Sen. Diane Feinstein has been a knee-jerk apologist for secret government surveillance until this week, when she realized that the government may have been spying on her. Oops!
How do you spy on a spy? In the case of Senate investigators, you do it by adopting some of their methods. During the five year investigation into the CIA interrogation and detention program, members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, working in a windowless room at the spy agency’s headquarters, suspected that key documents had been removed from their computer network. Luckily, they had a hard copy. To keep it from being destroyed, Senate sleuths spirited the document from the CIA and put it in a safe in the Hart Senate Office Building. The move set off a chain of events that broke open on the floor of the Senate on Tuesday as Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the chairwoman of the intelligence committee, accused the CIA of spying on her investigators. CIA Director John Brennan insists the CIA isn’t trying to thwart her investigations. The Justice Department is now conducting two inquiries: one looking into whether the CIA illegally snooped on congressional investigators and another looking into whether those investigators broke the law. The accusations include lying to Congress and to the Justice Department, and spying on congressional investigators to hide what the CIA was doing. Frank Underwood will no doubt be weighing in soon.
It's called "protecting America," Sen. Feinstein. http://t.co/qBqVV4d9us
Surely you don't want to mess that up.
— billmon (@billmon1) March 12, 2014
I don’t know that anyone’s actually in charge of anything in Washington. It would almost be comforting to think that the Obama Administration is actually directing this, which would mean someone is actually directing it, which means someone might actually be held accountable. But my guess is that the surveillance/security apparatus is becoming its own branch of government, and that’s much worse.
See also Annie Laurie.
My God, CIA bugged the Senate Intelligence Committee. I am sure nothing like that has ever happened before.
— Richard M. Nixon (@dick_nixon) March 11, 2014
Oy!
DiFi, another Dr. Frankenstein, ruing the days she’s spent helping to create this Security monster.
And what leverage does Congress have, or anyone for that matter, when these agencies presumably know all of everyone’s secrets?
Hmm?
Oh, and thanks for the graphic!
It brought back my long-lost youth.
FSM – I AM OLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, and thanks for the Mad Magazine graphic!
It brought back my long-lost youth.
FSM – I AM OLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m more worried about whether the government secretly connived at the street coup in Ukraine and is conniving even now in the attempted street coup in Venezuela.
“I’m more worried about whether the government secretly connived at the street coup in Ukraine and is conniving even now in the attempted street coup in Venezuela.”
Why would that bother you more than a attempted coup in the U.S. itself?
OMG, Nixon is a zombie and he’s tweeeeting!
My guess is that the surveillance/security apparatus is becoming its own branch of government, and that’s much worse.
I’ve often wondered how much influence any administration’s had over the spy community. I suppose they set a general tone, e.g. Reagan’s “obsess over commies all the time always” or Bush/Cheney’s “no holds barred, we love to torture” or Obama’s “spoonful of sugar/it’s for your own good” (or whatever the heck it is this week). But in the end, it seems the spymasters do whatever they want, and it’s been that way ever since I was old enough to care (around the time of the Church Committee).
btw, Diane F. isn’t fit to polish Frank Church’s headstone.
Why would that bother you more than a attempted coup in the U.S. itself?
Maybe because that “attempted” coup has already taken place? When you have secret classified programs that even acknowledging their existence is classified, then you’ve essentially eliminated all accountability to the American public either directly or indirectly by way of their representatives. Pandora’s box?
I’m not exactly a conspiracy theorist and I understand that the CIA and NASA do need some latitude in carrying out their function, but I think Bush, Cheney, and the rest of their cabal gave away the store with their Patriot Act and their war on terrorism. The Frankenstein monster is an apt analogy.
Shorter DiFi:
The surveillance apparatus has become its own government. The NSA has a secret court, that was originally instituted for those situations where the spooks wanted to do something, but weren’t sure of its legality. This court has rubberstamped almost everything the spooks wanted to do, and so the NSA went crazy with it. And who oversees the secret court?
OT, Watch an Expert Teach a Smug US Senator About (Aboot) Canadian HealthCare, courtesy Bernie Sanders.
Oops, that’s NSA, not NASA.. I’ll be alright once my spaceship touches down and I can get this damned foil helmet off my head.
I have thought for several years that there is a “deep government” beyond what we see. Not unlike looking across the beautiful flat surface of the ocean and thinking there’s nothing going on beneath the surface. There’s another whole universe beneath the surface that we never fully see or comprehend.
And who oversees the secret court?
Oh, that’s a secret also. Sorta like Major Major who’s in when he’s out, and out when he’s in.
Shades of J. Edgar – He operated above the law for decades. I’m not sure the various ‘directors’ have control. It’s an ancient problem.. dating back to the time of Plato…
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Wait a minute, so there’s really nothing new under the sun?!
But it’s great fun to watch anyway. God help me, I’m starting to enjoy Dick Nixon’s tweets.
Stella,
Yeah, ya gotta give the old guy credit.
It can’t be easy to tweet from where he’s at – between the heat, the flames, and the devils poking white-hot things in his every orifice.
nah, Dick’s merely Tanned, Rested, and Ready. Tweeting from fireside.
After the last Dick – Cheney – Nixon’s far too Liberal for today’s Republicans!
The devil ain’t poking Trickey Dickey. .He got assigned a top management position. Upstairs they’ve got the theocracy and downstairs they have a meritocracy.
You know… I wish there was a way we, the people, could blackmail her.
Wow, that is a really serious issue, ma’am. Seriously, that’s a violation of separation of powers, and possibly criminal activity. I think it really, really matters. But, damn it, I’m just so *stressed* about how *my* personal information could be swept up without cause, without, one might say, warrant, and that stresses me out so much I just *can’t* think of how I could help out, even though I agree that this is an important matter. Alas, if only someone would help alleviate this stress… some high ranking senator, perhaps. But when would *that* Happen?”