How Does The President Authorize A Leak?

• April 7, 2006

As I pointed out yesterday, how exactly does the President – commander-in-chief of the military and the author, by executive order, of the rules concerning the classification and declassification of national security information – authorize a “leak.”
The President has the authority to declassify national security information unilaterally and without input from other branches of government. Given that authority, if the President authorizes someone to release national security information to the media it is, by definition, not a “leak” so much as an authorized release of information.
The liberal/media outrage over this is just plain silly. They’re basically saying “How dare the President use his authority to declassify intelligence to refute critics of his policies!”
The left/media has been dreaming about a connection between the Plame leak and the President for so long now that it seems as though they are going to run as many headlines and articles with “Bush” and “leak” in them as they can, despite the fact that this isn’t a “leak” and it has nothing to do with Plame other than the fact that it came out during in Court during Libby’s trial.

Tags: Dennis Walaker, Domestic Issues, John Hoeven, Lori Swanson, Red River Flood

http://Array robert108

What docdave said.
TwoHotel9

Because they have heads full of bad wiring.
Anonymous

Why didn’the just call a news conference and release the information. Why did he have to use a “leak” tactic.
http://www.gribitonline.com/ tren

Bat One…thanks for your response. Your argument doesn’t persuade me but I appreciate your thoughts.
Carrick

Puzzlefeet:

Oh yeah, I know, it was done to punish a citizen for speaking out against the misinformation used to get us into the war.

The problem is that this "citizen" lied about what he found during his fact finding mission.  What you don’t like is that he got called out on it and was proved to be a liar, thus interferring with your antiwar/paint-Bush-a-liar agenda.

Fundamentally that is your beef, regardless of how the information was declassified and disseminated.
http://sayanythingblog.com/ likwidshoe

Anonymous – I took out your spam link from your comments and banned all of the urls.

So,…how much do you get paid to give us links to SEOs, furniture stores, and sex shops? Ever think about getting a real job and quit being a leech?

I give you small kudos for finally making real work of the spam trade. You guys can’t beat the Express Engine’s excellent spam filter any other way. You now have to personally log in and make a comment that passes muster among most website admins. Kudos for that, albeit small kudos.

Still though, get a real job. You’re just wasting your time here. I’ll find and delete your spammy urls.

But really – furniture stores? That’s a relatively new spam subject.
http://www.eastlondonheatingandplumbing.co.uk/ House Wiring

Great article there..
Steve L.

Just more of the same?

Someone was running around telling lies to everyone who would listen.  The President acted to set the record straight and that’s "more of the same?"  I could see that statement if the whole thing was a cover-up to hide some nefarious doings like, I don’t know, Chinese lobbyists dropping off big bags of money in the Oval Office.  This doesn’t even come close to "more of the same."
MikeAdamson

Epicurus…I’m amazed by fossils of fish that could walk on their fins…the lengths that partisanship can take folks ceased to amaze me years ago.
Puzzlefeet

Why didn’the just call a news conference and release the information.  Why did he have to use a "leak" tactic.  Oh yeah, I know, it was done to punish a citizen for speaking out against the misinformation used to get us into the war. So the President uses the very same leak tactics, then decries leaks.  so much for integrity and responsibility in the White House.  He uses classified information to punish a dissenter.  Sounds more like Nixon each day.
http://www.freerepublicans.com/ FreeRepublicans.com

He has the power to do it, I don’t dispute that at all.

But should he be declassifying info solely to sell his case?

Why not use the philosophical reasoning that we all used to defend the war?

This is a Legal vs. Ethical issue.  Just because it’s legal, does not mean it’s ethical.
robert108

Ah, yes, the lying scumbag.
realitybasedbob

To revise a well deserved and worn out phrase…this administration has a very serious credibility gap…how many times was W on the TV telling us that he hates leakers and he will find the leaker and kick the leakers out of his administration…and now under oath, Irving Libby say his bosses OK’d his leak… the NYT reported the story without an actual sources name, one can not argue that it was not conceived and carried out as an leak. Dumbya, as CIC may very well be legally allowed to unilaterally declassify docs, but come on now, this just stinks and falls into a pattern of deception most of us are painfully aware of.
MikeAdamson

Thanks…that makes sense to me so there shouldn’t be any questions about legality. The politics is another question but that will play out I’m sure.
MikeAdamson

Rob…what I hear you saying is that the President can declassify information at his discretion. I also hear you saying that authorising Libby to brief a journalist does not constitute the authorising of "leaking" because the information is no longer classified. Is this a reasonable interpretation on my part?
robert108

Referring to Joe Wilson.
http://www.captainnormal.org/ Don Myers

While it might be legal—neither one of us is a legal scholar, rob—unilaterally declassifying documents simply to retaliate against the wife of a political enemy is pretty unethical.

Nixon once said "If the president does it it’s not illegal." Turns out he was wrong.
Epicurus

MikeAdamson,

You’d be amazed what zealous supporters of a particular politician are willing to justify and the powers they are willing to grant him.
Bat One

Mike,

Neither the second nor the third of Greg Sargent’s arguments are particularly impressive.  In his second point rebutting Podhoretz (the term “Pod” is a lefty pejorative… his NRO online screen name is JPod), Sargent argues that the release of information “was political in nature.”  So?  The attacks on the Bush administration, from inside CIA, from inside State, from the NYT, all have been “political in nature.”  Was the Bush administration’s release of NIE information, as brayed about by the Democrats, any more “political in nature” than the Clinton administration’s release of Linda Tripp’s federal personnel file, or Harry Reid’s release of derogatory information from Judge Saad’s FBI file?  Hardly. 

As for Sargent’s third point, to make an objective evaluation of this argument, one would have to have access to both the unclassified version of the NIE from nine months previous, as well as the original, complete NIE.  As that isn’t very likely at all, it all comes down to partisan opinion and little else.

Oh, and as far as Addington is concerned, Libby would have been a fool not to consult a knowledgeable legal authority… just to be sure.

Bottom line here is that no one has shown the release of the NIE material violated any statute.  Beyond that, sadly, it’s politics as usual.
WOOF

The president declassifies a secret like this:

From the executive order:

” (m) “Declassification guide” means written instructions issued by a declassification authority that describes the elements of information regarding a specific subject that may be declassified and the elements that must remain classified.”
So there should be a written order somewhere?
Or maybe he he said it in the shower to prevent being overheard.

If the President secretly declassifies, maybe there is an exception for making public secrets that people are not really supposed to know are secrets.This could be a sly method to confuse your enemies.
MikeAdamson

Here is an interesting post from the American Prospect’s blog refuting some points made here. Anyone up to refuting the refutation? I don’t particularly agree with his first point but the rest makes sense to me.
http://www.moderninstances.com/ modern instances

Just so we’re clear, then, it’s ok for a president to de-classify information for political purposes?
http://magyartruth.blogspot.com/ Chief RZ

No comment on wuss speculation(s).  The CINC can declassify documents.   That is part of his power.  From what I have read, he did not use it politically to garner votes as others have done, nor to blackmail or besmerch.  I hope all this comes out and we find out why a certain lower-level CIA inoperative took a political trip and then "leaked" his non-findings to the NYT.   Tell The Truth so that the electorate can make an intelligent vote this November.
Epicurus

docdave,

I don’t see why the issue has to be binary. 
robert108

Anne: Because that is all they have.  The "Progressives" resist changing SS, lowering taxes, changing Iraq into a functioning 21st century country…
MikeAdamson

This might be interesting as well

This is startlingly flimsy. Pod is talking about the fact that in October 2002, then Senator Bob Graham demanded the declassification of parts of the CIA’s NIE before the congressional vote on the war. Graham subsequently said some parts had been declassified — but by no means was the whole NIE, or even much of it, declassified. How do we know this? Because on July 18, 2003 — after Bush authorized the leak — a senior administration official held a press briefing in which he declassified key portions of the NIE. Pod can read the briefing itself right here. It was also covered the next day in The Times, Washington Post and elsewhere. So why would this senior official have held this declassification briefing if, as Pod says, an "unclassified version" of the NIE had been declassified "nine months" earlier?
robert108

This might be of interest:

On Oct. 7, 2002, nine months before Bush’s supposed "leak," the administration released an unclassified version of the very same NIE at the urging of Senate Democrats. And in early 2003, reporters hostile to the administration (primarily John Judis and Spencer Ackerman of The New Republic) were being told all sorts of things about the still-classified portions of the NIE. – John Podhoretz
Puzzlefeet

Good work, Mr. Adamson, here is Mr Wilson’s letter to Sens. Rockefeller and Roberts of the Senate committee in response some of the conclusions in the Senate report:  http://www.buzzflash.com/alerts/04/07/ale04018.html. 
robert108

Just so I’m clear: Joe Wilson can lie his head off for political purposes, the MSM can support him in that for political purposes, but when the President declassifies a secret document to get the truth out, that’s hypocritical?  Nice double standard.
http://igotthisblog.blogspot.com/ Seth Williams

Time to call the Freud Brothers Electricians then.
Epicurus

Rob,

What is the meaning of "is" again?
http://www.freerepublicans.com/ FreeRepublicans.com

"If you boy had something to say, he should have been man enough to do it himself."

Actually not a bad point.  You’d think it coming frm his lips, at least back then when his numbers were good, would have been more effective than a backchannel leak.

If he said it himslef, that also throws out the ethical question because then it’s only a judgement call, and thats what the President is supposed to do, make judgements.
MikeAdamson

…but when the President declassifies a secret document to get the truth out, that’s hypocritical?

No…what’s hypocritical is to declassify a document but only three people know its declassified, release a version of the document that may or may not be true to a single Administration-friendly reporter then decry the existence of Administration leaks.

If the Administration felt that its critics were unfair then it has the right to defend itself. By doing so in such an opaque and twisted manner it leaves itself open to the questions that are being raised.
The.Whistler

but when the President declassifies a secret document to get the truth out, that’s hypocritical?

The last thing the liberals and the partisan press want is for us to hear the truth. 

 
MikeAdamson

So you think that the President should just lie down for Joe Wilson’s lying and the MSM’s assistance in his lying?

I answered that in my previous post.

It isn’t a leak if the document is declassified, btw.

Says who? "Leak" is one of those terms for which there is no universal definition so your attribution of the lie is inappropriate.

I think "opaque and twisted" is better applied to Joe Wilson, the MSM and the rest of the hate-filled left.

okey doke. 
MikeAdamson

Bat One…thanks for your response. Your argument doesn’t persuade me but I appreciate your thoughts.
http://www.freerepublicans.com/ FreeRepublicans.com

Yes, he has the power, and the executive right.

Just does not look good, and doesn’t help his case or claim of a new morality in the office.  Just more of the same.
robert108

MikeA: So you think that the President should just lie down for Joe Wilson’s lying and the MSM’s assistance in his lying?  That would work well for the lefties, I agree.  It isn’t a leak if the document is declassified, btw.  Just keep repeating that lie.  I think "opaque and twisted" is better applied to Joe Wilson, the MSM and the rest of the hate-filled left.
MikeAdamson

MI…it appears it’s okay legally but otherwise it’s pretty hypocritical IMO.
Anne

Why is the Left hate filled?
TwoHotel9

BOOYAA! You got that right.
robert108

A “leak” is generally considered to be the release of info that was meant to be kept hidden. Thus, when the President authorized the declassification, it wasn’t a “leak”. Keep up the Big Lie, though.
realitybasedbob

“Releasing” classified cherry picked National Intelligence Estimate info under the cover of “a former hill staffer” to a NYT reporter is a little more than stinky. If you boy had something to say, he should have been man enough to do it himself. But that’s not what he did, is it?
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

I see, so the President is perfectly in bounds on doing this…you just don’t like it.

Doesn’t any sense to me.  Either he has the power or he doesn’t.  Whether or not you like it is irrelevant. 
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

Why didn’the just call a news conference and release the information.

Because he doesn’t have to.

Oh yeah, I know, it was done to punish a citizen for speaking out against the misinformation used to get us into the war.

No, it was done to indicate that Joe Wilson was lying, which you’d know if you were able to see beyond the end of your partisan nose.

So the President uses the very same leak tactics, then decries leaks.

It isn’t a leak as he had the authority to declassify the information. 
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

Yes
http://sayanythingblog.com robport

unilaterally declassifying documents simply to retaliate against the wife of a political enemy is pretty unethical.

Plame didn’t have anything to do with this.  What was authorized to be released was information from a National Intelligence Estimate memo.

Try to at least have your facts right.

SayAnythingBlog.com

How Does The President Authorize A Leak?

Create a SAB Readerblog

Recent Comments