No, not the Iraq War but the war between the press and our government. The NYT has sued the Pentagon over the National Security Agency’s domestic spying program. From Reuters:
The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval. It also seeks the names of the people or groups identified by it.
If the Times succeeds with this suit, which I doubt, it will be a whole new era in government secrecy. Intelligence work, as we know it in our country, would virtually cease. How could it work any longer if all spying were subject to press supervision?
Roger, the answer is clear: we outsource it to India or China… like we do everything else.
Just when you think you can’t be surprised by anything else… that is astonishing news. Who in the hell does the Times think it is? Don’t answer that, I know, the Time’s need to know overrides this country’s need to protect us from those who would murder us. This action truly shows which side of the line they are on, as if there were any doubt. Your idea may have merit JM.
As a reply, I think the government should open a grand jury investigation into the leaks, and the first subpoenas should go to … the editors at the New York Times.
–Anthony
(who once admired that paper)
Nobody elected the G-D editorial board of the NYT to second-guess the Defense Department in time of war. Effrontery, arrogance, impersonating the Opposition party – those the paper has in spades, but for the wellbeing of the rest of us it giveth not a hoot. Rather the opposite – watch the Times fawn over the March 15 march for ‘peace’ and ‘justice’ which will theatrically ‘storm’ the White House, as if banana republic tactics were the highest expression of political life in a democracy.
I am more offended at this attempted usurpation of the functions of Government than any Muslim can possibly be at twelve innocuous cartoons he has never seen. But where’s the NYT’s oh-so-delicate sensitivity about MY feelings, hey?
Oh, extra-Constitutional fishing expeditions by savagely biased media are fine. It’s only when someone offends a mob into torching embassies and murdering horrified passersby that those sensibilities against giving offense must be honored.
Proves the need for tort reform, doesn’t it? Subpoenas, now, for Plamegate and all the other leaks of classified information.
This was posted earlier at Protien Wisdom. Jeff points out the idiocracy by likening it to Dahmer suing one of his victims because he contracted food poisoning.
Pure positioning and insurance on the Times part.
Takes some of the wind out of any attempts for the government to go after the Times for publishing state secrets.
Got to admire them for getting out in front on this one. Maybe one of their leakers told them that the government was getting ready to move. If so, this should give them pause.
All Things Beautiful TrackBack The New York Times Sues The U.S. Government
This is a developing story far from over and may parallel a similar case in the District of Columbia filed by the ACLU. DOD responded, as I read, with
a statement in DC that it needed “more time” which then presumably is followed by an affirmative declaration that “this and that” document are withheld on national security grounds and will not be turned over. Then, the court battle begins. In the District, it will go to the conservative Court of Appeals. In New York, regardless of the result at the trial level,
it will be appealed to the less conservative Second Circuit Court of Appeals. As I recall there is surely, an exception to FOIA for national security information. Then again, it may be the Times’ ploy to fend off the investigation of the leak to James Risen and the impending subpoenas to their reporters on that story.
Classified material is exempt from the FOIA (http://www.dod.mil/dfas/library/foia.htm).
The NYT will have to file a Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) request.
Since the NSA program only monitors members of AQ, the only clients who would be possibly affected are those who have been in contact with AQ. No one else has standing. Challange the lawyers to identify which, if any, of their clients have standing. Any lawyers who have no clients with standing should be booted from the case.
It’s the NYT’s effort to avoid any liability for releasing intelligence information related to the NSA’s intercept program… if it’s already in the public domain (via this suit alleging FOI status), they can’t be held liable for it’s release. On the other hand, they CAN argue that the information is already in the public domain and the FOI only seeks background.
Neat, huh?
Larry:
Any reasonable judge should impose sanctions (attorneys fees and costs) against the Times for the expenditure of the government lawyers time and effort on defending this suit.
We have reached a tipping point, if we didn’t reach it a while back already. The New York Times is no longer simply The Voice Of The People; they seem to think that they are also the government of the United States, and that national security is their responsibility.
Does it really need to be pointed out, again, that NYT reporting is endangering American lives? Sometimes it’s indirect, as here, when the U.S. government uses the tools available to it to thwart terror attacks, and the NYT does everything in its power to invalidate those tools. Other times it’s direct and explicit, as in the reportage of CIA aircraft, complete with names and photographs.
These actions make no sense, unless the editorial board of the NYT genuinely believes that the Bush Administration is a greater danger to the American people than al-Qaeda ever was. Acting on such beliefs is not necessarily treason — although it might be, if we still remembered how to pronounce the word.
These folks need to be taken down, hard. Please remember that Dan Rather and Mary Mapes lost their jobs for far less than this. It’s time to serve NYT with subpoenas, and pursue them aggressively.
respectfully,
Daniel in Brookline
Those who would sacrifice essential liberties for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
- Benjamin Franklin
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”
J.S. Mill
Markus,
Since when is the ability to break the law and report on leaked classified documents an “essential liberty”?
Help, help, I’m being oppressed.