November 26, 2008
He laughs bitterly, yet again...
In the previous post, Doug commented with a link to this 2006 article from American Thinker, about wiretapping and surveillance under Clinton...
The controversy following revelations that U.S. intelligence agencies have monitored suspected terrorist related communications since 9/11 reflects a severe case of selective amnesia by the New York Times and other media opponents of President Bush. They certainly didn't show the same outrage when a much more invasive and indiscriminate domestic surveillance program came to light during the Clinton administration in the 1990's. At that time, the Times called the surveillance 'a necessity.''If you made a phone call today or sent an -mail to a friend, there's a good chance what you said or wrote was captured and screened by the country's largest intelligence agency.' (Steve Kroft, CBS' 60 Minutes)Those words were aired on February 27, 2000 to describe the National Security Agency and an electronic surveillance program called Echelon whose mission, according to Kroft,'is to eavesdrop on enemies of the state: foreign countries, terrorist groups and drug cartels. But in the process, Echelon's computers capture virtually every electronic conversation around the world.'Echelon was, or is (its existence has been under--reported in the American media), an electronic eavesdropping program conducted by the United States and a few select allies such as the United Kingdom....
If I saw that article, I'd forgotten it. It's got some hot stuff, about Echelon surveillance product being passed to big Clinton donors for use against business rivals, and other fun things.
What foul frauds leftists and Democrats are. Just think of of the torrents of crap we've been subjected to about how Bush is "shredding our civil liberties," and such. And none of those phonies cared a bit about Clinton's much bigger surveillance program...
Posted by John Weidner at November 26, 2008 01:47 PMI think you have to give Reason magazine some appreciation for going on about the Clinton security state back during the transition to the incoming Bush Administration. They mocked the same people who were whining even back then about the oppressiveness of Bush by pointing out all the things that Clinton had done and correctly pointing out that much of what Bush was going to do that they didn't like would simply be continuations of Clinton actions.
Posted by: Annoying Old Guy at November 27, 2008 08:38 AMIsnt the retiring President culpable of not going after the people who leaked programs that were trapping Terrorists eg SWIFT?
I dont recall he even let out a peep when NYT exposed SWIFT.
I think it was culpable. People should have been thrown into prison for revealing the Swift Program.
Perhaps he did not feel it was politically possible to go after the NYT. That it would have just made them martyrs. I suspect there has become ingrained in our government a pattern of lack of moral clarity and lack of resolve on such things. Dating from the Vietnam Era especially, and the publication by the NYT of the (classified) Pentagon Papers.
I am naive about politics but what does "not politically possible" mean here?.
If a crime has been committed, then the Executive must prosecute it.
Indeed the Bush reign must hold a world-record ever in the number of things deemed "not politically possible".
It is wonderful that so many things are "not politically possible" for Right but for Left things are generally found to be "politically possible" as you will see in Obama reign.
"Not politically possible" actually means very unattractive because it will cause the politician to lose votes.
I was just reading about Indian leaders being reluctant to take harsh measures against possible Muslim radicals--because they have too many votes. That's just the way politics in democracies works...
No politician wants to go against the press.
Posted by: John Weidner at December 1, 2008 07:09 AMIt is not just votes but something like Spirit of the Age.
Indian politicians were not afraid to lose a lot of votes on Reservation question which upper castes hate but Spirit of Age likes.
