10 ms·

Senators skip classified briefing on NSA snooping to catch flights home

459 points by Libertatea 13y ago

e3pi 13y ago
Re: “...It’s hard to get this story out. Even now we have this big briefing — we’ve got Alexander, we’ve got the FBI, we’ve got the Justice Department, we have the FISA Court there, we have Clapper there — and people are leaving,” she said. This constant drone of Clapper-speak unbridled lying is taxing for even these people.
huhtenberg 13y ago
Given the Father's Day weekend, it wasn't hard to guess that the attendance will be low, so the question is why the briefing was still scheduled for that particular spot. I bet they are trying to tell us something...
- ldng 13y ago
  It's the usual trick for any hot or controversial matter. They hope nobody will see and/or complain. This trick is outrageous and used way too often.
brianobush 13y ago
Wonder if they would care (and attend) more if they were paid on the percentage of briefings attended.
- forgotAgain 13y ago
  They are paid for attending the meetings that are important to their patrons'. The rest of the meetings are strictly a PITA for them.
leetrout 13y ago
Is there anywhere online that lists the members that did attend? I would love to see if my state's senator was present.
pkill17 13y ago
> Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), one of the chief critics of the surveillance programs, was spotted leaving the briefing. Presumably leaving out of disgust for Clapper's lies; but the media will leave it short like this to make it seem he's marginally apathetic.
- mpyne 13y ago
  Isn't it his job as the elected Senator to call out Clapper on his 'lies' as he says them? If all Sen. Paul was going to do was watch the video of his testimony later then why schedule a hearing at all?
  - temp9251 13y ago
    How would he know what are lies? He isn't on the Senate Intelligence Committee, the 15 people in Congress privileged enough to know the truth.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Then how do we know that Clapper is lying? We're not on the Intel Committee either, are we? At least Sen. Paul gets invited to these things, we have no access at all, so Sen. Paul is still in a much better situation to call out Clapper on what we are all so convinced are a constant stream of lies.
      - temp9251 13y ago
        Sen. Wyden is on said Committee, and asked Clapper a question that, in Clapper's own words, he answered with a "least untruth" statement that was "too cute by half". This can be roughly translated as "a baldfaced lie". Apart from that, I am personally unaware of any instances where DNI Clapper has publicly lied. Additionally, DNI Clapper appears to only answer prepared questions (i.e. forwarded to his office prior to the discussion). I'm not sure if this is standard protocol for Congress, and for obvious reasons I also don't know if this applies to private briefings.
pkill17 13y ago
> Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), one of the chief critics of the surveillance programs, was spotted leaving the briefing. Presumably leaving out of disgust for Clapper's lies; but the media will leave it short like this to make it seem he's marginally apathetic.
ck2 13y ago
Not an excuse at all but part of the problem of our system, why they run home so fast, is they are constantly fundraising for their next election. They spend a massive amount of time in office just fundraising. Not sure how this can ever be fixed.
- misiti3780 13y ago
  easy solution: term limits
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Which itself leads to a permanent issue of elected public servants with no long-term experience on the very important function of leading the nation. That leaves the expertise in the hands of unelected bureaucrats, who could easily maneuver the constantly-inexperienced politicians in the direction they wish. Pick your poison...
    - jivatmanx 13y ago
      Absolute term limits would probably also worsen the trend of retiring congressman becoming lobbyists. But what if you only limited the number of consecutive terms? This is a solution more directly targeting the actual problem: the advantage of incumbency. This also creates more positive feedback between their lives in the public and private sector, congressmen hoping to be reelected will need to do something positive when out of office, and when in office they will have more understanding of the lives of working people than those who have spent the last 50 years in congress. It's important to note that limits on consecutive terms were used by the Greeks, Romans, and supported by many founding fathers (who admired the Romans especially).
      - mpyne 13y ago
        That might work indeed. At least no obvious problems come to mind, which is usually a good start.
  - woodhull 13y ago
startupfounder 13y ago
Our government is broken. It is no longer by the people for the people. Politicians are skipping out of their responsibilities. Politicians spend much of their time in office fundraising for re-election. Politicians raise much of their election financing from corporate interests, not the people, and thus have a diminishing obligation to the people.[1] A vast minority of people elect our politicians because 50% of eligible voters don't go to polls. Most are rich old white men, not a representation of the people.[2] We can do better. [1]http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_the_republic_we_must_reclaim.html http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_t... [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_Senators http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_S...
- gjm11 13y ago
  > Our government is broken. It is no longer by the people for the people. Are there good grounds for thinking it was ever much more "by the people for the people" than it is now?
  - forgotAgain 13y ago
    Are there good grounds for thinking it was ever much more "by the people for the people" than it is now? Teddy Roosevelt's national parks.
    - russell 13y ago
      Teddy Roosevelt's trust busting.
      - zArtLaffer 13y ago
        That was populist pandering based on some sensationalist fictions. Getting personal political gain by capitalizing on outrage ginned up through the activities of several yellow journalists. Some of the worst (not the only!) behavior in the name of progressivism in our (American) history. For the record, I used to really like this guy, until I read more about the era from some real (not high-school) history books and analysis pieces.
spinchange 13y ago
The icing on the cake is that Senate staff are prohibited from reading any classified materials Snowden leaked that are published in the press. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/06/14/senate-staffers-told-to-pretend-top-secret-documents-are-not-widely-available-on-web/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/06/14/senate-st... (Legislators rely on their staff for input, research, background and assistance in making decisions)
- mike_herrera 13y ago
  Interesting. So self-serving Congressional insider-trading on privileged information is kosher, but performing the People's business with information which is now public is not.
linuxhansl 13y ago
It seems that rather than attracting the best of the best to lead this country we managed to arrive at a process that reliably picks the most self serving crooks this country has to offer and allow them to run this country. With a few exceptions nobody in congress seems to actually care even a bit about the people, but only how to drive the personal agenda forward. It's the same in Europe. Apparently representatives are actually paid by attendance, so what they do is, they come to the session, sign in their names, and then leave.
- mpyne 13y ago
  Has no one ever noticed how poorly the leadership of our democracies are treated? It's understood in the commercial sector that you have to pay (both on benefits, quality of work/life balance, pay, etc.) to attract and retain the best and brightest talent. How can we all take that very important lesson and completely throw it away when considering the leadership of an entire nation? I'm not sure I'd take Pres. Obama or Rep. Boehner's jobs for a million bucks, so how are we supposed to get the "best of the best" leading the country, when they're off leading the Fortune 500? EDIT: People, there are reasons I mentioned things other than actual cash compensation when I referred to pay and benefits. You can almost literally watch the President of the United States age in front of your very eyes nowadays.... so I'm not saying the job of public service doesn't pay enough, I'm saying the job is so stressful that it's not possible to pay enough, as money quickly loses its motivational appeal once you make enough to live comfortably.
  - linuxhansl 13y ago
    That is a fair point. To that I would say the members of congress are exempt from insider trading laws (why?), and it turns out that many members of congress make the majority of the wealth from stock trades after they join congress. (now, that might be hear-say. I read this somewhere, and I have no good way to verify this).
  - amirmc 13y ago
    "Has no one ever noticed how poorly the leadership of our democracies are treated?" No, I haven't noticed this (because it's not true). What I do notice are many stories about politicians abusing their positions, almost systematically [1,2]. I see no reason why a higher rate of pay would curb such behaviour (it's not like they're broke in the first place). I don't see why leaders of the commercial sector should be considered the "best of the best" either (think back to banking and other corporate scandals of the last decade). In addition, the gap between CEO pay and 'normal' people has been the subject of debate before. When you realise that some of these folks sit on each-other's compensation committees it's easy to see how such arrangements can be abused -- and conveniently justified in hindsight as 'necessary' to "attract and retain the best of best". [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_expenses_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_e... [2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jun/02/lobbying-ministers-scandals http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jun/02/lobbying-mini...
DanielBMarkham 13y ago
In a normal scandal story, the appropriate committee would grant immunity to Snowden, have him testify, then bring up Clapper, have him testify, and compare notes. Preferably publicly. Here they bring in one side of the story for a secret Powerpoint presentation, no doubt with a high degree of spin to it, and publicly call Snowden a traitor. Then they complain that nobody shows up. This isn't a bake sale or a dog and pony show, it's supposed to be the workings of the U.S. Senate. This sounds much more like an effort to CYA from the committee chair and NSA than it does an actual investigation or anything useful. Not going to make much progress continuing to operate in this fashion. It IS interesting, however, that both sides here feel that, if only the other side knew more about what was actually going on, they would agree with them. But then the government insists on keeping it all secret. Meh.
- pvnick 13y ago
  Watch Glenn Greenwalds twitter (@ggreenwald) over the next few days/weeks. He alleges to have several more bombshell stories to release, and it looks like he's waiting for the government to lie themselves into a corner before dropping them in the limelight.
  - e3pi 13y ago
    >looks like he's waiting for the government to lie themselves into a corner before dropping them in the limelight. He's that good? Knows the `infinitude' of time? Chess gambit(@)? I like him. (@)The word "gambit" was originally applied to chess openings in 1561 by Spanish priest Rúy López de Segura, from an Italian expression dare il gambetto (to put a leg forward in order to trip someone).
    - pvnick 13y ago
      >He's that good? Knows the `infinitude' of time? Chess gambit(@)? Let's hope so!
    - olalonde 13y ago
      Wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambit
dnautics 13y ago
they're not attending because it's theatre. the NSA briefers are going to read from the script, no difficult questions are going to be asked, and even if they were, since it's secret, the public wouldn't get to see it so it doesn't matter.
wil421 13y ago
Glad to see at least one of my senators attended those meetings and doesn't remember being briefed about phone metadata collection (Johnny Isakson R-Ga). But then again the Director of National Intel James Clapper said that he understands that "collect data" would mean they take a book off the shelf and read it. Not that they have a giant bookshelf of data that is possibly yours and mine. Just another politician type doing some CYA. We will see more to come. [1] http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/intel-dir-james-clapper-lie-congress-complicated/t/story?id=19390786 http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/intel-dir-james-clapper-lie-c...
lettergram 13y ago
To be fair, I doubt I would attend the classified briefing. The point is the senators represent the peoples interest (specifically the states interest), if the state does not want it, then they shouldn't get it. Also, each senator should receive the briefing in paper. They never need to attend unless it is being voted upon.
fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
Friday afternoon briefings and statements like the following (paraphrased): "All congressmen have been briefed and are fully aware of the NSA's totally legit and above board program. There is simply nothing to see here, and making a big fuss about it compromises everyone's safety." Reminds me of this: "But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months." "Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything." "But the plans were on display ..." "On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them." "That's the display department." "With a flashlight." "Ah, well the lights had probably gone." "So had the stairs." "But look, you found the notice didn't you?" "Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."
protomyth 13y ago
The real question is why this was scheduled at a time that was pretty much guaranteed to conflict with the Senator's schedule? Scoring political points by foolishness is getting a tad old. [edit for branch]
cinquemb 13y ago
"Am now quite certain, that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood." -John Brown
ajays 13y ago
It's obvious. Those who know the details don't feel like they need to attend. They know they'll learn nothing new; why waste their time? Which begs the question: why didn't they speak up earlier? They probably would have, if they cared. The ruling class in this country knows that they won't be affected by these shenanigans. HSBC launders 100s of Billions of dollars for drug traffickers (sometimes literally accepting bags full of cash, and staying open late to do so), and no one goes to jail.
godgod 13y ago
Now you see who they work for. It's not us.
dashr 13y ago
Its important to note that some will NOT want to attend a classified briefing because they will then be bound NOT to discuss what they have heard in that classified meeting.
GeneralMayhem 13y ago
Same article was linked on Reddit; the top thread there points out that the meeting must have intentionally been scheduled to make this happen. It's common knowledge in DC that Congress is in session from Monday afternoon to Thursday morning, because Congressmen and Senators have duties in their home districts (listening to constituents bitch at them) that they have to take care of on Friday/over the weekend, and it takes them at least an afternoon's flight to get home. Don't blame the reps for not being there, at least not too harshly. Blame the asshats who WANTED the meeting to be underattended to provoke exactly this reaction rather than actually letting their arguments speak for themselves.
straight_talk 13y ago
Yeah, schedule the worst stuff at times with fewest senators available. Same way the Federal Reserve Act was passed a century ago on December 22, 1913.
stretchwithme 13y ago
If there's no exotic location and free golf involved, fact finding doesn't appeal to them.
niels_olson 13y ago
I think the senators who did this decided it would play better now that they skipped it, than what they suspected would come out in the briefing, which they would then be demonstrably complicit in by having knowledge of. Accomplices after the fact. They decided this very thin veneer of plausible deniability was the better option.

459 points by Libertatea 13y ago

e3pi 13y ago

Re: “...It’s hard to get this story out. Even now we have this big briefing — we’ve got Alexander, we’ve got the FBI, we’ve got the Justice Department, we have the FISA Court there, we have Clapper there — and people are leaving,” she said. This constant drone of Clapper-speak unbridled lying is taxing for even these people.

huhtenberg 13y ago

Given the Father's Day weekend, it wasn't hard to guess that the attendance will be low, so the question is why the briefing was still scheduled for that particular spot. I bet they are trying to tell us something...

ldng 13y ago
It's the usual trick for any hot or controversial matter. They hope nobody will see and/or complain. This trick is outrageous and used way too often.

brianobush 13y ago

Wonder if they would care (and attend) more if they were paid on the percentage of briefings attended.

forgotAgain 13y ago
They are paid for attending the meetings that are important to their patrons'. The rest of the meetings are strictly a PITA for them.

leetrout 13y ago

Is there anywhere online that lists the members that did attend? I would love to see if my state's senator was present.

pkill17 13y ago

> Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), one of the chief critics of the surveillance programs, was spotted leaving the briefing. Presumably leaving out of disgust for Clapper's lies; but the media will leave it short like this to make it seem he's marginally apathetic.

mpyne 13y ago
Isn't it his job as the elected Senator to call out Clapper on his 'lies' as he says them? If all Sen. Paul was going to do was watch the video of his testimony later then why schedule a hearing at all?
- temp9251 13y ago
  How would he know what are lies? He isn't on the Senate Intelligence Committee, the 15 people in Congress privileged enough to know the truth.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Then how do we know that Clapper is lying? We're not on the Intel Committee either, are we? At least Sen. Paul gets invited to these things, we have no access at all, so Sen. Paul is still in a much better situation to call out Clapper on what we are all so convinced are a constant stream of lies.
    - temp9251 13y ago
      Sen. Wyden is on said Committee, and asked Clapper a question that, in Clapper's own words, he answered with a "least untruth" statement that was "too cute by half". This can be roughly translated as "a baldfaced lie". Apart from that, I am personally unaware of any instances where DNI Clapper has publicly lied. Additionally, DNI Clapper appears to only answer prepared questions (i.e. forwarded to his office prior to the discussion). I'm not sure if this is standard protocol for Congress, and for obvious reasons I also don't know if this applies to private briefings.

pkill17 13y ago

ck2 13y ago

Not an excuse at all but part of the problem of our system, why they run home so fast, is they are constantly fundraising for their next election. They spend a massive amount of time in office just fundraising. Not sure how this can ever be fixed.

misiti3780 13y ago
easy solution: term limits
- mpyne 13y ago
  Which itself leads to a permanent issue of elected public servants with no long-term experience on the very important function of leading the nation. That leaves the expertise in the hands of unelected bureaucrats, who could easily maneuver the constantly-inexperienced politicians in the direction they wish. Pick your poison...
  - jivatmanx 13y ago
    Absolute term limits would probably also worsen the trend of retiring congressman becoming lobbyists. But what if you only limited the number of consecutive terms? This is a solution more directly targeting the actual problem: the advantage of incumbency. This also creates more positive feedback between their lives in the public and private sector, congressmen hoping to be reelected will need to do something positive when out of office, and when in office they will have more understanding of the lives of working people than those who have spent the last 50 years in congress. It's important to note that limits on consecutive terms were used by the Greeks, Romans, and supported by many founding fathers (who admired the Romans especially).
    - mpyne 13y ago
      That might work indeed. At least no obvious problems come to mind, which is usually a good start.
- woodhull 13y ago

startupfounder 13y ago

Our government is broken. It is no longer by the people for the people. Politicians are skipping out of their responsibilities. Politicians spend much of their time in office fundraising for re-election. Politicians raise much of their election financing from corporate interests, not the people, and thus have a diminishing obligation to the people.[1] A vast minority of people elect our politicians because 50% of eligible voters don't go to polls. Most are rich old white men, not a representation of the people.[2] We can do better. [1]http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_the_republic_we_must_reclaim.html http://www.ted.com/talks/lawrence_lessig_we_the_people_and_t... [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_Senators http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_S...

gjm11 13y ago
> Our government is broken. It is no longer by the people for the people. Are there good grounds for thinking it was ever much more "by the people for the people" than it is now?
- forgotAgain 13y ago
  Are there good grounds for thinking it was ever much more "by the people for the people" than it is now? Teddy Roosevelt's national parks.
  - russell 13y ago
    Teddy Roosevelt's trust busting.
    - zArtLaffer 13y ago
      That was populist pandering based on some sensationalist fictions. Getting personal political gain by capitalizing on outrage ginned up through the activities of several yellow journalists. Some of the worst (not the only!) behavior in the name of progressivism in our (American) history. For the record, I used to really like this guy, until I read more about the era from some real (not high-school) history books and analysis pieces.

spinchange 13y ago

The icing on the cake is that Senate staff are prohibited from reading any classified materials Snowden leaked that are published in the press. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/06/14/senate-staffers-told-to-pretend-top-secret-documents-are-not-widely-available-on-web/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/06/14/senate-st... (Legislators rely on their staff for input, research, background and assistance in making decisions)

mike_herrera 13y ago
Interesting. So self-serving Congressional insider-trading on privileged information is kosher, but performing the People's business with information which is now public is not.

linuxhansl 13y ago

It seems that rather than attracting the best of the best to lead this country we managed to arrive at a process that reliably picks the most self serving crooks this country has to offer and allow them to run this country. With a few exceptions nobody in congress seems to actually care even a bit about the people, but only how to drive the personal agenda forward. It's the same in Europe. Apparently representatives are actually paid by attendance, so what they do is, they come to the session, sign in their names, and then leave.

mpyne 13y ago
Has no one ever noticed how poorly the leadership of our democracies are treated? It's understood in the commercial sector that you have to pay (both on benefits, quality of work/life balance, pay, etc.) to attract and retain the best and brightest talent. How can we all take that very important lesson and completely throw it away when considering the leadership of an entire nation? I'm not sure I'd take Pres. Obama or Rep. Boehner's jobs for a million bucks, so how are we supposed to get the "best of the best" leading the country, when they're off leading the Fortune 500? EDIT: People, there are reasons I mentioned things other than actual cash compensation when I referred to pay and benefits. You can almost literally watch the President of the United States age in front of your very eyes nowadays.... so I'm not saying the job of public service doesn't pay enough, I'm saying the job is so stressful that it's not possible to pay enough, as money quickly loses its motivational appeal once you make enough to live comfortably.
- linuxhansl 13y ago
  That is a fair point. To that I would say the members of congress are exempt from insider trading laws (why?), and it turns out that many members of congress make the majority of the wealth from stock trades after they join congress. (now, that might be hear-say. I read this somewhere, and I have no good way to verify this).
- amirmc 13y ago
  "Has no one ever noticed how poorly the leadership of our democracies are treated?" No, I haven't noticed this (because it's not true). What I do notice are many stories about politicians abusing their positions, almost systematically [1,2]. I see no reason why a higher rate of pay would curb such behaviour (it's not like they're broke in the first place). I don't see why leaders of the commercial sector should be considered the "best of the best" either (think back to banking and other corporate scandals of the last decade). In addition, the gap between CEO pay and 'normal' people has been the subject of debate before. When you realise that some of these folks sit on each-other's compensation committees it's easy to see how such arrangements can be abused -- and conveniently justified in hindsight as 'necessary' to "attract and retain the best of best". [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_expenses_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_e... [2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jun/02/lobbying-ministers-scandals http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jun/02/lobbying-mini...

DanielBMarkham 13y ago

In a normal scandal story, the appropriate committee would grant immunity to Snowden, have him testify, then bring up Clapper, have him testify, and compare notes. Preferably publicly. Here they bring in one side of the story for a secret Powerpoint presentation, no doubt with a high degree of spin to it, and publicly call Snowden a traitor. Then they complain that nobody shows up. This isn't a bake sale or a dog and pony show, it's supposed to be the workings of the U.S. Senate. This sounds much more like an effort to CYA from the committee chair and NSA than it does an actual investigation or anything useful. Not going to make much progress continuing to operate in this fashion. It IS interesting, however, that both sides here feel that, if only the other side knew more about what was actually going on, they would agree with them. But then the government insists on keeping it all secret. Meh.

pvnick 13y ago
Watch Glenn Greenwalds twitter (@ggreenwald) over the next few days/weeks. He alleges to have several more bombshell stories to release, and it looks like he's waiting for the government to lie themselves into a corner before dropping them in the limelight.
- e3pi 13y ago
  >looks like he's waiting for the government to lie themselves into a corner before dropping them in the limelight. He's that good? Knows the `infinitude' of time? Chess gambit(@)? I like him. (@)The word "gambit" was originally applied to chess openings in 1561 by Spanish priest Rúy López de Segura, from an Italian expression dare il gambetto (to put a leg forward in order to trip someone).
  - pvnick 13y ago
    >He's that good? Knows the `infinitude' of time? Chess gambit(@)? Let's hope so!
  - olalonde 13y ago
    Wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambit

dnautics 13y ago

they're not attending because it's theatre. the NSA briefers are going to read from the script, no difficult questions are going to be asked, and even if they were, since it's secret, the public wouldn't get to see it so it doesn't matter.

wil421 13y ago

Glad to see at least one of my senators attended those meetings and doesn't remember being briefed about phone metadata collection (Johnny Isakson R-Ga). But then again the Director of National Intel James Clapper said that he understands that "collect data" would mean they take a book off the shelf and read it. Not that they have a giant bookshelf of data that is possibly yours and mine. Just another politician type doing some CYA. We will see more to come. [1] http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/intel-dir-james-clapper-lie-congress-complicated/t/story?id=19390786 http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/intel-dir-james-clapper-lie-c...

lettergram 13y ago

To be fair, I doubt I would attend the classified briefing. The point is the senators represent the peoples interest (specifically the states interest), if the state does not want it, then they shouldn't get it. Also, each senator should receive the briefing in paper. They never need to attend unless it is being voted upon.

fnordfnordfnord 13y ago

Friday afternoon briefings and statements like the following (paraphrased): "All congressmen have been briefed and are fully aware of the NSA's totally legit and above board program. There is simply nothing to see here, and making a big fuss about it compromises everyone's safety." Reminds me of this: "But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months." "Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything." "But the plans were on display ..." "On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them." "That's the display department." "With a flashlight." "Ah, well the lights had probably gone." "So had the stairs." "But look, you found the notice didn't you?" "Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."

protomyth 13y ago

The real question is why this was scheduled at a time that was pretty much guaranteed to conflict with the Senator's schedule? Scoring political points by foolishness is getting a tad old. [edit for branch]

cinquemb 13y ago

"Am now quite certain, that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood." -John Brown

ajays 13y ago

It's obvious. Those who know the details don't feel like they need to attend. They know they'll learn nothing new; why waste their time? Which begs the question: why didn't they speak up earlier? They probably would have, if they cared. The ruling class in this country knows that they won't be affected by these shenanigans. HSBC launders 100s of Billions of dollars for drug traffickers (sometimes literally accepting bags full of cash, and staying open late to do so), and no one goes to jail.

godgod 13y ago

Now you see who they work for. It's not us.

dashr 13y ago

Its important to note that some will NOT want to attend a classified briefing because they will then be bound NOT to discuss what they have heard in that classified meeting.

GeneralMayhem 13y ago

Same article was linked on Reddit; the top thread there points out that the meeting must have intentionally been scheduled to make this happen. It's common knowledge in DC that Congress is in session from Monday afternoon to Thursday morning, because Congressmen and Senators have duties in their home districts (listening to constituents bitch at them) that they have to take care of on Friday/over the weekend, and it takes them at least an afternoon's flight to get home. Don't blame the reps for not being there, at least not too harshly. Blame the asshats who WANTED the meeting to be underattended to provoke exactly this reaction rather than actually letting their arguments speak for themselves.

straight_talk 13y ago

Yeah, schedule the worst stuff at times with fewest senators available. Same way the Federal Reserve Act was passed a century ago on December 22, 1913.

stretchwithme 13y ago

If there's no exotic location and free golf involved, fact finding doesn't appeal to them.

niels_olson 13y ago

I think the senators who did this decided it would play better now that they skipped it, than what they suspected would come out in the briefing, which they would then be demonstrably complicit in by having knowledge of. Accomplices after the fact. They decided this very thin veneer of plausible deniability was the better option.