Posted on 07/01/2006 4:03:39 AM PDT by Oshkalaboomboom
Since Sept. 11, 2001, newspaper editors have faced excruciating choices in covering the government's efforts to protect the country from terrorist agents. Each of us has, on a number of occasions, withheld information because we were convinced that publishing it could put lives at risk. On other occasions, each of us has decided to publish classified information over strong objections from our government.
Last week our newspapers disclosed a secret Bush administration program to monitor international banking transactions. We did so after appeals from senior administration officials to hold the story. Our reports — like earlier press disclosures of secret measures to combat terrorism — revived an emotional national debate, featuring angry calls of "treason" and proposals that journalists be jailed along with much genuine concern and confusion about the role of the press in times like these.
We are rivals. Our newspapers compete on a hundred fronts every day. We apply the principles of journalism individually as editors of independent newspapers. We agree, however, on some basics about the immense responsibility the press has been given by the inventors of the country.
Make no mistake, journalists have a large and personal stake in the country's security. We live and work in cities that have been tragically marked as terrorist targets. Reporters and photographers from both our papers braved the collapsing towers to convey the horror to the world.
We have correspondents today alongside troops on the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others risk their lives in a quest to understand the terrorist threat; Daniel Pearl of The Wall Street Journal was murdered on such a mission. We, and the people who work for us, are not neutral in the struggle against terrorism.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
The answer is NEVER, you a$$hole$, because if you publish it, it isn't a secret anymore.
The NYT editors originally said said they had to go public because it's the public's right to know about such a secret program. They have since changed that excuse to the fact that there is no harm in their reporting on this program because everyone knew about it anyway. So which one is it?
Civil rights groups certainly didn't know about it. But they do now and are threatening to sue the financial institutions involved in the EU.
Co-Chairman of the 9/11 Commission Kean said that very few people even in the banking world know about SWIFT and how it works, and almost no one would have had any idea that the US was able to get access to this data.
Kean further said that: "The terrorists didn't know the financial transactions went through this one group. Treasury told me, this was a method of financial tracking that people didn't understand, that nobody knew this was how things were done. Top-notch people in the US didn't even know."
And if a Dim gets elected Prez in 2008. the programs will go on, the leaks will stop, and the MSM will be trumpeting
how the Dim's are great protectors of human rights and civil liberties!
US Traitors Keller and Punch: "We support terrorists. We support the murder of thousands of Americans.
We encourage treason. We want to help the enemies of America.
We want the death of Americans for our pleasure and paper's circulation.
Without these things, we are nothing."
When it's been declassified and released by the proper authorities.
It is only "excruciating" if their rears get hauled into jail. U.S. AG, please help them to enter the real world of---- excruciating.
Reveal secrets and when caught feed the horseshit.
Thats what this story is Horse crap.
The people who wrote this story believe the US is full of people stupid enough to believe this crap? They insult our intelligence. They send people into Danger so Al Quaeda wont have to. Doing the spying the terrorists dont want to do.
Not sure Kean has his facts right about that (shocking, I know!). I worked in a Chicago branch of an Australian bank for ten years in the Operations dept. ALL international banks (or large US banks) know about SWIFT.
The editor, the writer, and anyone else involved in publishing TOP SECRET information should be sweated in a room until they reveal who the leaker is, or face stiff prison sentences for their actions.
This is ridiculous!
The left, and it's partners in crime, the MSM and socialists in charge of our educational system, must be defeated at all costs, or we will have no freedom, no country, left behind.
Not to be ugly or anything, but I believe I'll take the word of Kean over a poster who I don't know.
And Kean was more specific than my post implied; there were things that the SWIFT program did that very, very few people knew about.
It's the difference in saying that we have troops trying to find OBL and then someone leaking about specifically where they are looking for OBL and what their next step will be.
Everyone knows we're looking for OBL. But they don't know where and what our next steps will be.
these a#$clowns treat these issues with all "subtly", "nuance" and "refinement". Precisely the weakness that terrorists exploit. Terrorists will take advantage of how we "parse" , of our "sophistication" and "senstive sensibilites"....in other words...of our "liberal" nature.
Really? What did you know about SWIFT?
Thanks for the pictures... it makes it's easier to estimate their neck sizes for the hanging ropes.
I was simply trying to clarify what SWIFT is.
Should read: Last week our newspapers disclosed a secret program run by our government to help prevent attacks against our country by terrorists. This followed our disclosure of another anti-terrorist program involving the surveillance of terrorist communications, which we have incorrectly described as an illegal domestic eavesdropping program.
I read this, and it didn't explain at all why they published the story. Just a lot of self-praise. Basically, we did it because we could.
I remember watching news coverage during the first Gulf War. Saddam was firing SCUDs at Israel, and one had just hit in Tel Aviv. CBS had live video with a CBS reporter on the scene of the missile attack. The reporter on the scene was talking with Dan Rather and stated that he didn't want to reveal his exact location because it might help Iraq with future targetting. Dan Rather spent five minutes badgering and then chastising the reporter for not revealing the neighborhood he was in. The reporter, to his credit, and probably to protect himself, never did give up his location. I realized then that it wasn't about a scoop, or informing the public; it was about power. Rather wanted to power to control the government, to get Saddam to fire missiles more accurately, to hurt other people. He wanted influence; and at any cost.
Same here.
Hi Peach.
the one thing I don't get about all this is for years it's been known the government does such things in the course of trying to protect us. so the "outing" of this program is nothing more than further confirmation. matter of fact, most folks associated with john birch and like groups have been talking about such programs and government activity for years. I'm not a bircher, but one of our local talk shows has them calling in all the time and they were talking about these types of activities for years with generally the same details.
another person noted that the swift program was widely known about. again, based on the above, i tend to believe him/her.
i think a lot of this is a tempest in a tea pot and manufactured to get people riled and agitated and of course focused on the nyt instead of on whatever shortcomings are going on. what has the administration really done to "punish" those involved? noting except to focus the base on the media.
and that focus is being drummed up by the "jaw bone media" against the "drive by media".
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