I agree with the assessment, "A mechanism to implement the worst nightmares is being created by a voracious intelligence community and its contractor posse, and we are not focused on this far more worrisome trend, a trend that continues with bipartisan support." Having seen government from the inside, I have no doubts whatever that any mechanism that can be abused, will be.

For the same reason, I am less certain than the author that "we will find that there has been little abuse in terms of who has been monitored or how collected information has been used."

However, I do believe that any current abuses probably are a pale shadow of those that will surely evolve. Overall, a good analysis by Mr. Arkin, in my opinion.

It is NOT blind hatred, that's how the Bush Administration deflects it critics by characterizing them as Bush Haters rather than address the issues raised by Bush's critics. No, we are not blind to the continued insulting of our intelligence by the Corporate Controlled MSM, the Bush Administration, and the Republican Controlled Congress.

WDM's my foot!!!!!!

Also the MSM's and Gingrich's characterization of the action in Lebanon as the beginning of WWIII is irresponsible.

It's the current political power structure in the US that is NUTS.

"...because so many are blinded by their hatred of the Bush administration, because Congress is so lame in its oversight, a slow and legal erosion of privacy and civil liberties is occurring..."

You have twisted this around, just like the Bush administration has twisted and distorted the truth. Yes, there is an erosion of our privacy and civil liberties...but not because of blind hatred of the Bush administration. There is nothing blind about seeing this president's piece-by-piece obliteration of our Constitutional foundations. That is a fact that is occurring as a result of Bush's arrogance and bullying. If you wish to speak of blindness, look no further than the Republican majority in Congress whose partisan loyalties refuse to see the truth of what this president, with their blind acquiescence, has unleashed upon us, and upon the world with a foreign policy based on control of oil. The "war on terror" is a twisted fiction this administration has turned into an ugly reality. Impeachment is clearly in order to open the sores of corruption in this administration and scandals erupting in Congress.

This may be the worst administration since Nixon, but I still find the rants from Che horrible and unproductive. I'm trolling here but I love this blog and there's always 5 pages of cut and paste garbage from this guy that serves no purpose. Most other people can contribute coherent arguments....

We get it; BUSH IS BAD can you write like a normal human being now?

keep hearing are Eisenhowers' comments, about

"Beware the Military_Industrial_Complex,"

I also see that there is mutual _using_ going

our soldiers and money to influence economic issues

that _you_ don't get to participate in or benefit from....

it's _your_ $345 BILLION DOLLARS being spent,,,,

and what happened to the 9 BILLION that Halliburton lost track of?

Who is on the board of directors of Halliburton?

George H.W. Bush you say? and who is Negroponte? you say he belongs to George H.W. Bush?

and why is a civilian using our military for profit and using

supercomputers in the Pentagon to track banking activity? to get a edge on betting stocks?

or for _his_ national security?

Yeah? I trust them, just like a trust serial killers, to do it again....

same old same old and you say, "IS THIS AMERICA?" yes

but are they Americans, no....they're family oriented, as in MA FIA

.

answer this,

what competent, caring personality wouldn't hate george h.w. bushes and george w. bushes guts?

are they making America a better place to live in?

if your answer is yes, then you must be making over $300,000,

if that is true, then you need to understand....once the middle class is gone,

you're next.....gotta get money from someplace

selling the country and selling out the citizens, that's what this administration is good at....

if people understood who was running things,

well, there just might be a Nouveau American Revolution....and there'd be some fauntleroy a reference to Le Roi' a ss getting kicked...

yeah, buddy, so be it.

.

one must distrust a government that is both malevolent and incompetent - that is a fair appraisal of Mr Bush's administration - they label critics as unpatriotic and are just plain incompetent, whether it's the war in Iraq, or the war in Afghanistan, or domestic security and emergency response - remember, they were in charge of national defense on 9/11/01 when the attacks came - their stress on secrecy can not be trusted - they can not be trusted - secrets they keep are more about keeping Americans in the dark than pursuing enemies of our country .... if you don't think they're abusing their power in the name of national security, you probably think Nixon wasn't a crook either ... and you're wrong!

find out what they're up to, make it public, and let them answer to the people of the US for a change

Consider the possibility that
bush himself leaked the letter.

What I get out of the letter is Hoekstra is telling Bush that Kappes is not only a whistle-blower but that he also hates Bush's guts.

Arkin said: 1) "I've also pointed to the failure of Congress, and particularly of Republican boosters such as Hoekstra, to oversee intelligence programs, which has contributed to unchecked executive power based upon fallacious assumptions about what is necessary to fight terrorism."

2) "In his desperation to be loved and included, Hoekstra is an embarrassment to his office and to his sacred duty"

In one breath Mr. Arkin complains that Congress and especially Congressman Hoekstra has failed to oversee intelligence programs...in the next, he states "Hoekstra is an embarrassment to his office."

I can't find any logic in Mr. Arkin's comments, especially after reading Congressman Hoekstra's letter to the President. I found his letter very straight forward and one that we should expect from the Chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, U.S. House of Representatives...it sure appears to me that Mr. Hoekstra was exercising the responsibilities of his office...providing some over sight!

Fallacious assumptions by whom Mr. Arkin?

I have no great confidence in Congress when it comes to oversight. I have read that Kappas is respected in CIA circles, and Hayden wanted him to help quiet troubled waters. I also understand Kappas takes care of his troops and will go to the mat for them. First comes the mission, second are the troops that execute the mission and, finally, superiors. God help the troops or superiors who do not properly execute or support the mission. Bush was elected President and not God. I had three Commanders-In-Chief, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson. Bush is Commander-In-Chief of the military services, and, if you are not in the service, he is not your Commander-In-Chief. Bush and Congress are trashing this country. They need to go.
While the mission comes first, any man who takes care of his people has my support. I have been somewhat influenced by N.C.O.s in the Air Force and Army

I found Hoekstra's letter to be a strange combination of paranoic rant and intriguing hints; the references to a whistleblower first pointed to Russell Tice, but after reading
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/001102.php#more
and his previous posts, Dave Gaubatz seems to be the guy, in light of Hoekstra's obsession with WMD. He worked at Air Force Research Lab, which has worked on space-based applications.

Could this NSA program be about detecting WMD's from space?

I do agree Congress needs to pay closer attention to what is going on, but if you've ever been involved in preparing Congressional testimony, you'd be very underwhelmed by how that process works. Its 100% scripted for the speakers, with a flash of bravado from the legislators for CSPAN, when its open testimony.

Nice to see Che is up to his old spam nonsense again, what a total butt monkey.

She never loved you anyway!

Mr. Hoekstra, she was just trying to get your 'House' and the Senate, to spend money on her.

Perhaps Mr. Hoekstra has been inspired by the recent decision of the United States Supreme Court with respect to the limits of Executive Power.

For it would appear that Mr. Hoekstra has decided to stand up, and not be a girly man, and demand an explanation for the unrequited love from the Bush Administration.

For the past 6-year daliance between Congress and the Executive Branch has left a lot to be desired. It would appear that she, the Executive Branch, ran around and got everything that she wanted, while her jilted lover stood by and gave consent!

It wasn't just Bush and the Administration, or simply the new heads of the CIA, former NSA guys who created the nexus of secrecy at the NSA, Dr. Rice's stamp is all over it.

She conducted herself in the same manner at the NSA, that she did as Provost, just down the street, at Stanford University! Dr. Rice is cute, but she is also deadly! Mr. Bush has learned a lot from her, just as his dad learned, when she was his expert on Sovietology!

Never let a pretty face fool you, not even George Bush's.

The Rev

For uncensored news please go to:
www.wsws.org
www.takingaim.info
www.onlinejournal.com
otherside123.blogspot.com

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_976.shtml

Bring me the head of "Kenny Boy" Lay: Another convenient death invites new investigations of Enron-Bush crimes

By Larry Chin
Kenneth Lay, world-class Enron criminal, long-time Bush family friend and crime ally, was pronounced dead on July 5, allegedly of a heart-related condition.

Lay's name can now be added to the list of dubious Enron-related deaths, which include the alleged 2002 shotgun suicide of Enron Vice Chairman Clifford Baxter (also see analysis here, and here).

Lay's hasty exit, which comes as he faced 45 years of prison for conspiracy and fraud charges (the barest tip of the iceberg of his true crimes), has sparked rampant speculation. Initial mainstream reports on the cause of death have been confusing at best: "heart attack," "heart failure," and "heart disease" are distinct and different conditions.

Lay, who was reportedly depressed and embittered, has now been conveniently removed before receiving punishment (elite criminals rarely get what they deserve). Charges against Lay and his estate may be conveniently tossed (leaving his squirreled assets available for new uses). The Bush administration, and Congress, is conveniently protected from any possibility of a damning testimony or revelation.

Lay's supposed demise, however interesting, is ultimately irrelevant. Far more important is the fact that Enron is still an open criminal case: the true crimes of Enron remain unaddressed.

More importantly, the apparatus that Ken Lay and Enron set into motion is alive and well. It still shapes the fabric of daily geopolitical life.

Ken Lay's living legacy in our faces

Lay, affectionately named "Kenny Boy" by the Bushes themselves, has in recent years gone from a leading Bush policy architect to the family's number one persona non grata. From a Wall Street darling, to a pariah and the poster child of malfeasance, shunned by those whose pockets he once lined.

His public treatment notwithstanding, the Bush administration, and the New World Order's inner circle, must privately worship Lay for the way he wielded Enron as a geostrategic weapon of mass destruction. Consider what Lay has left the world:

1. Lay and Enron not only helped create the Bush administration's energy and war policies; it brought them nightmarishly to life, in every corner of the planet. Ken Lay's fingerprints can be found, today, in every resource-rich hot spot that Enron infiltrated and conquered, from Central Asia and India, to Colombia and the Far East. The invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as plans to control domestic energy supplies and prices (and the lives of Americans) are a direct result of Ken Lay's machinations.

Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force, the infamous and secret US National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG), the probable "rosetta stone" of 9/11 that documents the motives behind the Bush administration's world energy conquest, has remained the subject of intensive and illegal stonewalling. Ken Lay was there: official memos have amply documented Lay's direct links to Cheney and Cheney's energy plan.

2. The practices pioneered by Enron and pushed to spectacular and creative extremes -- financial fraud, pro-forma accounting, money laundering, offshore funneling of illegal monies, shell companies, "off the books" transactions, energy gaming, etc. -- continue to be quietly used by corporations everywhere. It is business as usual on Wall Street.

3. Globalization, the brand epitomized by Enron, thrives. Multinational corporations continue to function as quasi-military-intelligence arms of the US, and other allied predatory governments, working alongside the intelligence agencies and militaries themselves. Witness the operations of Halliburton, DynCorp and AIG.

4. The financial institutions, banks and investment houses that assisted Enron in its schemes, domiciled in the US as well as offshore, continue to feed like engorged tapeworms from trillions of dollars of looted funds. Perhaps you still bank with one of these institutions. Perhaps your pension fund is under the control of one of them now. You can thank Ken Lay for that.

5. The manipulation of energy and the fleecing of consumers also continue to this day, in more shaded and sophisticated forms, as does "deregulation." The occasional cries of foul from certain politicians in victimized regions has changed nothing. As energy prices soar, as Peak Oil and Gas makes itself felt in earnest, and new "energy crises" erupt, the ghost of Ken Lay will be there, grinning. He -- it -- still presides over this nation's energy grids and energy trader's "gaming" rooms.

6. Enron is not dead and buried, any more than BCCI was ever destroyed. There is no cause for celebration. The Enron corporation itself even lives on (as does BCCI) in the form of renamed, acquired and merged entities.

The Enron players hiding in plain sight

Legions of politicians fed at Enron's trough, Republicans and Democrats alike. The same members of Congress who received fat Enron checks are still in Washington.

The George W. Bush administration, that Enron helped install and push into power, has two more years to expand its world war, seize remaining energy supplies, squeeze profits from Peak Oil for their own constituents, and deepen the militarization of the United States.

Arnold Schwarzenegger is the governor of California. His direct Enron connections scarcely mentioned, or even acknowledged. He will likely be re-elected (or re-selected) this fall, continuing the Republican plunder of California -- not ironically the target of Enron's first crimes in 2000.

The former chairman of Enron's finance committee, Herbert "Pug" Winokur, the wolf in the Enron fold, is still out there, untouched. As noted by Michael C. Ruppert in Crossing The Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil:

"Aside from playing a major role in the looting of Russia, Harvard University also seems to have deep connections into the domestic economy of crime. Catherine Austin Fitts connected the dots in a 2002 article which told us that not only had Winokur chaired the Enron finance committee and escaped federal scrutiny, he was also a lead investor in, and creator of, a company called DynCorp (now CSC-DynCorp) that has lucrative vaccine and biowarfare contracts . . .

"So ubiquitous is DynCorp that we will see its hands all over the map in connection with 9/11 and the ruling of America. DynCorp is everywhere. It manages the Congressional telephone system. Along with Lockheed-Martin, it does the computerized bookkeeping for a dozen federal agencies including the DoD and HUD, which have lost (or allowed to be stolen) trillions of taxpayer dollars. It also has a contract to manage the police and court systems in US-occupied Iraq.

"Winokur's connections to Enron, DynCorp and the Harvard Endowment (which during the Clinton years saw its assets increase from $3 billion to $19 billion) demonstrate that quite often the key players escape mainstream scrutiny altogether . . . Among other revelations were the facts that Harvard had made direct financial investments bailing out an ailing Harken Energy Corporation, then run by George W. Bush, and that, through its investment arm, Highfields Capital, it had dumped large quantities of Enron stock just before it crashed: insider trading at its best. " There is no doubt that "Kenny Boy" Lay, the founder of Enron, was there every step of the way with "Pug."

Where, indeed, are the trillions of missing taxpayer dollars that were bilked by Enron?

For the rest of this article go to the link above.

"I have learned of some alleged Intelligence Community activities about which our committee has not been briefed. ... If these allegations are true, they may represent a breach of responsibility by the administration, a violation of law and, just as importantly, a direct affront to me and the members of this committee who have so ardently supported efforts to collect information on our enemies."

Question: how is a direct "affront" as important as a "violation of law"? And has Hoekstra addressed this violation of law since the letter as he has the affront?