Did Cheney Order the CIA to Conceal Existence of "Sensitive" Counterterrorism Program? And Will the Bush Administration Finally be Called to Account?

by bartleby the scrivener | Leo Panetta, Director of the CIA, has told the Senate and the House Intelligence Committees that the CIA withheld information concerning a secret counterterrorism program on direct orders of none other than Dick Cheney. (NYT)   Christ knows what they were getting up to.

Mr. Panetta, who ended the program when he first learned of its existence from subordinates on June 23, briefed the two intelligence committees about it in separate closed sessions the next day. (NYT)

Whatever it was, Cheney seems to have been behind the decision to conceal its existence from Congress. (NYT)  Hey, but at least all those secret programs kept us safe, eh?  Well, maybe not.

The disclosure about Mr. Cheney’s role in the unidentified C.I.A. program comes a day after an inspector general’s report underscored the central role of the former vice president’s office in restricting to a small circle of officials knowledge of the National Security Agency’s program of eavesdropping without warrants, a degree of secrecy that the report concluded had hurt the effectiveness of the counterterrorism surveillance effort. (NYT)

How secret was this mystery program?

Intelligence and Congressional officials have said the unidentified program did not involve the C.I.A. interrogation program and did not involve domestic intelligence activities. They have said the program was started by the counterterrorism center at the C.I.A. shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but never became fully operational, involving planning and some training that took place off and on from 2001 until this year.

In the tense months after Sept. 11, when Bush administration officials believed new Qaeda attacks could occur at any moment, intelligence officials brainstormed about radical countermeasures. It was in that atmosphere that the unidentified program was devised and deliberately concealed from Congress, officials said.

Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House intelligence committee, said last week that he believed Congress would have approved of the program only in the angry and panicky days after 9/11, on 9/12, he said, but not later, after fears and tempers had begun to cool.

Mr. Hoekstra, the intelligence committee’s ranking Republican, said he would not judge the agency harshly in the case of the unidentified program, because it was not fully operational. But he said that in general, the agency had not been as forthcoming as the law required.

“We have to pull the information out of them to get what we need,” Mr. Hoekstra said.(NYT) 

Who knows -- unless it's Seymour Hersh -- what those guys were getting up to?  I wonder how long before we find out for sure?

Two former agency officials who were familiar with the program said it involved a series of proposals over several years for providing the intelligence agencies with a "needed capability," one of the officials said (WaPo).

In the meantime, angry Dems are pushing for more and better briefing of intelligence committees.  Guess who's threatening to veto legislation if the CHANGES go further than the executive branch likes?

Democrats in Congress, who contend that the Bush administration improperly limited Congressional briefings on intelligence, are seeking to change the National Security Act to permit the full intelligence committees to be briefed on more matters. President Obama, however, has threatened to veto the intelligence authorization bill if the changes go too far, and the proposal is now being negotiated by the White House and the intelligence committees.(NYT)

Meanwhile Dems are considering an investigation. (WaPo) 

 Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Tex.), chairman of the intelligence committee, has said the panel was "affirmatively lied to" regarding this program's existence. Reyes had not had a formal discussion with  Rep. Peter Hoekstra (Mich.), the ranking Republican on the committee, about opening a formal investigation. But lawmakers and aides said such a step was a formality and that a formal investigation probably would take place.

 Rep. Anna G. Eshoo (D-Calif.), a senior member of the intelligence panel, said she was calling for the committee to hire an outside counsel to investigate the issue. "We have to know who gave the order for this, who gave the order to conceal this, where did they draw the money for this," she said.

Eshoo said the committee may have to use its subpoena power to interview some of the top officials who oversaw intelligence issues during the Bush administration. (WaPo) .

Republicans aren't bothered.

After listening to Panetta's June 24 presentation, some Republican committee members said they wanted to know more about the program but were not overly alarmed. "I didn't walk out of there saying this is some horrible thing,"  Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) said. (WaPo) 

More reactions to this article at Memeorandum.

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Comments

[Devoirs]

CHENEY IS MENTALLY ILL AND REQUIRES PSYCHIATRIC HELP IMMEDIATELY.
_____________________
SCANDALS! SCANDALS! SCANDALS!

DANGER! DANGER! DANGER!

GEORGE W. BUSH IS AN EXTREMELY DANGEROUS CRIMINAL STALKER!

“In her suit, Margie Schoedinger states that George W. Bush committed sexual crimes against her, organized harassment and moral pressure on her, her family members and close relatives and friends. As Schoedinger said, she was strongly recommended to keep her mouth shut. . . . Furthermore, she alleges that George Bush ordered to show pressure on her to the point, when she commits suicide” (go to Google, type “blog of drizzten Margie Schoedinger,” and hit “Enter”).

“George [Bush is personally complicit] in the death (murder to be precise) of my friend Margie Schoedinger in September of 2003. Determining the exact whereabouts and contacts of . . . George Bush on September 21 thru 22, 2003, should be entirely lacking in difficulty” (Leola McConnell—Nevada Progressive Democratic Candidate for U.S. Senate in 2010).

McConnell is correct: Bush applying pressure (continuously criminally stalking Margie Schoedinger) purposefully to force Schoedinger to commit suicide does in fact constitute murder where it culminated in her death.

Bush’s method of murdering Schoedinger cannot exist in a vacuum: he must have murdered other people in the same way.

During Bush’s presidency, of course Bush would have desired to kill people whom he hated or get them out of his way. Insofar as Bush was clearly capable of murdering Schoedinger—even in “broad daylight”—and is clearly capable of getting away with it, in consideration of common sense and the laws of human nature, Bush of course murdered numerous people in the disgusting way he murdered Schoedinger. One can examine public information; in various situations where people who sought to oppose or disadvantage Bush ever so frighteningly ended up “committing suicide”—specifically—Bush murdered them just like he murdered Schoedinger. For example, Bush continuously criminally stalked James Howard Hatfield to the point that he could not get away from it, and he committed suicide in desperation to escape: Bush murdered Hatfield. However, the vast majority of such scandalous information will never come out (the grisly details are typically hard to substantiate). A prosecutor really can lawfully charge a former president with murdering one or more people in the disgusting way Bush murdered Schoedinger. The American people unfortunately live in a world where evil presidents can murder any number of people—figuratively—with a wave of a magic wand and get away with it.

(There are thousands of copies of the information above on the Internet. Please feel free to go to any major search engine, type “GEORGE W. BUSH IS AN EXTREMELY DANGEROUS CRIMINAL STALKER” or “George W. Bush continuously criminally stalked Margie Schoedinger to the point that she could not get away from it, and she committed suicide in desperation to escape: he murdered her” or “George W. Bush applying pressure (continuously criminally stalking Margie Schoedinger) purposefully to force Schoedinger to commit suicide does in fact constitute murder where it culminated in her death” or “George W. Bush continuously criminally stalked numerous people to the point that they could not get away from it, and they committed suicide in desperation to escape: he murdered them” or “George W. Bush continuously criminally stalked James Howard Hatfield to the point that he could not get away from it, and he committed suicide in desperation to escape: Bush murdered Hatfield,” hit “Enter,” and find hundreds of results.)

(Please feel free to see my “GEORGE W. BUSH IS THE WORST PRESIDENT IN U.S. HISTORY” blog.)
_____________________
Andrew Wang
(a.k.a. “THE DISSEMINATING MACHINE”)
B.S., Summa Cum Laude, 1996
Messiah College, Grantham, PA
Lower Merion High School, Ardmore, PA, 1993