Right-Wing Bloggers Give the New York Daily News a Free Pass

The following are snips of posts made today in the right-wing blogopshere following the revelation made by the New York Daily News that an alleged NYC bombing plot has been thwarted. The NYDN reporters wrote:

The FBI discovered the plot by monitoring Internet chat rooms, where the aspiring terrorists discussed striking the U.S. economy, rather than causing mass casualties, a source said.
[...]
The Lebanese government had been expected to release a statement about Andalousli's arrest but was asked by the U.S. to hold off while operations to disrupt the plot continued, sources said.

Now, one would assume that anyone on the right who is concerned about anonymous sources leaking classified imformation to the media and who had viciously attacked the New York Times for revealing such strategies would also feel the same way about what the New York Daily News has done.

Not so.

The right-wing blogopshere mouthpieces who called for the NYT's reporters personal residence information to be posted so they could 'hunt them down'* have chosen to defend the NYDN and are, instead, attacking the NYT once again. Hypocrisy at its very worst.

Will Bush now come out and say that the actions of the NYDN were 'despicable' and will Rep Peter King (R-NY) accuse the paper of having a 'left-wing elitist agenda' as he did when he slammed the New York Times? Highly doubtful.

Here's a roundup of the right-wing blogosphere's reactions:

The American Spectator blames the New York Times in a confusing post titled: 'What the New York Times Has Wrought'.

Because apparently al Qaeda had promised the purported lead plotter based in Lebanon financial support. Other plotters scattered around the world -- some presumably in the U.S. -- would have been in need of the funds to purchase explosives, to finance travel, etc.
[...]
Our Treasury source wouldn't comment on the case. One DOJ source indicated that this case initially took off from monitoring of chat rooms that had been identified as havens for some of the plotters (that monitoring was undertaken in part by the NSA, and some of the monitoring required FISA court filings, something the New York Times doesn't support, either).

BTW: another DOJ source said that in the past year, counter-terrorism officials have noted a marked downturn in the use of cell phone and landline communications. There are a number of reasons for this, but they readily point to the N.Y. Times story on NSA overseas terror-call monitoring as one reason.

The FBI officials stated that they learned of this alleged plot by monitoring chat rooms. What that has to do with the NYT's stories is beyond me, since they've apparently been monitoring chat rooms for years.

2) Absolutely no criticism of the New York Daily News by Captain's Quarters.

3) The Strata-Sphere blames the NYT as well:

I can only say I am saddened beyond belief that leaks have caused the authorities to move early and possibly lose some key players in this (5 our still free). And I am angry that the NY Times and others naively exposed programs used legally by this country to foil these plots and save lives. Keller and Co. need to be on the hot seat right now!

4) Hugh Hewitt tries to tie this story to the SWIFT monitoring too.

I wonder if Swift helped us follow the terrorist and his money, and whether he knew about Swift:

5) No call by Stop the ACLU to publish the home addresses of the NYDN reporters. Nope. Instead they save their wrath for the NYT:

I find it quite disturbing that it is the successful programs the NY Times are crippling by their revealing such classified information. These terrorists were caught through methods like monitoring conversations in chat rooms, and tracking finances; the very kind of programs the NY Times describe in intimate detail.

I must have missed the NYT story that provided the ever so secret details of the FBI's monitoring of chat rooms.

6) Silence so far from Michelle Malkin.

7) Ace of Spades notes that the FBI criticized the media, but chooses to link to Hot Air's post that joins in on the NYT bashing.

As of this time, I have yet to find one major right-wing blog that condemns the New York Daily News for publishing this story.

(*Note: The blog I linked to originally had this statement posted:

Let's start with the following New York Times reporters and editors: Arthur "Pinch" Sulzberger Jr. , Bill Keller, Eric Lichtblau, and James Risen.

Do you have an idea where they live? Go hunt them down and do America a favor. Get their photo, street address, where their kids go to school, anything you can dig up, and send it to the link above. This is your chance to be famous - grab for the golden ring."

The blog has now disappeared, thankfully, but it's obvious that the cached version shows some edits to the original post. And, frankly, I hope I had something to do with said disappearance since I brought that post to the attention of those who needed to know about the campaign to harass the NYT's staff. We cannot be passive in the face of such threats.)