The NSA and CIA don’t answer to Congress:
In 2007, reporter Charles Davis asked then-Chairman of the Senate Intelligence committee – Jay Rockefeller – about clandestine U.S. operations against a foreign government.
DAVIS: Reports quote administration officials as saying this is going on and it’s being done in a way to avoid oversight of the Intelligence Committee. Is there any way—
ROCKEFELLER: They’ll go to any lengths to do that, as we’ve seen in the last two days [during hearings on FISA].
DAVIS: Is there anything you could do in your position as Chairman of the Intelligence Committee to find answers about this, if it is in fact going on?
ROCKEFELLER: Don’t you understand the way Intelligence works? Do you think that because I’m Chairman of the Intelligence Committee that I just say I want it, and they give it to me? They control it. All of it. ALL of it. ALL THE TIME. I only get – and my committee only gets – what they WANT to give me.
This is shocking … but not new. The NSA was created in secret … and Congress wasn’t even notified.
This description of Congress’s feeble attempts at oversight is almost amusing:
Amash
said that intelligence officials are often evasive during classified
briefings and reveal little new information unless directly pressed.“You don’t have any idea what kind of things are going on,” Amash said. “So
you have to start just spitting off random questions. Does the
government have a moon base? Does the government have a talking bear?
Does the government have a cyborg army? If you don’t know what kind of
things the government might have, you just have to guess and it becomes a
totally ridiculous game of twenty questions.“
I have to admit, I am genuinely curious about this talking bear? Does anyone know if the government’s ownership of it was officially denied?