by Debbie Schlussel
Thomas Tamm, a former Bush Justice Department lawyer, says he’s the one who leaked to the New York Times and other news media, the existence of the Bush terrorist surveillance program. He’s outed himself as some sort of hero to Newsweek. But he’s no hero at all. Saboteur is the nicest appropriate word. The rest, other than traitor, are not printable here without expletive deleteds.

During his childhood, he played under the desk of J. Edgar Hoover.

Hmmm . . . now I know why he leaked the info: Exposure to dresses on men wounds you mentally for life.

The New York Times won a Pulitzer Prize for its story. The two reporters who worked on it each published books. Congress, after extensive debate, last summer passed a major new law to govern the way such surveillance is conducted. But Tamm–who was not the Times’s only source, but played the key role in tipping off the paper–has not fared so well. The FBI has pursued him relentlessly for the past two and a half years. Agents have raided his house, hauled away personal possessions and grilled his wife, a teenage daughter and a grown son. More recently, they’ve been questioning Tamm’s friends and associates about nearly every aspect of his life. Tamm has resisted pressure to plead to a felony for divulging classified information. But he is living under a pall, never sure if or when federal agents might arrest him.
Exhausted by the uncertainty clouding his life, Tamm now is telling his story publicly for the first time.”

So, we’re supposed to feel sorry for this guy who sold out America to Islamic terrorists because the people who helped him do so won a prize, but he’s been harassed? Tell it to the 3,000 graves from 9/11, dude. Tell their families how tough life is.

Tamm concedes he was also motivated in part by his anger at other Bush-administration policies at the Justice Department, including its aggressive pursuit of death-penalty cases and the legal justifications for “enhanced” interrogation techniques that many believe are tantamount to torture.

Ah, now we get to the point of this not-heroic-at-all coward. He has an agenda. He didn’t like U.S. policy. Well, maybe, then, he should have joined the ACLU, not the Justice Department, which also bends over for these terrorists.

He had never been “read into,” or briefed, on the details of the program. All he knew was that a domestic surveillance program existed, and it “didn’t smell right.”

You know what doesn’t smell right? The stench of traitors who jeopardize American lives and boost the chances of success for terrorists. That’s what really smells. He emboldened those who are bent on our destruction–whatta guy. The whole Muslim world is laughing at him. They love, but never appreciate, useful idiots like him. He won’t be getting any awards for bravery from them.

Tamm is haunted by the consequences of what he did‚Äîand what could yet happen to him. He is no longer employed at Justice and has been struggling to make a living practicing law. He does occasional work for a local public defender’s office, handles a few wills and estates–and is more than $30,000 in debt. (To cover legal costs, he recently set up a defense fund.) He says he has suffered from depression. He also realizes he made what he calls “stupid” mistakes along the way, including sending out a seemingly innocuous but fateful e-mail from his Justice Department computer that may have first put the FBI on his scent. Soft-spoken and self-effacing, Tamm has an impish smile and a wry sense of humor. “I guess I’m not a very good criminal,” he jokes.

So sad, too frickin’ bad. A lot of attorneys–like me–are having a tough time in this economy. And some of us didn’t jeopardize America’s national security like he did.
At the very least, he violated the attorney-client privilege and should be grieved for in whichever state or states he’s licensed to practice law. (The client was us–the U.S. government.) But he should also be prosecuted. It’s a crime to leak information about espionage activities. Isn’t that what all the liberals were whining about over Valerie Plame?
So, when will Thomas Tamm get the Lewis “Scooter” Libby treatment? I guess we’re only in the business of prosecuting non-leakers (ie., Libby) not going after real, actual leakers who broke the law, like Tamm and Richard Armitage (the real leaker of Plame’s CIA status).