Trust Me

I suppose there is no way out of this NSA issue without the disclosure. Though this will probably end the effectiveness of the program. How many senators and representatives are being briefed? I'm thinking its around 70.

After weeks of insisting it would not reveal details of the National Security Agency's warrantless monitoring of Americans' phone calls and e-mails, the White House reversed course Wednesday and provided a House committee with highly classified information about the operation.

The White House has been under pressure from lawmakers who wanted more information about the NSA program. Democrats and many Republicans rejected the administration's contention that they could not be trusted with national-security secrets.

The shift came the same day Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., announced he is drafting legislation that would require the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to review the NSA's monitoring program and determine if it is constitutional.

It also came after Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M., chairwoman of a House intelligence subcommittee that oversees the NSA, broke with the Bush administration and called for a full review of the program, along with legislative action to update the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

She and others also wanted the full House intelligence committee to be briefed on the program's operational details. Although the White House initially promised only information about the legal rationale for surveillance, administration officials broadened the scope Wednesday to include more sensitive details about how the program works.

The results are to be seen. You can also be quite certain when, and note I don't say if, the details make it into the MSM there will be no accountability from those briefed.

Lawmakers leaving the briefing said it covered the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, Justice Department papers outlining legal justifications for the operations, details on success stories and some highly sensitive details.

Not that that is a disclosure, but typically when being briefed on secret information, one doesn't detail what the briefing was about, even at a high level.

But "trust me" is what the legislature has bashing Bush for saying, and now they are saying the same. And these politicians do have political axes to grind in many cases.

I get nervous when a president says "trust me." But when that turns into a chorus I know I'm going to lose.