NSA General attacks Freedom of the Press

Asshole Alert

What the Fuck?

• NSA General Keith Alexander rips into a free press for daring to report on unconstitutional spying.
• Isn't it just fucking wonderful that the military is gathering billions of our phone calls and Internet communications without a warrant.  What could possibly go wrong?

The outgoing director of the National Security Agency lashed out at media organizations reporting on Edward Snowden’s surveillance revelations, suggesting that British authorities were right to detain David Miranda on terrorism charges and that reporters lack the ability to properly analyze the NSA’s broad surveillance powers.

General Keith Alexander, who has furiously denounced the Snowden revelations, said at a Tuesday cybersecurity panel that unspecified “headway” on what he termed “media leaks” was forthcoming in the next several weeks, possibly to include “media leaks legislation,” reports the UK Guardian.

In perhaps his most expansive remarks to date since Miranda – the partner of former Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald – was detained for nine hours at Heathrow airport last summer, Alexander noted that a panel of UK judges found Miranda’s detention to be legal.

“Recently, what came out with the justices in the United Kingdom … they looked at what happened on Miranda and other things, and they said it’s interesting: journalists have no standing when it comes to national security issues. They don’t know how to weigh the fact of what they’re giving out and saying, is it in the nation’s interest to divulge this,” Alexander said.

“And I just put that on the table because that’s a key issue that we as a nation [are] going to face. My personal opinion: these leaks have caused grave, significant and irreversible damage to our nation and to our allies. It will take us years to recover,” he said.

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Miranda was held for the maximum amount of time allowable under schedule 7 of the UK’s Terrorism Act 2000. The Guardian paid for Miranda’s trip from his Rio de Janeiro home to Berlin, during which he met with filmmaker Laura Poitras, one of the recipients of Snowden’s leaks.

Miranda carried with him encrypted files that included thousands of classified UK surveillance documents that came from Snowden, in order to facilitate journalism about the source material.

Although the statute cited to detain Miranda concerns terrorism – with which UK officials have never suspected Miranda of involvement – a panel of three UK judges last month quashed a legal challenge to his detention.

Lord Justice Laws, a member of the panel, found that the objective of Miranda’s detention “was not only legitimate but very pressing,” a decision criticized by press-freedom advocates in the UK and beyond.

Alexander said he would be at the White House on Tuesday to discuss proposed changes to the NSA’s mass collection of US phone records, less than a week after he seemed to soften his opposition to the NSA acquiring only metadata related to terrorism.

The general, who is due to retire in the next several weeks, said that the furore over Snowden’s surveillance revelations – which he referred to only as “media leaks” – was complicating his ability to get congressional support for a bill that would permit the NSA and the military Cyber Command he also helms to secretly communicate with private entities like banks about online data intrusions and attacks.

“We’ve got to handle media leaks first,” Alexander said.

“I think we are going to make headway over the next few weeks on media leaks. I am an optimist. I think if we make the right steps on the media leaks legislation, then cyber legislation will be a lot easier,” Alexander said.

The specific legislation to which Alexander referred was unclear.

The NSA’s public affairs office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.