|
I'm not saying that they need to detail how they get the calls and who/when they managed and who/when failed to intercept. However, even if the individual interception targets aren't discussed, 100% of them (not 99%) should be according to policy explicitly decided by the lawmakers - not arbitrarily by NSA leadership, but by President and/or Congress. Should NSA wiretap governments of NATO countries? Should NSA record communications of all americans? The answer may be yes or no, there are all kinds of reasons, but it's definitely not the right of NSA to decide on that answer; they are allowed to do that if and only if the democratically elected policymakers have, well, made policies that allow that. These policies need not be public, but they need to be there - it would be completely understandable if Obama had authorised the wiretapping of Merkel and everyone else but denies it for diplomatic reasons, but it's unforgiveable sabotage if the same thing happened against the direction that president and secretary of state desired. It's quite likely that the intel coming from German politician phones is more important than the effect of it on German relations, as the scandal will likely wash away soon. However, it's not the job or privilege of mr. Clapper to decide on that compromise; his job is to implement whatever decision the lawmakers and commander in chief come up with, even if he disagrees with that decision. And if the lawmakers ask him to testify under oath, as they had with earlier surveillance questions then his absolute duty is to obey them, not the intelligence community. The intel committee does know better than to ask for methods and sources, but if they do explicitly ask for some reason and keep up the request after being warned - then he'd damn well give up the real sources, even if it costs lives; if in such a situation he provides a fake source then he deserves (forgive me for some exaggeration) to be executed for treason - it's not 'his' agency or data, it all belongs to the elected representatives of 'we the people'. How would mr. Clapper personally react in his previous USAF position, if one of his subordinate officers had deliberately mislead him to cause a decision that the subordinate wanted? Wouldn't court martial be the obvious, immediate, mandatory response? |