So much for credibility ... nice work USA Today

I read the USA Today thing again....and it looks unclear. I don't know if they should have said anything, because it looks like they're not sure...that the phone companies started singing a different tune after the article came out and the members of Congress familiar with the plan haven't changed their opinion. Personally, I think they should have named names at the phone companies...somebody lies to you or gives you misleading info on a big story like that, you need to burn the fuck out of them.

 

Spell-check changed his name to Rudy Homosexual.

 

Hate to admit this, but it happens easily. The Wenalway mock draft was all finished, but without one of the trades that happened before the draft. In the process of fixing it, another oddity was introduced. It didn't throw off the results (much).

 

All the problems in this biz, and THAT's what has you concerned?

I read the note. Basically all it said is these companies are changing their stories. At least USA Today reported as much. How would you have handled it.

 

You're assuming that the companies changed their stories. I believe her original reporting was wrong.

If your theory was correct, USA Today wouldn't have done anything. They would have stood by their story. The very fact that they issued this revamped story and note proves they know they screwed the pooch.

This story -- if legit -- would have been one of the biggest stories of the year. That makes the original flaws and this convaluted clarification (or whatever it is) downright disturbing.

 

I give USAT credit for saying something when I think they could have held their ground and stood on the original reporting. This story does open itself up to the claim that the original story was bogus, when in fact, we're talking about some details of the original story. Nobody is denying that these databases exist and can/are being used by the government. And that's the real story.

 

Generally, though, it's good to have solid evidence of things like that before printing articles.

 

Anybody who ever read a Tom Clancy novel knew about this stuff 15 years ago, of course.

 

That's exactly the tone USA Today offers in this clarification-note thing. "Yeah, there were a few hiccups, but the crux of the story was legit."

Well, that's pretty much a lie. What made that story sensational -- a story that virtually every paper in the country had to pick up on the wire and attribute to USA Today -- was this allegation that your phone provider was willingly handing over your private phone bill to the NSA. That was the news.

USA Today's "re-reporting" shows that's not the case. Not even their original sources can back up their claims.

Let's look back at a few graphs from the original story and see how small these "details" were.

By Leslie Cauley, USA TODAY
The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.

That was the lede. It's been a long time since J school, but from what I remember, if something MAKES YOUR LEDE, it should be accurate. The second half of the lede is incorrect ... wouldn't be surprised if the first half is wrong too.

For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.
In the follow-up story, USA Today quotes a real live person -- a lawmaker on the record -- saying that the records do NOT include city-to-city calls. It's geared at repeated calls to the Middle East, etc. So much for that.

The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying and tracking suspected terrorists, they said.

So much for that graph.

The NSA's domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call database.

In defending the previously disclosed program, Bush insisted that the NSA was focused exclusively on international calls. "In other words," Bush explained, "one end of the communication must be outside the United States."

As a result, domestic call records — those of calls that originate and terminate within U.S. borders — were believed to be private.

Sources, however, say that is not the case. With access to records of billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a secret window into the communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information.

Is any of that true? I frankly don't know any more. Even after re-reading the original story (and the note), I honestly can't tell what's true and what's not. That's the crazy thing about credibility. Mistakes -- especially whoppers like this -- make you question everything. I'm inclined to believe most of that is not true if the companies are not participating.

 

CONTINUED


The government is collecting "external" data on domestic phone calls but is not intercepting "internals," a term for the actual content of the communication, according to a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the program. This kind of data collection from phone companies is not uncommon; it's been done before, though never on this large a scale, the official said. The data are used for "social network analysis," the official said, meaning to study how terrorist networks contact each other and how they are tied together.

Well, apparently, it's not being done on "this large a scale" even now.

AT&T recently merged with SBC and kept the AT&T name. Verizon, BellSouth and AT&T are the nation's three biggest telecommunications companies; they provide local and wireless phone service to more than 200 million customers.

The three carriers control vast networks with the latest communications technologies. They provide an array of services: local and long-distance calling, wireless and high-speed broadband, including video. Their direct access to millions of homes and businesses has them uniquely positioned to help the government keep tabs on the calling habits of Americans.

Guess, we can throw this out. More "details."

The agency told the companies that it wanted them to turn over their "call-detail records," a complete listing of the calling histories of their millions of customers. In addition, the NSA wanted the carriers to provide updates, which would enable the agency to keep tabs on the nation's calling habits.

The sources said the NSA made clear that it was willing to pay for the cooperation. AT&T, which at the time was headed by C. Michael Armstrong, agreed to help the NSA. So did BellSouth, headed by F. Duane Ackerman; SBC, headed by Ed Whitacre; and Verizon, headed by Ivan Seidenberg.

I love how they named the leaders of the companies ... but I guess those people don't deserve a formal clarification or correction.

There are all kinds of loaded gems in there, like the reporter's allegation that Qwest felt like it was going to lose million-dollar gov't contracts if it didn't cooperate. Even though it turns out now that other companies didn't participate either.

Anyway, like I said, before you accept USA Today's current stance that the story was fine -- minus a few glitches -- go back and read the original with the understanding that USA Today has no proof that the companies are participating. After doing that, I don't see how anyone can say this revamped story is sufficient.

The original -- http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.htm

 

Can we do away with all mock drafts please? Thank God my current newspaper refuses to run them.

 

Guess that rules out the big P