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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSENATE RESOLUTION 400---Members CAN Declassify NSA Docs ANYTIME They Want---They Just Don't
Worthy of repeating today (are you listening DiFi?)
Senate intelligence panel could seek to declassify documents; it just doesnt
That, however, is not the full story. Buried in the pages of Senate Resolution 400, which established the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in 1976, is a provision that allows them to try. Across those nearly 40 years, its never been used.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/08/12/199122/senate-intelligence-panel-could.html#.Ug6Yn9JzGpB
http://beta.congress.gov/congressional-report/110th-congress/senate-report/3/1
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Four decades without a single challenge being raised. That's rather odd (or obsequious, if you prefer), considering the provision was added with the intent of providing an adversarial avenue to prevent intelligence agencies from controlling the dialog. This addition was added as the Church Committee was replaced by the Senate Intelligence Committee:
As a part of this oversight, Section 8 of the resolution lays out a process by which a member of the Intelligence Committee may seek the declassification of information that he or she thinks is of public interest, even if the executive branch labels the material top secret.
The select committee may, subject to the provisions of this section, disclose publicly any information in the possession of such committee after a determination by such committee that the public interest would be served by such disclosure, the section reads.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130814/01083324168/senate-intelligence-committee-has-been-able-to-challenge-classification-documents-forty-years-it-just-has-never-done-it.shtml
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)responsible for something?
DJ13
(23,671 posts)Thats why this kind of widespread spying is so dangerous, who would speak out against it and risk having some dark secret exposed?
David Krout
(423 posts)Readers should not think that Wyden, for example, could invoke that section and simply declassify something himself.
And since we know the intelligence committee members are the most NSA-friendly members of Congress (with a few exceptions), we have to conclude that it's not as easy as you and the article make it appear.
Wyden would never convince that NSA loyalists in his committee to declassify anything, for example.
kpete
(72,056 posts)http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130814/01083324168/senate-intelligence-committee-has-been-able-to-challenge-classification-documents-forty-years-it-just-has-never-done-it.shtml
Rex
(65,616 posts)Sounds like a lot of people that are completely ignornant of their job! All this "I knew nothing at the time" bullshit is wearing thin.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Rex
(65,616 posts)Or maybe you already knew Congress was a scripted act.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)David Krout
(423 posts)mick063
(2,424 posts)Few people are entirely squeaky clean for an entire lifetime.
It doesn't even have to apply to breaking the law. Just saying something that is political poison, thought to be "off the record".
Instead of buying politicians, they can be coerced instead.
Much cheaper.