Sunday, July 12, 2009

'Inappropriate' Secrecy Hurt Surveillance Effort, Report Says

"Extraordinary and inappropriate" secrecy about a warrantless eavesdropping program undermined its effectiveness as a terrorism-fighting tool, government watchdogs have concluded in the first examination of one of the most contentious episodes of the Bush administration. A report by inspectors general from five intelligence agencies said the administration's tight control over who learned of the program also contributed to flawed legal arguments that nearly prompted mass resignations in the Justice Department five years ago. The program "may have" contributed to successful counterterrorism efforts, some intelligence officials told the investigators. But too few CIA personnel knew of the highly classified program to use it for intelligence work, the report stated, while at the FBI, the program "played a limited role," with "most . . . leads . . . determined not to have any connection to terrorism."...WPost

"most . . . leads . . . determined not to have any connection to terrorism."

This confirms what I and others have been saying all along. It has more to do with federal law enforcement gaining additional powers than with combating terrorism (see this post). Even those additional powers granted by Congress were not limited to terrorists.

The federal law enforcement agencies utilize whatever crisis is at hand, be it drugs, the OKC bombing, terrorism, etc. to grab more power and lessen our civil liberties.

And they are well on their way, via the purse, to "federalizing" local and state law enforcement.

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