Rep. Peter King Says NSA Should Spy On Congress, Because They Might Be Talking To Al Qaeda

from the or-the-IRA? dept

Every day, Rep. Peter King seems more and more like a TV villain politician. He's so... over the top in his crazy surveillance state opinions that it's almost difficult to believe he's real. Just take a stroll through his previous statements, in which he's attacked the NY Times for supporting Ed Snowden, whom he calls both a "traitor" and a "terrorist appeaser." He's said that it's a "disgrace" that anyone might call out the fact that Director of National Intelligence James Clapper lied to Congress. He's argued that it's "slander" to call the NSA's activities "spying." And he's argued that Glenn Greenwald should be arrested and prosecuted for reporting on Snowden's leaks.

His latest, it seems, is in response to Senator Bernie Sanders' simple question to the NSA, about whether or not it was spying on Congress (I'll note that Sanders appears to use "spying" in the manner in which King has previously insisted was "slander"). King was asked about Sanders' question, and argued that the NSA should be spying on Congress because they might be "talking to an al-Qaeda leader."

Specifically, after a very leading question from the Fox News reporter, King says:

I think members of Congress should be treated the same as everyone else. If a member of Congress is talking to an Al Qaeda leader in Iraq or Afghanistan, why should that member of Congress be any different from any person on the street?

While that might sound ridiculous at first, I guess if any member of Congress knows about talking to terrorist leaders, it would be Rep. Peter King. As we've pointed out multiple times, King was a very big supporter of a known terrorist group, the IRA, back in the 80s, supporting the group that was known for bombing a shopping center, killing six and injuring 90.

King goes on with this whopper:

What they're trying to suggest is that somehow the NSA is spying on members of Congress. They're not spying on anyone.

Anyone? Really? They're clearly spying on lots and lots of people, because that's the NSA's job. King goes on to pretend, again, that metadata is no big deal since it just shows phone numbers. So, I'm curious, will Rep. Peter King release his own phone records for the last year? After all, it's no big deal. Just the phone numbers he called, the times he called and how long he was on call. Just like the info the NSA collects, and which King insists is not secret.

Filed Under: bernie sanders, congress, metadata collection, nsa, peter king, section 215, spying