Russell Tice: NSA Leaker

ABCNews is reporting Russell Tice, ex-NSA employee, who apparently was so obsessed about a co-worker being a Chinese spy he who violated rules and tried to investigate her, has decided to admit he was a source for the NY Times story:

But now, Tice tells ABC News that some of those secret “black world” operations run by the NSA were operated in ways that he believes violated the law. He is prepared to tell Congress all he knows about the alleged wrongdoing in these programs run by the Defense Department and the National Security Agency in the post-9/11 efforts to go after terrorists.

Emphasis mine. Bush is not spying on his political enemies, his administration is monitoring our enemies, who have sworn to risk all to kill us.

Is Tice the only source for the story, and just how credible a witness is he to the program? Is he qualified to examine the legalities of the program? Considering that there are divergent views on whether circumventing FISA is permissible, legal, or wholly a function of Executive Power to protect this nation against enemies foreign and domestic, is Tice really capable of making sweeping statements alleging illegal conduct? I don't think so. And this is wholly based on his credentials, such as they are. It doesn't even get into his character and fitness, which are suspect based on reports (and a reason he was fired from the NSA in the first place).

And what if the courts do eventually decide this issue against the Administration and find that the possibility of violation of civil rights is such that anyone who receives a call from a suspected terrorist cannot be subject to a warrantless search? What exactly does this mean for national security, our intel gathering means, and terrorist exploitation of the situation?

For starters, it means that any terrorist seeking to contact anyone in the US will simply cc: any US citizen on an email who is unlikely to actually read the email and thereby innoculate themselves against a warrantless search. The terrorist would attach the message to a Cialis or Viagra advertisement sent out in spam fashion to a host of people, including his intended recipient. Since most everyone would delete the email without reading, the coded message would end up in the hands of the terrorist recipient without worry for being under surveillance because the email had US persons as recipients. Since the rules, such as they are being interpreted by those on the Left, prohibit such intel gathering without going to FISA court, the terrorists will be able to exploit the time periods necessary to go to FISA for the warrants, even if they can do a post-search warrant.

MacRanger has more.

UPDATE:
Blackfive takes Tice out behind the woodshed. And the Political Pit Bull thinks that Tice may be mentally unstable.