NSA Whistleblower Tice To Meet With Senate Armed Services Committee
A former NSA officer will be alleging that heretofore publicly unknown illegal activities, possibly involving the use of satellite-based platforms, has been conducted by the NSA and that nominee for CIA director Gen. Michael Hayden was told personally that such operations were forbidden under U.S. law.
An article in GovExec has the details:
A former intelligence officer for the National Security Agency said he plans to tell Senate staffers (this) week that unlawful activity occurred at the agency under the supervision of Gen. Michael Hayden beyond what has been publicly reported, while hinting that it might have involved the illegal use of space-based satellites and systems to spy on U.S. citizens.
Russell Tice, who worked on what are known as "special access programs," has wanted to meet in a closed session with members of Congress and their staff since President Bush announced in December that he had secretly authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens without a court order. In an interview late Thursday, Tice said the Senate Armed Services Committee finally asked him to meet (this) week in a secure facility on Capitol Hill...
He said he plans to tell the committee staffers the NSA conducted illegal and unconstitutional surveillance of U.S. citizens while he was there with the knowledge of Hayden, who has been nominated to become director of the CIA. Tice said one of his co-workers personally informed Hayden that illegal and unconstitutional activity was occurring...
"I think the people I talk to next week are going to be shocked when I tell them what I have to tell them. It's pretty hard to believe," Tice said. "I hope that they'll clean up the abuses and have some oversight into these programs, which doesn't exist right now."
Tice originally asked to meet with the Senate and House Intelligence committees, but they did not respond to his request. The NSA did not reply to written questions seeking comment for this story.
The NSA fired Tice for what it claimed were psychological problems, including paranoia. A number of NSA employees have been terminated under such pretexts in recent years, corresponding with the extra-legal endeavors of the SIGINT agency following 9-11.
Branding dissidents as being mentally ill is an old Soviet tactic to discredit one's opponents and discourage others from becoming whistleblowers. It is yet another dickless "get tough" approach from the discredited U.S. government.
An article in GovExec has the details:
A former intelligence officer for the National Security Agency said he plans to tell Senate staffers (this) week that unlawful activity occurred at the agency under the supervision of Gen. Michael Hayden beyond what has been publicly reported, while hinting that it might have involved the illegal use of space-based satellites and systems to spy on U.S. citizens.
Russell Tice, who worked on what are known as "special access programs," has wanted to meet in a closed session with members of Congress and their staff since President Bush announced in December that he had secretly authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens without a court order. In an interview late Thursday, Tice said the Senate Armed Services Committee finally asked him to meet (this) week in a secure facility on Capitol Hill...
He said he plans to tell the committee staffers the NSA conducted illegal and unconstitutional surveillance of U.S. citizens while he was there with the knowledge of Hayden, who has been nominated to become director of the CIA. Tice said one of his co-workers personally informed Hayden that illegal and unconstitutional activity was occurring...
"I think the people I talk to next week are going to be shocked when I tell them what I have to tell them. It's pretty hard to believe," Tice said. "I hope that they'll clean up the abuses and have some oversight into these programs, which doesn't exist right now."
Tice originally asked to meet with the Senate and House Intelligence committees, but they did not respond to his request. The NSA did not reply to written questions seeking comment for this story.
The NSA fired Tice for what it claimed were psychological problems, including paranoia. A number of NSA employees have been terminated under such pretexts in recent years, corresponding with the extra-legal endeavors of the SIGINT agency following 9-11.
Branding dissidents as being mentally ill is an old Soviet tactic to discredit one's opponents and discourage others from becoming whistleblowers. It is yet another dickless "get tough" approach from the discredited U.S. government.
posted by Effwit at 11:12 AM
12 Comments:
Poor Tice. I have been following his truncated heroics since he stepped out of the shadows like a true hero.
Go Tice Go
M1:
I for one, will not be surprised when the "mentally ill" ex-NSA man, despondent over unpaid bills, takes the honorable exit.
A suicide with 2 shot gun blasts to the head. Where have I heard that one before?
M1:
Gary Webb managed to get off two shots to the head from his .38 special revolver.
Or at least that is the official story.
He was depressed about losing his Sacramento newspaper job after being fired from his San Jose Mercury gig for the CIA/crack cocaine series.
There you have it.
Thanks
Funny how a lot of things going on these days harken back to the bygone era of the USSR. Perhaps Kruschev was correct: they would conquer the U.S. from within. Has the party of staunch anti-communism finally turned red?
I KNEW there was a reason they had the "red" states!
DrewL:
LOL
It is the old Cold War Convergence Theory. We were destined to become more totalitarian, while the Russians were supposed to become more democratic.
Funny how the US has ended up converging towards the ways of the former Soviet Union more than the core debris of the former Soviet Union has converged towards the US.
M1:
True enough. The Russian part of the old USSR has not become a paragon of democracy.
But from what I have heard, the nightlife in St. Petersburg and Moskva (at least for the moneyed) has become more like New York than Des Moines or Omaha could ever hope to achieve.
OMG. That was the understatement of the year. Party on Mockba. (well dizzying pockets of it at least)
M1:
Mockba
Now spelling matters? Especially the cyrillic?
Remember, all I have to go on is the pronunciation of the Russian 'tutes who try to get an entry into a journalism career via my futon.
You did the correct Skankanavian spelling. Bravo!
I did the fake Rusky version.
Ergo Swedish hotties have now taken to posing as Russian tutes.
Oh dear.What has the world come to but the Futon of yet another EFFWIT.
Buy a real bed.
Get a cellphone.
Glow.
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