Cheney Behind CIA Concealment Of Secret Counterterrorism Program

No surprise here. And the odds are that little-to-nothing will come of it, but according to CIA agency director Leon P. Panetta, former VP Dick Cheney gave the direct order for the CIA to withhold information from Congress for 8 years regarding a secret counterterrorism program.

The program in question is still unidentified and never became fully operational. Panetta himself only learned of the program on June 23rd and quickly put an end to it and briefed two Congressional intelligence committees in separate closed sessions.

This is not the first time Congress has discovered that critical information was being withheld by Cheney and the Bush Administration. The recent waterboarding “scandal” was one of the more publicly discussed.

According to the New York Times:

The law requires the president to make sure the intelligence committees “are kept fully and currently informed of the intelligence activities of the United States, including any significant anticipated intelligence activity.” But the language of the statute, the amended National Security Act of 1947, leaves some leeway for judgment, saying such briefings should be done “to the extent consistent with due regard for the protection from unauthorized disclosure of classified information relating to sensitive intelligence sources and methods or other exceptionally sensitive matters.”

In addition, for covert action programs, a particularly secret category in which the role of the United States is hidden, the law says that briefings can be limited to the so-called Gang of Eight, consisting of the Republican and Democratic leaders of both houses of Congress and of their intelligence committees.

All this comes one day after the inspector general’s report that Cheney restricted knowledge of the National Security Agency’s program of eavesdropping without warrants, “a degree of secrecy that the report concluded had hurt the effectiveness of the counterterrorism surveillance effort,” according to the Times.

While Mr. Cheney will most likely be found to have been within the limits of the law or, at worst, skirting the edges of it, it’s important info to know. And while some may agree that Cheney’s decision to keep this information concealed was the right one, Panetta’s decision to end the program and inform Congress right away suggests a different school of thought.

The effectiveness of our entire system is compromised if information that is meant to be shared with Congress is not. There must be some measure of oversight if the government is to remain “for the people.” Otherwise, we find ourselves in danger of living in the type of society the Republican’s keep warning us that those “liberal Democrats” are trying to create wherein the government has far too much control.

The pot calling the kettle black, I’d say.