GOP Senate Staff Stole Democratic Computer Files
The blogosphere is abuzz with news that for the last year Republican staff members of the Senate Judiciary Committee took advantage of a security hole in shared computer systems to access secret Democratic strategy memos. Much of this information was then passed onto conservative columnists in the media. Imagine if the Democrats had done anything close to this.
According to the Boston Globe, the office of the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms has launched an investigation with the help of General Dynamics and the US Secret Service. In addition to interviewing about 120 people, they have seized "half a dozen computers -- including four Judiciary servers, one server from the office of Senate majority leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, and several desktop hard drives." It appears that the security hole was mistakenly created by a technician who left certain user directories open to the network.
The Republican staffers were able to take advantage of this security hole to access restricted Democratic documents. "Trolling through hundreds of memos, they were able to read talking points and accounts of private meetings discussing which judicial nominees Democrats would fight -- and with what tactics." This information was then fed to conservative columnists and in one clear case formed the backbone of a February 2003 column by Robert Novak "that revealed plans pushed by Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, to filibuster certain judicial nominees."
As you might recall, Novak is at the center of the scandal involving the unmasking of CIA agent Valerie Plame based on information from senior administration officials. Such a leak is a felony and is currently under investigation by the Justice Department. It has gone so far that Attorney General Ashcroft has recused himself from the case.
The similarity between these two controversies is that Robert Novak's column has been the mouthpiece of the Republican party and that he is refusing on principle to reveal his sources. Yet, as Atrios points out, Novak has revealed his sources before. In 1997, Novak joined the conservative pile-on by accusing the Justice Department under Janet Reno of covering up alleged 1996 campaign scandals involving China. He reported that a veteran FBI agent resigned after refusing to give Attorney General Reno the names of top secret sources in China. Three years later, he revealed that his source in that circumstance was FBI agent Robert Hanssen by then a convicted Soviet and Russian mole.
Novak said at the time that he revealed his source because " the circumstances here are obviously extraordinary." Yet Novak continues to withhold the names of administration officials, and now Senate Republican staffers, who have broken the law and violated the trust of our democracy. The Plame scandal represents a serious threat to the security of undercover CIA operatives working to gather intelligence in the war on terror. This new scandal represents a far deeper violation of political norms than Watergate. By his own standard, it is high time that Robert Novak reveals his sources and sets the historic record straight.
Who is this guy?
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