NSA Oversight: To Difi, It Means "Sitting In a Higher Chair Than the Witness."

Senator Feinstein has felt the heat and now she has seen the light. Whereas previously, she was unwilling to consider any sort of legislation that would annoy even the littlest finger of the Stasi NSA, now she is willing to consider it.

Color me "unimpressed".

Feinstein, for all her fealty to the NSA, might as well be drawing a paycheck that was personally signed by Emperor Alexander. Her "reforms" were either written by the Emperor's staff or approved by him.

I can think of at least three things that are needed to begin to reform this mess. First, the "black budgets" must end. The American people have the right to know where our money is going.

Second, an independent inspector general must have the authority to investigate abuses at Department of Defense intelligence agencies. The IG must not be under the command of the Secretary of Defense, but someone appointed by the President, confirmed by the Senate and answerable only to them.

Third, a public/Constitutional advocate must be appointed to represent us in all FISA court proceedings. The public advocate (and, for that matter, the IG) should serve only for a set period of time to prevent "regulatory capture", the bureaucratic analogue to the Stockholm Syndrome.

Alexander and his "boss", Jimmie the Perjurer, have been lying for years about the scope and quality of the NSA's surveillance of the American people. As Sen. Wyden put it:

"You talk about the damage that has been done by disclosures, but any government official who thought this would never be disclosed was ignoring history. The truth always manages to come out.... The NSA leadership built an intelligence data collection system that repeatedly deceived the American people. Time and time again the American people were told one thing in a public forum, while intelligence agencies did something else in private."

The intelligence community is also ignoring history by their repeated assurances that they can be trusted not to abuse their powers. History teaches us that power corrupts, period. Power, both large and small, can be counted on to be abused by the person holding the power. The only way to stop such corruption is to have watchdogs, both inside and outside the government.

The "outside the government" watchdogs are supposed to be our free press. They have fallen down woefully on the job. The NY Times has continued in the Judith Miller tradition of acting as a stenographer to the powerful. The revelations throughout the NSA Affair have been made public by foreign news organizations, with the Times and the WaPo coming in behind them in "oh, this is out there, so we can print it now" mode.