A LITTLE NSA PUSHBACK

My local paper included an "analysis" piece about the NSA from Newhouse News Service and this is the letter I sent to an editor at Newhouse:

Dear Mr. Membrino,

A story from your news service appeared in my local paper:

http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/attack/114595.php

Written by Mr. George Latanzio, it contains what I believe to be a mistake:

All that changed in 1995, when Attorney General Janet Reno issued a memo that established a "wall" between law enforcement and counterintelligence officers.

The "wall" began some time in the 1980s, according to a decision by the FISA Appeals Court and other sources:

But the joint House and Senate intelligence committees' report of pre-September 11 intelligence failures assessed that the "wall" was "constructed over 60 years," and a 2002 ruling of the top-secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review found that the "wall" originated "at some point during the 1980s." Even the Ashcroft-led Justice Department recognized as much in a July 2004 report on the impact of the USA Patriot Act: "During the 1980s, the Department operated under a set of largely unwritten rules that limited to some degree information sharing between intelligence and law enforcement officials."

LINK: http://mediamatters.org/items/200508150002

Would you please issue a correction?

Thank you,

Steven Jandreau
Tucson, AZ