[here’s McCarthy recently on how the NSA program and much of the Patriot Act had the intent of ending the firewall http://pjmedia.com/andrewmccarthy/2013/06/12/congressman-sensenbrenner-is-wrong-on-patriot-act-records/ ]

Vietnam War ended right after Watergate, no coincidence. Ford was not committed to the war. Congress was reacting in part to Watergate, although mostly just to the long arduous haul. Also, the plumbers were to plug leaks, and had to do with Ellsberg at first, and Ellsberg was let off because of Watergate.]

Here’s the great McCarthy article.

Here’s my post on the history of the firewall (from August of 2005):

The antiwar movement that rose as a result of the Vietnam War had a distrust of American power and intelligence gathering and of agencies such as the CIA. The events of Watergate only “deepened the aversion,” since the burglars included former intelligence officers, and Nixon also used the CIA to obstruct the work of the FBI in trying to investigate the break-in. Furthermore, the CIA was engaged in some domestic spying scandals and other acts considered excesses, such as attempts to assassinate foreign leaders (investigated by the Congressional Church Commission of the mid-70s). The upshot of all this was, among other things, a desire to limit the power of the executive branch of government and of intelligence-gathering, because the fear was that these entities, unchecked, could (and would) combine in corrupt ways to undermine our liberties.

What were the mechanisms by which these limits were applied? Congressional oversight, and rulings by federal courts. Previously, the executive branch had been trusted in manners of national security without much input from these branches; after Vietnam and Watergate, no more”“Congress and the courts sought to keep the executive branch and the intelligence bureaus on a tight leash.

In addition, national security issues and intelligence-gathering began to be regarded as a form of law enforcement, especially when the activities took place domestically. It’s well worth quoting from McCarthy’s article on the difference between law enforcement and national security; his writing is incredibly lucid on these matters (and, coincidentally, Belmont Club touches on some of these issues in today’s post, entitled “Law vs. War):

Actually I could (and should) quote the whole thing, because it’s very relevant in tracing the conflict between civil liberties and security (and the loss of trust), and the different ways we’ve gone about trying to preserve civil liberties. After Vietnam, the pendulum definitely swung way in favor of that. And 9/11 was probably a direct result. Ironic, no?

The firewall was removed for the most part, I think. But this coordination and communication has allowed things like the NSA databank to spring up.

The fact that Obama was not trustworthy and fought dirty to win (because, as Hanson says, a lot of the scandals are for political reasons, winning the election) should have come as a surprise to no one. And yet it did. Ask Alice Palmer and Blair Hull and Jack Ryan for starters; they know.