a strong comment on -- CIA recommends prosecuting press outlets for espionage

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Sun, 01 Jun 2003 21:47:08 -0400
> From: "Baker, Stewart" <SBaker () steptoe com>
>
>
> Dave,
>
> Jim Warren's rant does not do justice to this issue.  He assumes that 
> anything classified is classified to save some bureaucrat's butt.  But 
> there are genuine national security secrets, and in the last 25 years the 
> press has simply lost sight of that.  (Probably the last restraints died, 
> ironically, at the hands of the right.  Anti-Clinton leaks to Bill Gertz, 
> and his full-frontal release of classified data in the Washington Times 
> are now the gold standard for press irresponsibility.)
>
> In fact, maintaining strict national security secrets in a war on 
> terrorism is probably more important than in the Cold War.  In the old 
> days, the press could argue that anything it could figure out, the 
> Russians had probably already figured out, given their resources and 
> intense surveillance of our government.  But now we're fighting an enemy 
> whose principal intelligence capability is reading the New York Times on 
> line (though since the Jayson Blair thing they may have switched to the 
> Post).  At any rate, if it's not in the press, the chances that al-Qaeda 
> is going to find out about our capabilities and plans is nearly zero. That 
> makes press reporting of national security secrets a particularly 
> dangerous thing.
>
> In fact, there's a pretty fair argument that Bin Laden is alive and three 
> thousand Americans are dead because of press leaks of such 
> information.  Bin Laden dumped his satellite phone when the press reported 
> that we were using the phone to target him with cruise missiles.  Without 
> the leak, we might have had another three years of intelligence and 
> opportunity to kill Bin Laden before 9/11.  As I remember, that was a 
> pro-Clinton leak.  Responding to claims that our cruise missile attack on 
> an Afghan camp was futile and merely designed to make everyone forget 
> Monica, some White House staffer told the press, "No, we really almost got 
> him.  We had his satellite phone number, so we knew he was there."  Do I 
> think that that staffer -- and the press that lapped up the colorful 
> detail -- should face prosecution?  In light of what it cost us, don't you?
>
> Stewart Baker
> Steptoe & Johnson LLP
> 1330 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.
> Washington, DC 20036
> phone -- 202.429.6413
> email fax -- 202.261.9825
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dave Farber [<mailto:dave () farber net>mailto:dave () farber net]
> Sent: Sunday, June 01, 2003 6:30 PM
> To: ip () v2 listbox com
> Subject: [IP] CIA recommends prosecuting press outlets for espionage
>
>
> >Date: Sun, 01 Jun 2003 14:01:35 -0700
> >From: Jim Warren <jwarren () well com>
> >
> >
> >The Bush Administration wants to use espionage laws to prosecute any
> >media
> >outlets that dare publish or disclose [embarrassing] information if it
> >turns out to be "classified".
> >
> ><http://www.msnbc.com/news/919521.asp?0si=-&cp1=1>http://www.msnbc.com/ne 
> ws/919521.asp?0si=-&cp1=1
> >
> >But ... wait!
> >
> >Remember the screeches from multiple administrations' "leaders" when
> >the
> >New York Times published "classified" documents obtained from Daniel
> >Ellsberg -- that came to be known as "The Pentagon Papers" -- showing
> >decades of systematic deception of members of Congress and of American
> >citizens and voters by the Pentagon, and by presidents and other top
> >officials in multiple Republican and Democratic administrations, regarding
> >our participation in Viet Nam's civil war? (57,000 Americans killed;
> >hundreds of thousands maimed for life; millions of innocent Vietnamese
> >killed and maimed; U.S. torn apart politically and economically.)
> >
> >Or the Reagan-Bush administration's embarrassment when their Col. Ollie
> >North disclosed their "classified" secret document, where they authorized
> >trading arms to the Iatollah for hostages plus his funding assistance,
> >hidden from Congress, of Central American terrorists/rebels -- that became
> >known as "Iran-Contra"?
> >
> >Or the many, many other press disclosures of "secret" documents that
> >embarrassed numerous administrations ever since the beginning of the
> >nation -- where such documents were "classified" mostly to protect
> >bureaucrats and politicians, rather than to protect legitimate operations
> >that were truly essential for the well-being of the nation's citizens?
> >
> >(SHOULD politicians' and bureaucrats' desire to hide their misdeeds
> >from
> >citizen review really be sufficient basis to further-crush what's left of
> >First Amendment freedoms of speech and of the press?)
> >
> >--jim
> >Jim Warren; jwarren () well com, columnist, writer & public-policy
> >advocate 345 Swett, Woodside CA 94062 U.S.A.; 650-851-7075; fax/off due
> >to spam-glut
> >
> >[self-inflating puffery: InfoWorld founder; Dr.Dobb's Journal first
> >editor; Soc.of Prof.Journalists-Nor.Cal.James Madison
> >Freedom-of-Information Award; Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer
> >Award (1992, its first year); Playboy Foundation Hugh Hefner
> >First-Amendment Award (1994); founded the Computers, Freedom & Privacy
> >Conferences; blah blah blah]
> >
>
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