Anything they can do we can do better!
May/16/06 10:29 PM
Your war against reporters has hit new heights, but
you still have a way to go.
Mr. President,
In 1971 the Supreme Court decided to allow the publication of the Pentagon Papers. Two of the judges in the 6-3 majority opinion left the door open to prosecute the Washington Post after-the-fact under the espionage laws.
The issue was never pursued of course, but that was then not now.
According to an article I just read, from the Associated Press, the wording seems ambiguous.
There are at least two potential problems for journalists from this law.
One: Under the law no private person might have classified documents that were illegally provided to them.
Two: If the person who receives documents or information which concerns the national defense, repeats that information, and they have reason to believe the information could be used to do injury to the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation; it is against the law.
An aggressive DOJ will push these suppositions. You are constantly over-reaching your powers. Your low ratings and the incessant scandals have not slowed you down in this arena; in fact, I think you have become more dangerous.
It’s a well know fact the CIA has had a conflict behind the scenes, with your administration since the beginning of the war. Several people from the CIA have been very concerned about you and Vice-president Cheney's motives. And although Goss tried to make an example out of Mary McCarthy, disgruntled agents and analysts must be bursting at the seams to talk to somebody about potentially illegal policies implemented by this administration. You seem especially animated when it involves leakers and reporters.
Even in death your domestic spy agency won't leave reporters at peace. The FBI recently tried to obtain the late reporter Jack Anderson's files and documents from his widow. She told them to shove it; I would say that is pretty damn aggressive.
To quote an article from Brian Ross and Richard Esposito's Report at ABC news, the "FBI acknowledged late Monday that it is increasingly seeking reporters' phone records in leak investigations."
"It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration," said a senior federal official."
"The acknowledgement followed our blotter item that ABC News reporters had been warned by a federal source that the government knew who we were calling."
There is also an important case involving Steven J. Rosens and Keith Weissman, two former AIPAC lobbyists, indicted fro violating the 1917 espionage laws. They received and repeated information concerning national defense to foreign power (Israel) and to reporters.
Their defense team is claiming that if reporters cannot be held to this standard, lobbyists can't be bound to it either. Prosecutors claim lobbyists, and reporters are different but said reporters indeed can be charged under the same laws. What do you think?
I think your justice department will use the result of this case to press more reporters into some tight corners. The first amendment is at stake, but I don't believe Bush is afraid of pressing this issue to subdue leakers and reporters even more.
I don't expect many people feel all that bad for reporters but if we rely only on the press secretary to tell us what we need to know we should weld our TV tuners to FOX TV. If we lose the first amendment, you seriously cripple our Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The other reason involves understanding what reporters do to gather the news and the risks they take for us. More reporters and photo journalists have been killed in three years of the Iraq war than the entire 13 years of the Vietnam war. Forty-seven journalists were killed covering the Iraq war just last year. They gave their lives to bring us the real news, in place of government propaganda.
Here is another way of considering the role of journalism in our democracy. A free democracy is not a destination; it is a process which is adjusted by the will of the people. The only way the people know to adjust our democracy is through the information they receive from a free press.
And that free press is in serious danger. The FBI recently acknowledged that reporter's phone records are a lot easier to access than ever before because of a new provision within the Patriot Act which allow federal agents to seek information with National Security Letters (NSL).
The NSL's are a type of an administrative subpoena but are not signed by a judge.
Under this new law, a phone company that receives an NSL for phone records must provide them and may not divulge to the customer that the records have been given to the government.
Spying on reporters is not a new thing or even unique to the United States. I guess you can strive to do it better than other countries.
Anything they can do you can do better!
The latest news coming out of Europe states that the German spy agency is spying on journalists, keeping files on them and paying reporters to spy on their fellow journalists.
Their government 's spy agency was already under investigation for allegedly helped you prior to the Iraq war.
All of the this brought up painful memories for many German people who lived in terror of the Stasi, the feared East German secret police.
Older German people would also remember Adolf Hitler's dreaded spy program where even children were encouraged to spy on their parents.
I would guess you hold Russia and China as your model for managing the news.
China is the midst of a new program of repressing independent news reporters. A freelance writer was just sentenced to 12 years in prison Tuesday for posting articles on foreign websites
In Beijing; prosecutors filed a new indictment against a Chinese researcher for The New York Times who has been in custody since 2004 on state secrets charges. In southern China, a journalist went on trial and pleaded not guilty to extortion charges.
China has 42 journalists in jail; more than any other country in the world. According to the Associated Press, the charges used to lock them up are pretty vague but many charges involved national security.
All that WalMart-money has emboldened Beijing to do what they damn well please.
So as you see, you are in at least 3rd place among major nations on squashing the news, but you're probably tied with Germany on spying on journalists and managing the news.
It's not to late to catch up with the big guys junior.
The best part is that most Americans are too concerned about how to pay for gas and juggle equity loan payments to pay for the schooling of their kids to be concerned about things that don't immediately affect them until it may be too late.
In summary you have several tools to deal with nosy reporters, the original law reviewed by the Supreme Court on the Pentagon Papers, the new Patriot Act's National Security Letters (NSL), the pending outcome of the AIPAC spy trial and the existing NSA domestic phone monitoring database you collected since the 9/11.
I did not receive the normal thank you for writing auto-response from the White House.
Mr. President,
In 1971 the Supreme Court decided to allow the publication of the Pentagon Papers. Two of the judges in the 6-3 majority opinion left the door open to prosecute the Washington Post after-the-fact under the espionage laws.
The issue was never pursued of course, but that was then not now.
According to an article I just read, from the Associated Press, the wording seems ambiguous.
There are at least two potential problems for journalists from this law.
One: Under the law no private person might have classified documents that were illegally provided to them.
Two: If the person who receives documents or information which concerns the national defense, repeats that information, and they have reason to believe the information could be used to do injury to the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation; it is against the law.
An aggressive DOJ will push these suppositions. You are constantly over-reaching your powers. Your low ratings and the incessant scandals have not slowed you down in this arena; in fact, I think you have become more dangerous.
It’s a well know fact the CIA has had a conflict behind the scenes, with your administration since the beginning of the war. Several people from the CIA have been very concerned about you and Vice-president Cheney's motives. And although Goss tried to make an example out of Mary McCarthy, disgruntled agents and analysts must be bursting at the seams to talk to somebody about potentially illegal policies implemented by this administration. You seem especially animated when it involves leakers and reporters.
Even in death your domestic spy agency won't leave reporters at peace. The FBI recently tried to obtain the late reporter Jack Anderson's files and documents from his widow. She told them to shove it; I would say that is pretty damn aggressive.
To quote an article from Brian Ross and Richard Esposito's Report at ABC news, the "FBI acknowledged late Monday that it is increasingly seeking reporters' phone records in leak investigations."
"It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration," said a senior federal official."
"The acknowledgement followed our blotter item that ABC News reporters had been warned by a federal source that the government knew who we were calling."
There is also an important case involving Steven J. Rosens and Keith Weissman, two former AIPAC lobbyists, indicted fro violating the 1917 espionage laws. They received and repeated information concerning national defense to foreign power (Israel) and to reporters.
Their defense team is claiming that if reporters cannot be held to this standard, lobbyists can't be bound to it either. Prosecutors claim lobbyists, and reporters are different but said reporters indeed can be charged under the same laws. What do you think?
I think your justice department will use the result of this case to press more reporters into some tight corners. The first amendment is at stake, but I don't believe Bush is afraid of pressing this issue to subdue leakers and reporters even more.
I don't expect many people feel all that bad for reporters but if we rely only on the press secretary to tell us what we need to know we should weld our TV tuners to FOX TV. If we lose the first amendment, you seriously cripple our Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The other reason involves understanding what reporters do to gather the news and the risks they take for us. More reporters and photo journalists have been killed in three years of the Iraq war than the entire 13 years of the Vietnam war. Forty-seven journalists were killed covering the Iraq war just last year. They gave their lives to bring us the real news, in place of government propaganda.
Here is another way of considering the role of journalism in our democracy. A free democracy is not a destination; it is a process which is adjusted by the will of the people. The only way the people know to adjust our democracy is through the information they receive from a free press.
And that free press is in serious danger. The FBI recently acknowledged that reporter's phone records are a lot easier to access than ever before because of a new provision within the Patriot Act which allow federal agents to seek information with National Security Letters (NSL).
The NSL's are a type of an administrative subpoena but are not signed by a judge.
Under this new law, a phone company that receives an NSL for phone records must provide them and may not divulge to the customer that the records have been given to the government.
Spying on reporters is not a new thing or even unique to the United States. I guess you can strive to do it better than other countries.
Anything they can do you can do better!
The latest news coming out of Europe states that the German spy agency is spying on journalists, keeping files on them and paying reporters to spy on their fellow journalists.
Their government 's spy agency was already under investigation for allegedly helped you prior to the Iraq war.
All of the this brought up painful memories for many German people who lived in terror of the Stasi, the feared East German secret police.
Older German people would also remember Adolf Hitler's dreaded spy program where even children were encouraged to spy on their parents.
I would guess you hold Russia and China as your model for managing the news.
China is the midst of a new program of repressing independent news reporters. A freelance writer was just sentenced to 12 years in prison Tuesday for posting articles on foreign websites
In Beijing; prosecutors filed a new indictment against a Chinese researcher for The New York Times who has been in custody since 2004 on state secrets charges. In southern China, a journalist went on trial and pleaded not guilty to extortion charges.
China has 42 journalists in jail; more than any other country in the world. According to the Associated Press, the charges used to lock them up are pretty vague but many charges involved national security.
All that WalMart-money has emboldened Beijing to do what they damn well please.
So as you see, you are in at least 3rd place among major nations on squashing the news, but you're probably tied with Germany on spying on journalists and managing the news.
It's not to late to catch up with the big guys junior.
The best part is that most Americans are too concerned about how to pay for gas and juggle equity loan payments to pay for the schooling of their kids to be concerned about things that don't immediately affect them until it may be too late.
In summary you have several tools to deal with nosy reporters, the original law reviewed by the Supreme Court on the Pentagon Papers, the new Patriot Act's National Security Letters (NSL), the pending outcome of the AIPAC spy trial and the existing NSA domestic phone monitoring database you collected since the 9/11.
I did not receive the normal thank you for writing auto-response from the White House.