I swear to defend the U.S. against enemies foreign and domestic, unless I miss a paycheck

The Director of National Intelligence says that the government's Shutdown Lite could tempt some U.S. intelligence operatives to become double agents working for foreign powers. They have to make ends meet, after all.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said it could be easier for enemies to recruit U.S. spies among the federal employees hit by furloughs from the sequester and now the shutdown.

"This is a dreamland for foreign intelligence service to recruit, particularly as our employees already ... [subjected] to furloughs driven by sequestration, are gonna have even greater financial challenges," he said. ...

When Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) asked Clapper, point blank, whether the intelligence community could guarantee the security of the United States in the face of the ongoing shutdown, Clapper said no. "I don't feel that I can make such a guarantee to the American people," he told Grassley.

Clapper is probably just blowing smoke in support of his employer, Reverend Obama. Still, it is not the least strange pronouncement in a topsy-turvy time. Our director of national intelligence tells the Senate and American people that our intelligence agencies employ functionaries in sensitive positions who might be turned by our enemies because they've been furloughed for what will probably be just enough time to do a few household repairs.

But you have to remember, these are members of the Washington privileged class. The country works for them, and if it doesn't, too bad for the country. Our federal apparatchiks don't know what it feels like to toil for a corporation that can unemploy them in the blink of an eye, along with tens of thousands of their co-workers. They can't imagine spending years looking for a position in their field and winding up as a boiler room salesperson for aluminum siding. Or giving up job hunting and facing the rest of a lifetime as a redundant component of the economy.

The furloughed employees include both support staff and intelligence analysts, according to the official.

Weren't these people checked out to a fare-ye-well to get their security clearances? Aren't they routinely polygraph-fluttered at random times every few years? These aren't high-level operatives like Robert Hanssen with enough pull to deflect investigations (for a while, anyway). Is Clapper saying the U.S. intelligence establishment can't even protect itself against moles in its own "middle management"?

No one asks them to choose death before dishonor. Analysts don't risk capture and interrogation. Is it too much to expect that they might put loyalty to the country that has treated them so generously before the total job security they see as their right?