Update:  Making this a weekend OTA post.  I have to work Sunday, so likely I will not have much to post.

In personal news, I spent much of today guitar amd amp shopping.  I just had to share that.  Wee this blog in a few weeks to see what I bought.

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For todays special Treason edition I am posting Oliver North and Ann Coulter’s opinion of the NY Times.  Enjoy.

"Show Me The Money!"

By: Oliver North

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In the movie, "Jerry Maguire," Tom Cruise, playing a sports agent in the title role, euphorically shouts, "Show me the money!" Until this week, when the editors of the New York Times decided to reveal highly classified details about the Terrorist Finance Tracking Program, that’s exactly what the U.S. government has been doing to Al Qaeda. In an effort to prevent another Sept. 11, the CIA and Department of the Treasury — with the help of several U.S. and European financial institutions — have been secretly mapping terrorist networks through the use of financial data. It’s not a secret anymore.

The paper that boasts about delivering "all the news that’s fit to print" defends its right to divulge state secrets by arrogantly claiming that "the public has the right to know." In the wake of publishing accounts on how the National Security Agency monitors overseas communications with suspected terrorists and the means by which the CIA has been tracking terrorist finances, the NYT, other media outlets and "civil libertarians" describe those in government who leaked this classified information as "whistleblowers," "patriots" and "watchdogs against government abuse of our right to privacy." They’re not. They are traitors.

In 1985 John Walker, a U.S. Navy Petty Officer, was convicted of compromising U.S. military codesecrets to the Soviets in exchange for cash — and placing an untold number of Americans in our Armed Forces in extraordinary jeopardy. In 1994, CIA officer Aldrich Ames was jailed for selling the names of people spying for the United States to his Soviet handlers. His perfidy enabled the KGB to eliminate more than 130 agents working for our CIA and at least 10 were executed. In 2002, FBI agent Robert Hanssen was sentenced to life in prison for selling classified information about U.S. counter-intelligence operations to the KGB and its successor, the FSB, and irreparably damaging U.S. national security. These men were not "whistleblowers." All were avaricious, treasonous men, filled with hubris. Their actions directly harmed the country they were sworn to protect.

What’s the difference between what Walker, Ames and Hanssen did — and those who decided to "out" NSA and CIA efforts to track terrorist communications and financial data? Materially, there is no distinction. As in the earlier espionage cases, current and former U.S. government employees — according to the NYT, "nearly 20" of them — broke their oaths not to disclose classified information. Like Walker, Ames and Hanssen, "reporters," editors and publishers have hope that their exposes will result in substantial financial gain. Brutal adversaries with a proven penchant for killing innocent Americans have gained invaluable knowledge about our intelligence sources and methods. "Sources and methods." Remember those words. They are important.

In a candid letter to the editors of the New York Times, Treasury Secretary John Snow observed that the most recent revelations have "alerted terrorists to the methods and sources used to track their money trails." Vice President Cheney bluntly noted, "The New York Times has now made it more difficult for us to prevent attacks in the future. Publishing this highly classified information about our sources and methods for collecting intelligence will enable the terrorists to look for ways to defeat our efforts.""

The revelation of yet another super-secret operation to root out terrorists has prompted some in Congress to call for hauling editors of offending media outlets into court. Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., has called on the Justice Department to prosecute the New York Times for "treasonous actions." As our FOX News "War Stories" documentary, "Deception In The Pacific" noted, that’s what President Franklin Roosevelt wanted to do in June of 1942 when Robert McCormick’s Chicago Tribune revealed that we had won the Battle of Midway because we had broken the Japanese JN-25 naval codes. Though the story did terrible damage, leading the Japanese to immediately change their codes, McCormick was never prosecuted — in part because Admiral King, the Chief of Naval Operations, feared that a public trial would result in revelations about other ongoing intelligence operations.

That’s just one reason why the "reporters," editors and publishers who repeatedly promulgate classified information will never be tried for treason. But that shouldn’t be the case for the leakers. They clearly have broken the law — and they need to be found, prosecuted, convicted and jailed — for they are no different than Walker, Ames and Hanssen.

Defenders of what the NYT has done will claim that the press must "protect their sources" — and not reveal the leakers. That too is wrong. The courts have the power to compel media moguls to reveal government employees who unlawfully divulge classified information about intelligence sources and methods during time of war — or be jailed for contempt. If we fail to do so, we’re accepting the premise that media "sources" are more valuable than the sources and methods used to protect the American people from those who seek to kill us. If that’s the case, we might as well just fax all our secrets to our enemies.

********** 

12 Down: Top Secret War Plans, 36 Across: Treason 

By: Ann Coulter

When is the New York Times going to get around to uncovering an al-Qaida secret program?

In the latest of a long list of formerly top-secret government anti-terrorism operations that have been revealed by the Times, last week the paper printed the details of a government program tracking terrorists’ financial transactions that has already led to the capture of major terrorists and their handmaidens in the U.S.

In response, the Bush administration is sounding very cross – and doing nothing. Bush wouldn’t want to get the press mad at him! Yeah, let’s keep the media on our good side like they are now. Otherwise, they might do something crazy – like leak a classified government program monitoring terrorist financing.

National Review has boldly called for the revocation of the Times’ White House press pass! If the Times starts publishing troop movements, National Review will go whole hog and demand that the paper’s water cooler privileges be revoked. Then there’s always the "nuclear option": disinviting Maureen Dowd from the next White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

Meanwhile, the one congressman who has called for any sort of criminal investigation is being treated like a nut. Don’t get me wrong: Rep. Peter King is nuttier than squirrel droppings – but he’s right on this.

Unless, that is, the country has simply abolished the concept of treason. We’ve got a lot of liberals who hate the country and are itching to aid the enemy, so what are you going to do? Indict the entire editorial board of the New York Times? (Actually, that wouldn’t be a bad place to start, now that I ask.)

Maybe treason ended during the Vietnam War when Jane Fonda sat laughing and clapping on a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun used to shoot down American pilots. She came home and resumed her work as a big movie star without the slightest fear of facing any sort of legal sanction.

Fast forward to today, when New York Times publisher "Pinch" Sulzberger has just been named al-Qaida’s "Employee of the Month" for the 12th straight month.

Before the Vietnam War, this country took treason seriously.

But now we’re told newspapers have a right to commit treason because of "freedom of the press." Liberals invoke "freedom of the press" like some talismanic formulation that requires us all to fall prostrate in religious ecstasy. On liberals’ theory of the First Amendment, the safest place for Osama bin Laden isn’t in Afghanistan or Pakistan; it’s in the New York Times building.

Freedom of the press means the government generally cannot place a prior restraint on speech before publication.

But freedom of the press does not mean the government cannot prosecute reporters and editors for treason – or for any other crime. The First Amendment does not mean Times editor Bill Keller could kidnap a child and issue his ransom demands from the New York Times editorial page. He could not order a contract killing on the op-ed page. Nor can he take out a contract killing on Americans with a Page One story on a secret government program being used to track terrorists who are trying to kill Americans.

What if, instead of passing information from the government’s secret nuclear program at Los Alamos directly to Soviet agents, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg had printed those same secrets in a newsletter? Would they have skated away scot-free instead of being tried for espionage and sent to the death chamber?

Ezra Pound, Mildred Gillars ("Axis Sally") and Iva Toguri D’Aquino ("Tokyo Rose") were all charged with treason for radio broadcasts intended to demoralize the troops during World War II. Their broadcasts were sort of like Janeane Garofalo and Randi Rhodes on Air America Radio – except Tokyo Rose was actually witty, and Axis Sally is said to have used a fact-checker.

Tokyo Rose was convicted of treason for a single remark she made on air: "Orphans of the Pacific, you really are orphans now. How will you get home now that your ships are sunk?" For that statement alone, D’Aquino spent six years in prison and was fined $10,000 (more than $80,000 in today’s dollars).

Axis Sally was convicted of treason for broadcasts from Germany and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Pound avoided a treason trial for his radio broadcasts by getting himself committed to an insane asylum instead (which I take it is Randi Rhodes’ "Plan B" in the event that she ever acquires enough listeners to be charged with treason).

There was no evidence that in any of these cases the treasonable broadcasts ever put a single American life in danger. The law on treason doesn’t require it.

The federal statute on treason, 18 USC 2381, provides in relevant part: "Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States … adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000."

Thanks to the New York Times, the easiest job in the world right now is: "Head of Counterintelligence – al-Qaida." You just have to read the New York Times over morning coffee, and you’re done by 10 a.m.

The greatest threat to the war on terrorism isn’t the Islamic insurgency – our military can handle the savages. It’s traitorous liberals trying to lose the war at home. And the greatest threat at home isn’t traitorous liberals – it’s patriotic Americans, also known as "Republicans," tut-tutting the quaint idea that we should take treason seriously.

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