Some time back, a terrorist plot arising in Yemen was foiled by our CIA, working with people within al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The Associated Press reported about it, using confidential and secret information supplied to them, thereby exposing the intelligence network to great danger.

The Department of Justice is charged with following up on such leaks, and obtained information about telephone communications on a great many business and personal telephones used by AP reporters, for several months. After doing so, as required, they informed AP of what they had done. Generating outrage.

Reporters will not be able to investigate without confidence in the confidentiality of their communications. Sources will shrink from them. Such investigations are the sunlight the President himself has said repeatedly he seeks.

A knotty problem, with much to be said for each side. Is it a matter of degree? How many phone lines, for how long? Or is there a need for discussion before the taps? (Forewarned of such searches in the past, journalists have gone to jail rather than reveal a source). Is the spying to be viewed, each time, as an incident, or is a pattern of government overreach to be sought? And how would we know?

It has been said that the AP's disregard of national security concerns is outrageous. And the government's broad and secret snooping has likewise been so characterized. We have the Constitution to guide us, but here I don't think it offers much guidance. At the last, as with so many Constitutional questions, we must rely on common sense and conscience.

Dave Sagarin (May 15, 2013)