Which Member Of Congress Was Under Surveillance?
The big story of the day will be this one in The New York Times reporting that the National Security Agency intercepted private emails and calls of Americans beyond the limits set by Congress.
But this detail buried in the article is particularly interesting. Seems a member of Congress was under surveillance:
And in one previously undisclosed episode, the N.S.A. tried to wiretap a member of Congress without a warrant, an intelligence official with direct knowledge of the matter said.
The agency believed that the congressman, whose identity could not be determined, was in contact — as part of a Congressional delegation to the Middle East in 2005 or 2006 — with an extremist who had possible terrorist ties and was already under surveillance, the official said. The agency then sought to eavesdrop on the congressman’s conversations, the official said.
The official said the plan was ultimately blocked because of concerns from some intelligence officials about using the N.S.A., without court oversight, to spy on a member of Congress.
Really? Note that there was an active attempt by the NSA to wiretap a member of Congress. Who was it? Seems worth finding out.
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Shouldn’t be too tough to narrow down. “Congressional delegation to the Middle East in 2005 or 2006.” How many were there in those two years? The only one I remember making headlines was Pelosi’s, but that was in 2007 after the 2006 mid-terms. The whole headscarf and Syria bullschwank.
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Ultimately, it doesn’t matter who was the target. That is seriously messed up. It’s time for Congress to realize that the executive branch needs its check and balance. Trusting the White House to “do the right thing” will always result in over-reach.
Yeah it does matter if it was one Congress person in particular. I am not saying it was, but if it was Keith Ellison, the only Muslim in Congress, there is going to be hell to pay! And I am sure I am not the only person thinking it could be him.
what I’m thinking is that if the NSA wanted to wiretap a member of Congress for some kind of BS reason it would make the story much more serious. that’s why it might be worth figuring out who it is.
I haven’t seen one thing that even hints as to who it might be. I would have guessed Kerry at one time because I do think they were monitoring the Democrats running for office – I always have thought so since we found out they were abusing the securities act.
It’s not the Act – it never was. It was that Bush ignored the requirements for due process in the Act which were simply to report back after the fact.
Here is what would be FANTASTIC. If it was a Republican under surviellance during the Bush years. Talk about a party turning on a dime. You can bet your a$$ that all of a sudden Republicans will want civil liberties protected that they never cared about for the last 7 years.
sgwhite – you are such an optimist you may even beat me.
I am not as sanguine that if it was a Repug that would cause the GOP to turn around on this. That makes entirely too much sense.
I thought this line interesting…
“It led intelligence officials to realize that the N.S.A. was improperly capturing information involving significant amounts of American traffic.” (p 2)
Tena
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Just remember that the GOP never cares about abuse until it happens to them.
sgwhite – well of course you have a good point there.
“I thought this line interesting…”
It is interesting because it says to me what I have thought since Obama took office – mainly that the intelligence agencies, along with the DOJ, are so fucked up after the last 8 years that the Obama administration is still trying to work out just exactly how fucked up everything is. I can just imagine how bad it is and how long it’s going to take to take it apart in order to put it back together the right way.
What would have really been great is if the report said Bill O’Reilly had been under surviellance. Especially after he tried to discredit the guy who came out and said the NSA was doing all this stuff earlier this year on Olbermann’s show. That should have been the wake up call honestly.
It’s a virtual lock to be a Democrat. Also any chance this was the reason for the Card and Gonzalez hospital bed visit with Ashcroft? Do we know the time frame on this?
Of course, our concerns regarding such matters would be properly perceived by ourselves as puerile bourgeois underdevelopment if we were – oh, and how we wish it to be so – George Will http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/15/AR2009041502861.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
It would be good if some enterprising reporter would do a little gumshoeing to find out, instead of speculating and echoing the horse-race aspects. Surely it wouldn’t be hard for an interested reporter to discover who in Congress went to the ME during that time and probably some details about some of the meetings. Methinks reporters in Washington have forgotten how to do actual reporting, in favor of reading what everyone else is writing about and writing about that.
Spencer Ackerman started a list of potentials
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http://attackerman.firedoglake.com/2009/04/16/this-phone-is-tapped/
The first thought that came to me as well was Keith Ellison, but wasn’t he elected in 2006, after the surveillance came about?
The Islamic terrorists have won. The Bush fascists and traitors have handed American’s rights, liberties, and freedoms over to the Islamic nutjobs. The Islamic crazies have gotten everything they wanted thanks to these Christian terrorist traitors.