People have tried to defend Obama administration intelligence chief James Clapper for lying to Congress, saying that Ron Wyden’s question on classified operations in an unclassified setting put him in an awkward situation. That seems to make some sense, until you learn that Clapper was warned of the question in advance. He also failed to avail himself of the opportunity to correct his statement after the fact.
In short, he lied, not because he wanted to keep the operation secret from the world, but because he wanted to keep it secret from Congress.
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