Help! DU thread on NSA program's start during Bush transition?

[EFerrari]

Help! The NYT has a 1/18 editorial -- UL's thread HERE:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x170620

-- which calls the B* administration's arguments for this program "weak" even during a "time of "extreme fear."

I need the source in that thread to show the argument is not weak, but just FALSE!

[upi402]

1. Do you want the '3 day after tap' -rule of FISA court?

This is important, I want to help if I can.

[EFerrari]

2. Thanks. No, I want the threads that talk about Bush

starting this program DURING HIS TRANSITION, NOT AFTER 9/11.

I think I've found the main source, Jason Leopold at Truthout -- reference, for example in Buying Thyme's thread (greatest page).

But, before I send in the letter, I want to be as sure as possible that this is good information. :)

[rumpel]

3. I dowloaded the NSA declassified pdf. Let me find the link again

[rumpel]

4. Found it.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=2039722

It was apparently also in truthout

Titled: "Transition 2001" published December 2000

[G_j]

5. after trying a few different searches

it all seems to go back to Leopold

[EFerrari]

6. Thank you! Letter sent to the Times. Check out UL's thread here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x170620

[Stephanie]

7. do you mean this thread from the home page?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2039722

Bush illegally spied on Americans prior to 9-11
Posted by Vyan
Added to homepage Sat Jan 14th 2006, 08:40 AM ET

Contrary to the Bush Administrations claims that they were granted the authority to conduct warrantless wiretaps of U.S. Citizens as a result of the 9-11 and the Authorization to Use Force in Afghanistan against al-Qaeda, Truthout.org reveals today that Bush performed domestic spying against U.S. Citizens long before September 11th, 2001.

The National Security Agency advised President Bush in early 2001 that it had been eavesdropping on Americans during the course of its work monitoring suspected terrorists and foreigners believed to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a declassified document.

The NSA's vast data-mining activities began shortly after Bush was sworn in as president and the document contradicts his assertion that the 9/11 attacks prompted him to take the unprecedented step of signing a secret executive order authorizing the NSA to monitor a select number of American citizens thought to have ties to terrorist groups.

In its "Transition 2001" report, the NSA said that the ever-changing world of global communication means that "American communication and targeted adversary communication will coexist."

"Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the Fourth Amendment and all applicable laws," the document says.

However, it adds that "senior leadership must understand that the NSA's mission will demand a 'powerful, permanent presence' on global telecommunications networks that host both 'protected' communications of Americans and the communications of adversaries the agency wants to target."

What had long been understood to be protocol in the event that the NSA spied on average Americans was that the agency would black out the identities of those individuals or immediately destroy the information.

But according to people who worked at the NSA as encryption specialists during this time, that's not what happened. On orders from Defense Department officials and President Bush, the agency kept a running list of the names of Americans in its system and made it readily available to a number of senior officials in the Bush administration, these sources said, which in essence meant the NSA was conducting a covert domestic surveillance operation in violation of the law.

Discuss this topic (116 responses)

[EFerrari]

8. Thanks, got it. Isn't it a little silly for the NYTs to insist

even rhetorically, that B* started this in response to a "time of extreme fear"?

Unless, they mean what we all felt when the Supreme Court cheated thousands of citizens out of their vote and gifted Monkey Boy with the Oval office? That sure scared the cr@p out of me.