Treason By The Extreme Press

Strong words, I know. But take a look at Michelle Malkin's coverage of the revealing of a perfectly legal *secret* program used to thwart terrorists. The New York Times and the L.A. Times blew the lid off of this program, and will no doubt harm our national security by doing so.

Remember when Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales said there could be charges brought against newspapers who did this kind of thing? I think it's time. This is beyond unpatriotic. This is treason.

JASmius adds: It's either prosecute these flagrant violations of the Espionage Act now, or lose freedom of the press under the dire circumstances that would follow an even bigger sequel to 9/11 later. If that's what it takes to finally get across to the Extreme Media that nobody bleeping elected them to make national security decisions, so be it.

I'm sure there must be vacancies at Gitmo by now....

UPDATE: Now, after some insufficient sleep, allow me to drop the other shoe.

The comments above represent the justice (small "j") perspective. There is a reason, though, why justice is so rarely done inside the Beltway: politics. I'm sure that the Bushies look at this latest seditious act of the New York Times ACEs (Aid & Comfort to the Enemy) the same way Jen and I do, but they also have to look at the public relations of following through on it. The end result of that would be an absolute bonanza for the President's enemies.

The headlines write themselves: BUSH POLICE STATE EXPANDS! EMBATTLED WHITE HOUSE TAKES AWAY MORE CIVIL LIBERTIES! FREEDOM OF THE PRESS IN MORTAL PERIL! Annnnnd Eric Lichtblau and James Risen would become martyrs as well as the Woodward & Bernstein of their age. Heck, it'd probably make their careers. To say nothing of the fact that going after the Times would take the PR onus off the Extreme Media (and by extention, the Democrats) and put it right smack back on the Administration (and by extention, the GOP). You'd have panicking Republicans stampeding away from Bush like elephants from a Chuck E. Cheese. The political momentum regained over the past few weeks would evaporate like an M&M in front of Michael Moore.

Lastly, as infuriating as the Times' "indiscretion" is, they are, after all, just the recipients. The core problem is, as Rush Limbaugh described it yesterday, the "Clinton shadow government," all the Clintonoid holdovers in the various federal bureaucracies that the Bushies, for whatever idiotic "New Tone" reason(s), never purged when they came into office in 2001. That cabal has been waging a war of obstruction and leaks from day one, and their desperation to sabotage Dubya's efforts in the GWOT as its successes grow and multiply is the equal of their office-holding counterparts in the House and Senate. They see the chances of regaining legislative power, and with it the ability to impeach and remove Bush, Cheney, Hastert, Ted Stevens, Condi Rice, Don Rumsfeld, and so forth (the House would become an impeachment machine) until they got down to Democrat Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta (oops! They're even losing him!), going up in the smoke and debris of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's love shack and, more pertinently, the multiple al Qaeda plots foiled by the very clandestine intelligence tools that the NYT is doing its level best to destroy.

All of this is metastasizing toward what could be a Donk election debacle of McGovernesque proportions. And given their stratospheric expectations, even gaining no ground in either House would be a disaster. D'ya think Karl Rove isn't noticing that, and begging the President not to have Oh, Boy, Alberto unleash the prosecutorial hounds?

Not until after the election, at least....

UPDATE II: Speaking of strong words, how about Cap'n Ed's closing graf:

This story is only good for one thing, and that is an attempt to blow the program and stop our ability to follow the money. The New York Times apparently wants to stage itself as a publication written by traitors for an audience of idiots.

UPDATE III: Hugh Hewitt has his usual comprehensive roundup. I especially enjoyed these two nuggets.

A Freeper fly-on-the-wall perspective on a likely terrorist conversation:

"Achmed?"

"Yes Khalid?"

"Did you see the New York Times report on how the infidels are tracking our money?"

"Yes Khalid. I sent a courier with a note to the financier, and he wrote back and assured me that he will route the transfers through a firm in the Bahamas and have the money laundered."

"That is good Achmed."

"It is easy. The infidel newspapers do all the hard work. All I have to do is sit here and write out notes."

"Achmed?"

"Yes Khalid?"

"How come you just don't call the financier?"

"Oh - that! Because the New York Times revealed that the infidels were monitoring our phone calls."

"Damn those infidels!"

"Thank Allah for the New York Times, Khalid. Without them we'd have no secrets that weren't known to the infidels."

"Praise Allah for the New York Times."

"Indeed, praise Allah for the New York Times."

And this brilliant observation from Instapundit:

What's interesting to me is that when you talk about military force, we're supposed to use law-enforcement and intelligence methods instead. But if you use law-enforcement and intelligence methods, people shout "Big Brother" and the Times runs stories exposing them.

Home run.

And some still wonder why we call it treason.