Joe Nacchio said the NSA approached Qwest more than six months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks about participating in a warrantless surveillance program to gather information about Americans' phone records.

Decius wrote:

This is something that I'd noticed but hadn't posted on yet. I've kind of been waiting for another shoe to drop, but the implication is that increased NSA spying was a policy of the Bush administration that was unrelated to 9/11. Apologists will argue that islamic terrorism was a threat prior to 9/11 and the government knew it was a threat, and now it is clear that this sort of program is necessary. Frankly, the same is basically true for the USA PATRIOT Act, which was a collection of various law and order wish lists that were easy to pass in the wake of 9/11 but designed and desired in advance.

Yes, though "apologists" is rather loaded language. I'm not particularly interested in an argument, but what part of Bin Laden determined to strike in US requires further explanation? I'd like to revisit the 9/11 Commission report, perhaps in its comic book form.

For now, I'll quote the August 2001 memo:

Intelligence suggesting that suspected al Qaeda operatives were traveling to and from the United States, were U.S. citizens, and may have had a support network in the country.

Al Qaeda members -- including some who are U.S. citizens -- have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks.

Two al-Qaeda members found guilty in the conspiracy to bomb our embassies in East Africa were U.S. citizens, and a senior EIJ member lived in California in the mid-1990s.

Islamic terrorism was rather more than "a [hypothetical] threat" at the time.

Convicted plotter Ahmed Ressam has told the FBI that he conceived the idea to attack Los Angeles International Airport himself, but that in ---, Laden lieutenant Abu Zubaydah encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation. Ressam also said that in 1998 Abu Zubaydah was planning his own U.S. attack.

Ressam says bin Laden was aware of the Los Angeles operation. Although Bin Laden has not succeeded, his attacks against the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 demonstrate that he prepares operations years in advance and is not deterred by setbacks. Bin Laden associates surveyed our embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam as early as 1993, and some members of the Nairobi cell planning the bombings were arrested and deported in 1997.

noteworthy wrote:
Yes, though "apologists" is rather loaded language. I'm not particularly interested in an argument, but what part of Bin Laden determined to strike in US requires further explanation?

Simply put, the part where that justifies law breaking by the executive branch. In particular, many of the legal arguments for the power of the executive to do things like engage in warrantless surveillance are directly tied to the Authorization for the Use of Military Force which obviously did not exist at this time. I don't agree with those arguments anyway, but they are now completely irrelevant, and the executive is left with not even their own arguments for why these programs were legal.

This is not about whether or not the NSA should be survielling Al'Queda. Obviously they should be and obviously the law ought to allow them to. No one has ever, ever argued to the contrary.

This is about whether or not there are checks and balances in our system of government wherein the actions of the executive are reviewed or authorized by the judicial and or the legislature. Prior to this revelation the sentence beforehand included the minor caveat "during the war on terrorism." Now that caveat has been removed. We are now talking about whether or not the NSA needs court authorization to spy on Americans AT PEACE TIME.

Decius wrote:

... the implication is that increased NSA spying was a policy of the Bush administration that was unrelated to 9/11.

... This is not about whether or not the NSA should be surveilling Al Qaeda.

... This is about whether or not there are checks and balances in our system of government wherein the actions of the executive are reviewed or authorized by the judicial and or the legislature.

Your implication may be true, and I agree with your statement of What This Is About. But perhaps the implication conflates a few things, and it ends up either: giving the administration undue credit for an insight that wasn't theirs; or painting the picture of a grand conspiracy that seems far too sophisticated to be credible, given the actors. Consider an alternative:

The IC hunts Islamic extremists throughout the 90's. They fail to prevent the embassy bombings, though law enforcement succeeds in prosecuting conspirators in the case. Several times, they get close to capturing (or killing) bin Laden, but they fail to get the green light. Too much political risk, and no way to sell the story.

A new administration arrives, and with the shift change at the top comes a lot of uncertainty ... about direction, about policy, about priorities. The military and bureaucratic leadership make their pitch about What They Need. It's the same pitch they've been giving for years. It's an establishment idea. It's not the brand-new brainstorm of a political appointee.

What's new is that when the pros say, "the threat is real, we need this, NOW", the official response is "Just make it happen." This causes some discomfort, but the need is real, and with the impression of top-cover, much of it moves ahead. This is where those checks and balances should have kicked in, but instead of working groups, requirements documents, position papers, integrated product teams, conference committees, off-site meetings to socialize the concepts and get buy-in from the key stakeholders, etc., you get Just Do It.

This is certainly not an excuse. To highlight just one among countless things, the whole business with Gonzales at the hospital is profoundly disturbing. However, many of the deepest problems are systemic, and they aren't going to disappear magically in 463 days. Unless and until the process of government can be more than endless skirmishes between Team A and Team B, things aren't to improve markedly. It's a devil's choice; pick your poison.

noteworthy wrote:
This is certainly not an excuse. To highlight just one among countless things, the whole business with Gonzales at the hospital is profoundly disturbing. However, many of the deepest problems are systemic, and they aren't going to disappear magically in 463 days. Unless and until the process of government can be more than endless skirmishes between Team A and Team B, things aren't to improve markedly. It's a devil's choice; pick your poison.

It's not going to change. This might sound like extreme pessimism, but I just think of it as reality. When has a government sustainably acted for the good of its populace? Even though our flavor of 'democracy' is relatively young, it's starting to look gentrified in the face of current world trends. Our society has benefited greatly from the freedom, liberty, and opportunity that the original system provided. But it's complete and utter folly to think that this system was by any means truly any of those things to all people. Someone always gets screwed for someone else to benefit. Now that the world is collectively a much smaller place, with more and more people vying for fewer and fewer resources, this system is strained and its shortcomings are glaring. Besides, the truth always comes out in the end.

noteworthy wrote:
Your implication may be true, and I agree with your statement of What This Is About. But perhaps the implication conflates a few things, and it ends up either: giving the administration undue credit for an insight that wasn't theirs; or painting the picture of a grand conspiracy that seems far too sophisticated to be credible, given the actors.

This is interesting but even if its true the just do it orders were based on philosophy that is at the core of the modern Conservative movement... one which Justice Thomas has expounded... that the changes wrought in the wake of the Nixon scandal went too far and its time to reestablish a more powerful executive. One of the key changes made in the 70's was an extraconstitutional regulation (FISA) of the executive's surveillance powers and this is a clock the administration clearly seeks to wind back.

I don't think this was their insight personally but its a standard they bore with them into the Whitehouse which has colored a collection of their policy decisions. It wasn't merely a systemic accident. Note the recent public statements of Jack Goldsmith.

The reason this philosophy is wrong is not merely because (as Goldsmith argues) it is counter productive. It is wrong because these rules are the product of hard learned lessons. They can be refined but you cannot simply throw them away and expect not to learn the same lessons again the hard way. This administration has failed to grasp that in context after context. The evidence will not be available for a long time.

noteworthy wrote:

Yes, though "apologists" is rather loaded language. I'm not particularly interested in an argument, but what part of Bin Laden determined to strike in US requires further explanation? I'd like to revisit the 9/11 Commission report, perhaps in its comic book form.

For now, I'll quote the August 2001 memo:

Intelligence suggesting that suspected al Qaeda operatives were traveling to and from the United States, were U.S. citizens, and may have had a support network in the country.

Al Qaeda members -- including some who are U.S. citizens -- have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years, and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks.

Two al-Qaeda members found guilty in the conspiracy to bomb our embassies in East Africa were U.S. citizens, and a senior EIJ member lived in California in the mid-1990s.

Islamic terrorism was rather more than "a [hypothetical] threat" at the time.

Convicted plotter Ahmed Ressam has told the FBI that he conceived the idea to attack Los Angeles International Airport himself, but that in ---, Laden lieutenant Abu Zubaydah encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation. Ressam also said that in 1998 Abu Zubaydah was planning his own U.S. attack.

Ressam says bin Laden was aware of the Los Angeles operation. Although Bin Laden has not succeeded, his attacks against the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 demonstrate that he prepares operations years in advance and is not deterred by setbacks. Bin Laden associates surveyed our embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam as early as 1993, and some members of the Nairobi cell planning the bombings were arrested and deported in 1997.

All that is well and good, but there is solid information out there (see the reports about the August memo) that the administration did not care about bin Laden, nor for anything else done in any manner by the Clinton administration. If Clinton touched it, it was tainted.

Were there concrete, legitimate reasons for CIA or NSA to want to expand what they were doing vis a vis bin Laden and his organization? Sure. That has nothing to do with what this administration wanted. Based on what came out of PNAC, they wanted the war in Iraq, and used 9/11 to get it and everything else their Grinchy little fascist hearts desired, because without it, I don't think even the rubber stamping Republican congress would have gone along with it.