We have nothing here. Program was never fully operational. It was a plan, nothing more.
Posted on 07/10/2009 11:11:18 AM PDT by Steelfish
Lawmaker says CIA director ended secret program
By PAMELA HESS
WASHINGTON – CIA Director Leon Panetta has terminated a "very serious" covert program the spy agency kept secret from Congress for eight years, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, a House Intelligence subcommittee chairwoman, said Friday.
Schakowsky is pressing for an immediate committee investigation of the classified program, which has not been described publicly. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has said he is considering an investigation.
"The program is a very, very serious program and certainly deserved a serious debate at the time and through the years," Schakowsky told The Associated Press in an interview. "But now it's over."
Democrats revealed late Tuesday that CIA Director Leon Panetta had informed members of the House Intelligence Committee on June 24 that the spy agency had been withholding important information about a secret intelligence program begun after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Schakowsky described Panetta as "stunned" that he had not been informed of the program until nearly five months into his tenure as director.
Panetta had learned of the program only the day before informing the lawmakers, according to a U.S. intelligence official. The official spoke on condition of anonymity Friday because he was not authorized to discuss the program publicly.
Panetta has launched an internal probe at the CIA to determine why Congress was not told about the program. Exactly what the classified program entailed is still unclear.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
This is how we get 9/11s.
Who knows, maybe the CIA didn't want the information about the program "leaked" to China and just kept it from him. Tells me a whole boatload about how much Panetta's trusted.
Congress probably wasn’t told of the program because the program really needed to stay top-secret and members of Congress cannot be trusted to keep their fat mouths shut.
We’re all “nice people” now and by golly, Europe likes us! They really like us! ROTFL!
The rat’s security policy is national suicide.
So you approve of the CIA acting with complete autonomy? The idea of the CIA conducting intelligence programs that have not been authorized or that anyone in our government even knows about is frightening.
We have nothing here. Program was never fully operational. It was a plan, nothing more.
Is this an excuse to purge any agents that will not pledge allegiance to Obama and the DNC?
Started about the time the executive order allowing us to assassinate foreign leaders and clintons “preemptive war” law was signed.
Treadstone.
seems like no one can: "The official spoke on condition of anonymity Friday because he was not authorized to discuss the program publicly. "...
Now come on, don’t be childish. I don’t approve of anyone acting with autonomy in a free country. However, I think the CIA is much less of a threat to my liberty than some other groups that operate with relative impunity, like the ATF or the DEA (two groups that violate the constitution every day). I also know that tons and tons of rules are responsible for the lack of information-sharing that resulted in 9/11. How to balance the two? Hey, I don’t work for free. Elect me and pay me and I’ll figure something out.
What’s the point of having CIA programs if angry homosexuals at the NYTimes don’t print the programs on the front page?
First, I doubt nobody knew about it and that it had no oversight.
Second, the program may have been surveillance on members of government suspected of colluding with terrorists.
I will reserve criticism until I know more facts.
Apparently this more political theater like the Valerie Plame circus, the legal Bush firing of some federal attorneys, the AIG “protests” by paid activists, etc.
What if they were tracking hits to known terrorist phone numbers called from government phones? Representatives, Senators, staff...
Back around 1975, Senator Frank Church held hearings on the operation of the CIA and found that -- HORRORS -- taxpayer money was being paid to foreign citizen snitches who had CRIMINAL RECORDS for vital human, on-the-ground intel on the activities of those who were planning the destruction of this country. Church commented at one session that "Gentlemen do not read other gentlemens’ mail." Interesting how Church and his fellow Dimocraps viewed men who would destroy America “gentlemen.” Glad that a**hole didn't serve during the run-up to WWII. (Although he may have handled the "delayed" communication to Pearl Harbor that the Japanese were on the way!)
When he became president, Jimmy Carter fully supported and enforced the Church Amendment. The sorts of people who consort with -- and, more importantly, get cozy with -- the leaders of terrorist organizations are not normally choir boys. Church moved the legislature to PROHIBIT any US funds going to these potential informants. Since it can take upwards of 20 years for these guys to move close enough to the top to be seriously valuable, we had virtually NO humintel on bin Laden's plans for 9-11!
While there are still Church-like imbeciles (Reid, Pelosi, et come to mind) at the levers of power here, I THINK the law has been changed.
While the NSA wiretaps and eavesdrops on US citizens HERE, isn't it comforting to know that in just 15 or 20 years we may be able to thwart a plan hatched THERE for some future 9-11 with information gathered THERE.
Now our guys are required to MERANDIZE enemy combatants NOT wearing uniforms and displaying NO recognizable military patches, etc., etc., all of which, de facto, removes them from the protections afforded under the Geneva Convention. In past conflicts, the Geneva Convention permits the capturing forces to shoot these guys on the spot. Of course, any trooper caught doing that would be up on charges in the morning.
Anybody else see a pattern here?
The morons now “leading” (and I use that term very loosely) the United States have finally achieved something I thought impossible: They’ve tied BOTH our hands behind our backs. They will get MILLIONS of us KILLED before they are removed from office – hopefully in 2010 and 12. “Whom God would destroy, He first makes mad.”
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