Olbermann: "not too SWIFT"

If the New York Times did not exist, the Bush administration would have to invent it. Bush has gotten more value from the Times than Stalin ever got fom Pravda.

The Times helped Cheney and Bush build up the fiction of Saddam as a nuclear threat by funneling exclusive coverage of Chalabi bullshit through Judith Miller to the front page.

And how does the Bush team show its gratitude? By casting The Times in the role of dart-board for the latest episode of the long-running series, "If you ______, you're helping the terrorists."

Bush, Cheney, Tony Snow, and a chorus of Republicans in the Senate and House over all expressed shock and outrage that the Times blabbed about a state secret. It's a secret that White House hid in plain sight in this 2001 press release: President Announces Crackdown on Terrorist Financial Network. And SWIFT, the agency that provided information to the U.S. Government, has long acknowledged their cooperation on their own website:

As you may know from the User Handbook and swift.com, SWIFT has a longstanding history, beginning in the 1990s, of cooperating with authorities such as central banks, treasury departments, law enforcement agencies and international organisations such as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in their efforts to prevent misuse of the financial system. Our members support this policy.

Keith Olbermann's team put together a fine set of clips on this. Crooks and Liars has it.