While we were busy covering the ‘Iranian Twitter Revolution’ and gobbling up the latest ‘sex’ news involving Sanford:

Robert Gates issued his anticipated order to establish the U.S. Cyber Command which ‘supposedly’ will be responsible for defending the military portion of cyberspace. Of course the preoccupation with Sanford’s hanky panky and playing cheerleader for our twitter buddies didn’t allow for any in-depth coverage of this gigantic development.

Here is what my friend and a member of NSWBC, Russ Tice, Former NSA Senior Intelligence Analyst & Action Officer, had to say about this latest development:

“As StratCom has neither the expertise nor technical resources to conduct this mission, the default control of CyberCom will fall, by design, into the lap of NSA. This was similarly true of StratCom being given responsibility for military space after the demise of US Space Command, which effectively ceded control of space to the Air Force. Are we to believe that CyberCom being headquartered not at Omaha, NE, but rather at Fort Meade, MD, right next to NSA; and with NSA’s current director, Lieutenant General Keith Alexander, promoted to a four star general, as its head, is a coincidence?

NSA has coveted control of cyber operations for some time and already exerts considerable influence in the mission field. Illegally, NSA has tapped into all domestic e-mail traffic within the United States. To allow them the ability to subject all U.S. domestic computer communications to offensive cyber attacks and the many other aspects of digital “information warfare” should make all of America shutter in fear. Of course this supposedly will be subject to congressional oversight, federal statutes, executive orders, and agency regulations, and we all now know how steadfastly NSA is committed to these safeguards and to our constitutional liberties. With NSA now pulling the wool over our new president’s eyes, in conjunction with their contempt for congressional oversight, I am truly horrified of the prospect that NSA will usher us into a new dystopia where we will soon learn the mandatory newspeak language that will alter the concluding line of our national anthem from “… the land of the free and home of the brave” to, “… the land of the fear and the home of the depraved”.

This development indicates that SecDef Robert Gates is truly a creature of his former master. Be afraid America, be very afraid, as NSA will soon be the number one “clear and present danger” to your freedom and liberty. “

For the first time, Tice goes on record and reveals his exact job title and mission concentration while working for the NSA & DIA:

“At NSA and while at DIA, I worked as an Intelligence Analyst & Capabilities Operations Officer specializing in all aspects of OFFENSIVE INFORMATION WARFARE (O-IW).”

I had a meeting with James Bamford and got a ‘real’ education on how alarming this really is. I am also in touch with a few other NSA sources and friends, so more on this later…

Next

US drone attacks on a funeral in South Waziristan piled up at least 35 more civilian bodies. Let’s add these up as we go. Jeremy Scahill has a solid piece on this:

“In the first 99 days of 2009, more than 150 people were reportedly killed in these drone attacks. The most recent documented attack was Tuesday in Waziristan. Since 2006, the US drone strikes have killed 687 people (as of April). That amounts to about 38 deaths a month just from drone attacks.”

So yes, let’s take the responsibility of adding these up since our media and many blogosphere activists are currently busy with Sanford’s escapade and ‘twitter land.’

Back to Iran

And, for the final update I am choosing a couple of relevant reports in line with our own ‘twitter’ coverage:

Chip Pitts has an interesting analysis on ‘Twitter Factor’ over at CSR LAW. It is extensively documented and linked. I plan to go back and read it a second time.

Philip Giraldi has a refreshing perspective on the latest concerning Iran over at AntiWar.

Giraldi appropriately bashes the newly found expertise among those who’ve been muddying historical facts and what’s really happening on the ground with their intentional fiction, spin, or, ignorant interpretation reeking with naivety or plain old stupidity:

“Having spent much of my working life as an intelligence officer on the street in places like Istanbul, I am astonished at what passes for expertise in the debate over what to do about Iran. It is clear that even the few genuine experts on Iran don’t really know what is going on there because they are slaves to their sources of information, which tend to reflect their own philosophical viewpoints and are, in any event, narrowly based.”

Here are a few excerpts on ‘Twitter Hero’ Mousavi:

“He is, in reality, a defender of extremely corrupt vested interests. That he has attracted the support of the so-called “Gucci crowd” of twentyish twitterers does not mean that he has embraced western values.”

I love his right on target characterization here: “Gucci Crowd of Twentyish Twitterers”!! Well-said, Phil, totally in line with what I’ve been getting from my Iranian sources here and over there.

“And then there is the corruption issue, Iran’s six hundred pound gorilla. Mousavi is heir to the corrupt Iran of the post- revolutionary period when the country was looted by the senior clerics cooperating with the business class, the bazaaris.”

The corruption charges on Mousavi are valid; have been established. He appears to fit the “State Department Viable Candidate Criteria,’ don’t you agree? And, here is another good observation:

“If there was one thing I learned from twenty years of experience as a military intelligence and CIA officer it is that nothing is ever what it seems. If a situation appears to be clear cut, with good guys and bad guys arrayed against each other it is probably anything but. So maybe black and white comes out gray. All the more reason to step back.”

And this is how Giraldi nicely wraps up his piece:

“The old Hippocratic advice to doctors to “do no harm” should perhaps be the best advice for the American political chattering classes and the media. Doing no harm regarding events in Iran is to stay out of it.”

That’s it for a quick round up of a few select issues while Sanford Gate & the Iran Spin machine are busy at work, taking up space and time all over the news and much of the blogosphere…

‘Pressure’ is one of those buzzwords you hear in almost all discussions involving the mainstream media and related topics: Government Pressure, Corporate Pressure, Special Interest & Lobby Pressure, Management Pressure, Colleagues Pressure…It’s always pressure – whether its pressure placed directly on the reporter, editor, or on the board and or ownership…So how does it work? How much pressure? What methods are used? Of course, the answer largely depends on ‘who’ the pressure comes from (government or corporate or …), ‘who’ is the target of the pressure (is it the source, the reporter, etc.). For this post I am going to focus on what’s referred to as ‘government pressure,’ provide you with my take by providing context and case examples, and then let you bring in yours.

Just to make sure you understand – I don’t claim to be an expert, nor do I pretend to have all the right answers. I am drawing upon eight years of direct first hand experience in dealing with the media on my case, four years of interaction with the MSM on and with our organization and our National Security Whistleblowers, and years of association and friendship with many journalists, authors, attorneys and experts active in the area of national security and civil liberties. I am still seeking answers and looking for solutions…


Flexing Muscles

Many cases of the government resorting to intimidation and harassment to prevent a story from coming out go unreported. I suppose this proves the effectiveness of this method. The flexing muscles method ranges from subtle threats to overt harassment. Many of these cases go unreported simply because the ‘pressure’ takes care of the ‘problem,’ and the ‘pressured’ party, either due to the shame of giving in or the fear of ‘further pressure,’ goes mum into their grave.

Here is a case where government agents’ muscle flexing through overt harassment did not go unreported because the target happened to be an investigative journalist with a proven track record and integrity; a rare breed, indeed:

Bill Conroy is an editor at the San Antonio Business Journal and a contributing journalist for Narco News and an author. The Reports Committee for Freedom of the Press was one of very few outlets to report the story of the government’s harassment and intimidation, targeting Conroy for his reporting of a leaked memo regarding the centralized database for tracking terrorists.

“A leaked memo from the investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security sparked its officials to interview a writer last month in an attempt to discover his source for an article on the online news service Narco News.”

You can read the story and the leaked memo in question here. The memo divulged that DHS supervisory agents in the field were directed to alter terrorism related files without preserving their original versions. This is equivalent to shredding during the pre-computer era. Rather important, right? The government then sent some agents who apparently were instructed to teach Conroy a lesson or two:

“Two agents came to his home and spoke to his wife while Conroy was at work, and appeared at his office the next day. Conroy, an editor at the San Antonio Business Journal, contributes to Narco News. The agents spoke to Conroy as well as his boss at the Journal in an apparent attempt to intimidate him into revealing his source, said Ron Tonkin, Conroy’s attorney.”

So they send a couple of tough looking agents with a mission to intimidate and harass. Send the agents to the target reporter’s office and have them treat him as a ‘criminal suspect,’ and make sure his colleagues and boss are around to watch… Send them to his house, make sure the neighbors see the agents knock on his door and flash their badges, and instruct them to intimidate the spouse and or the children. You might be surprised to learn how many ‘targeted reporters’ actually do get ‘pressured’ out of reporting in cases like this; how many divulge sources; and how many pledge not to ever enter the ‘no no zone’ again. Bill Conroy didn’t, but Conroy is among a tiny group…

“Bill Conroy did not divulge the source of the leak in his article and refused to when agents visited his home and workplace on May 23 and 24, respectively, asking for his sources in the department.”

And guess what? In the end, they couldn’t do anything to him. Shouldn’t this be a lesson to reporters who follow a different path?

“Although the agents reportedly mentioned speaking to the U.S. attorney, implying they might obtain a subpoena for the information, no such order has been issued. A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton of the western district of Texas declined comment. Calls to the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Office of Professional Responsibility were not returned.”

Intimidation can also come in the form of a legal bluff. This approach seems to be gaining popularity since the September 11 attacks. The government can, and has been, using ‘National Security’ to declare many embarrassing or incriminating stories ‘classified.’ This allows them to flash their ‘we’ll take you to court’ card, and wait to see whether the target publication or reporter decides to ‘hold or fold or walk away.’

Let’s look at New York Times reporter James Risen’s case:

“A federal grand jury has issued a subpoena to a reporter of The New York Times, apparently to try to force him to reveal his confidential sources for a 2006 book on the Central Intelligence Agency, one of the reporter’s lawyers said Thursday.”

The same article emphasized that this trend is not isolated:

“Mr. Risen, who is based in Washington and specializes in intelligence issues, is the latest of several reporters to face subpoenas in leak investigations overseen by the Justice Department.”

How many reporters can afford the hefty legal fees to fight a case like this in court, when the government has at its disposal unlimited resources in dollars, legal maneuvering expertise, and manpower? Not many, I can assure you. Lucky lucky Risen! As for publications, also not many who’ll be willing. And unfortunately, not many reporters can easily secure pro-bono representation by a civil liberties organization with enough muscle to challenge the government. Thus many at an early stage, when ‘pressured’ by threats of legal action, give in and abandon a story yet to be written. Then add to this the recently revealed NSA targeting of journalists and you get the kind of pressure that may even eliminate the need for legal threats. Just the knowledge of being monitored is enough ‘pressure’ to dissuade many editors and reporters from pursuing‘radioactive’ cases in the first place.

The same government intimidation and threat tactics are also applied to ‘sources.’ Here is a brief account of my own experience:

In 2002, a few days before the airing of the CBS-60 Minutes segment on my case, my attorneys received a letter by fax from the Justice Department attorneys. The letter was to let us know that I would be pursued legally and severely if I went through with this interview. They strongly claimed that any information I was to disclose was being considered ‘classified.’ Of course, my attorneys knew better, and we didn’t bulge. And low and behold no ‘action’ ever came from the government following the airing of the segment. It was bluff, threat and intimidation; just that.

Not only did the government try to stop my appearance on the program, they took similar action with another FBI whistleblower, John Roberts, who also was interviewed for that same segment.


Source Pressures

Everyone knows ‘high-level government sources’ to reporters on politics and intelligence related matters is what the rolodex is in business. The net-worth, the value, of these reporters is frequently judged based on their ‘access.’ Sure; it makes sense. First, a reporter tries to make his/her way up the chain and establish the ‘relationship and trust’ necessary for this access. Next, and equally important, is to ‘maintain’ this relationship. This too makes sense, and is part of the job. Now, the question is, at what price? What are the things a reporter is willing to do, how far is he/she willing to go to ‘maintain’ his or her access?

Successful experienced journalists with a solid sense of ethics and integrity are good at ‘balancing’ when it comes to ‘source maintenance.’ This appears to be one of those disappearing qualities within the mainstream media. When the publication, the editors, lean towards, sorry, bend over, the government’s angle on stories, the reporters follow by compromising ‘a lot’ to keep and maintain their news/information ‘feeders’ within the government agencies.

I am going to provide you with another first-hand witnessed and documented incident. The only reason I am not naming ‘the well-known reporter & publication’ is to protect the source who obtained and passed on the incriminating documented evidence – the communication that occurred in writing between him and this particular ‘reporter.’

The individual who dealt with the congressional and press side of my case during the early stages of my whistleblowing journey wrote an e-mail to a well-known and well-placed journalist, saying, ‘Man, I can’t believe you guys did not cover this!!! Ashcroft comes out and invokes the State Secrets Privilege, first time ever asserted by the Bush administration, and you don’t write about it?! What the hell, man?! What’s the deal? I sent you the press release and attached a bunch of documents on that e-mail…’

Here is the response from that well-known journalist, and stupidly enough in writing: ‘I was going to call you. A few months ago I finally got this big DOJ guy, I mean BIG! Our deal-exclusive. You can’t do better than that in Washington. Anyhow, he doesn’t want us to touch Edmonds’ story. Period. I am not going to piss off my source for some God Damn translator whistleblower…’

The reporter’s refusal to cover the story was irrational – the State Secrets Privilege invocation was first released through an official DOJ press release and other major publications ran with the news. So what does this tell you? To maintain high-level government sources well-known reporters cut deals like this: You be my man, and I and what I cover will be yours. Unfortunately, through several reporter friends I was given many more examples and was told ‘that’s the name of the game when it comes to covering politics and government in this city.’

Soft Pressures

I touched on this type of pressure in the previous piece and in my last op-ed, and the recent revelations on Harman-New York Times provides both the context and case example. The fact that the NSA, DOJ and whatever other agency can softly ask the editors and management of the New York Times to sit on a major story involving criminal government action against it’s own people for over a year, and the request be complied with. The fact that a Congresswoman has enough ‘ins and pull’ to dial the decision-makers’ number at the New York Times and ask them ‘as a favor’ to not publish a story. The fact that a LA Times editor dutifully reports to NSA its source’s disclosure on wiretapping and the AT&T, takes his marching orders, comes back, and kills the story.

You see what I mean? There are many, many ‘soft pressure’ cases out there.

As with the various theories on the factors contributing to MSM degradation, the pressure styles can also be applied in combination. While the Justice Department attorneys are ‘flexing muscles’ by threatening the information source with legal action, their Attorney General or Deputy or whomever can be making his ‘soft’ call to dissuade the editor from moving forward with the story, and their Special Agent in Charge of whatever department may be summoning his ‘pet reporter’ to ban him from working on this same target story.