. Believe me the arrogrance and Keller’s misstated facts is beyond belief. Keller’s contact is near treasonous and Flap urges the Attorney General to go after the government leakers first and then Keller for violating our federal espoinage/national security laws.
Allah has the video/audio of the CNN Keller interview here.
As far as Flap is concerned Bill Keller can be frog marched out of the New York Times offices and thrown in a cell and let him reflect on how many Americans he endangered with this reckless act. Bill Keller, James Risen and Eric Lichtblau are not above the law and have put Americans in jeopardy. Mr. Keller, how many Americans have to die?
Hugh Hewitt on his radio show this afternoon has interviewed Doyle McManus Washington Bureau Chief of the Los Angeles Times. When the transcript comes up, Flap will have some comments about this stammering dumbshit’s interview. His conduct and arrogance are DISGRACEFUL.
Stay tuned……
Michelle Malkin has TREASURY TO KELLER: “IRRESPONSIBLE;”
MURTHA, KEAN, HAMILTON INTERVENEDMore just in: AJ Strata notes that in an interview with CNN, Bill Keller reveals that John Murtha–yes, that John Murtha–also joined Kean and Hamilton in pleading with the Times not to run the story…
Plus: Video of Tony Snow laying the smackdown over at Hot Air.
Graphic courtesy of Michelle Malkin
Patterico has a more satirical view of Bill Keller’s response with Blogosphere Excels in Reaction to Keller Letter
The blogosphere did a bang-up job today reacting to Bill Keller’s silly missive in defense of publishing classified details of an effective counterterrorism program. Rarely have I been prouder to be associated with such a group of clever folks — all giving world-class opinions for free!
I can’t give you every good link out there, but here are a few that caught my attention:
For those short on time, Wizbang admirably summarizes Keller’s letter:
Dear Reader:
1) We have no reason to believe the program was illegal in any way.
2) We have every reason to believe it was effective at catching terrorists.
3) We ran the story anyway, screw you.
Bill Keller
But for my money, as is so often the case, some of the best expressed and most on-target sentiments came from one of my very favorite bloggers (if not my very favorite), Allahpundit, in this post.
It’s more direct, more entertaining, and more dead on target than anything you’ll read in the newspaper about this sad affair.
These are terrible days for Old Media, as exemplified by Keller’s pathetic letter. But these are also great days for New Media, as exemplified by the thoughtful and funny posts quoted above.
Previous:
Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog Trainer
Global War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Technorati Tags: BillKeller, HughHewitt, NewYorkTimes, GlobalWaronTerror, Swift, JohnSnow, DoyleMcManus
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Global War on Terror Watch: President Bush Condemns Disclosure and Publishing Details of SWIFT Anti-Terrorism Finance Program
Graphic courtesy of Michelle MalkinAP: Bush slams leak of terror finance story
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.”
And the uproar over the disclosure/leak of the program is almost as great as the revulsion towards the attitude of the New York and Los Angeles Times for printing the story.
Bill Keller, Executive Editor of the New York Times, offers his explanation: Letter From Bill Keller on The Times’s Banking Records Report.
The following is a letter Bill Keller, the executive editor of The Times, has sent to readers who have written to him about The Times’s publication of information about the government’s examination of international banking records:
I don’t always have time to answer my mail as fully as etiquette demands, but our story about the government’s surveillance of international banking records has generated some questions and concerns that I take very seriously. As the editor responsible for the difficult decision to publish that story, I’d like to offer a personal response.
Some of the incoming mail quotes the angry words of conservative bloggers and TV or radio pundits who say that drawing attention to the government’s anti-terror measures is unpatriotic and dangerous. (I could ask, if that’s the case, why they are drawing so much attention to the story themselves by yelling about it on the airwaves and the Internet.) Some comes from readers who have considered the story in question and wonder whether publishing such material is wise. And some comes from readers who are grateful for the information and think it is valuable to have a public debate about the lengths to which our government has gone in combatting the threat of terror.
The arrogance of Keller is obvious from the introductory paragraphs. Has the Fourth Estate abdicated their responsibility to America’s National Security?
Apparently…….
Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger (left) presents Bill Keller of The New York Times, with the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service.Read the rest of the piece here.
Hugh Hewitt dissects Keller’s response: Mr. Keller Believes You Are Easily Confused
I don’t believe him, and there is no reason to believe him. The paper has been waging a war on the war and on the Adminsitration for years, so it has no credibility when it comes to arguing its good intentions.
What matters though is the statement that “other conscientious people” could have reached a different decision.
In fact, they did. The Congresses and the presidents of the past have passsed laws about what is classified and who can release it. They didn’t include the editor of the New York Times in the group that can make national security decisions. Mr. Keller decided he would risk the national security of the United States and the lives of its citizens. He has done so before and will no doubt do so again.
This incredibly weak response tells us that Bill Keller will not be responding to interview requests, at least not from any critic of the paper’s decision. He doesn’t have an argument. He doesn’t have any defense other than his position as editor of a once great newspaper.
Read it ALL.
Maybe you consider the safeguards thin because you don’t understand them, Mr. McManus. In your reporters’ story, they describe administrative subpoenas as “a little-known power,†and claim: “The subpoenas are secret and not reviewed by judges or grand juries, as are most criminal subpoenas.†As I have shown in this post, these subpoenas are not “little-known†to law enforcement, but are actually quite common — and your assumption that “most criminal subpoenas†are “reviewed by judges or grand juries†is quite wrong. Trust me on this. Criminal subpoenas are almost never reviewed by judges or grand juries. When I read this sentence of the article to working prosecutors, they laugh out loud. That’s how wrong it is.
And I speak for a lot of Americans when I say that we don’t want to “learn over time†whether this story has impeded our counterterrorism efforts. We wish you’d simply left the story alone, so that we didn’t have to undergo that “test†of your judgment.
Mr. McManus, you don’t really know how criminal prosecutors do their business. You didn’t really know how successful this program was when you ran the story. And your stated concerns about the program — its legality and safeguards — appear to have been answered, to a large degree, in favor of the program.
Here’s my bottom line, Mr. McManus:
Maybe you should be a little more careful about taking it upon yourself to weigh your mistaken impressions of these various factors against the safety of myself and my family.
Michelle Malkin has WHY THEY BLABBED: IT’S THE ARROGANCE
Arrogance may not be a crime, but Rep. Peter King thinks the MSM blabbermouths ought to be prosecuted for publishing secrets in wartime. Gabriel Schoenfeld made the definitive case in the March issue of Commentary and testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the national security threat of the NYTimes’ December disclosure of terrorist surveillance earlier this month:…
Blogosphere:
It is time for another First Amendment Freedom of Speech case before the United States Supreme Court. The Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, should posecute the government employees who “LEAKED” this story and the New York/Los Angeles Times for printing them. National Security is no small “right” that should be protected in time of war – and the Global War on Terror IS a WAR.
The American Press has self-regulated itself in not printing what they deem harmful to the United States. However, in this case and the case of the NSA Surveillance Progam they have crossed the line. It is time for the United States Supreme Court to exert the control that obvioulsy the Press has been unable to accomplish themselves.
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Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog TrainerGlobal War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Technorati Tags: BillKeller, HughHewitt, NewYorkTimes, GlobalWaronTerror, Swift
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Los Angeles Times Watch: Conservative Members of Chandler Family “HIT” by Los Angeles Times Editors
Los Angeles Times: The Family Feud Behind a Media Fight
The move to break up Times owner Tribune Co. has roots in discord in the Chandler clan.
In 1995, Jeffrey Chandler decided to break with tradition and expose a family schism. A member of the large, extended and very private family that owned the Los Angeles Times, he had come to believe that the newspaper had become far too liberal under the control of his cousin, Otis Chandler.
It was time for The Times to return to its conservative roots, Chandler and his sister, Corinne Werdel, told Forbes magazine. “We have the inmates running the asylum,” Werdel said. “They’re so far out in left field.”
The siblings were especially upset with the paper’s coverage of gay rights and AIDS. “This is a mainstream paper, and the homosexual population is 1% to 1.5%,” Jeffrey Chandler said. “When you start featuring these kinds of stories the way The Times does … my God, you’ve got a campaign going on here.”
Not much came of the complaints, or of a study the two reportedly commissioned around the same time. Never made public, the study, by a consulting firm, is said to have argued that the paper should adopt a more conservative stance, modeling itself after publications such as the National Review, the Weekly Standard and the Wall Street Journal. Werdel and her brother had limited power then to influence the paper or its parent company, Times Mirror Co.
Today, Jeffrey Chandler, 64, is at the center of power within the Chandler family, which sold Times Mirror six years ago to Tribune Co. of Chicago. As one of three family representatives on the Tribune board, he is a key player in the Chandlers’ fight to force the sale or breakup of the giant media company and could ultimately help determine the future of the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Baltimore Sun, Newsday, KTLA-TV and other Tribune properties.
The piece goes onto to portray the Chandler family as greedy, uncooperative, Christian Right Wing, manipulative financiers who do not give a damn about the Los Angeles Times, journalism or anything slse but their own financial wealth.
First, the Los Angeles Times editors go after Tribune Chairman and CEO Dennis FitzSimons.
Next, they “HIT” the Chandler family and their Trusts – the long time owners of the Los Angeles Times that are in a business war over the financial transactions through which the Los Angeles Times was sold to the Tribune Company.
Even more interesting is that Michael Hiltzik, Lefty and disgraced former sock puppet blogger contributed to this piece. Hiltzik wouldn’t have an axe to grind now would he? Or be amenable to write whatever his editors desire due to his tenuous employment situation at the Times and the likelyhood that other newspapers or journalistic enterprises would ever hire him.
This is an interesting piece indeed from the editors of the Los Angeles Times.
If the Tribune Company does not clean house (FIRE the Los Angeles Times Senior Editors and Publisher) then Flap is sure the Chandler family will.
Dean Baquet (Editor) – say good night Gracie and don’t let the door hit you in the ASS as you leave.
Los Angeles Times Editor John S. Carroll, left, announces his retirement to news staff. Managing Editor Dean P. Baquet, center, will succeed him on Aug. 15. Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson, right, praised Carroll’s leadership, saying, “We are indebted to him for his extraordinary legacy of journalistic excellence and wish him every happiness in the future.â€
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Los Angeles Times Watch: Tribune Company CEO “HIT†by the Los Angeles Times Editors
Technorati Tags: LosAngelesTimes, MichaelHiltzik, TribuneCompany, ChandlerFamily, OtisChandler, JeffreyChandler, DeanBaquet, JeffreyMJohnson
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Los Angeles Times Watch: Patterico and Danziger Dump the Los Angeles Dog Trainer
Patterico (Via Hugh Hewitt): Patterico Cancels his Subscription to the L.A. Times
I cancelled my subscription to the Los Angeles Times this morning.
I explained to the person who answered the phone that I was cancelling because I am outraged that the newspaper revealed classified details of a successful anti-terror operation.
They put me on with a “specialist,†and I repeated the reason for the cancellation. He said they were sorry to lose me as a subscriber. “I’m sorry, too,†I said. And I am. I’ve had my differences with the paper — plenty of them — but I’ve been subscribing since 1993. That’s thirteen years.
He said: “Of course, different people have different opinions about what’s written in the newspaper . . .â€
I told him that this has nothing to do with disagreeing with what I read in the newspaper. I disagree with the newspaper all the time. This is different. The newspaper made a deliberate choice to print classified details of an anti-terror operation that, by all accounts, was effective and legal. Key members of Congress had been briefed on it and had no problem with it. Strict controls were in place to prevent abuse, and those controls appear to have been effective.
Winds of Change.NET: Goodbye, LAT
Subject: Cancel SubscriptionFrom: Marc Danziger
Date: 9:54 am
To: subscriptions@latimes.com
cc: dean.baquet@latimes.com, readers.rep@latimes.com
I’ve been a subscriber to the Los Angeles Times continuously since I moved back to Los Angeles in 1980.
With this email, I’m asking that you cancel my subscription, effective Monday, June 26, 2006.
Subscription details are:
[deleted]
I’m canceling my subscription because I am appalled that you would publish the details of a legal, effective government program – the financial transaction monitoring program.
The Times and its staff are not above the obligations of citizenship. Those obligations absolutely do extend to vigorously questioning the government about its actions and inactions and continuously challenging it to get better.
But it seems to me that there is a bright line between challenging government policies with an aim to ensuring that it is doing its job, and openly disclosing the mechanics of a program designed to identify those who murder innocent civilians and who have openly declared war on our nation, its people, and on the values that make us who we are.
I’m disappointed in the Times for doing this, and I cannot support you by funding you. I’ll miss the paper.
Marc Danziger
Flap stopped giving his hard earned dollars to the Chandlers and Tribune Company many many years ago. I could not fathom giving any reward to such a biased and, at times, anti-American enterprise. The case at point is one of many Los Angeles Times anti-American moments.
Watch the Tribune Company “DUMP” the L.A. Times after circulation further tanks.
Stay tuned……
Previous:
Los Angeles Times Watch: Los Angeles Times Ignores Discovery of WMD in Iraq
Los Angeles Times Watch: Tribune Company CEO “HIT†by the Los Angeles Times Editors
Los Angeles Times Watch: Up For Sale?
Technorati Tags: LosAngelesTimes, DennisFitzSimons, TribuneCompany, ChandlerFamily, HughHewitt
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Global War on Terror Watch: Dear Mr. Keller – Why?
Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger (left) presents Bill Keller of The New York Times, with the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service.Dear Mr. Keller,
Why have you endangered America’s National Security by publishing the secret NSA Surveillance and Swift Financial Anti-terrorist Program stories in the New York Times?
Why? For the public interest? Or the interest in winning Pulizer Prizes?
Please explain………
Please explain why subscribers should could continue to pay your company to endanger their lives?
Hugh Hewitt wonders if you have the guts to be interviewed and calls you out. How about it?
Hugh calls Bill Keller out again…… Well?
To prepare for your interview, Bill, you can go here and read some messages for blabbermouths – meaning you.
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Technorati Tags: BillKeller, HughHewitt, NewYorkTimes, GlobalWaronTerror, Swift
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Global War on Terror Watch: New York Times Publishes Secret Details of SWIFT Bank Data Anti-Terrorism Program
Among the program’s successes was the capture of an Al Qaeda operative known as Hambali, believed to be the mastermind of the 2002 bombing of a Bali resort, several officials said.
New York Times: Bank Data Sifted in Secret by U.S. to Block Terror
Under a secret Bush administration program initiated weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, counterterrorism officials have gained access to financial records from a vast international database and examined banking transactions involving thousands of Americans and others in the United States, according to government and industry officials.
The program is limited, government officials say, to tracing transactions of people suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda by reviewing records from the nerve center of the global banking industry, a Belgian cooperative that routes about $6 trillion daily between banks, brokerages, stock exchanges and other institutions. The records mostly involve wire transfers and other methods of moving money overseas and into and out of the United States. Most routine financial transactions confined to this country are not in the database.
Viewed by the Bush administration as a vital tool, the program has played a hidden role in domestic and foreign terrorism investigations since 2001 and helped in the capture of the most wanted Qaeda figure in Southeast Asia, the officials said.
Another Leak of a secret United States program to combat terrorism brought to you by the leakers of the NSA Surveillance program, ERIC LICHTBLAU and JAMES RISEN.
Remember James Risen and his New Year’s surprise?
So, read the rest of the piece here.
The Bush administration has made no secret of its campaign to disrupt terrorist financing, and President Bush, Treasury officials and others have spoken publicly about those efforts. Administration officials, however, asked The New York Times not to publish this article, saying that disclosure of the Swift program could jeopardize its effectiveness. They also enlisted several current and former officials, both Democrat and Republican, to vouch for its value.
Bill Keller, the newspaper’s executive editor, said: “We have listened closely to the administration’s arguments for withholding this information, and given them the most serious and respectful consideration. We remain convinced that the administration’s extraordinary access to this vast repository of international financial data, however carefully targeted use of it may be, is a matter of public interest.”
The Swift Program is NOT illegal and most of the activity occurs in a foreign location. So, why leak a secret program that has been protecting American from terrorism? Because some anonynmopus sources question the proprieatry of the program or is it because the New York Times and its employees want a scoop at any cost?
Is this responsible journalsim?
Should the leakers of classified information that served as the basis of the story be prosecuted?
You betcha!
The first subpoenas should be directed at Lichtblau, Risen and Keller. The Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, should seek out the traitors who stole this classified information and gave it to the media whores at the New York Times.
The Swift Program:
And the program had been successful in finding terrorist cells. Flap says had because he doubts the program will continue now that it is public and terrorists adapt.
Data provided by the program helped identify Uzair Paracha, a Brooklyn man who was convicted on terrorism-related charges in 2005, officials said.
The Los Angeles Times has just picked up and posted the story as well: U.S. Mining Bank Transfer Data in Anti-Terror Effort
The U.S. government, without the knowledge of many banks and their customers, has engaged for years in a secret effort to track terrorist financing by accessing a vast database of confidential information on transfers of money between banks worldwide.
The program, run by the Treasury Department, is considered a potent weapon in the war on terrorism because of its ability to clandestinely monitor financial transactions and map terrorist webs.
Dean Baquet, the editor of the Times, said: “We weighed the government’s arguments carefully, but in the end we determined that it was in the public interest to publish information about the extraordinary reach of this program. It is part of the continuing national debate over the aggressive measures employed by the government.”
In other words, the Los Angeles Times says to Hell with the secret nature of the anti-terror program and National Security because it is in the “public interest” to make Americans LESS SAFE FROM TERRORISTS.
THIS IS BULL!
Michelle Malkin has a good round-up of reactions from the blogosphere: NYTIMES BLABBERMOUTHS STRIKE AGAIN
The NYTimes has in-house produced video showcasing Licthblau as he “reveals a secret Bush administration program to access to financial records.”
Write the New York Times( letters@nytimes.com ) and the Los Angeles Times and voice your displeasure. Better yet refuse to purchase their publications for allowing Americans to be placed in MORE jeopardy from terrorists.
Stephen Spruiell has it RIGHT: NYT: We’re Still Above the Law
According to the NYT’s own reporting, the program is legal. The program is helping us catch terrorists. The administration has briefed the appropriate members of Congress. The program has built-in safeguards to prevent abuse. And yet, with nothing more than a vague appeal to the “public interest” (which apparently is not outweighed in this case by the public’s interest in apprehending terrorists), the NYT disregards all that and publishes intimate, classified details about the program. Keller and his team really do believe they are above the law. When it comes to national security, it isn’t the government that should decide when secrecy is essential to a program’s effectiveness. It is the New York Times.
National security be damned. There are Pulitzers to be won.
Patterico says these guys are dangerous.
They are to a fault.
Technorati Tags: NewYorkTimes, Swift, LosAngelesTimes, Terrorism, AlQaeda, JamesRisen, EricLichtblau, Bill Keller