Should we sue the press? (Updated)

News scoops spell disaster for intelligence.

It’s an idea I’ve read here and there in comments sections of blogs and forums, but now AJ Strata is wondering if a class-action law suit against the leaking press, by the American public which is left vulnerable through their folly, is not a doable idea.

Are we to expect every day for the foreseeable future political partisans (and let’s be honest here, that is what is motivating these ‘whistleblowers’ – they want democrats in power) will be slowly dismantling our protection mechanisms as they leak to the press?

AJ points out that articles like this point to no illegal “wrongdoing” by the government and therefore cannot be considered “whistleblowing.”

First off, this report makes no claims any of this is illegal or unwarranted. It is simply a data dump to our enemies and their leftwing apologists who want to extend civil rights to terrorists, even it if means the terrorists’ plans succeed in killing lots of Americans.

Read it all, including the update. AJ is considering all the ways Al Qaeda has been helped by these leaks, and all the ways we’ve been hurt. Let AJ know what you think about it.

As Ed Morrissey pointed out here, the goverment seems to have taken great pains to insure that everything they’ve done has been done within the bounds of the law, and with the consultation of members of congress.

Others writing – very thoughtfully – about the press and what is both within the NY Times (which more and more is coming to resemble a teeming snakepit lashing out without regard even for its own safety) and alive within the fourth estate itself: bitterness, paranoia and recklessness:

Kobayashi Maru, who notes that free speech does not mean one is guaranteed an audience and who also writes:

Which leads to two concerns I have about the First Amendment – neither of which I worry about in the least under this president. I am concerned that Hillary Clinton or some other similarly Nixonian personality on the ropes will get so frustrated at a sustained onslaught of criticism from all directions that they ham-handedly attempt to shut down the blogosphere or, (as the UN has already attempted to do), put control of the Internet into the hands of the devil’s band of rogues, fools and despots that seem to run everything else over there. Since the Democrats are – of their own making – the ones on the ropes at the moment, my primary concern is there. Should the tables turn, that concern would shift. I don’t see it anytime soon.

It is kind of odd that the press and many on the left seem to want to push the idea that President Bush is out to take away civil liberties…could it be projection? After all, it was Hillary Clinton, not George W. Bush who has suggested that the internet will require regulating (and no wonder she feels that way!) It is the UN, not George W. Bush, which would like to “control” the internet and the flow of information. The press seems to be projecting the thoughts and ideas of others onto their arch-enemy, George W. Bush.

Ed Morrissey writes a beautiful analyisis on the excesses of the fourth estate, and the whining about blogs as well.

What the technology allows people like me to do is to become our own newspaper, our own media outlet, with the entire blogosphere acting as oversight to my posts. It takes the same basic activities that reporters perform — fact-gathering, quote-gathering, interviews on occasion, and publication — and then subjects the result to a peer-review process that the media long since gave up.

It’s that crucial component that Seelye misses in her article, and that the media misses when it considers the impact of the blogosphere. Blogs get their assumptions wrong and facts incorrect as well, but the natural peer-review process exposes it pretty quickly — and our credibility suffers if we don’t acknowledge it. The Exempt Media doesn’t bother to do peer review or act in any kind of competitive manner at all, except in narrow geographic areas where newspapers and local TV stations compete for consumer attention.

Ace wonders, How do they justify running a piece like this when they cannot even hint at what could be unethical, let alone illegal, about it? It’s a nothing little fart of a story that does nothing to inform Americans (it’s common sense that we’d be doing this, after all) and only serves the purposes of Al Qaeda.

Hmmmm…sort of sounds like treason, doesn’t it?

Writes Marc Johnson:

America spends $40 billion per year on intelligence operations aimed at discovering our enemies’ secret activities. All our enemies have to do is subscribe to the New York Times and, for as little as $4.65 per week, they can discover most of our secret operations — at least as long as a Republican is President.

Granted, reading the Times won’t give them an accurate picture of the growth of the U.S. economy, the progress in the Iraq War, or the average American’s political opinions. But it will provide them a detailed description of almost any classified military, CIA, or NSA operation designed to catch or kill them.

Hugh Hewitt notes that the NY Times writes on journalism in the business section and they still don’t seem to get it.

But then again, the NY TIMES and many other members of the fourth estate are working toward only one aim just now so, it’s easy to understand why they are missing big pictures, everywhere. Right now, all they want to do is impeach the president and redefine leaks as whistleblowing. They have utterly jumped the ship of reality and are trying to quickly inflate a lifeboat.

And perhaps all of this contributes to why Fausta is no longer a ‘liberal’.

Like I said, tell AJ what you think of his idea.

UPDATE: Alexandra has an unsurprisingly terrific new graphic meant for the NY Times accompanied by many links. A great post.

UPDATE II: Slightly off topic, but chock full of excellent links, Sisu thinks about Hillary and blogs.

UPDATE III: Read Jeff Goldstein’s long must-read.