The National Security Agency's electronic surveillance programs are
already having a chilling effect on free speech, at least according to a
report by the former executive editor of The Washington Post.
"The Obama Administration and the Press," penned by Leonard Downie
Jr., whose career at the storied newspaper included time spent as an
editor during the Watergate era, says sources for stories involving
national security are far less likely to talk to reporters following
revelations of mass spying by the NSA.
Downie -- also an executive with the Committee to Protect Journalists,
the press-freedom nonprofit that published the report Thursday -- spoke
with 30 experienced Washington journalists about the Obama
administration's dealings with the press, and its aggressive policies
toward leakers such as Edward Snowden. The journalists included
reporters from ABC, the Associated Press, CBS (parent of CNET), CNN, The
New York Times, and the Post.
Downie says there's no evidence the Obama administration is tapping
NSA tools like Prism in its efforts to track and prosecute leakers but
that the tools are nevertheless a threat to the press' role as a
watchdog over government:
At this writing, no connection has been established between the NSA
surveillance programs and the many leak investigations being conducted
by the Obama administration -- but the surveillance has added to the
fearful atmosphere surrounding American journalists and government
sources.
"There is greater concern that their communications
are being monitored -- office phones, e-mail systems," Post reporter
[Rajiv] Chandrasekaran said. "I have to resort to personal e-mail or
face to face, even for things I would consider routine."
Downie also quotes the Post's Dana Priest, whose 2011 book "Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State"
examined the huge and secretive national security apparatus assembled
after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks on the World Trade Center
and the Pentagon.
Potential insider sources "think [the government is] looking at
reporters' records," Priest said. "I'm writing fewer things in e-mail.
I'm even afraid to tell officials what I want to talk about because it's
all going into one giant computer."
It's not just the NSA. Downie's report looks at the Obama
administration's attitude toward the control of information and the
censuring of leakers -- "the most aggressive I've seen since the Nixon
administration," he says.
In regard to leakers/whistle-blowers, The New York Times' Scott Shane is quoted as saying:
I think we have a real problem. Most people are deterred by those leaks
prosecutions. They're scared to death. There's a gray zone between
classified and unclassified information, and most sources were in that
gray zone. Sources are now afraid to enter that gray zone. It's having a
deterrent effect. If we consider aggressive press coverage of
government activities being at the core of American democracy, this tips
the balance heavily in favor of government.
And Downie taps Harvard Law professor and former Bush administration
lawyer Jack Goldsmith for some perspective. There's no "perfect solution
to this problem," Goldsmith says. "Too much secrecy and too much
leaking are both bad. A leaker has to be prepared to subject himself to
the penalties of law, but leaks can serve a realy important role in
helping correct government malfeasance, to encourage government to be
careful about what it does in secret and to preserve democratic
processes."
The report also discusses the Obama administration's unprecedented
use of social media and the Web. What some might characterize as an
effort toward transparency and direct contact with the public is called
into question as something more akin to propaganda and, as former CNN
Washington Bureau Chief Frank Sesno puts it, an attempt "to end run the
news media completely."
Downie said that in its defense, the administration points, in part,
to "presidential directives to put more government data online, to speed
up processing of Freedom of Information Act requests, and to limit the
amount of government information classified as secret." It also cites
the "declassification and public release of information about NSA
communications surveillance programs in the wake of Snowden's leak."
You can read the report in its entirety -- including the various responses from the Obama administration --
here.
Snowden feted in Russia Meanwhile, Prism leaker Edward
Snowden was visited in Russia by four US whistle-blowing advocates, who
gave him an award for his efforts and said he looked "great" and was
"remarkably centered."
Snowden had pretty much vanished since being granted temporary asylum by Russian President Valdimir Putin this summer.
Except, that is, for the occasional run to the grocery store for a
shopping cart full of secrets.
(Note: The Christian Science Monitor reports that Snowden's lawyer says, yes, that is indeed Snowden on a supermarket run, though probably not in Moscow.)
Those honoring Snowden were members of the Sam Adams Associates for
Integrity in Intelligence, a group of former national security
officials,
says The Washington Post.
They included Thomas Drake, a former NSA employee who leaked
documents about spending and mismanagement issues at the NSA to a
Baltimore Sun reporter, and was
subjected to a prosecution
that a federal judge later called "four years of hell.
" (Drake figures
in the above mentioned report by the Committee to Protect Journalists.)
Another, former CIA officer turned activist
Ray McGovern, said,
according to
The Wall Street Journal, that Snowden has "made his peace with what he
did. He's convinced that what he did was right. He has no regrets and he
is
ready to face whatever the future holds for him."
Snowden's father also landed in Russia on Thursday and will presumably be secreted away to a visit with his son.
"I have no idea what [my son's] intentions are, but ever since he has
been in Russia, my understanding is that he has simply been trying to
remain healthy and safe and he has nothing to do with future stories,"
Lon Snowden was
quoted as saying in The Christian Monitor.
"
I am not sure my son will be returning to the US again. That's his
decision, he is an adult, he is a person who is responsible for his own
agency. I am his father, I love my son, and I certainly hope I will have
an opportunity to see my son," the elder
Snowden said.
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