Sen Roberts Attacks NYT For Leaking-When He Himself Is A BIG-TIME Leaker

[kpete]

Sen. Pat Roberts’ Double Standard on Intel Leaks

Today, Senate Coverup Committee chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) attacked the media for writing about the SWIFT bank records tracking program, and he called for a “formal damage assessment”http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-06-27T231932Z_01_N27264175_RTRUKOC_0_US-SECURITY-LEAKS.xml to be done by Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte. (Dan Froomkin today explained how the “existence of SWIFT itself has not exactly been a secret.”)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html
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But Roberts is the one who needs to “look in the mirror” about the effects leaks have on national security. The National Journal’s Murray Waas http://news.nationaljournal.com/articles/0425nj1.htm reported in April that during the start of the Iraq war, Roberts disclosed sensitive intelligence in a speech he delivered (ironically enough) to the National Newspaper Association:

Three years ago on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Roberts himself was involved in disclosing sensitive intelligence information that, according to four former senior intelligence officers, impaired efforts to capture Saddam Hussein and potentially threatened the lives of Iraqis who were spying for the United States.

On March 20, 2003, at the onset of military hostilities between U.S. and Iraqi forces, Roberts said in a speech to the National Newspaper Association that he had “been in touch with our intelligence community” and that the CIA had informed President Bush and the National Security Council “of intelligence information from what we call human intelligence that indicated the location of Saddam Hussein and his leadership in a bunker in the suburbs of Baghdad.”

The former intelligence officials said in interviews that Roberts was never held accountable for his comments, which bore directly on the issue of intelligence-gathering sources and methods, and revealed that Iraqis close to Hussein were probably talking to the United States.

As former intelligence officials told Waas, the incident showed “how rank and file intelligence professionals now have much to fear from legitimate and even inadvertent contacts with journalists, while senior executive branch officials and members of Congress are almost never held accountable when they seriously breach national security through leaks of information.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/06/28/roberts-leaks/

[KittyWampus]

1. this, coupled w/fact Bush Administration was talking up how they traced $

really, really makes them look very stupid.

Hope Democrats jump on this info.

[Epiphany4z]

2. I remember

watching some of the dumb ass stuff republicans did during the pres election..I often thought to myself...do they even really want to win...They know they sound dumb..but they want the main idea to be blared out for all those who are not addicted to like us...they only hear NY Times traitors as they pass that TV in wall mart tuned to Fox news...

They will hear

WMD found

cut and run

Rove vindicated

Dem's can't agree

Dem's hate the flag

Dem's are godless

Liberals leak

Liberal press goes after Bush

Dem's weak on security


It is all for the bumper sticker crowed. It Rove back to work.

[kentjay44]

3. the rethugs and bush,cheney cabal

have leak info to the times on purpose,knowing that the times will print,whats important to realize is they are trying to cover their ass` in case an attack occurs,blame it on the nyt.i would prefer bill keller publicly tell bush to fuck off,it was good enough for chenet,why not use it?i would have more respect for the times if they did.