Now You've Upset Dianne

In a pointed statement issued today, Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Dianne Feinstein said she was "totally opposed" to gathering intelligence on foreign leaders and said it was "a big problem" if President Obama didn't know the NSA was monitoring the phone calls of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. She said the United States should only be spying on foreign leaders with hostile countries, or in an emergency, and even then the president should personally approve the surveillance.

It was not clear what precipitated Feinstein's condemnation of the NSA. It marks a significant reversal for a lawmaker who not only defended agency surveillance programs -- but is about to introduce a bill expected to protect some of its most controversial activities.

Perhaps most significant is her announcement that the intelligence committee "will initiate a review into all intelligence collection programs."

[...]

A former intelligence agency liaison to Congress said Feinstein's sudden outrage over spying on foreign leaders raised questions about how well informed she was about NSA programs and whether she'd been fully briefed by her staff. "The first question I'd ask is, what have you been doing for oversight? Second, if you've been reviewing this all along what has changed your mind?"

  The Cable

Two good questions. Perhaps we are about to hear something even more untoward about Dianne's defense contractor connections through an upcoming leak.

The former official added that the "bottom line question is where was the Senate Intelligence Committee when it came to their oversight of these programs? And what were they being told by the NSA, because if they didn't know about this surveillance, that would imply they were being lied to."

Or possibly they knew very well, and there are memos about to come out proving it.

An excerpt of Der Feinstein's comments:

"Unlike NSA's collection of phone records under a court order, it is clear to me that certain surveillance activities have been in effect for more than a decade and that the Senate Intelligence Committee was not satisfactorily informed.

"With respect to NSA collection of intelligence on leaders of US allies – including France, Spain, Mexico and Germany – let me state unequivocally: I am totally opposed," she said.

  Guardian

Peon U.S. citizens, not so much.

And good little Democrat that she is, she provides some more cover for the Listener in Chief in a backhanded sort of way:

Feinstein also provided the first official confirmation of a German report that indicated Merkel's phone had been monitored for more than a decade. "It is my understanding that President Obama was not aware Chancellor Merkel's communications were being collected since 2002," Feinstein said. "That is a big problem."

Donkey Hotey

Although, frankly, I could be persuaded to believe that nobody told Obama anything. The respect he gets in Washington is something short of awesome.