NSA spying will be Obama’s Watergate

An interview with Franklin Lamb, international lawyer, about Director of National Intelligence James Clapper admitting he lied to Congress when he said NSA doesn’t spy on Americans.
Question: Let’s jump right in. Do you think that James Clapper is only accepting this now that Edward Snowden has revealed the details of widespread spying not only on Americans but even on citizens and officials from other countries as well?

Lamb: Well I think that James Clapper statement was it to be…of his lawyers to keep him out of jail under the idea that he lied to Congress under a perjury sworn testimony but this apology will be used as this saga unfolds and I think it is going to unfold.

I think, can you imagine it has already been 40 years almost to the month since Watergate which brought down Nixon for a crime that does not compare really to this crime.

I think there is going to be, this continues to be as we said last week the tip of iceberg. It is Obama’s Watergate I believe and the first question that is going to start soon from Congress if they haven’t already, what did he know and when did he know it and let the chips fall and the investigations by the Congress and media and others continue.

I think it is very hard to say right now where this is going but it is not going in a good place for the Obama administration but it may be going to a good place for the American public who want to protect our civil liberties and our Constitution if this thing is totally exposed and this patriot, Mr. Snowden continues his work as others are joining not only in America but around the world.

So it is a very major happening and I think that Mr. Clapper is a small fish in this but there is going to be others.

So it is … of what happened with France, violating IATA, the International Air Transport Association authority rules with regard to air space. He put the President of Bolivia, Morales wife in danger on a whim at a phone call and pressure and the Congress is going to want to know and the American people are going to want to know who gave the orders to contact France, Portugal, Italy, our allies to close off international air space so some team could run in there and arrest this fellow.

It is amazing what is unfolding the last couple of days and we are going to hope that some good comes out of this terrible experience which occurs in an egregious attack, a fundamental attack on civil liberties in America.

Q: Mr. lamb, let’s scale back to just how bad this is for national intelligence and for the United States. If people in the position of James Clapper are lying to Congress about such issues, what is to say that there aren’t more lies still to be revealed that just haven’t been unearthed yet?

Lamb: Nothing and that is why we use the term the tip of the iceberg and we do not fantasize about that but that is what history teaches us. Remember Watergate, it was step by step unfolded, unfolded and grew and grew and grew and I predict the same thing is going to happen with this and there were some good results that came out of the Church hearings and the Ervin hearings and the Baker hearings with Nixon and Watergate which caused of course his resignation but it was good for the people to see these kind of crimes being committed and I think we are going to frankly see the same thing here.

Again it is just the beginning, it is incalculable I think the damage that has been done to America by the American government in the eyes of the world and its allies. What country is going to trust America anymore with a secret?

And there is a boast coming out of Washington today, AIPAC, oh the thing you allowed about this Snowden stopped for a long time.

But wait a minute, how did the Israelis know about it if the American public did know about it ?

The claim is in the Intelligence Committee of the House of Representatives that somebody shared this intelligence with the Israelis before the story broke in last couple of years.

So we gonna have to see what develops on this historic and potentially very damaging episode in American history.