Former spokesman for the U.S. Mission to the U.N. Richard Grenell fills his twitter feed to the brim with all sorts of flippant comments about liberals, Democrats, women and, especially, U.S. foreign policy under the Obama administration. Yesterday, though, Grenell got a new job that one imagined would carry with it a more sober tone on twitter. Not so, it seems.

Only a day after the announcement of his new post as the Mitt Romney campaign’s national security spokesman — just as he was taking heat for his past tweets — Grenell again let loose with a tweet about President Obama that, had it come from more serious quarters, might have caused concern. In short, Grenell joked that President Obama had committed treason by passing missile secrets to the Russians:

Grenell is referencing an Obama comment picked up on a “hot mic” at a summit in Seoul, South Korea. There the president told his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, that after the election he would have more “flexibility” on various issues. The White House explained that Obama was discussing a missile defense plan that the Russians object to, and noting that, as adviser Ben Rhodes put it, 2012 “is clearly not a year in which we are going to achieve a breakthrough” in those negotiations.

Grenell frequently harped on the “hot mic” comment — seeing all sorts of insidious implications to them — but today’s tweet took it further than ever before. (He’s been mum on Romney’s own “hot mic” moment.)

One expects this sort of joking invective when plumbing the depths of the internet, but not so much from a campaign spokesman trying to get someone elected to the most powerful office in the world. Since Grenell saw fit to apologize (sort of) for the his repeated off-color tweets about presidential candidates’ wives, perhaps he should also take the time to apologize to President Obama.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak appeared on CNN yesterday to be interviewed by anchor Christiane Amanpour. In a sometimes contentious interview, Amanpour focused mostly on the Iranian nuclear program. Despite agreement that a potential nuclear armed Iran would constitute a threat, a slight rift opened up last week between the U.S. and Israeli administrations over the first new round of talks between Iran and the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany.

Amanpour dove into Iran issues and commented on Barak’s repeated references to Iran’s “military nuclear program.” Amanpour cited reports about American intelligence estimates which — along with Israeli and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) estimates — doesn’t conclude that Iran has decided on building a weapon. “You’re obviously very concerned, and so are many, should Iran get a nuclear capability that’s military. As I said, the U.S. does not believe any such decision has been made,” she said. Barak shot back: “No, no, no. The — I want to correct you.” He didn’t, however, contradict what she said, but rather added to it his own assessment:

BARAK: I’m talking to the American intelligence. I’ve talked to American leaders. There is no difference in the assessment of intelligence. It’s true that probably [Iranian Supreme Leader] Khamenei did not give an order to start building a weapon or a device.

But why he’s doing this, just because he understands that if he starts to break the IAEA and start to actually build a weapon, he might find himself faced with an American response, Israeli response or whoever, in a way that might damage him. And that’s the only reason why he did not give the order. But they’re clearly heading toward this objective.

AMANPOUR: But if that’s the case, then, then surely the pressure is working, that they’re not doing it, as you said, because the pressure is there and the threat of what you might do.

BARAK: These are quite effective sanctions. But it’s still far away from working.

Watch the video:

Barak is right to say that sanctions have not worked, as such, because Iran has yet to answer many questions from the IAEA about its past activities and allow unfettered access to sites on the IAEA’s list — both points Barak made. But Barak’s conclusion, which buttressed Amanpour’s point, is also correct: pressure is having an effect, as evinced by Iran’s willingness to come to the table and engage — albeit on what will almost certainly be a rocky path. President Obama has vowed to keep all options on the table and limits the window for successful negotiations, which his administration considers the “best and most permanent way” to end the crisis.

Barak’s comments that sanctions “are quite effective” track with those of Israel’s Ambassador to the U.N. Ron Prosor, who said earlier this month that the sanctions track is “much more effective than people think and it might change, hopefully it might change behavior patterns if we continue with it.”

Our guest blogger is Corina Simonelli, an intern with Enough

On Monday, several civil rights and online privacy organizations–including the American Civil Liberties Union (ALCU) and Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)–launched a “Stop Cyber Spying” week of action to counter H.R. 3523, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA). CISPA, sponsored by Reps. Mike Rogers (R-MI) and C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD), is an information sharing amendment to the National Security Act of 1947. The bill is aimed at improving communications between government agencies and private companies in order to enhance cyber security measures. However, the bill has come under fire recently from privacy rights organizations who claim the bill opens the door to massive violations of individual privacy rights.

The week of action includes online petitions, letters to representatives and a tweeting campaign. The ACLU provided tweet suggestions such as:

@MyRepresentative Does the military need to know I send my Mom lolcat pictures? #CongressTMI Stop #CISPA

And

@MyReprsentative, I get lab and test results from my Dr online. Please don’t give the govt access too! #CongressTMI Stop #CISPA”

An online petition on avaaz.org has garnered over 682,396 worldwide signatures urging Congress to vote against the bill.

Objection to the measure focuses on its vague language, which allows private companies to give government agencies- — for example the NSA — confidential customer information if there is thought to be a cyber threat. The bill loosely defines a cyber threat as:

“[E]fforts to degrade, disrupt, or destroy such systems or networks [of a government or private entity] or efforts to gain unauthorized access to a system or network, including efforts to gain such unauthorized access to steal or misappropriate private or government information.”

Under these regulations, private information, including personal conversations and emails, could be shared without a warrant and without the knowledge or consent of an individual, effectively bypassing previous measures for privacy and transparency. As Center for American Progress Senior Fellow Peter Swire has explained, the broad definitions “enable companies to share detailed information about their customers with the government and other companies, without telling their customers, and without a close link to actual cyber-threats.”

On Tuesday, the Obama Administration joined with these groups in voicing opposition to privacy restricting measures. National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said in a
statement to The Hill newspaper:

“[I]nformation sharing provisions must include robust safeguards to preserve the privacy and civil liberties of our citizens. Legislation without new authorities to address our nation’s critical infrastructure vulnerabilities, or legislation that would sacrifice the privacy of our citizens in the name of security, will not meet our nation’s urgent needs.”

Clearly, CISPA does not provide the privacy protections the White House seeks. Although some revisions have been made in response to this criticism, many organizations believe the bill is still dangerously vague in its handling of privacy rights.

In a speech Tuesday, CISPA co-sponsor Rep. Rogers said that this week’s outcries were mere turbulence in passing this very controversial bill. But the week of action shows that many Americans believe their 4th Amendment rights are much more than turbulence to be ignored. The bill will be voted on next week, along with many others during Cybersecurity Week at the U.S. Congress.

The largest circulation daily newspaper in America, USA Today, reports that two of its journalists were targeted by a campaign to discredit their work shortly after publishing pieces about a Pentagon propaganda operation.

The journalists, Pentagon reporter Tom Vanden Brook and editor Ray Locker, worked together on a long and critical feature story — and did follow-up stories — about a Pentagon campaign to improve the image of U.S. military adventures abroad, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Pentagon program paid contractors — 172, for example, during a three-year period in Iraq — such as California’s Leonie Industries to run what it calls “information operations.”

Yesterday, USA Today published its own story about what one expert called “reputation attacks” that were likely run by people with experience. USA Today reporter Gregory Korte wrote that after inquiries went in to contractors involved with the Pentagon propaganda campaign and stories were published, fake websites and twitter accounts using the journalists’ names began to pop up. Korte explained:

For example, Internet domain registries show the website TomVandenBrook.com was created Jan. 7 — just days after Pentagon reporter Tom Vanden Brook first contacted Pentagon contractors involved in the program. Two weeks after his editor Ray Locker’s byline appeared on a story, someone created a similar site, RayLocker.com, through the same company.

Once in place, the websites and twitter accounts were used to discredit reporting by the journalists. Wikipedia entries for the journalists were also created and misleading information about them published there.

The websites using their names were registered through false addresses and routed through proxy servers to conceal their origins. Registering a website costs about $10 and routing it through a proxy about $50. USA Today noted that if federal funds were used, “it could violate federal law prohibiting the production of propaganda for domestic consumption.”

The Pentagon said it was “unaware” of such activity and deemed it “unacceptable.” A source told Korte that the Pentagon had asked the related contractors if there had been any such activity, and all had denied it, but the inquiries were “informal and did not amount to an official investigation.” After USA Today made inquiries to the Pentagon about the websites, they were taken down.

The propaganda campaigns waged by the Pentagon can be lucrative for both the Defense Department and contractors. The long feature by Vanden Brook and Locker noted:

From 2005 to 2009, such spending rose from $9 million to $580 million a year mostly in Iraq and Afghanistan, Pentagon and congressional records show. Last year, spending dropped to $202 million as the Iraq War wrapped up. A USA TODAY investigation, based on dozens of interviews and a series of internal military reports, shows that Pentagon officials have little proof the programs work and they won’t make public where the money goes. In Iraq alone, more than $173 million was paid to what were identified only as “miscellaneous foreign contractors.”

(HT: Robert Mackey)