Terrorist Surveillance Program

Political wind, Terrorist Surveillance Program

Kennedy and Dodd cannot prove domestic spying

by  • 

Update, 12:25 PM EST (see note at the end of this post)

Here is the fear many politicians are attempting to plant in American minds about the NSA’s Terrorist Surveillance Program (TSP): our government is conducting wholesale, domestic spying on the populace’s communications, “Big Brother” is spying on us all. It is a flat out lie.

Yet because the program is highly classified, soup to nut fear mongers — Senator Ted Kennedy to Congressman Ron Paul — can allege it without offering one example of proof, and the administration cannot roll out the program for the public to view to prove them wrong. The allegation of domestic spying stands alone, unproven and undisputed, and is the perfect storm for those seeking to undermine our national security for political gain.

Washington Times columnist Bill Gertz reported this morning:

“There is no evidence to substantiate claims about warrantless spying on Americans prior to the 9/11 terrorist attacks,” the report stated. “Nor is there any evidence to substantiate the claim that the TSP covered domestic calls between friends, neighbors and loved ones. As the president has stated, the TSP involved the collection of international calls involving members of al Qaeda.” [Editor — The report came from the office of Senator Christopher S. Bond, a Missouri Republican and the vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.]

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, said during the floor debate last month that the surveillance program spied on innocent Americans. Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, Connecticut Democrat, also said then that any surveillance without a court order undermines “our democratic society.”

But the report stated that “warrantless surveillance for foreign intelligence collection has been an integral part of our nation’s foreign intelligence gathering. During World War II, our warrantless surveillance of the German and Japanese militaries and the breaking of their codes preserved our democracy.
…
The staff report said critics of the surveillance program claim it should have been carried out under FISA rules. However, it stated that a decision by a surveillance court judge last year “proved that the TSP could not be done under FISA as it existed at that time.”

“This decision resulted in significant intelligence gaps and led to the need for, and passage of, the Protect America Act,” the report said.
…
Democratic critics also have said the FISA law is the only permitted basis for conducting electronic surveillance, but the report stated that the Constitution “trumps any statute.”

“It is false to suggest that the president has no inherent constitutional authority to conduct warrantless surveillance for foreign intelligence purposes because Congress tried to limit it in FISA,” the report stated.

There is evidence that the FISA law inhibited the rescue operation of three soldiers kidnapped in Iraq by al Qaeda last year.

Senators Kennedy and Dodd have yet to refute the evidence that their perfect storm is getting our soldiers killed. If asked, they will likely claim they cannot discuss the details of that classified operation, proving my point that their allegation of domestic spying is scurrilous and the TSP is only being used to target the enemy.

Update: I spoke with Congressman Bill Shuster (R-PA, 9th District) this morning who stated that a senior military officer had briefed him and confirmed the search for the three kidnapped US soldiers was delayed by more than nine hours while waiting for a FISA warrant.

FISA, Terrorist Surveillance Program, War on Terror

New York Times “fine” with FISA law that delayed search for missing U.S. troops

by  • 

The New York Times is “fine” with the fact that after United States soldiers were kidnapped in Iraq, the existing FISA law delayed the monitoring of enemy communications while thousands of troops frantically searched for them.

The story about those kidnapped soldiers is here, this morning, in an editorial in the Washington Times:

Before leaving town, Senate Democrats, led by Majority Leader Harry Reid, Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and Sens. Chris Dodd and Russ Feingold, left a lump of coal (and a stink bomb) in the stockings of the American people when it comes to prevention against terrorist attack. After they failed on Monday failed to block Republican efforts to retroactively bar lawsuits against telephone companies that helped the government monitor suspected jihadist communications after September 11, Mr. Reid pulled from the floor legislation to modernize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the primary law governing the monitoring of electronic communications. Unless Congress acts, on Feb. 1 U.S. intelligence agencies will lose the ability to monitor at least some overseas terrorist telecommunications without first obtaining court approval.
…
No case on the public record better illustrates the heightened dangers Americans will face than the case of three soldiers from the Army’s 10th Mountain Division who were ambushed May 12 south of Baghdad, apparently by al Qaeda. One soldier was found dead on May 23, while the other two remain missing. As coalition forces searched for the missing soldiers on May 13 and May 14, intelligence officials learned about insurgent communications they believed to be related to the ambush. On May 14, a special court overseeing FISA issued an order permitting some suspected terrorist communications to be monitored. The following day, lawyers and intelligence officials spent more than nine hours discussing the need for a FISA order to monitor these communications before Attorney General Alberto Gonzales authorized monitoring. Critics attribute the delays in the search to bureaucratic “bungling” — an intellectually dishonest argument, because it overlooks the fact that the FISA court had issued several rulings earlier this year that called into question the government’s authority to act without prior court approval.

Yet the New York Times is “fine” with letting the law expire that temporarily fixed this foolishness:

The issue before the Senate is fairly simple. Last summer, President Bush asked Congress to close a gap in the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act created by advancements in technology…

That law expires in February, which means Congress has to pass new legislation giving the intelligence agencies a little more leeway in the wireless Internet age…
…
…If the law expires, fine. It won’t harm national security, and it will give Congress time to reflect…

And, if the law expires and while Congress reflects, what happens if the enemy again kidnaps our troops? Will it again give them added time to get away and to torture and murder America’s troops? Will that be “fine” with Senators Leahy, Dodd, and Feingold?