From the AP: “With officials exercising extraordinary security measures, Bush bluntly accused lawmakers Tuesday of leaking classified information to the press – and made the point in person during today’s breakfast meeting with Gephardt, Speaker Dennis Hastert, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and Senate GOP Leader Trent Lott.”
I’d like to know before I re-elect one of these morons.
One thing noted on CNN by NOT saying what was leaked it gives the administration wide leverage to blame the media for any mistakes they make, saying the media leaked it.
I wondered who it was, too, but they aren’t saying.
http://chicagotribune.com/news/printedition/chi-0110100395oct10.story?coll=chi-printnews-hed
So it’s just Orrin Hatch and “unnamed sources”.
No, there’s more to it than that. I was watching CNN tonight and they were talking about it. Someone in Congress leaked evidence suggesting the actual locations of the next attacks to a national newspaper, and the White House had to do damage control by spending the afternoon convincing the newspaper not to publish the information. The newspaper finally agreed.
There are ways to solve this problem. One is to brief congressmen separately or in small groups, but give each group a different, irrelevant detail. Then if a leak happens, you can tell which congressman did the leaking.
Bush should say to every one of them, “If we discover who leaked information, we will make that person’s identity public, and your constituents can deal with you in the next election.”
Congress has always been terrible for security leaks, because the public scrutiny on people in congressional elections is a lot lower than it is in Senate or Presidential elections, and once a person is elected to Congress they get an automatic clearance to sensitive information, whether they deserve it or not.
Interesting points, Sam. It seems that “regular” civil servants get much more scrutiny than some of the elected officials. I speculate that some sources “leak” because it makes them feel important. Maybe the clearance issue policies will change. But I wouldn’t bet on it.
There is also something of a problem with people’s interpretations of what is or is not “sensitive”. Maybe classifying absolutely everything in the briefings is too much, but so’s giving unconditional clearance to everyone in the Congress. We’d probably be better off if we divided classes of clearance within the Congress itself, with only a selected group within each class authorized to speak on the issue. These would get a more thorough orientation on how to avoid saying too much.
Now, “there’s a 100% probability of retaliatory terrorism” doesn’t strike me as particularly sensitive information, it strikes me as a statement of the damn obvious. OF COURSE there’s sure to be another attack on us! I don’t need a classified briefing to learn that, it just stands to reason, doesn’t it? And I might as well tell the bastards: “Hey, I KNOW you’re going to try to hit us again.”
OTOH, dropping clues as to the next locations to be struck — that’s just irresponsible. Regardless of how much you think it’ll cheer up the folks back in the district.
While some in Congress may have gotten a bit too communicative, let’s also acknowledge that the executive branch would prefer if we’d just trust them on nothing but blind faith, and left to their own would likely classify even the exit signs on I-95, lest an enemy be able to find Washington. And like it was mentioned earlier, then we risk having any real blunder be blamed on media leaks rather than command incompetence. There’s got to be a balance.
jrd