Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com
Video in Streaming Flash format…
Video in Windows Media format…
Audio in MP3 format…
This video provides some background to a special story posted on THE BRAD BLOG yesterday, by White House Correspondent Eric Brewer of BTC News. During a White House press conference, Eric Brewer asked about reports of the Patriot Act being used to spy on journalists. The video is an interview with ABC’s Brian Ross who first reported that the Patriot Act is being used to spy on journalists.
White House Press Secretary issued a rather weak denial. Snow denied that National Security Letters, enabled by the Patriot Act, were being used to spy on journalists. He then said that National Security Letters were only concerned with Foreign to Domestic calls so “the pieces just don’t add up.” (see: Eric Brewer’s article for Snow’s full response.)
Snow’s answer was misleading and possibly wrong. The FBI can issue National Security Letters (NSL) to collect personal records for a target and all of that target’s contacts. In this way, a single NSL can collect records for a social network of hundreds of people. Organizations that are ordered to hand over their customer’s information via an NSL are immediately gagged from revealing the NSL to anyone. Last year, the FBI targeted about 3500 Americans using NSL’s without a warrant or the approval of any court. The FBI investigates domestic crimes; NSL’s issued by the FBI are certainly being used to spy on Americans.
In this video, Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow! interviews ABC’s Brian Ross who was first to report that the federal government was spying on ABC News and other media organizations. Some of what Ross says is truly shocking and should give every American pause.
The video consists of about 7 minutes of clips from the Brian Ross interview. The entire 16 minute interview is available at DemocracyNow!.
Keep reading for a few selected quotes from the Ross interview…
[..] And they do this, they say, legally. What that means is they use a provision in the PATRIOT Act — which is designed to go after terrorists, but they’re using it to go after reporters — what they call a national security letter. Essentially, it’s a letter an F.B.I. agent writes, takes it to a phone company — or anywhere, really — but takes it to a phone company, and the phone company is then required under the provisions of the PATRIOT Act to turn over the information, and also a phone company is required not divulge to the customer, me or anybody else, that the records have been sought by the government.
[..] AMY GOODMAN: Brian Ross, is this changing the way you work?
BRIAN ROSS: Absolutely. I mean, this makes it very, very difficult. And, you know, you sort of have to start thinking, I guess, like some sort of Mafia capo. You make your phone calls with bags of quarters at pay phones, if you can find them anymore. It’s chilling, to say the least, and I guess I’ve concluded that this requires, you know, on my part, your part, all of us who are reporters and care about the truth, really reporting on this subject, and I don’t think it’s self-centered. I think it’s important that everyone know this is what’s happening and, you know, let Americans decide if that’s how they want the government to operate.
Good for them! The MSM deserves being stabbed in the back by the Bush administration, for cheerleading them and not holding them accountable. What did they think was going to happen? Good for them!
Glad to see you’re watching Democracy NOW! , Brad. When is Amy Goodman going to interview you??? Can’t wait; make sure you tell us, if it happens!
ABC is obviously going to lose White House access on account of this whistle blowing. The important point is that they’re willing to risk it now; they wouldn’t have a year ago. "Lie to me once, shame on you…lie to me repeatedly, shame on me."
This is a sea change for the corporate media.
Coming to a town near you?
"Egypt cracks down on critics…
The two judges, who contend that last fall’s parliamentary elections were rigged, were accused of speaking ill of the government."
I thought so.
Off topic, forgive. I wish bradbloggers in every state would look into the salaries of their sec. of states. This is where a lot of the problem came from in 2000 and 2004. They have to be bought off. The reason I’m bringing this up now…Just remembered after ’04 election was stolen , I was calling anybody and everybody trying to get answers..someone I talked to, in Fed. govt. may have been disgruntled herself said more money would be going to Sec. of state in states like Miss. Well, I doubt if that would happen now after Katrina and the election wouldn’t be close….Maybe the money helped get the voting machines in.
Congress contact information — courtesy of firedoglake — should you wish to give them a piece of your mind (heh…maybe that’s not the best choice of words, considering I’ve heard they want our dna, too, now)..
http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/cgi-bin/newcommittee.cgi?site=ctc&lang=&commcode=sintelligence
Thats going over the top useing the Patriot Act to spy on journalists, George Bush should stop with all these laws and acts. Cant believe the white house press secretary issued a rather weak denial.
http://www.MikesAmericanBlog.com
The bloggers/journalists debate has a new wrinkle. If the Patriot Act has been used to spy on journalists, has it been used to spy on bloggers as well?
The way I look at it. If you’re not being wiretapped, you’re not doing enough.
It’s time for journalists to stop using the excuse that they can’t report on important stories or ask hard questions, because they’ll "lose access".
We’re not learning a damn thing from any of these people. Scotty never illuminated ANY subject, the entire time he was there. It was pure babble.
We would learn more from a drunk on the street then from Cheney, Rumsfeld, (speaking of drunks), Rice… Any of them.
Just walk away press corps. You’ve got a wealth of information to report from the last five years. Let’s Roll!
And when they come to court to vindicate their rights, will the court say it cannot be litigated because of "state secrets"?
Judges can be traitors too (link here).
Circular logic is taking over the minds of the blind, as they lead us into the ditch.
What is a state secret? Anything that implicates the republican dictatorship in violations of the constitution, criminal acts, or embarrasments.
Big brother is a republican!
Dredd: Don’t forget about judge Reggie Walton, who keeps getting "randomly assigned" to cases such as Libby & Sibel Edmonds.
Also, did everyone see, the case of the German citizen who was tortured, was thrown out by an American judge, because of "national security"?
What a country! We are a totalitarian government!
For Larry Bergan: True, Scottie McClellan never revealed anything, thus "access" has been basically worthless from a public interest standpoint.
But that’s the problem in a nutshell. Corporate media are in business to make money. Their first obligation isn’t to the public, it’s to their stockholders. Their advertisers don’t give a damn whether media fill a public-service function; they care about exposure. The question is, "How many readers (or viewers) are we reaching?" Not, "Are those readers and viewers being well served?" Why? Because advertising is also a business; in truth, it’s indistingushable from media.
So "access" means being able to parrot what a White House spokesperson says, whether it makes any sense or not. If it’s one lie after another, it becomes one side of a two-sided argument, the other side being the truth. Election fraud isn’t covered at all, because fraud doesn’t lend itself to two-sided arguments. Fraud is fraud…so deal with it only as the misguided fantasy of "conspiracy theorists," no matter what the evidence reveals.
Big Dan #12
Yes, I saw that one too and linked to it in another thread here.
There is a work out, by Geoffrey Stone, which historians and judicial watchers may find interesting.
It is mentioned in John Dean’s piece this week which continues the comparison of this regime to the Nixon administration.
Meanwhile the UN asks the US to close the torture chamber at GITMO (link here).
But that would require the ok from the Torturer-in-chief, so there is substantial doubt that will happen. After all he is the guy who Colbert says has the same understanding on Wednesday as he did on Monday, no matter what happens on Tuesday.
BLOGGERS AND THE MSM
FINALLY GET TO THE SAME PLACE
IT IS THE HOTEL GEORGE W
"YOU CAN CHECK OUT ANYTIME
BUT YOU CAN NEVER LEAVE"
RLM # 13 – You said:
“Fraud is fraud…so deal with it only as the misguided fantasy of "conspiracy theorists," no matter what the evidence reveals”.
A local radio station here in Salt Lake has a story with comments from Our Lt. Governors chief of staff Joseph Demma calling the BBV report about the Emery County machines "juvenile fearmongering." Kathy Dopp gives him a piece of her mind and another guy named Ronald Thompson weighs in.
My curiosity gets the best of me because I can’t figure why some guy is getting so passionate in support of the machines. I Googled the name and came up with somebody in the state water department, but, of course, I have NO IDEA if it’s this man. Anyway, I decide to give my two cents and end up being called “a conspiracy theorist” among other things. He refuses to acknowledge any fraud involving Diebold and makes your case perfectly! Pretty funny stuff if you’ve got the time!
conspiracy theories squared
By the way, I have to admit Thompson’s remark about my GGG Grandaddy is pretty funny.
I don’t get into that ancestor worship thing. I even have a large book written about him but I’ve never read it, I was just trying to show I had roots here because of Thompson’s accusations about Kathy’s Florida driven ulterior motives.
For Larry Bergan: Somebody named Joseph Demma is chief of staff to the lieutenant governor of Utah. That’s not a job that requires any computer skills or any knowledge of how an election machine functions. Yet he calls BBV’s findings "juvenile fearmongering."
On what basis? How would he know one way or the other? That’s like my saying Einstein’s theory of relativity is "speculative." It’s utter nonsense coming from someone with no qualifications to offer an opinion.
Please don’t be offended by this question, but are people in Utah brainwashed through the L.D.S. church to simply spout establishment claptrap like this, as if any threat to the status quo is at once a threat to their provincial notion of family values?
I didn’t follow it much, but when the Catholic Priest scandal was in the news, a priest said something that really stuck with me. He said that he was taken aback by the difference in the way people treated him before and after he became a priest. He hadn’t really changed any, and made the observation that after the appointment it was as if he could do no wrong.
I think that’s a problem in any religion. Things are similar to the rest of the nation here in the respect that average people are pretty normal, but the leaders are downright NUTS. It’s because they are TOO respected. We are comfortable enough, that we keep sending the same nitwits back again and again. Once you’re elected here (Democrat or Republican), You’re “in like flint” (a wonderful man). Truckloads of nepotism over decades doesn’t help either. Conservatism here means to keep the status quo no matter what.
I’ve never lived anywhere else, but something I heard somebody say about Utah people that seems to ring true is that we don’t like to discuss things that make us uncomfortable, so we avoid it. I’m sure that goes on everywhere, but I don’t know if it’s worse here or not. The computer issue seems to indicate it’s not.
All in all I have to stand up for the people here. They are set in their ways, but really community oriented and surprisingly tolerant.
The thing that drives me crazy about this computerized voting issue is that you really don’t even need to know anything about computers to know that they can be programmed to bend reality. The fact that they condemn us for being worried is hypocritical.