DOJ obtains AP phone records

I know there's another thread for Benghazi!11!11! but I don't visit that one at all. The two talking points above stick in my craw b/c they are so lame at their core.

1. Here's a memo to any American who doesn't know better: all press-briefing talking points change multiple times. It's called writing multiple drafts, and professionals in more minor positions (like me) even do that with little daily emails if the topic looks especially dicey (nevermind if people have been killed.) For Chrisakes America, get over "changing talking points!!1!!" -- that's true in any smart organization.

Suppressing or distorting information is bad. Changing talking points is nothing but normal business.

2. Four people died as a result of an attack on our embassy, just like dozens of other Americans have died in dozens of previous attacks on our embassies. Could some of these deaths been avoided? You bet. All of them could have been avoided if we posted standing armies at all our embassies or just shut more of them the hell down.

 

so changing talking points to a lie to make it appear the attacks were from protesters instead of terrorists to follow their youtube theory sound aok? No one is talking about the actual changing of points but changing of points to push a lie is a different story. 12 changes for one report normal? Seems a little excessive no?

as far as other embassies.. no one died as a result of politics is the argument.

 

Yes, if talking points are changed to lie, that's not good (though that, too, happens every day of national politics that I've seen, including and especially for matters of war, i.e. Vietnam and Iraq to name only two.)

But also yes, lots of people keep saying: "they changed the talking points! OMG!" And that in itself, (it sounds like you agree), is trivial and meaningless.

I personally think the talking points were altered: (1) truly in the fog of war, with incomplete information, but (2) given 1, they felt free to tilt things to their political advantage, especially in light of their reelection themes.

Who in modern politics would not do that? Sorry to be so cynical, but given point #1, how could politicians not do #2? I guess the alternative was to make no statements at all, to anyone, until they were much more sure about what happened? Meh, I am derailing the thread at hand, and my apologies for that.

 

The Benghazi one, and the AP one.

The AP one appears to be totally fake at this point. The investigation is over the information leaked to the AP reporters which is why the govt. took their records. They did that only after more than 500 interviews and other ways to try and acquire the records.

The information that was leaked was highly classified. Republican congressmen were crying out for an investigation into the leak which is exactly what happened and why the govt. seized the records.

Not only is Obama not at all involved neither is the AG since he recused himself since in the abstract he could be the actual leaker because it was someone from the DOJ.

I'm sorry yet another scandal didn't work out for you.

 

AP held records until after the investigation.. classified information was obviously not classified at that point. (which is the issue)

Eric Holder investigating himself is not something I would give much trust in.. cudos to him.. but regardless when you get phone records.. the search must be focused not 20 AP reporter records for 2 months unfettered. I know you are protecting your dear leader but I don't give 2 ****s about him.. the system is broken if they are allowed to do this.

Sorry that your dear leader is having a hard time but the scandal investigations appears to be just starting. So I wouldn't count those eggs just yet.

You know it's bad when the MSM is starting to cut strings and know when that ship is sinking.

Slate - The U.S. Government Spies on Reporters All Too Frequently
Jon Stewart blasts Obama on IRS scandal
USA Today - IRS approved liberal groups while Tea Party in limbo

 

The question isn't about AP holding the records until after they weren't classified it's about how they got them in the first place. Somebody leaked. Republicans were calling for investigation and punishment in it. The investigation eventually involved the AP reporters.

The dear leader you keep referring to is the President of the United States. I guess it's a piss poor attempt at humor to call him by the N.Korean president's nickname, but he's your president as well. He isn't someone I voted for in the past election. I am in general against Obama's going after whistle blowers, and in general he has a terrible record in going after whistles blowers. At first, I thought this was another horrible example of that. He's had others. Those could be real scandals but nobody else seemed to care. In this instance I have no stake in trying to protect the president. I hate the idea of going after whistle blowers. IT just looks like that isn't what happened here. I prefer the truth rather than another fake scandal in an effort to go after someone you don't like.

In this case there is a reasonable and logical explanation of why the govt. looked into the reporters phone records.

 

1) Benghazi seems murky, at best, as a "scandal". IMO it's a bit more scandalous how the press made a fool of themselves. Reminds me of the Dan Rather flub as of late, honestly.

2) The AP story is scandalous, but in light of the now 10+ year old warrantless wiretapping "scandal" and the administration's obvious doublespeak regarding transparency, it's hardly something new or egregiously different in terms of its breadth. Arguably, the DOJ was following the rule book way more than the normal modus operandi of our government as of late. That doesn't excuse it in any way shape or form. It's just that many folks screaming about it strike me as disengenuous, particularly those on the right.

This was good:

Although generically I don't like the broad search of reporter's records and I disagree with the methodology employed accordingly - they have a right to maintain the secrecy of their contacts. The most important part of any competent government journalist's job is precisely to uncover the secrets and report them so that the people can, in theory, react. I don't like the slippery slope here at all. But I'm not surprised at all.

 

Several things

1. This is our first Ambassador to die in 30 years.

2. Having diplomatic missions around the world is vital is creating relationships of good will and support to United States ex pats around the world.

3. Question. What is a standing Army? Stevens asked for support and was denied. He asked the Libyans for support and they ignored him. There are records that the Mission was being staked out during the day of Sept 11th.

4. The YouTube video was not in the talking points at all.

5. Any reference of AQ or other terrorist group were scrubbed from talking points even though overwhelming evidence states otherwise including Hick's testimony of speaking directly with State Dept.

6. Because of the YouTube Sunday talk show debacle, the Libyan gov't refused to allow FBI to investigate the crime scene for another 18 days.


Was this a horrible tragedy? Yes. Should there be some kind of consequence for the poor handling and improper deception used? Yes

Do I know what that consequence should be? Not yet

Let the investigation run its course. Demos and Repubs will have every opportunity to make their cases.

 

Boy I wish we could apply this more often. You know, maybe regarding things like wars and wiretapping programs and guantanamo and torture and...

See my previous post, end of point 2.

 

benghazi tangent in the DOJ AP thread... ok.

To say those people died because of politics is a twisted view of those that would seek to politicize a tragedy, something we once persevered to rise above together as a country. The politics is after the fact bickering over how accurate the portrayal of the events that had already occurred were. Buttsore meandering of those mad that it didn't cost dems the election.

Painting everyone who doesn't agree with the conservative talking points on the legitimacy of this as partisan dems protecting their dear leader is lacking in thought. There are other parties, ideologies, and opinions out there besides "ours or enemy kowtowing".

Rhad is on the money, and should prove the previous paragraph here.

 

I agree.

 

I'm all for protecting the press, and think it's really the only way to protect our democracy, so it is of utmost importance.

The only reason I don't think it's necessarily a scandal, is that the press has never been allowed to have classified information. Somebody had details regarding the foiling of a terrorist bomb plot and that pertained to the active investigation of that, and leaked them to the press. Any govt. in the history of the U.S. would investigate to find out who did that. If the DOJ went right away and confiscated all of the phone records that would be a problem. They only did that after their investigation hit a dead end after more than 500 interviews and other investigative techniques. It wasn't a first resort, and hardly seems politically motivated.

 

But it's not just any government, is it?

 

I could theoretically subpoena your phone records in a civil proceeding - did you know that?

 

Which is it? The press is in the lap of the President...... but they are reporting on the scandals and criticizing Obama... So I guess they are not in the lap of the President... you cannot have it both ways.

 

I have done it numerous times.

I only needed a court order one time. I got it in about 10 minutes from the judge.

Par for the course in civil proceedings.....

 

Is rhad a member of the press?

 

What difference does THAT make? Both are private citizens.

 

So tell me how you would get a judge to give you a member of the press' work phone records?