Congressman Twitters an Iraq Security Breach

**Odd** · 02-07-09, 11:38 PM

Congressman Twitters an Iraq Security Breach
CQ Politics | Congressman Twitters an Iraq Security Breach

A congressional trip to Iraq this weekend was supposed to be a secret.

But the cat’s out of the bag now, thanks to a member of the House Intelligence Committee who broke an embargo via Twitter.

A delegation led by House Minority Leader John A. Boehner , R-Ohio, arrived in Iraq earlier today, and because of Rep. Peter Hoekstra , R-Mich., the entire world — or at least Twitter.com readers—now know they’re there.

“Just landed in Baghdad,” messaged Hoekstra, a former chairman of the Intelligence panel and now the ranking member, who is routinely entrusted to keep some of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets.

Before the delegation left Washington, they were advised to keep the trip to themselves for security reasons. A few media outlets, including Congressional Quarterly, learned about it, but agreed not to disclose anything until the delegation had left Iraq.

Nobody expected, though, that a lawmaker with such an extensive national security background would be the first to break the silence. And in such a big way.

Not only did Hoekstra reveal the existence of the lawmakers’ trip, but included details about their itinerary in updates posted every few hours on his Twitter page, until he suddenly stopped, for some reason, on Friday morning.

Since it’s already a matter of public record, here are some of Hoekstra’s twitter dispatches, typos and all, delivered in just 140 characters or less:

“On the way to Andrews Air Force base.12 hour flight to mid east. Be back on Mon instead of tues. Votes mon. I’ll keep you posted,” he wrote on Feb. 4

In his last dispatch today, he wrote: “Moved into green zone by helicopter Iraqi flag now over palace. Headed to new US embassy Appears calmer less chaotic than previous here [sic].”

**Bob Loblaw** · 02-07-09, 11:51 PM

Time for me to sound like my dad: what the hell is this "twitter" all the kids are talking about? While I'm at it, what the hell is "Digg"?

**Odd** · 02-08-09, 12:37 AM

Digg is a place where you submit a story and others comment on it - so far not unlike what happens in the forum here. In this forum the stories are displayed by date of last reply. With Digg, users vote it up or down (with some other weighting figured in) to determine the order the stories are displayed. Unpopular stuff gets buried quick and hot topics are rocketed up.

And no I don't really get the appeal of the site.

Twitter is "micro blogging". Instead of the more common blog where you can post pages of rambling along with pictures and videos, Twitter is limited to 144 (I think) character long messages. The size being similar to the size of a cellphone text message is not by coincidence as cellphones are commonly used to post to and read "Tweets" to Twitter blogs.

Nope, don't get the appeal of this one either.

Here's Rep. Peter Hoekstra Twitter blog.

**Five-0** · 02-08-09, 10:32 AM

And people that drive up on my scenes wonder why I tell that there is nothing going on. Stupid people, gotta love'em cause there are laws against killing them.