December 19, 2005

An angry President Bush said yesterday that it was illegal for the New York Times to have in its possession and publish top-secret intelligence on the National Security Agency’s (NSA) orders from the president to conduct electronic surveillance of known al Qaeda operatives and supporters inside the United States, some of whom are American citizens. This report by the Times placed in jeopardy an unknown number of surveillance operations against al Qaeda and thus aided the enemy, who now know that they must flee or change their communications methods. Those terrorist now know that any plans they had in the works could very well have been compromised, making new plans mandatory, and when they begin making those new plans, you can bet your sweet bippie al Qaeda operatives here in the United States will use more secure means of communication that telephones and emails.

But I don’t understand why the president is so upset.

The White House, Congress and various agencies within our government are rife with criminals who, for personal, political or financial reasons, enjoy stealing classified information and giving or selling it to a praetorian media, which then, in order to increase their profit margin, goes public with that classified intelligence, knowing full well that Americans might die because of the leak.

Profit far outweighs life and national security at the infamous New York Times, Mr. President, which you should have known.

It is a commonplace occurrence for the media to brag in public and report that they have illegally acquired oftentimes top-secret intelligence. I have personally filed reports with the FBI on this matter, detailing the likely whereabouts of such stolen intelligence and advised the FBI on how to retrieve that intelligence. I have demanded that the United States attorney general investigate and file charges against these media; possession of stolen, top-secret intelligence is a felony in this country, in case you were wondering.

President Bush has only himself and his administration to blame for this fiasco. The New York Times felt empowered to come into the possession of this extremely sensitive intelligence about a top-secret program for electronically surveilling terrorists right here at home, and because the Bush administration refuses to order the FBI to recover the intelligence documents and arrest the editor, publisher, reporters and others involved, the media will continue to steal or possess classified intelligence from the United States government. Yet the president still complains bitterly about all these leaks and the Times damaging our national security and endangering our citizens.

President Bush is encouraging the theft, illegal dissemination and illegal possession of highly classified intelligence because he hasn’t even attempted to hold accountable the thieves who commit the crimes.

Where are the arrests? I am unaware of a single arrest in any of the thefts of such intelligence.

When the Times announced it was guilty of possessing stolen top-secret intelligence about an ongoing counterterrorism operation inside the United States, why didn’t 500 FBI agents immediately descend upon the newspaper’s offices to recover the intelligence and make arrests? Interrogations of the publisher, editors, reporters and others who were involved in the plot may very well have revealed who illegally gave or sold the newspaper the intelligence.

The president and his administration should be dealing with the media just as previous administrations dealt with the Soviets, Chinese, Cubans, East Germans, North Koreans and so on when it comes to espionage. Stealing, selling, transferring, possessing and publishing top-secret intelligence that aids the enemy is a deadly serious federal offense, but the US attorney general and FBI have done nothing to hold the criminals accountable, whether they are members of Congress, the NSA or whomever. This c’est la vie attitude is why such destructive, extraordinarily dangerous activities by our media will continue unabated.

So until the president directs the US attorney general and FBI to do their respective jobs, I don’t want to hear him whining about top-secret counterterrorism operations being exposed by the media.