PATRIOT ACT, PART II

I came up with my own theory, using the old HeavyHanded instincts, about this new revelation, this new non-story of the moment, produced by the Old Gray Lady. She published the story about eavesdropping on Americans, and non-Americans, here in the U.S., and abroad.

I wondered about the timeliness of the story. How convenient that they "sat on the story" for a year to help out the administration. When's the last time that they had any such concerns? Six years ago when Clinton was in office might be a reasonable guesstimate.

So they sat on this story for a year, just to be nice and helpful, you know, because that's just the way they operate; and then released it two weeks before parts of the Patriot Act would expire and at a time they knew heavy discussions would be taking place as to whether it should be extended or not.

I see that the guys at Powerline were of like mind:

This morning, I wrote about the New York Times' publication of leaked classified information about a National Security Agency program involving monitoring of international communications between persons in America and known terrorists overseas. Many have wondered about the timing of the story; the Times says that it sat on the story for a year. Some have surmised that the Times was trying to take yesterday's election in Iraq off the front page. I think a more plausible theory is that the paper wanted to give cover to the Democrats' filibuster of the Patriot Act.

I am going to take this conspiracy theory of mine one step further. The New York times writer of the NSA article was written by James Risen. Mr. Risen also has a new book ("STATE OF WAR: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration") that just COINCIDENTALLY is being released that addresses this very same subject. The Gray Lady conveniently forgot to disclose this information.

The NYT reporter James Risen says the paper delayed publication of the story for a year to conduct "additional reporting", according to the Drudge Report. I say hogwash. What additional reporting would this be? More accurately, it was delayed for a year so he could write his book and time it so both the book and the article could be released at its most critical time: when contentious discussions would be taking place on the fate of the Patriot Acts extensions. The paper neglected to mention that the "urgent" story was "timed" to the release of a new book.

How dumb do they think we are? My tin-foil hat doesn't fit that tight that it prevents all critical thinking. Does anyone remember the Richard Clark bible book? It came out at the exact moment of the 9/11 commission hearings (the same publisher as Mr Risen's book - just another coincidence, I'm sure - oh yea, same editor too. More coincidence). If you recall, the book was treated as gospel and was referred to repeatedly by certain commissioners.

More evidence that our political system has run amok. It is no longer what's best for the American people - in this case the safety of the American people. But has become, "how can we turn this situation into a political football, and use it to damage the other party."