In the wake of closed briefings before both the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, this Washington Post article reports that any further Congressional inquiry on the NSA Terrorist Surveillance Program is unlikely to happen. As the Post tells it, the decision may be due to a “full court press” by the Bush Administration (dubbed so by an anonymous Republican senate aide) to discouraged further inquiry, in spite of reports that John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), the Senate intelligence committee's vice chairman has
…drafted a motion calling for a wide-ranging inquiry into the surveillance program, according to congressional sources who have seen it.Many bloggers have exhaustively commented on the NSA program, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and the exposure of the existence of the program via Big Media Sources, the New York Times and the Post. However, the most far-reaching and thoroughly-researched work has been done by Jeff Goldstein of Protein Wisdom.
Tomorrow, the Senate Intelligence Committee is set to decide whether to conduct further investigation into the program’s legality.
However, even if the program is pronounced “clean,” it is now a useless weapon in the War on Terror, as Daniel Henninger of Opinion Journal pointed out last week.
If the purpose of the public exposure was to pull the plug on the pre-emptive surveillance program, mission accomplished. Be safe, Times Square.Nice(ly) job(bed), Big Media.
(Thanks to Pajamas Media's NSA Files)
