Jimmy Carter Reveals Secret NSA Plan to Keep Post Offices Relevant

What can you say when formal newswire services refer to physical mail as "snail mail" without the ironic quotes? Like it's the actual term used for mail sent through the United States Postal Service. That's how wire service Agence France-Presse calls mail in the lede of its piece describing how former President Jimmy Carter is now using letters, envelopes and postage to correspond with foreign leaders, thanks to revelations of National Security Agency surveillance:

"When I want to communicate with a foreign leader privately, I type or write a letter myself, put it in the post office, and mail it," Carter said with a laugh, as he was questioned on the matter on NBC's Meet the Press program.

"I have felt that my own communications are probably monitored," he said on the Sunday show. …

Asked whether the programs were necessary, Carter said he thought they had "been extremely liberalized and, I think, abused by our own intelligence agencies."

It was only a small part of the interview by Andrea Mitchell. Watch the rest below.

Special awful anti-bonus: Earlier in Meet the Press Sunday, GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, promoting vague "do-something"-ism in Ukraine (send them small weapons and medical supplies!) and insisting that everybody in the intelligence community believes that Edward Snowden is "under the influence of Russian intelligence services today," despite not actually being able to provide any evidence that supports his claim. Watch below:

Full transcript of the episode is here.

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

I thought we read that the snails were scanning our letters for the NSA.

[a better weapon]

They are working closely with the squirrelz...

*Securely fastens tinfoil hat*

[prolefeed]

I'm gonna guess that the same government that reads our emails and listens in on our phone calls isn't going to be overly deterred about reading snail mail if they think the contents are interesting to them.

[Swiss Servator, mehr Spr?ngli]

That is a punishment assignment...

"Hey Williams, since you botched that last job, you get the Carter mail assignment"

[WTF]

Well of course they want to keep an eye on History's Greatest Monster.

[Acosmist]

They open actual mail and probably have been doing so for decades. Nice empty gesture, Jimmy.

[GroundTruth]

Still a more useful ex-president than he was president.

[CampingInYourPark]

"I have felt that my own communications are probably monitored," he said on the Sunday show.?

Actually, Jimmy, you're probably one of the very few people that care about your communications

[UCrawford]

I think it would bother him more if his communications weren't monitored.

I liked the delusional part about Obama is one of the few Presidents who didn't ask him for advice. Reagan and both Bushes didn't care what he had to say, and the one time that Bill Clinton tried to use him (North Korea in 1994), Jimmeh completely screwed him over by trying to negotiate a treaty without authorization (after which he threw Clinton under the bus on CNN).

If there's one intelligent thing that Obama's done, it's ignore Jimmy Carter...because Jimmy is a cancer.

[Bee Tagger]

"I have felt that my own communications are probably monitored," he said on the Sunday show. ?

Yeah, well I have communicated that my own feelings are probably monitored, which is why I use tail-mail for my sexting.

[R C Dean]

Nobody cared what Jimmy said when he was President. He's kidding himself if he thinks anybody cares now.

[Paul.]

Didn't Carter say that criticism of the NSA was racist?