"criminal referral" for three Democrat Senators ?

[motorola7]

a writer with National Review says on Batchelor show that a "referral" exists for Sens. Rockefeller, Wyden, and Durban, regarding their public disclosure of a "black" stealth satellite program. Article to break in NR tomorrow.

[26lemoncharlie]

Hey these guys are Socialist, that's there job to give Top Secret Info Out!!

Off with their Heads ! Off with their Heads ! Off with their Heads !

[Mike Fieschko]

Rocky Spysat Investigation at Defense Tech:

The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reports that "U.S. intelligence officials are likely to seek a criminal investigation into disclosures about a top-secret and increasingly expensive spy-satellite program that several lawmakers have sought unsuccessfully to kill."

(PHOTO AT RIGHT: It's in there somewhere! STS-36 Launches with MISTY 1.)

The probe will focus on leaks that appeared in the Washington Post and New York Times. Rockefeller's office said his statement "was fully vetted and approved by security officials", but some Bush Administration officials also indicated that "discussions were under way about whether to ask Senate Republicans to consider removing Messrs. Rockefeller and Wyden from the committee."

The investigation would center on reports in "some other news stories [that] alleged that there are shortcomings in the program, such as that it is useful only in daylight and in good weather," the Journal reported. "Such details, while sketchy, suggest that people with knowledge of the program may have shared information on it." The allegation appears at the beginning of the New York Times story, which noted the satellite "still would take photographs only in daylight and in clear weather, current and former government officials say." That, to me, sounds like a government official with a high school physics education.

MISTY's secret is not the fundamental science behind the behavior of light but rather the stealth technology--some of which may have been made public when the geniuses over at SDIO filed a patent shortly after the first MISTY launched in 1990 on STS-36.

It's not like either MISTY was invisible. Amateur satellite observers tracked the first and second MISTY satellites. I blogged about this a couple of months ago after a couple of former SPACECOM officers mentioned a classified piece of the puzzle that would complicate plans to share satellite tracking data to reduce the risk of collisions.

Stealth, my ass.

[PISANO]

I won't believe it, even IF I SEE IT!!!

[swilhelm73]

Or Metzenbaum leaking the Anita Hill allegations to cause the Thomas lynching...

[Calpernia]

That article was posted here this morning....I will go look for it.

[John Lenin]

What is this about ? A military spy satellite or one to snoop on Americans ?

[Calpernia]

The FR article:

Too much talk lets out US spy secret [Senator Rockefeller blabs]

[Lancey Howard]

If there is one thing that disappoints me about the Bush Administration it is the utter impotence of the Justice Department. How can that thieving scumbag Sandy Berger still be walking free? None of us would be walking free. And what about Dan Rather, Mary Mapes, and CBS using illegal forged memos to try to manipulate a US Presidential election? Any FBI investigation of that? Anything at all? "Hands off", I suppose.....

Nothing's going to happen to these Senators, either. If that baby's-ass-faced, smirking p.o.s. "Leaky" Leahy never got indicted, then nothing's going to happen to these clowns. I am thoroughly disgusted.

[politicalwit]

Law enforcement and national security really don't seen to be a top priority to this administration.

[barkeep]

Mind you, I hold no brief in defense of Shockefeller the Rit, but criminal charges, get real! As you point out, the program in question was known to anybody that matters, the picture of the launch does not strike me as "stealthy", and once a bird is in low earth orbit, it doesn't take an especially bright enemy to figure out where it is going to be every 90 minutes or so.

Satellite capability is truly amazing, but it really ain't magic. Put something in a hole in the ground, hide it on the far side of a steep hill, build a mosque over it and satellites cannot see. We need, really, really need HUMINT, people on the ground, people who can overhear the conversation between the bad guys we have a nice and nearly useless photo of, and tell us what was said.

I am sick to death of security laws that primarily work to keep we the people ignorant, and this is a fine example. The bad guys know it. We know the bad guys know it. The bad guys know we know they know it, and the only people who don't know it are the taxpayers who fund the whole sorry mess. Save the criminal charges for those who expose real secrets and get real people hurt or dead.

[zip]

ping

[fire_eye]

Everything to which you're referring, with the exception of Leahy's leaks, happened during an election year.

I'll give Bush some time, on into next year, to act on those cases before I decide that he hasn't learned his lesson and still thinks he needs to "Be Nice'.

[isom35]

there's no way a rockefeller goes down for anything. maybe the other 2 knuckleheads...

[bayourod]

Remember the Dem national convention in about 1980 where the delegates went wild with cheering when Jim Hightower said "The Republicans are the party of the Rockefellers, the Demecrats are the party of the common fellers."?

[Brimack34]

Was not Rockefeller the one that wrote the leaked memo on how to stop Pres. Bushes judges?

[nw_arizona_granny]

Ping

[Petronski]

They'll never be prosecuted, but if all that results is public exposure of what they've done, great!

At least let the public know.

[shamusotoole]

If it's a criminal referral, then it would fall under...

Article II.

Section. 6.
Clause 1: The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. (See Note 6) They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be-privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.