Intelligence Official Says He Was Fired For Not Lying To Congress

[kpete]

Intelligence Official Says He Was Fired For Not Lying To Congress; Says Rogers & Feinstein Don't Know What's Happening

from the more-whistleblowing dept:

As more and more details come out about the NSA surveillance programs, the federal government is looking more and more ridiculous. The latest comes from a column by John Fund at the National Review Online -- a publication which has been a pretty strong supporter of the surveillance state. The column highlights that even the NSA's staunchest defenders are beginning to get fed up with the NSA as more leaks come out (especially last week's revelation of thousands of abuses). But the really interesting tidbit is buried a bit:

A veteran intelligence official with decades of experience at various agencies identified to me what he sees as the real problem with the current NSA: “It’s increasingly become a culture of arrogance. They tell Congress what they want to tell them. Mike Rogers and Dianne Feinstein at the Intelligence Committees don’t know what they don’t know about the programs.” He himself was asked to skew the data an intelligence agency submitted to Congress, in an effort to get a bigger piece of the intelligence budget. He refused and was promptly replaced in his job, presumably by someone who would do as told.
Yes, it's an unsourced quote, so you can take it with whatever grains of salt you'd like. However, given the various revelations over the past few weeks and months, it's becoming increasingly clear that Congress does not, in fact, know what the NSA is up to, despite the claims by Rogers and Feinstein that there's strong oversight. Given that we've already seen how NSA agents are told to withhold certain info from those in charge of oversight, combined with the use of a loophole to avoid reporting details of its activities to Congress, the statement above certainly is supported by the various leaks to date.

more:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/356098/time-answers-nsa-john-fund

[G_j]

1. sigh..

“It’s increasingly become a culture of arrogance. They tell Congress what they want to tell them. Mike Rogers and Dianne Feinstein at the Intelligence Committees don’t know what they don’t know about the programs.”

[geek tragedy]

2. National Review Online?

Sweet Jeebus, was Infowars down?

[grasswire]

3. aside from the fact that John Fund is a lying jackass....

....what else is new?

[lamp_shade]

4. Unsourced. n/t

[MineralMan]

5. Unsourced = Unreliable

[leveymg]

8. On background, not "unsourced." The anonymous source told the author directly from his own exper.

You can take or leave it as far as the author's veracity is concerned, but it isn't "unsourced," it's as they say in journalism, on background.

[MineralMan]

9. Anonymous sources can mean anything, be anyone, and have

any information or none.

That's why they're useless. And third party writing based on such sources is even more useless. It should be disregarded, since it cannot be investigated.

And so, that's what I do with such writings. Thanks for your reply.

[leveymg]

11. The source spoke from his own experience. That's not unsourced. Look it up.

A lot of people are told to lie (or expected to simply do it on their own), and some lose their jobs when they don't. I know a thing or two about that.

[MineralMan]

12. Whatever you say.

[leveymg]

13. In other words, begrudging, "You're right. Thanks for setting that straight."

[MineralMan]

14. Uh, no, that wasn't what I said.

Not in any way, or by any stretch of the imagination.

[leveymg]

15. Say what you like, but you were wrong.

What's your next comeback line?

[leveymg]

16. Forget I even got into this one.

The subject isn't worth fussing over.

[MineralMan]

17. .

[nashville_brook]

18. +1

[leveymg]

6. Smart people know what they don't know and ask appropriate questions. DiFi and Rogers aren't.

That's the apparently the criteria by which the Chairs of these "watchdog" committees are chosen. They are like Ronald Reagan and Gerry Ford - affable dunces who have no curiosity.

Dump them from their chairs, and back to the drawing boards for a real oversight process.

Better yet, just declassify everything and let G-d sort it out.

[HooptieWagon]

7. They're not affable dunces....

They are well paid to turn a blind eye.

[leveymg]

10. I didn't say they did it for free. Even Reagan was well-paid by General Electric for his cooperation

in misleading the American people.