John McLaughlin: What we’re seeing now, in the release of intelligence, is unprecedented. It’s a common request from the policy community — in the past, I’ve so frequently heard them say, “This is great intelligence, it’s great stuff, but we can’t use it.” Meaning we can’t go public with it. Policy people always want, understandably, to be able to deploy intelligence as a way of throwing off, or combating something from an adversary. And the intelligence community typically has been conservative about that because it risks losing sources and methods.
