Is the Secrecy Crumbling?

Cracks in the Facade

There is a big dust-up brewing in D.C. Between the CIA and its handlers, the Senate Intelligence Committee which is charged with overseeing the super-secret agency to make sure it does not unduly trample on civil rights or do nasty things. Well, nasty things that they get caught doing. It isn't even over a disagreement on what is nasty and what is not but instead it is about someone removing something from the vault of dastardly deeds and taking it to a place where it might be exposed.

It seems that there is an unmarked room at Langley (that is what the spooks call CIA headquarters) that is dedicated to allowing the overseers access to computers that contain sensitive information concerning aforementioned dastardly deeds. In this case, the so called black sites where the CIA held prisoners it surreptitiously stole from various locations so they could be interrogated out of the sight of curious eyes. It was here that many of the alleged torturous methods euphemistically called enhanced interrogation were used. It seems that the Senate Intelligence Committee headed by California Senator Diane Feinstein have been looking into the allegations of improper treatment of prisoners by the CIA and its operatives. CIA Director John Brennan has been quite protective of that information.

It is an alarming sight to see Senator Feinstein at odds with the intelligence community over anything since she has been a stalwart supporter of many questionable actions. She has defended the agencies in no uncertain terms and to lengths that some civil rights advocates find disconcerting. The CIA is allowed much leeway in its accountability for reasons they say are paramount if they are to conduct the covert work they do on our nation's behalf. Their budget is not subject to examination and is accorded a vote without knowing what it is for. The Director is accountable supposedly to the NSA Director and the Director of National Intelligence but who knows who is being forthcoming? It is to account for this great power that the Senate Intelligence Committee is given oversight of agency actions. It is all that stands between this paragon of secrecy and deadly action and the wishes of the American people. If you fear, as I do, this much power being unaccountable to a representative of the people then you should appreciate the work this committee does.

But, in a larger sense, what we are seeing here is a fracture in the formerly impenetrable wall of government intelligence gathering and secrecy. Senator Feinstein must be greatly concerned that the oversight duties of her committee are being impinged upon to take this argument public. But those that are paying attention are seeing cracks in the facade of the intelligence community.

Prior to 9/11 (see how those numbers are instantly recognizable) government was not so agreeable to the intelligence community being so able to conduct operations outside the vigilance of civilian overseers. The panic following 9/11 threw civil rights and accountability to the wind along with our previous reluctance to use “enhanced interrogation.” In the wake of that disaster the Department of Homeland Security was created that was envisioned to encompass all other intelligence gathering agencies and assure that the data collected by one was available to all. A noble goal prevented from maturing by the bloat of a huge new bureaucracy. The most super-secret of all, the National Security Agency, blossomed into an Orwellian beast capable of gorging itself on our digital communications, long distance calls, cell phones, computers and who knows what else in order to put together threads of information that, when assembled by the banks of super-computers, would paint a picture of any individual in the modern world. As citizens of the U.S. we were protected from this intrusiveness unless a warrant was obtained from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) which granted them with abandon. Of course, we had little knowledge of the extent of this surveillance until a junior grade computer operator working for one of the hundreds of private intelligence gathering business that have sprung up finally decided he had seen too much to continue to stay quiet.

Edward Snowden

If you don't mind we will leave the discussion of Edward Snowden and his actions for another time. But the fact is that without his revelations we would likely still be unaware of the government spying on ordinary people to the extent that they know us better than we do. Is this legal? Probably so since a spineless Congress granted the authority even though they had no idea what they were doing. Is it constitutional? Personally, I think not but that is something that the courts will have to decide. When it comes time I hope they will be more capable of dispassionate reasoning than I think they are.

Was it a crime for Edward Snowden to steal that information and reveal it? Most certainly so but history is rife with people who have shouldered the burden and acted according to conscience. Daniel Ellsberg revealed the Pentagon Papers that exposed the accounts of success in the Vietnam war as being fabricated and false. Those revelations changed the course of discussion and were influential in bringing an end to that war by allowing the people, yes, the people, to participate in the direction of the

Daniel Ellsbert

nation. “Deep Throat” revealed the nature of the coverup of the Watergate Breakin and brought down an administration. Daniel Ellsberg was tried but the charges were thrown out due to prosecutorial misconduct and if Edward Snowden ever comes within reach of the United States I expect he will also be tried. It is actions like these that expose the cracks in the seemingly impenetrable monolith of secrecy. So, we can be thankful that an American politician has found enough enough gumption and political cover to take the cause of personal freedom a bit further. We should not expect too much from Senator Feinstein but she may provide the opening.

Personally, my take is that if we willingly allow our freedoms to be whittled away with promises of benevolence then we are fools indeed.