[UPDATE at end of post]
ABC’s investigative reporting unit is breaking a big story about "eavesdropping on Americans" today, but it didn’t do elementary Googling about whether their sources are politically motivated. The first source quoted on ABC’s Blotter item is "Adrienne Kinne, a 31-year old US Army Reserves Arab linguist assigned to a special military program at the NSA's Back Hall at Fort Gordon from November 2001 to 2003." But Kinne is on the board of directors of the radical-left group Iraq Veterans Against the War. Shouldn't viewers be tipped that a source has an axe to grind?
Another source of the story, David Murfee Faulk, sought out the impeach-Bush-and-Cheney folks at After Downing Street as a target for his whistle-blowing allegations. It makes you wonder about this claim: "The accounts of the two former intercept operators, who have never met and did not know of the other's allegations..."
It also sounds political when you dial up Islamic creep-defending lawyer Jonathan Turley to pronounce, "This story is to surveillance law what Abu Ghraib was to prison law."
Both Kinne and Faulk are sources for the new book from Bush-bashing James Bamford: "Both former intercept operators came forward at first to speak with investigative journalist Jim Bamford for a book on the NSA, The Shadow Factory, to be published next week."
UPDATE: 2008-10-09 17:36:48 -0400
Brian Ross appeared on Thursday's "Good Morning America" to tout the same story. And just as with the online story, he did not identify the associations of David Murfee Faulk or Adrienne Kinne:
ROBIN ROBERTS: But first in this half hour, bombshell allegations this morning of Americans being spied on by their own government. These explosive charges are contained in a soon-to-be-published book, "The Shadow Factory." But ABC's chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross has gone beyond the book to pursue the story. And, Brian, is with us this morning. Good morning, Brian.
BRIAN ROSS: Good morning, Robin. This is the first time any of the actual intercept operators, the people who actually listen in and record phone calls, on behalf of U.S. agencies, the first time any of them has come forward. Now, President Bush says they only listen to Americans if it involves al Qaeda. These two say not true. This is a satellite photo of the largest electronic spy operation in the world. A facility at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Georgia, run by the NSA, the super secret National Security Agency. It is place where two former intercept operators say Americans are being spied on during phone calls to and from the Middle East.
DAVID MURFEE FAULK (Former NSA agent): Person phone calls.
ROSS: Of American officers.
FAULK: Of American officers. Mostly in the green zone, calling home to the United States, talking to their spouses and sometimes their girlfriends. Sometimes on the same days. Sometimes one call, following another. And co-workers of mine were ordered to transcribe these calls.
ROSS: David Murfee Faulk was a Navy Arab linguist assigned to the NSA facility at Fort Gordon until a year ago.
FAULK: Then, one of my co-workers went to a supervisor and said, but, sir, these are personal calls. The supervisor said, my orders were to transcribe everything.
ROSS: Those were the same orders Arab linguist Adrienne Kinne says she got from her Army commanders at the same NSA facility, from 2001, to 2003. Kinne said she listened to hundreds of Americans, simply calling their families. Americans in the Middle East, calling home.
ADRIENNE KINNE (Former NSA agent) Oh, most definitely. Personal, private things, with Americans who are not in any way, shape or form, associated with anything to do with terrorism. It was just personal conversations that, really, nobody else should have been listening to.
ROSS: And you were?
KINNE: And we were.
ROSS: But the law's very specific. And President Bush has reassured Americans again and again.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: It's a phone call of a al Qaeda, known al Qaeda suspect making a phone call into the United States.
KINNE: I would say that is completely a lie. I would call it a lie because we were definitely listening to Americans who had nothing to do with terrorism.
ROSS: Kinne says she intercepted, recorded and transcribed conversations with the military, journalists and Red Cross and aid workers. Did you just pull the plug and say we shouldn't be listening to this?
KINNE: I wish that I had. But I didn't.
ROSS: And former intercept operator Faulk says, some private calls were passed around like office jokes.
FAULK: And, at times when I was told, hey, check this out, there's some good phone sex. Or there's some pillow talk. Pull up this call. It's really funny. Go check it out.
ROSS: And you'd listen?
FAULK: It was there, stored the way you look at songs on your iPod.
ROSS: That number would get passed around? Listen to this call, you'll hear some phone sex? Hear some pillow talk? And you did?
FAULK: Right. Yes, I did.
ROSS: And how do you feel about that?
FAULK: I feel that it was something that people should not have been doing, including me.
ROSS: In a book on the NSA to be published next week, investigative journalist, James Bamford recounts the stories of the two former intercept operators turned whistle blowers.
JAMES BAMFORD (Investigative journalist): This is the most secret operation of the U.S. Government. And we're doing it strictly for one purpose. And that one purpose is to catch terrorists. And what it turns out to be is for a more prurient reason. Listening for the sake of listening and then laughing at what has been collected.
ROSS: In a statement for the former head of the NSA, General Michael Hayden, now the head of the CIA, the spokesman said the NSA assiduously follows the law. And any suggestion General Hayden sanctioned or tolerated illegalities of any sort is ridiculous in its face.
