Comments (43)

Mike Conwell wrote on July 30, 2007 5:32 PM:

Commentary on the next secret program revelation:

Last Friday I had the teevee on watching the local weather radar. Switched to the 24hr channels to see what was being covered.

46 CNN Drunk NASA Astronauts
47 HLN Drunk NASA Astronauts
48 Fox Drunk NASA Astronauts
49 MSNBC Possible *other* program revealed in AGAG testimony!

Wow!! I hadn't thought anybody in the MSM was keeping track, but there was a interior lobby shot of a reporter going over the possibility of another secret surveillance program. But suddenly the main desk anchor broke in to interrupt... And took us live to the Drunk Nasa Astronauts story.

46 CNN Drunk NASA Astronauts
47 HLN Drunk NASA Astronauts
48 Fox Drunk NASA Astronauts
49 MSNBC Drunk NASA Astronauts!

drational wrote on July 30, 2007 5:46 PM:

Glen Greenwald made the same point.
So did I in the Kos Diary linked below.

This is Judith Miller revisited, no mistake.

modmom wrote on July 30, 2007 5:52 PM:

So will Conyers inquire as to whether the data mining/eavesdropping was outsourced to a foreign company?

mo2 wrote on July 30, 2007 5:59 PM:

"respond via Administration leak" - why I never! Conyer's audacity! Oh, well there was this one time with this guy named Wilson, but that was a matter of national (or my-ass-ional) security.

-GW

drational wrote on July 30, 2007 6:01 PM:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/07/29/data_mining/index.html

TheraP wrote on July 30, 2007 6:21 PM:

Several of us are working together to piece some of this story together. The story of how intelligence gathering was outsourced to private companies, which were allowed to spy on us (!) illegally - all of which was then classified - so of course these companies could operate secretly outside the law.

Thanks to an anonymous poster who is relying on us to get the word out, it seems that in spite of all this secrecy, the administration apparently also authorized a trojan horse so to speak: The ability to set up dummy companies, acting just like all the other private companies, capable of linking in with the government data bases. This apparently allows for tracking of information about what is or is not being altered within the bush computer network system. Audits will be able to show what was altered and when.

To learn all about it, click on my name and consult the cafe blog post - then go to the google references if you like. And help us spread the word - or continue the work.

The full posts by the anonymous poster can be seen at: http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003805.php (as well as previous threads for that week)

To be sure, we are not certain that all posts in that thread are by the same anonymous poster - and some comments are quite confusing. Which is why we are trying to put order to the myriad of details and theories posted by anonymously.

TPM staff: Please, if you have better sourcing or more time or whatever, your assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I am no expert on these matters. Any assistance is welcome here. It's a good lead for getting at the missing information, how it went missing and when, together with the ability to speculate on what reasons it went missing.

michael blaine wrote on July 30, 2007 6:23 PM:

Isn't "data mining" actually Admiral Poindexter's Total Information Awareness program, which Congress supposedly rejected? Or some tentacle thereof? And if the Bushites are leaking info about this "data mining." in what sense is--or was--that legal to begin with? My sense is that it involved massive invasions of citizens' privacy,and that it was the biggest enchilada of all domestic spying techniques.

Anybody out there who can enlighten us?

eliot wrote on July 30, 2007 6:49 PM:

THis just came out. Iglesias is going to testify before the House Ethics Committee on Wednesday about Congresswoman Heather Wilson's phone calls to him

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/073007R.shtml

Halcyon wrote on July 30, 2007 6:50 PM:

In his testimony Mueller referred only to an NSA program. Did the NSA do data mining?

I assume Gonzales used the term 'other intelligence activities' as a convenient hedge that could pave the way for a disinformation campaign.

bobh wrote on July 30, 2007 6:54 PM:

Did Jake not get his check? I havent seen that paid troll for a day. Kinda nice.

Jessica wrote on July 30, 2007 6:55 PM:

Gonzales needs to step down, and if he won't do so gracefully, I hope Congress will force him to do so. Like the entire Bush administration, he refuses to take responsibility for his illegal actions and needs to be held accountable. The Iraq War bespeaks a lot about Bush’s personal shortcomings and his administration’s horrible policy choices. To date, the war has cost over $340 billion dollars—money which could have been spent much more wisely and with better end results. It is estimated, for example, that the expenditure of a mere $19 billion would eliminate starvation and malnutrition worldwide. In a time when the current defense budget is $522 billion, the goal of eradicating world hunger is clearly well within reach. Thus, it is clear that the occupation of Iraq needs to end and the entire Bush administration, including Gonzales, needs to come clean with the American public. There are simply much more important issues that need to be addressed.

Steve5117 wrote on July 30, 2007 7:12 PM:

bobh

Josh posted a couple days ago that in response to TPMmuckraker popular demand, steps were taken to block the IP address where Jake was posting from.

Perhaps we need a memorial page that shows a few posts from Jake D along with some epithets posted back at him. A training page for people who do not know how to deal with trolls.

p winslow wrote on July 30, 2007 7:25 PM:

Off topic, but here goes, did anyone else see jubilant Iraqis riding around waving flags yesterday? I did a little asking and found out they were celebrating Iraq's victory in the Asian Cup soccer tournament. It also looked a lot like a Rove
phony spontaneous event. Word here is that they were paid, but by whom? They rode around areas of Northern Virginia for at least two hours honking their horns and waving Iraq flags. I thought one might be Jake, but he wasn't

Jay_M wrote on July 30, 2007 7:55 PM:

Congress should start to take the passports of everybody who every worked for the White House or GOP. Then after 08 elections cheney/bushies could be tried & not flee to UAE.

KY3 Democrat wrote on July 30, 2007 8:03 PM:

What if Admiral Poindexter's *military* TIA data mining program got caught up with NSA's TSP *civilian spying* program? Could we be talking about possible military oversight over a civilian law enforcement program?

Think about it, people...

Anon wrote on July 30, 2007 8:04 PM:

I worked at a US think tank while in grad school that had us searching for US and foreign databases of people. We were looking for things like inport/export directories, dating websites, expat chat rooms, etc. Pretty sure it was related to all of this stuff, though we were never told its purpose or its client. If I am right, and this was part of the program, it is seriously amateur. But I think that is par for the course in the intel world.

Steve5117 wrote on July 30, 2007 8:14 PM:

Anon

Sounds creditable, if I have the ability to filter out traffic to and from certain IP addresses why not subcontract the job of looking for differeny websites to a bunch of different people?

I think that only increases the odds of finding suspect sites. It also gives the customer a pool of potential employees if any show exceptional ability in locating intel sites.

Jim wrote on July 30, 2007 8:15 PM:

I doubt if John Ashcroft was refusing to allow normal data mining from public sources. He's not exactly the President of the ACLU when it comes to civil rights. You can safely bet that whatever he was disagreeing with, it was illegal domestic wiretapping or WORSE.

Sully18 wrote on July 30, 2007 8:24 PM:

I know this sounds stupid,but I`m a patriotic American.I have the right to be stupid.I know choose to exercise that right.
Is there a possibility that Bush et.al.,through their illegal wiretaps acquired data which is either embarrassing or incriminating to several in Congress who might want to investigate all or any of his or Cheney`s crimes since he`s been in power?
Also,why does spell check always indicate that Cheney`s name is mispelled.
Code word warm as in warm at the WH.

Mstessyrue wrote on July 30, 2007 8:27 PM:

Impeachment of Gonzales will be the first step in voicing strong disapproval for the Bush administration from our Congress and the American people. It is no surprise to anyone that our president and his administration have, yet again, hid the truth from the American public. Similar to the dealings with the war in Iraq, this administration has been feeding lies to the public. Now the war has proven to be a failure and is causing more violence, terror and poverty in this world. According to the Borgen Project, it only takes $19 billion dollars annually to eradicate world hunger and poverty. However, our government has already spent more than $450 billion dollars over this fruitless war in Iraq. It is time for the Bush Administration to take a real interest in the lives of the American people as well as people who are in desperate needs around the world. Stop the lies and stop poverty now.

Barry Champlain wrote on July 30, 2007 8:34 PM:

First of all, you have to realize that there are probably LOTS of folks, running around Washington, from congresspeople to US attorneys, who KNOW precisely what the hot potato program or part of a program, or whatever, is.

Our only job at this juncture, if we want to play that game, is to GUESS what it was. But bear this in mind: whatever theory you come up with... ask yourself if it's outrageous enough to cause a goodly chunk of the Justice department to threaten to quit.

Or whether it is such a tinder box, that Abu had to haul ass to the hospital, to get the Attorney General to mark an "X" on it, before he possibly shuffled off his mortal coil.

Nothing I've read above so far seems quite that incendiary. And yet... as I said, there's lots of people who know full well what all this is about.

Maybe in the NEXT administration, we'll know.

Sully18 wrote on July 30, 2007 8:36 PM:

I am once again going to exercise my God-given American right to be stupid.
I have two what I believe to be good questions.
First,what are the chances that some of the illegal wiretaps were targeting those in the House and Senate that could investigate the illegal activities of Bush and Cheney and their merry gang of thugs?
Second,why does spell check always indicate that Cheney`s name is misspelled?

Emily wrote on July 30, 2007 9:37 PM:

Now that, Gentlemen, is a Man. There is so much strutting posturing that the right does, right up to the point of fetishism, but this is a strong, passionate, discerning man and that heightens my interest.

This is an analogy, of sorts, of course.

It's not about style, it's about content. Bring it on.

KY3 Democrat wrote on July 30, 2007 9:50 PM:

Hey Barry,

If we delve too deep into this, aren't you afraid some pipe-hittin' dude from the NSA might drive by and throw down a Condor? I don't dig getting shot in the throat, man.

Well, hell, let's speculate anyway:

1: TIA at DoD linked up with TSP at NSA. DoJ said "It's DOA, dudes. Please, no military oversight of civilian law enforcement (yeah, NSA is now a civilian surveillance agency)." How close are we to tanks in the streets? Remember Kent State.

2: Bush's other war: Iran? Nooo... Cross-border Special Ops operations with Turkey into Kurdistan? Maybeee (thanks Novak)... Arm Taiwan with nuclear weapons, really piss off the Chinese? You're getting warmer! You don't mean... CUBA?!? Hell yeah! They're already repaving highways around Tampa as a jumping-off point to Havana; massive troop movements on I-75, then the tourist trade follows. When that old f*cker Castro kicks the can, America owns the place.

3:Sully18's theory, go after Congress first. Data mine them and blackmail them. "Tell me, Mr. Anderson, how are you going to impeach when you have no Congress?" Which leads us to:

4: "Seven days in October (2008)", planning for the coup. Create a national emergency under a false flag, whip out the old Executive Findings, and shut down the election. "My fellow Americans, yet another of our great cities writhes in agony tonight. Free and fair elections cannot possibly be held until the present emergency is resolved. I will continue the occupation of this Office until democracy is restored. God Bless Amerika."

I don't hold out much hope. Bush is not yet done f*cking this country. Sometime before 20 Jan 2009, we're gonna see something hatched.. Just make sure your ass is to the wall, and don't bend over if you drop the soap.

Anonymous wrote on July 30, 2007 10:01 PM:

Posted by: TheraP
Date: July 30, 2007 6:21 PM

Clarification on this:
"the administration apparently also authorized a trojan horse so to speak: The ability to set up dummy companies, acting just like all the other private companies, capable of linking in with the government data bases. This apparently allows for tracking of information about what is or is not being altered within the bush computer network system. Audits will be able to show what was altered and when."

1. The Trojan horse wasn't necessarily known, authorized: It was something that they allowed in without realizing what was going on. By "Trojan Horse" this doesn't mean a virus, but discrete, known packages of information: The auditors know to look for it: It's either there or not.

2. The Dummy companies are means by which the Congress -- if it chooses -- to use as an audit target of the President: These entities are things that the Congress can use to monitor how the President does or doesn't audit things, as he should have. Using these entities, the Congress can compare [a] what was supposed to have happened n the audit standards; vs [b] what the President's auditors really do.

3. Once the known information is reacted to, and the Presidents' personnel respond (issuing guidance, doing things, responding, communicating), it's possible to pinpoint _what_ the President's personnel were responding to; and develop a timeline. However, if the data has been removed, but the _responses_ are still there, the President's people have to explain: What, despite the gap of information, were you responding to? The answer is known: The problem is that the "triggering" information, which once existed, has been deleted

4. It true that using the known information that was sent, captured, received, and responded to, how this information compares with the holes within the WH and RNC e-mail systems. People don't do things in a coordinated manner unless there is a coordination: Either they were using telephone, instant messaging, or they were using something other than e-mail like a file transfer system to coordinate: The issue isn't _what_ they were dong; but the _means_ by which they were coordinating; and whether Congress -- when it gets a responses -- has confidence that the data provided is complete; or whether the privilege log also has holes in it.

Anonymous wrote on July 30, 2007 10:21 PM:

Comment on allegations President leaked data mining information to help Gonzalez: Let's play devils' advocate from the perspective of what is _adverse_ to the President's interests. Pretend for the moment that the explanations Gonzalez gave were true: In that he's not lying; and there _is_ some way to reconcile his inconsistent testimony.

If we live in a universe where truth is related to disclosed facts, the _disclosure_ of that Assertion must be linked with something that is either: real, fabricated after the fact, illusory, or has been orchestrated. If we presume Gonzalez, while under oath, has a responsibility to support his assertions with facts, evidence, and otter things: He can't very well assert something that "sounds true or false," but then not offer evidence to support his position.

If we presume for the sake of argument that Gonzalez is telling the truth, then it would stand to reason that the Committee -- upon hearing of that _disclosure_ (now not privileged, because of the disclosure_ -- would be able to require the President, Gonzalez, and others involved with that discussion, planning, and elsewhere to either provide the information; or to admit that there is no information.

The point isn't that Gonzalez is or isn't lying; but by him making this statement, this opens the door for Congress to reasonably expect the President to provide information. It doesn't matter if the information, assertion, or data is true, real, fabricated, or withheld: Congress, upon hearing Gonzalez assertions can go to the President say simply, "Until you provide confirming information of what Gonzalez said, we will target the budgets for cutting. Without information, we cannot support this activity which appears lawful."

It doesn't matter if the President opposes, blocks, vetoes this funding change: he still gets no money. Again,t eh point of this isn't to say that Gonzalo is lying or telling the truth; or that the information does or doesn't support his position, but the opposite: Encourage the Congress to call Gonzalez and the President on the assertion: "Gives us the needed documents, or you get no funding." Then litigate.

Anonymous wrote on July 30, 2007 10:45 PM:

Correction: [ Date: July 30, 2007 10:21 PM ]

Change: "we cannot support this activity which appears lawful"

To read "we cannot support this activity which appears _unlawful_"

Slippery Slope wrote on July 30, 2007 10:49 PM:

Anonymous, I've followed many of your detailed posts through what I believe has been at least a month.

I may be mistaken but I believe you’ve also post on CREW back on June 20th (link provided in my comment in TheraP’s TPMCafe post linked below). That post had many of the same format characteristics and definitely the same level of detail and disturbing hypotheses as those found here on TPM Muckraker. [I think your] the CREW posting raised many interesting issues.

Maybe these too can be included in TheraP’s thread (though – like many of Anonymous’ posts it is lengthy and full of many areas worthy of follow-up).

[Okay... just tried to post with a link but was prevented by the TPMMuckreaker "Thank you for commenting - filter. So, I'll post with the link to TheraP's TPMCafe post. TheraP, if you'd like to link it again, I'd encourage that]

Anonymous wrote on July 30, 2007 11:50 PM:

Posted by: Slippery Slope
Date: July 30, 2007 10:49 PM

The file has been removed/truncated from Crew. This is the Google Cache of the content Crew has removed/truncated: [ http://snipurl.com/1oz3c ]

If you want the content, you'll have to capture it before it is removed.

Anonymous wrote on July 30, 2007 11:53 PM:

FYI: The original Ralston deposition, prompting the comments is here [ http://oversight.house.gov/story.asp?ID=1362 ]

Anonymous wrote on July 31, 2007 12:00 AM:

Someone had asked about Fitzgerald's investigation; and would he have a role in ths. I'm wondering this in light of Conyers request today.

Consider this from the Ralston deposition:

- - - - - -

18 Q Well, you had referred earljer to a request from
79 Mr. Fitzgerald in the Plame 'investigation.
20 Was there more than one request?
2I For documents 'in that 'invest'igat'ion, there was more than one subpoena.
23 Q How many?
24 A There may have been as many as six or seven.

- - - - - -

If you were in OLC or OVP as Addington and othere were, and you knew Rove was organizing something, wouldn't you want to make sure, as the army attys did in re Tillman, that the Grand Jury was obstructed?

FISA, rendition, prisoner abuse, and destroing evidence: Part of the same problem.

Where to hide this? "Who cares. No need to deal with that later, the GOP has permanent control. . . . ." How much of the destruction occurred _after_ GOP lost the 2006 election; and Rove's "new math" didn't add up?

I'd be interested in Conyers can get some specifics on the timnig of the data dumps out of RNC, WH as it relates to the returns on the 2006 elections: When did the GOP fear DNC control; and how did the "bad news" Rove had about the returns trigger data destruction related to FISA?

JNagarya wrote on July 31, 2007 12:08 AM:

Several of us are working together to piece some of this story together. The story of how intelligence gathering was outsourced to private companies, which were allowed to spy on us (!) illegally - all of which was then classified - so of course these companies could operate secretly outside the law. . . .

Posted by: TheraP
Date: July 30, 2007 6:21 PM

One of the reasons for "outsourcing" gov't "business" to private companies is that that which is illegal for the gov't to do -- some forms of violations of privacy -- is not illegal for the private sector to do.

Though it certainly requires investigation, we vaguely see analogies with military and intelligence issues: intelligence methods used by private firms for the gov't which is illegal when the gov't does it. The use of mercenaries in order to suippress information about what is being done in our name.

parrot wrote on July 31, 2007 1:33 AM:

Look at the bright side. Perhaps no laws were broken with the leak because it was illegal in the first place! Problem solved, nothing to see here!

myiq2xu wrote on July 31, 2007 2:25 AM:

46 CNN Drunk NASA Astronauts
47 HLN Drunk NASA Astronauts
48 Fox Drunk NASA Astronauts
49 MSNBC Drunk NASA Astronauts!

Didja start with 99 drunk astronauts?

Rick wrote on July 31, 2007 3:58 AM:

I just think back to all the data of information lost in the past like Veterans, Military,etc. Was this information added to the data mining then returned as if it was never lost?

Posted by: JNagarya
One of the reasons for "outsourcing" gov't "business" to private companies is that that which is illegal for the gov't to do -- some forms of violations of privacy -- is not illegal for the private sector to do.

carol lam wrote on July 31, 2007 5:05 AM:

The posts were confusing Thera but very informative and I hope they are right about the war crimes that may well be charged to Congressmembers and bushco who in any way authorized the renditions and the fact that American citizens may have been harrassed or worse using this datamining.

I would like to know if it is the FBI or other entity who can use this tracking system for proof of the renditions and other crimes against humanity. I need to research the news articles that came out about the 10,000 NSA letters and its connection to the Comey and Mueller showdown with Gonzales and Card in Ashcroft's hospital room.

The FBI recently released a report about 500 incidents where they obtained information that they should not have had. It sounds like the FBI and/or other intelligence agencies are letting the American people know about some of the threats to our freedom that this program and the subprograms within it pose to our freedom and right to free speech.

Whatever happened to the courageous whistleblower Russell Tice? Sen. Rockefeller having to handwrite letters to Cheney and put in his safe because of the draconian legislation on the secrecy about these programs make it sound like congress is being held hostage. We need to write and request that Congress be allowed to talk about the nature of these programs and the threat to citizens. Talking about what the program does, esp. if it is about the rendition of US citizens must be done and it is possible to do that without endangering "national: (read bushco) security.

Goldspinner wrote on July 31, 2007 6:30 AM:

Unfortunately, I'm a little behind on my signint reading but here's a link that some of you may find interesting: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/intel/RL31798.pdf.

Security code: PROMIS

Goldspinner wrote on July 31, 2007 6:59 AM:

Correction to my above comment: I meant SIGINT but had C-SIGNINT on the brain. Geez, I'm getting old...not noticing my own typos without coffee first.

Slippery Slope wrote on July 31, 2007 8:36 AM:

The file has been removed/truncated from Crew. [...]
If you want the content, you'll have to capture it before it is removed.
Posted by:
Date: July 30, 2007 11:50 PM
***************************************
No. The post I was referring to is still there and fully available on CREW, but each time I attempt to post it here I get;

"Thank You for Commenting
Your comment has been received. To protect against malicious comments, I have enabled a feature that allows your comments to be held for approval the first time you post a comment. I'll approve your comment when convenient; there is no need to re-post your comment."

Yet, I've been able to post links in the past using this same name. Oh well. Some day I'll be elavated to no first time user.

Until then, was able to post the link over on TheraP's TPMCafe post.

pjwright wrote on July 31, 2007 8:45 AM:

After skimming the preceding comments, I'm struck that some folks still refer to all this NSA stuff as "wiretapping." NSA's forte is electronic surveillance on a global scale -- listening to everything and sorting for nuggets. They don't discriminate between domestic or foreign sources in the initial trawl ... so, if NSA was involved, we were spying on ourselves. That's why Ashcroft wasn't willing to go along, and why Comey had to be there to protect him from Cheney's toads while he was in a semi-comatose condition. Another in a long litany of felonies that we all hope the spineless Congress will hold the White House accountable for.

dee illuminati wrote on July 31, 2007 11:31 AM:

That is when this all went really bad.. that is when the Inspector General office had security clearances denied to look into reported problems and when FISA judges resigned.

http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/glennfine.htm

Glenn Fine was denied access to assess the program as to legality and then clearances were issued to 'contractors' to source the leak.

This is when the A.G> breached his office's responsibility and the lies started in ernest and when a 'purge' was initiated.

But Conyers has the moment when the I.G. said to the A.G. there is a problem houston and the A.G. started extra-judiciary management.

This time span from Glenn Fines inquiry and the subsequent post-election disclosure is where A.G. is directly responsible for any subsequent abuse of NSL's (which are the by-product or product) of the NSA program if it can be believed that data was "required" from NSA to initiate a NSL or that the content or findings of a NSL warranted NSA involvement.

What we see is a programme where even the IG was not briefed or read into, and could be manipulated to have the ends justify the means, leaving both sides, the DOJ and NSA vulnerable to accusations of abuse where they in fact find themselves today.

And in revieweing this debacle you see that metrics, review, controls, and checks and bounds were ignored that have diminished national security and undermined institutional credibility, beyond the simple fact that these acts in entirety were illegal.

But Conyers marks the moment when this 'went wrong' and the A.G. should have allowed Glenn Fine to issue a report that he would not be subsequently found guilty of perjury over.

This is Gonzales problem!

Anonymous wrote on July 31, 2007 12:28 PM:

Posted by: Slippery Slope
Date: July 31, 2007 8:36 AM

Suggestion: Post a link to the content you want people to look at; and post a sample line of text of what you are reading, and highlight it by spearating it. We may or may not be talking about the same/different things.

Anonymous wrote on July 31, 2007 1:58 PM:

Folks,

Data mining has been an ingrained part of the American landscape for years; the general public and mainstream media just haven't been paying attention. Be it PRIZM codes or PROMIS, data meta-analyses already provide plenty of "useful" information on civilians. When the NSA's Michael V. Hayden was confirmed to head up the CIA last year, how many people expressed concern that he remained an active-duty Air Force General? KY3 Democrat, you've raised some excellent points. Have you noticed the recent surge in Cuban immigration to the US this week? Hmm.