Terrorists must be grateful to their ally the New York Times

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176519734_e65781b940_o[1].jpgThe Price of Publishing Leaks: SWIFT Data Flow to U.S. Must Stop by April
Posted by Noel Sheppard on February 6, 2007 - 10:24.

In a huge blow to America’s ability to defend itself from future terrorist attacks both home and abroad, the European Central Bank has told SWIFT, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, that it must halt the transfer of personal banking information to American authorities by April.

As reported by Agence France-Presse on February 1 (h/t to Dan at Riehl World View): “The agency, the European Data Protection Supervisor, told the bank to come up with measures ‘to make its payment operations fully compliant with data-protection legislation,’ urging it to ‘take appropriate measures as soon as possible.’”

Hadn’t heard about this? Well, how could you? After all, according to Google and LexisNexis searches, the only major American media outlet to bother reporting this was, coincidentally and quite ironically, the New York Times.

Isn’t that a delicious twist of fate? Yet, the hypocrisy in this goes much deeper.

For those that have forgotten, the Times first released information surrounding this top secret program on June 22, 2006, much to the dismay of the Bush administration and most right-thinking Americans.

The strategy was simple and effective: identify suspicious wire transfers of funds from suspicious sources to suspicious recipients, and one might be able to thwart the terror activity being planned while capturing or killing the participants.

Doesn’t that sound like a good strategy in a post-9/11 world?

Unfortunately for America, the New York Times and its executive editor Bill Keller felt that the public’s need to know about this program was much more important than keeping it secret. In fact, this was irrespective of whether the program was illegal, as Keller stated in a letter to his readers on June 25, 2006, that the strategy appeared not to violate any known laws.

In that letter, Keller also said that the Bush administration asked the Times not to reveal this information because it might jeopardize the viability of the program. Keller didn’t agree, and offered the following now obviously specious opinion (emphasis mine):

The central argument we heard from officials at senior levels was that international bankers would stop cooperating, would resist, if this program saw the light of day. We don't know what the banking consortium will do, but we found this argument puzzling. First, the bankers provide this information under the authority of a subpoena, which imposes a legal obligation. Second, if, as the Administration says, the program is legal, highly effective, and well protected against invasion of privacy, the bankers should have little trouble defending it. The Bush Administration and America itself may be unpopular in Europe these days, but policing the byways of international terror seems to have pretty strong support everywhere. And while it is too early to tell, the initial signs are that our article is not generating a banker backlash against the program.

Well, Bill, it appears that you were 100 percent wrong on all counts, for this counterterrorism program is about to go the way of the dodo, and you and your people are to thank.

Hope you and all the folks on the left who celebrated your decision to release this information for the public’s welfare are happy.

Of course, the point can't be made strong enough concerning how absolutely unbelievable it is that this story went virtually unreported as compared to the media firestorm the revelation of this program caused in June and July 2006.

Well, maybe that's not too shocking. After all, nobody's going to win a Pulitzer Prize for reporting this news.
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I hope these guys are really proud of themselves. They all deserve to go to jail for life.

176519734_e65781b940_o[1].jpg
 
Maybe not directly related to this story, but how does all of this "top secret" stuff get leaked to the press in the 1st place? Clearly it comes from someone in the Bush administration....unless reporters sit in on "top secret" discussions in the White House.

So who is ultimately to blame? The "leaker" in the administration, or the press printing the "leaks"????
 
RRocket said:
Maybe not directly related to this story, but how does all of this "top secret" stuff get leaked to the press in the 1st place? Clearly it comes from someone in the Bush administration....unless reporters sit in on "top secret" discussions in the White House.

So who is ultimately to blame? The "leaker" in the administration, or the press printing the "leaks"????

There are holdovers from the Clinton administration in the state department who would like nothing better than to embarrass the Bush admin or help it to fail. Call it a shadow government if you want. Remember Occam's Razor.

The press is abusing the first amendment to the Constitution in order to embarrass the administration. There is no other reason to do it, and they certainly don't care anything about helping with national security. Both the leakers and the "journalists" are at fault.

Remember when Keller said the admin came to him and begged him not to release the story, and he said some bullcrap about thinking it over carefully? That's baloney. They always intended to print the story; they simply notified the Bush admin so they could see them beg.
 
Oh....so it's all the Clinton hold-overs that have the power to leak stuff. Do you think that Republicans ever leak anything?

And a bit off topic..but I thought it was spelled "Ockham's"???
 
RRocket said:
Oh....so it's all the Clinton hold-overs that have the power to leak stuff. Do you think that Republicans ever leak anything?

And a bit off topic..but I thought it was spelled "Ockham's"???

You asked the question, I gave an answer. Sorry you don't like my answer, but I guess you don't have a good answer of your own, so you have to attack mine.

Now you're the spell King? Don't make me laugh. First of all, it's bad form to correct spelling on this forum, and second of all, you are not the best speller on here, so you should shut up before you embarrass yourself.

Troll.
 
No...was wondering if it was one of the Canadian/American spelling things. Sorry you took it personally.

Oh...and you didn't answer my question either. Do you think Republicans leak stuff to the press?
 
RRocket said:
No...was wondering if it was one of the Canadian/American spelling things. Sorry you took it personally.

Oh...and you didn't answer my question either. Do you think Republicans leak stuff to the press?
I can be intellectually honest and say that the Republicans don't NEVER leak anything. The only one recently, however, is Richard Armitage, who worked for Bush, who was the source of the Plame leak.

Think back yourself: Who do you think leaked the NYT info? Hmm? Republicans? Not on your life. What about the Mark Foley IMs? No, we know that was Democrats, CREW which is a George Soros front group. What about the phony Rathergate Bush National Guard story? Nope, Democrats. Who got caught with classified documents down his pants? Ding ding ding! That's right, a Democrat, Sandy Burglar! Who had 900 unauthorized FBI files in their possession? Democrats! What about the White House furniture that was "misplaced" into the Clintons' private stash? Oh, those were Dems too! Who published a phony story about yellowcake uranium? That's right, a Democrat!
 
I don't know who published the phony uranium story...but it was the Bush administration that at the very least tried to sell this story off as true, wasn't it?
 
RRocket said:
I don't know who published the phony uranium story...but it was the Bush administration that at the very least tried to sell this story off as true, wasn't it?

Incorrect. It was Joe Wilson who tried to lie about the Bush admin in the uranium story. The Bush admin attempted to defend the truth and the media jumped all over the story, salivating over the impending demise of Karl Rove, who...um...STILL hasn't been indicted, nor will he be.
 
I remember Bush using the attempt to buy the uranium cake story in one of his speeches leading up to the war. He implied that Saddam had tried to buy the cake. And not only "some" cake, "significant quantities" he said. And he said this on TV. Clearly that wasn't defending the story as being false.
 

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