Civil libertarians and others are understandably outraged by the news of a DOJ investigation that included obtaining AP journalists’ phone records. It’s skating on thin constitutional ice to have government agents investigating whom members of a free press contact and when, and it merits careful oversight to avoid abuses. Nevertheless, based on what we know to date, I think the DOJ did the right thing for two principal reasons:
First, this wasn’t a leak about some garden-variety (pun intended) pot-growing or cocaine-smuggling operation getting busted, or even a bribery scandal involving high-ranking public officials. It didn’t involve “whistle-blowing” on any wrongful government behavior. This leak reportedly related to the successful infiltration of freakin’ al Qaeda in Yemen that effectively prevented a terrorist attack using an advanced type of bomb that is allegedly undetectable by airline security. Continue Reading
