TIFTFY
I wanted to come back to this, in a more specific way than I did earlier.
One of your premises seems to be [quote]Leaking classified materials is a crime, should always be treated as such, and should always be punished.[/quote] If I’ve put words in your mouth, I’m sure you’ll tell me about it, but reading through your posts in this thread, I feel confident in the summary enclosed above.
Whether or not you consider my summary of your premise to be correct, what should we do when the government itself leaks classified information?
Here’s a little snippet, so you don’t have to go read the whole article [quote]It doesn’t really matter which modern presidential administration you decide to scrutinize for this behavior, as all of them are guilty. For instance, President George W. Bush’s administration declassified or leaked whole barrels of intelligence, raw and otherwise, to convince the public and Congress making war on Iraq was a good idea. Bush himself ordered the release of classified prewar intelligence about Iraq through Vice President Dick Cheney and Chief of Staff I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby to New York Times reporter Judith Miller in July 2003. Sometimes the index finger of government has no idea of what the thumb is up to. In 2007, Vice President Cheney went directly to Bush with his complaint about what he considered to be a damaging national security leak in a column by the Washington Post’s David Ignatius. “Whoever is leaking information like this to the press is doing a real disservice, Mr. President,” Cheney said. Later, Bush’s national security adviser paid a visit to Cheney to explain that Bush, um, had authorized him to make the leak to Ignatius.[/quote]
You might choose to respond by saying that when the government chooses to leak classified material, that it automatically makes the material unclassifed.
But how then are we to explain the curious response to a recent FOIA request?
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/220254-nsa-list-of-authorized-leaks-is-classified
This is the one where the NSA said that the list of authorized disclosures of classified materials is itself classified. I’ll let you wrap your head around that one for a second.
The only way this could be more meta, would be for someone to leak the list of authorized leaks.
Pray, what should be done with that hypothetical meta leaker?
