If so, I'm wondering if anyone thinks that Mr. Bush using the NSA for listening to domestic calls to a foreign country is a good thing.
Posted by Topher (Member # 71) on :
I wonder if Canada and/or Mexico is included in the definition of a foreign country...
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
This whole thing is, finally, proof of Bush's criminal activities. The whole wiretapping business constitutes violation of the Fourth Amendment against unreasonable search and seizure. The NSA conducts their searches completely independently of the judicial system, and therefore, any monitoring of United States citizens in such circumstances is a breach of the Constitution.
I've been seriously wondering why more people haven't been screaming for impeachment already.
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
bEcuz we R winnink the war on ter0rr!!1!!
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
The real issue is that Bush purposely did not go through the FISA court that handles all covert warrants. So leinent is this court's criteria for a warrant that this year they've only refused four of over 1700th requests.
So: either Bush knew that his actions were expressly illegal or they had zero cause for the surveliance...I mean, not a shred.
There's also the rather shady fact that only select congress members knew about this little operation: anyone that would have seriously opposed it (Arlen Spector of the House Judiciary Committe for example- a man who's job it is to approve such things)were keptout of the loop.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
All the evidence is here to see.
Posted by Shakaar (Member # 1782) on :
On CNN they reported that only one request to conduct surveillance was rejected. I�m not troubled that it was being done- but I am troubled that he didn�t go through the courts. Bush has given very poor reasoning for it- that they wouldn�t have been carried out fast enough (when the law stated he can order it to be done, and then go to the court 72 hours later)� but it hasn�t been three days� it�s gone on for three years. Bush condemned the media for publishing the story- as it brought it to light and now the terrorists will adapt. Well, I feel if he had gone to the courts, it would not have been a big story and would have stayed quiet- it was not the fact that it was going on that was a story, it was the fact that it was going on illegally.
Posted by Malnurtured Snay (Member # 411) on :
People engaged in illegal activity ALWAYS get upset when the media focuses in on them -- generally, they won't come out and say "I'm upset because I'm engaged in illegal activity and now everyone knows about it because of you pesky newspapers", rather, they'll just scream about national security and try to justify themselves.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
So, we won't get to hear Bush say "And I would have gotten away with it, if it wasn't for you meddling kids and your dog!"?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Fuck, that was my response. Bush could be the Phantom President or some oher Scooby villan.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
To my way of thinking, what the domestic surveillance event, along with so many other things, indicates to me that this administration is trying to us September 11 to rebuild the Imperial Presidency.
Q Sir, if I could ask you to step back for a moment, there has been a lot written and talked about recently about executive power, the power of the presidency. You have a really interesting perspective on this having served in the Ford White House, which arguably was the point at which presidential power had reached its absolute nadir. And I'm curious how that experience has shaped your view of presidential powers, and the degree to which you felt over the last four years that you and your office need to play a role in reasserting those powers both vis-a-vis Congress, and in terms of expanding presidential powers to take account of the world that we live in now, which is a very different world from --
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Yes, I do have the view that over the years there had been an erosion of presidential power and authority, that it's reflected in a number of developments -- the War Powers Act, which many people believe is unconstitutional. It's never really been tested. We sort of have an understanding when we commit force that the U.S., the government, the executive branch will notify the Congress, but making it clear we're not doing it a different form of the War Powers Act, in fact. It has never been tested. It will be tested at some point. I am one of those who believe that was an infringement upon the authority of the President. The budget -- the Anti-In Common and Control Act, back in the '70s, passed during the Ford administration that limited the President's authority to impound funds, a series of things Watergate -- a lot of the things around Watergate and Vietnam, both, in the '70s served to erode the authority, I think, the President needs to be effective especially in a national security area.
----
In other areas, in the perspective looking at issues that come up during this administration, one of those was the Energy Task Force. My belief that the President is entitled to and needs to have unfiltered advice in formulating policy, that he ought to be able to seek the opinion of anybody he wants to, and that he should not have to reveal, for example, to a member of Congress who he talked to that morning.
I think you're right, probably the end of the next administration, you had the nadir of the modern presidency in terms of authority and legitimacy, then a number of limitations that were imposed in the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate. But I do think that to some extent now, we've been able to restore the legitimate authority of the presidency.
I found the opinion expresed by Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post in this piece interesting.
At his news conference yesterday, he took advantage of the sovereign's divine right to rewrite history. Clearly outraged at the Senate's recalcitrance on the USA Patriot Act, the president issued a challenge: "These senators need to explain why they thought the Patriot Act was a vital tool after the September the 11th attacks but now think it's no longer necessary." The president conveniently forgot to mention that Congress originally set a "sunset" date for the act to expire precisely because members were so deeply concerned about the extent to which it compromised our liberties.
He also sought to explain why he believes he has the right to order the National Security Agency to conduct electronic surveillance of Americans without first getting a warrant. He cited Article II of the Constitution, which of course doesn't mention telephones or the Internet. When it's convenient, the president recognizes that "strict constructionism" has its limits.
None of this is really unexpected from a president whose apparent goal from the beginning has been to reinflate the presidency and unshackle it from those inconvenient restraints that Congress or the courts might seek to impose.
Think about the powers this White House has asserted: to detain terrorist suspects indefinitely, without charges or due process. To kidnap suspects and hold them in secret CIA-run prisons, with no acknowledgment that the suspect is even in U.S. custody. To inflict on these prisoners inhumane and degrading treatment that amounts to torture.
And now the president claims the unilateral right to tap your phone and mine whenever he wants. Never mind that there is a legally established procedure to obtain warrants for such domestic surveillance; never mind that this lawful process is conducted quickly and in total secrecy. The imperial president does not bow to lowly courts. He just does what he believes he needs to do.
The Administration has been out pushing the 'Congress gave us the authority' line of reasoning, which is, in my opinion, tenious at best.
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales yesterday said President Bush has "inherent authority" to conduct secret surveillance on people inside the United States without getting a warrant from any judicial body.
Speaking at the White House before Mr. Bush's press conference, Mr. Gonzales vigorously defended the legality of the secret domestic spying, the existence of which elicited an uproar on Capitol Hill ever since Mr. Bush acknowledged the program Saturday.
The administration has been authorized to intercept phone calls and gather "signals intelligence" without warrants since shortly after September 11, when Congress authorized the president to "use all necessary and appropriate force" to combat terrorism.
"We also believe the president has the inherent authority under the Constitution, as commander in chief, to engage in this kind of activity," Mr. Gonzales said. "Signals intelligence has been a fundamental aspect of waging war since the Civil War."
Begun and held at the City of Washington on Wednesday,
the third day of January, two thousand and one
Joint Resolution
To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the recent attacks launched against the United States.
Whereas, on September 11, 2001, acts of treacherous violence were committed against the United States and its citizens; and
Whereas, such acts render it both necessary and appropriate that the United States exercise its rights to self-defense and to protect United States citizens both at home and abroad; and
Whereas, in light of the threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States posed by these grave acts of violence; and
Whereas, such acts continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States; and
Whereas, the President has authority under the Constitution to take action to deter and prevent acts of international terrorism against the United States: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This joint resolution may be cited as the `Authorization for Use of Military Force'.
SEC. 2. AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES.
(a) IN GENERAL- That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.
(b) War Powers Resolution Requirements-
(1) SPECIFIC STATUTORY AUTHORIZATION- Consistent with section 8(a)(1) of the War Powers Resolution, the Congress declares that this section is intended to constitute specific statutory authorization within the meaning of section 5(b) of the War Powers Resolution.
(2) APPLICABILITY OF OTHER REQUIREMENTS- Nothing in this resolution supercedes any requirement of the War Powers Resolution.
Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Vice President of the United States and
President of the Senate.
According to Tom Daschle during the drafting of the resolution, the Administration was trying to get around the law to conduct action inside the United States.
On the evening of Sept. 12, 2001, the White House proposed that Congress authorize the use of military force to "deter and pre-empt any future acts of terrorism or aggression against the United States." Believing the scope of this language was too broad and ill defined, Congress chose instead, on Sept. 14, to authorize "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines planned, authorized, committed or aided" the attacks of Sept. 11. With this language, Congress denied the president the more expansive authority he sought and insisted that his authority be used specifically against Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.
Just before the Senate acted on this compromise resolution, the White House sought one last change. Literally minutes before the Senate cast its vote, the administration sought to add the words "in the United States and" after "appropriate force" in the agreed-upon text. This last-minute change would have given the president broad authority to exercise expansive powers not just overseas -- where we all understood he wanted authority to act -- but right here in the United States, potentially against American citizens. I could see no justification for Congress to accede to this extraordinary request for additional authority. I refused.
So why didn't the Administration go to Congress to change Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, apparently the controling law in the domestic surveillance area.
Well, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales answers that question.
FISA also contains emergency provisions that permit warrantless eavesdropping for up to 72 hours when the attorney general certifies that there is no other way to get crucial information. The law also permits warrantless eavesdropping for up to 15 days after a declaration of war.
"There is an emergency provision within FISA, and one could ask for more authority," Gorelick said. "If they had good reason, Congress would have given it to them."
Gonzales said that the administration contemplated doing that, but was told by "certain members of Congress" that "that would be difficult if not impossible."
So, it would be too difficult to amend FISA so, why bother really.
However, that pesky law, the PATRIOT Act actually did amend FISA.
quote:SEC. 218. FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE INFORMATION. Sections 104(a)(7)(B) and section 303(a)(7)(B) (50 U.S.C. 1804(a)(7)(B) and 1823(a)(7)(B)) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 are each amended by striking "the purpose" and inserting "a significant purpose".
The text of the PATRIOT Act can be found as a PDF on a Department of Justice web page called oddly enough, lifeandliberty.gov
WASHINGTON, Dec. 26 (UPI) -- U.S. President George Bush decided to skip seeking warrants for international wiretaps because the court was challenging him at an unprecedented rate.
A review of Justice Department reports to Congress by Hearst newspapers shows the 26-year-old Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court modified more wiretap requests from the Bush administration than the four previous presidential administrations combined.
The 11-judge court that authorizes FISA wiretaps modified only two search warrant orders out of the 13,102 applications approved over the first 22 years of the court's operation.
But since 2001, the judges have modified 179 of the 5,645 requests for surveillance by the Bush administration, the report said. A total of 173 of those court-ordered "substantive modifications" took place in 2003 and 2004. And, the judges also rejected or deferred at least six requests for warrants during those two years -- the first outright rejection of a wiretap request in the court's history.
The reason I say that is important, is that in the new Imperial Presidency, when denied warrants by the constituted court, you just ignore the court and commit a federal crime and no one is supposed to actually.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Something I'm unclear on- who, if anyone has been arrested from intel gathered via these illegal wiretaps?
If anyone has, it's grounds for dismissal, if no one has, it only showcases that there was never just cause for a tap in the first place.
I dont think history will be too kind to Mr. Bush. ...or his cronies (like Gonzales, that asshat).
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jay the Obscure: The reason I say that is important, is that in the new Imperial Presidency, when denied warrants by the constituted court, you just ignore the court and commit a federal crime and no one is supposed to actually.
Um, oops.
....and no one is supposed to actually care.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Here is the point of view of Mr. Bush regarding the warrantless wiretaps:
As President and Commander-in-Chief, I have the constitutional responsibility and the constitutional authority to protect our country. Article II of the Constitution gives me that responsibility and the authority necessary to fulfill it. And after September the 11th, the United States Congress also granted me additional authority to use military force against al Qaeda.
After September the 11th, one question my administration had to answer was how, using the authorities I have, how do we effectively detect enemies hiding in our midst and prevent them from striking us again? We know that a two-minute phone conversation between somebody linked to al Qaeda here and an operative overseas could lead directly to the loss of thousands of lives. To save American lives, we must be able to act fast and to detect these conversations so we can prevent new attacks.
So, consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution, I authorized the interception of international communications of people with known links to al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations. This program is carefully reviewed approximately every 45 days to ensure it is being used properly. Leaders in the United States Congress have been briefed more than a dozen times on this program. And it has been effective in disrupting the enemy, while safeguarding our civil liberties.
This program has targeted those with known links to al Qaeda. I've reauthorized this program more than 30 times since the September the 11th attacks, and I intend to do so for so long as our nation is -- for so long as the nation faces the continuing threat of an enemy that wants to kill American citizens.
*Emphasis added.
It appears that Mr. Bush intends to ignore the constituted courts as long as someone out there wants to kill Americans.
So, roughly forever then.
I guess the old the Rule of Law thing is no longer an issue for some members of the right-wing.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
What a bunch of wackos.
Posted by Veers (Member # 661) on :
And we now have an investigation into the leak itself:
It's good to see the Justice Department is done with all of the other leak investigations--you know, like that Plame thing.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Are you insinuating that the Administration isn't really serious about finding the leak in the Valerie Plame case?
Why do you hate America!
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
The question arises, if Mr. Bush broke the law in authorizing the warrantless surveillance, is it an impeachable offence.
John Dean, of Watergate fame and now a legal commentator, writes this:
quote:There can be no serious question that warrantless wiretapping, in violation of the law, is impeachable. After all, Nixon was charged in Article II of his bill of impeachment with illegal wiretapping for what he, too, claimed were national security reasons.
quote:Article 2 Using the powers of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in disregard of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has repeatedly engaged in conduct violating the constitutional rights of citizens, impairing the due and proper administration of justice and the conduct of lawful inquiries, or contravening the laws governing agencies of the executive branch and the purposed of these agencies.
This conduct has included one or more of the following:
1. He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavoured to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposed not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be intitiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.
2. He misused the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service, and other executive personnel, in violation or disregard of the constitutional rights of citizens, by directing or authorizing such agencies or personnel to conduct or continue electronic surveillance or other investigations for purposes unrelated to national security, the enforcement of laws, or any other lawful function of his office; he did direct, authorize, or permit the use of information obtained thereby for purposes unrelated to national security, the enforcement of laws, or any other lawful function of his office; and he did direct the concealment of certain records made by the Federal Bureau of Investigation of electronic surveillance.
3. He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, in violation or disregard of the constitutional rights of citizens, authorized and permitted to be maintained a secret investigative unit within the office of the President, financed in part with money derived from campaign contributions, which unlawfully utilized the resources of the Central Intelligence Agency, engaged in covert and unlawful activities, and attempted to prejudice the constitutional right of an accused to a fair trial.
4. He has failed to take care that the laws were faithfully executed by failing to act when he knew or had reason to know that his close subordinates endeavoured to impede and frustrate lawful inquiries by duly constituted executive, judicial and legislative entities concerning the unlawful entry into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee, and the cover-up thereof, and concerning other unlawful activities including those relating to the confirmation of Richard Kleindienst as Attorney General of the United States, the electronic surveillance of private citizens, the break-in into the offices of Dr. Lewis Fielding, and the campaign financing practices of the Committee to Re-elect the President.
5. In disregard of the rule of law, he knowingly misused the executive power by interfering with agencies of the executive branch, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Criminal Division, and the Office of Watergate Special Prosecution Force, of the Department of Justice, and the Central Intelligence Agency, in violation of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed.
* Emphasis added.
It appears we have parallels.
Posted by Shakaar (Member # 1782) on :
Yes and no... Nixon had surveillance conducted against news agencies that didn't report nice things about him. This is why article 2 section 2 states "for purposes unrelated to national security"- which is very different from communications involving Americans to overseas individuals suspected of terrorism.
Now don't get me wrong, I hope this is investigated and everyone gets charged for whatever crime has been committed. I think Bush deserves some punishment over it- but it's certainly not as bad as what Nixon did.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Well, let's see...
Abuse of power: check. Contempt of Congress: check. Obstruction of justice: check. Undermining of political opposition: check.
Now all we need is enough people marching through the streets of Washington again, and we can really party like it was 1974.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Oh, and, apparently, this is what happens when you express dissent for a school project in The Dear Leader's United States. Parallels? We have NOTHING BUT.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Sam Wall always did say he wanted to give it to the little guy, so the emplyee was just doing Sam's work.
Don't worry, in a few years the Russians will wonder why they gave up the freedoms of communism when they look at us.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"Sam Wall"...?
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
In my country we can criticize our prime minister and king in live TV, no one will raise an eyebrow. I wonder where all this US government sensitivity stems from, has it been like this forever? Was it like this even under Carter? Reagan? Clinton?
I can understand that public death threats to the pres is punishable, but a thumbs-down photo?
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Sam Wall, founder of Wal Mart and Sam's Club. Once said that his purpose fo making Wal Mart and Sam's Club big was to knock the little guy out of business. I have not shopped at Walley World in a couple of years.
Posted by Siegfried (Member # 29) on :
Sam Walton, actually. I've tried thinking of something additional to add here of a witty or humorous nature so that it wouldn't seem like I'm just nitpicking, but I've failed.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
I knew something was screwed, but I couldn't figure it out....
Walley World is where I got the Wall from....
Night Sam boy
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
How ya dong Jay?
You know, I think my "worst fear" senearo is coming to pass.
Several months back, I suggested that Bush would nominate someone completely unsuitable to the Supreme Court (Hitler's Brian in a jar, I said) to draw attention away from his real choice- a stealth conservative to sway the cort into Neo-Con territory for years to come.
Man, I wish I was wrong.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"How ya dong Jay?"
Well, that's rather personal, don't you think?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Heck no- I have money on Jay's penis falling off -as his warranty obviously expired.
I bet a coke on it falling off by March 15th. Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
I'll see that coke and raise you a sprite. My bets on the 30th
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Oh, were it only that various parts of my anatomy stayed out of both discussion and the betting pool.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
You are the one that posted the porn, a pic with two of America's biggest dicks in it.... What did you expect?
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
Karma at it's finest.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
quote:Originally posted by Da_bang80: I'll see that coke and raise you a sprite. My bets on the 30th
A bit over a week ago, President Bush and his men promised to provide the legal, constitutional and moral justifications for the sort of warrantless spying on Americans that has been illegal for nearly 30 years. Instead, we got the familiar mix of political spin, clumsy historical misinformation, contemptuous dismissals of civil liberties concerns, cynical attempts to paint dissents as anti-American and pro-terrorist, and a couple of big, dangerous lies.
The first was that the domestic spying program is carefully aimed only at people who are actively working with Al Qaeda, when actually it has violated the rights of countless innocent Americans. And the second was that the Bush team could have prevented the 9/11 attacks if only they had thought of eavesdropping without a warrant.
�
Sept. 11 could have been prevented. This is breathtakingly cynical. The nation's guardians did not miss the 9/11 plot because it takes a few hours to get a warrant to eavesdrop on phone calls and e-mail messages. They missed the plot because they were not looking. The same officials who now say 9/11 could have been prevented said at the time that no one could possibly have foreseen the attacks. We keep hoping that Mr. Bush will finally lay down the bloody banner of 9/11, but Karl Rove, who emerged from hiding recently to talk about domestic spying, made it clear that will not happen � because the White House thinks it can make Democrats look as though they do not want to defend America. "President Bush believes if Al Qaeda is calling somebody in America, it is in our national security interest to know who they're calling and why," he told Republican officials. "Some important Democrats clearly disagree."
Mr. Rove knows perfectly well that no Democrat has ever said any such thing � and that nothing prevented American intelligence from listening to a call from Al Qaeda to the United States, or a call from the United States to Al Qaeda, before Sept. 11, 2001, or since. The 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act simply required the government to obey the Constitution in doing so. And FISA was amended after 9/11 to make the job much easier.
Only bad guys are spied on. Bush officials have said the surveillance is tightly focused only on contacts between people in this country and Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. Vice President Dick Cheney claimed it saved thousands of lives by preventing attacks. But reporting in this paper has shown that the National Security Agency swept up vast quantities of e-mail messages and telephone calls and used computer searches to generate thousands of leads. F.B.I. officials said virtually all of these led to dead ends or to innocent Americans. The biggest fish the administration has claimed so far has been a crackpot who wanted to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge with a blowtorch � a case that F.B.I. officials said was not connected to the spying operation anyway.
The spying is legal. The secret program violates the law as currently written. It's that simple. In fact, FISA was enacted in 1978 to avoid just this sort of abuse. It said that the government could not spy on Americans by reading their mail (or now their e-mail) or listening to their telephone conversations without obtaining a warrant from a special court created for this purpose. The court has approved tens of thousands of warrants over the years and rejected a handful.
As amended after 9/11, the law says the government needs probable cause, the constitutional gold standard, to believe the subject of the surveillance works for a foreign power or a terrorist group, or is a lone-wolf terrorist. The attorney general can authorize electronic snooping on his own for 72 hours and seek a warrant later. But that was not good enough for Mr. Bush, who lowered the standard for spying on Americans from "probable cause" to "reasonable belief" and then cast aside the bedrock democratic principle of judicial review.
Just trust us. Mr. Bush made himself the judge of the proper balance between national security and Americans' rights, between the law and presidential power. He wants Americans to accept, on faith, that he is doing it right. But even if the United States had a government based on the good character of elected officials rather than law, Mr. Bush would not have earned that kind of trust. The domestic spying program is part of a well-established pattern: when Mr. Bush doesn't like the rules, he just changes them, as he has done for the detention and treatment of prisoners and has threatened to do in other areas, like the confirmation of his judicial nominees. He has consistently shown a lack of regard for privacy, civil liberties and judicial due process in claiming his sweeping powers. The founders of our country created the system of checks and balances to avert just this sort of imperial arrogance.
The rules needed to be changed. In 2002, a Republican senator � Mike DeWine of Ohio � introduced a bill that would have done just that, by lowering the standard for issuing a warrant from probable cause to "reasonable suspicion" for a "non-United States person." But the Justice Department opposed it, saying the change raised "both significant legal and practical issues" and may have been unconstitutional. Now, the president and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales are telling Americans that reasonable suspicion is a perfectly fine standard for spying on Americans as well as non-Americans � and they are the sole judges of what is reasonable.
So why oppose the DeWine bill? Perhaps because Mr. Bush had already secretly lowered the standard of proof � and dispensed with judges and warrants � for Americans and non-Americans alike, and did not want anyone to know.
War changes everything. Mr. Bush says Congress gave him the authority to do anything he wanted when it authorized the invasion of Afghanistan. There is simply nothing in the record to support this ridiculous argument.
The administration also says that the vote was the start of a war against terrorism and that the spying operation is what Mr. Cheney calls a "wartime measure." That just doesn't hold up. The Constitution does suggest expanded presidential powers in a time of war. But the men who wrote it had in mind wars with a beginning and an end. The war Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney keep trying to sell to Americans goes on forever and excuses everything.
Other presidents did it. Mr. Gonzales, who had the incredible bad taste to begin his defense of the spying operation by talking of those who plunged to their deaths from the flaming twin towers, claimed historic precedent for a president to authorize warrantless surveillance. He mentioned George Washington, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt. These precedents have no bearing on the current situation, and Mr. Gonzales's timeline conveniently ended with F.D.R., rather than including Richard Nixon, whose surveillance of antiwar groups and other political opponents inspired FISA in the first place. Like Mr. Nixon, Mr. Bush is waging an unpopular war, and his administration has abused its powers against antiwar groups and even those that are just anti-Republican.
�
The Senate Judiciary Committee is about to start hearings on the domestic spying. Congress has failed, tragically, on several occasions in the last five years to rein in Mr. Bush and restore the checks and balances that are the genius of American constitutional democracy. It is critical that it not betray the public once again on this score.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
And so, it falls to Arlen Spector to hold the White House accountable?
God help us all...
Am I the only one that thinks Gonzales may be the slimest Attorney General we've ever had? It's as if his whole job is making up legal justifications for Bush's actions.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
The desperation of the administration to find some sort of legal justification for illegal activities is palpable. It showed in this exchange between Senator Grassley and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.
In news of pre-electronic electronic surveillance:
quote:GRASSLEY: I think that as the American public hears examples of how Democrat presidents and Republican presidents alike have done similar things, they may begin to see this program in a different light, particularly in regard to the president's over 225 years' use of the exercise of the power of commander in chief.
GONZALES: I gave in my opening statement, Senator, examples where President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all authorized electronic surveillance of the enemy on a far broader scale -- far broader -- without any kind of probable cause standard, all communications in and out of the country.
Yes, the Attorney General just highlighted George Washington as an example of the Chief Executive engaging in warrentless electronic surveillance.
Even allowing for a slip of the tongue regarding George Washington, I suppose it would be pointless to mention to Mr. Gonzales and those like him who are pushing so hard for so large an expansion of presidential prerogatives that all of the presidential surveillance, electronic or otherwise mentioned in his exchange with Senator Grassley came before 1978.
As a result, none of the pre-1978 presidents were contravening federal law the way that Mr. Bush is doing today.
[ February 06, 2006, 11:26 PM: Message edited by: Jay the Obscure ]
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
I'm also agog to see what form electronic surveillance took in the Civil War.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Mabye they watched a lightening storm...
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Apparently it took the form of tapping the telegraph lines.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Nevertheless, it's bullshit. "I say President Bush is just like all these other Presidents. So if you criticise him then you criticise them, and anyone who criticises them must HATE AMERICA!!" And people just lap it up.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
We went to see Terrence Malick's "The New World" yesterday and the John Smith character said something to a subordinate that I felt was rather timeley.
I can't remember the direct quote, but it went something like:
'Crossing the president is a hanging offence.'
He was talking about the president of the colony I believe, but I leaned over to my wife and mentioned just how current it was.
[ February 07, 2006, 10:39 AM: Message edited by: Jay the Obscure ]
Posted by Saiyanman Benjita (Member # 122) on :
quote:President Bush believes if Al Qaeda is calling somebody in America, it is in our national security interest to know who they're calling and why
Wait, so all they need to do is start cold-calling people in America to start a Witch Hunt? And if they do, does the person called get put on the no-fly list? I mean, does the CIA have Caller ID on every line coming out of Iraq or Afghanastan?
Man, I read the first few pages of the PATRIOT Act, it looks like a corrected assignment without the assignment "Strike", "Add 'OR'", etc.
Wait, I just read that... They can trace my ISP, and put me on their lists.
All that aside, I'm still confused.... Are we still at War???? I suppose that's a question for another Topic.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
We've never been at "war" since Mr. Bush never sought and Congress never passed, a resolution of war.
We have not declared war on anyone...just an idea.
We're certainly in a shooting conflict with people or our choosing, but I grow tired of the rhetoric of the media...'we're at war, we're at war!'
Posted by Saiyanman Benjita (Member # 122) on :
I'd have to agree with that assessment. Also looking back on this twenty years from now, the students will not look on it as a "War", but as a "Conflict" or more appropriately a "Mistake" (Like Vietnam. Sticking our noses in where we don't belong - coincidence? I think not.)
But yeah, News channels won't settle for "Conflict" or "Rebellion", it HAS to be "And now for the War in Iraq" (Subnote - which we started with no apparent reason, and we keep calling it that, even though we're the ones trying to change an entire culture, and if we'd only take a page from Star Trek's General Order One, we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with.)
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
It's still "war" even if it hasn't been formally declared...
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
With whom are we at war?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Radical religious nutcases.
Well, Muslim radical religous nutcases anyway- the others are running the circus once called the Republican Party.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Well, originally, we were having a war with the emotion of fear. But then they changed the name, so we're simply having trouble with maxima and minima. But, actually, I think they went back to the original again.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Still, it's something of an important distinction. Mr. Bush is claiming the constitutional cover for what he's doing is the president's "war powers"...he is afterall a "war president."
So, if we're not in a declared war does the president get all his "war powers?"
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
From the Authorization for Use of Military Force. Supposedly.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
The same circular logic that alows Gonzalez to say that some information (leaked by the White House) was "declassified", but that the wiretap leak was treason. They make the rules, so anyone not working for them is breaking whatever rules they decide to make up.
Bush says we're at WAR, so assumes more war powers than any president since FDR.
Somehow, I think if a democrat is elected President, the republicans will be calling for a limit on presidential powers...
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Now, to be fair, Congress did give Bush war powers. The Authorization for Use of Military Force that they issued in 2001 specifically invoked the War Powers Resolution. So, the question isn't whether he has powers. It's which powers he has and where he can use them.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Something so open-ended that even his republican pals are concerned... After all, they need to get re-elected.
As to the powers themselves, do they last indefinitely, or just untill the president declares "Mission Accomplished"?
oh wait...he already declared that. 1800 dead servicemen ago.
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
Who knows? Bush might pull a Palpatine and elect himself president for life of the Neo-American Empire or something to that effect.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Darth CHeney? Her's already got the raspy breathing problem down..
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"As to the powers themselves, do they last indefinitely, or just untill the president declares 'Mission Accomplished'?"
I don't know, but I'm guessing it's until the Congress passes another resolution to take them away.
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jason Abbadon: Darth CHeney? Her's already got the raspy breathing problem down..
I think Darth Dick would be more appropriate.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
On the whole 'are we at war thing,' Glenn Greenwald, who has his own blog at Unclaimed Territory, wrote the following bit on Mr. Bush's Incoherence on the issue of war at Crooks and Liars.
quote:Presidential Incoherence
George Bush gave another speech yesterday on the "Global War on Terror." If one actually sits down and reads these speeches, it really is staggering how much deceit and propaganda gets packed into each one of them. What they have him say is not just factually false, but directly contrary to claims he made in the past or which other Administration officials are making now. Sometimes, the most compelling argument against the White House's propaganda is simply to place it side-by-side with prior Administration statements and/or undisputed political facts:
_______________________
BUSH YESTERDAY:
I knew we're at war when they attacked us. As a matter of fact, I was down here in Florida. It didn't take long to figure out what was going on. And I vowed that day that I would not rest, so long as I was the President, in protecting the people. So a lot of my decision-making is based upon the attack.
And I know we're at war, see -- I knew it then, and the enemy has, unfortunately, proved me right because they continue to attack. In order to win the war against the enemy you got to understand the nature of the enemy.
And we've got a coalition of countries. I spent a lot of time reminding people about the nature of the war. Listen, the tendency for folks is to say, well, this really isn't a war.
ATTORNEY GENERAL ALBERTO GONZALES, testifying on February 6 before the Senate Judiciary Committee:
There was not a war declaration, either in connection with Al Qaida or in Iraq. It was an authorization to use military force.I only want to clarify that, because there are implications.
Obviously, when you talk about a war declaration, you're possibly talking about affecting treaties, diplomatic relations. And so there is a distinction in law and in practice. And we're not talking about a war declaration. This is an authorization only to use military force.
_____________
BUSH YESTERDAY:
So I want to share some of the strategy in winning this war on terror. Make no mistake about it, we're going to win the war on terror.
Bush during the 2004 Campaign:
President Bush ignited a Democratic inferno of criticism on Monday by suggesting the war on terrorism could not be won, forcing his aides to scramble to defend his remarks just as he had hoped to bask in convention accolades.
On the campaign trail in New Hampshire, Mr. Bush sought to emphasize the economy, but his comments on terrorism dominated national attention. In an interview on NBC-TV's "Today" show, Mr. Bush vowed to stay the course in the war on terror, saying perseverance in the battle would make the world safer for future generations. But he suggested an all-out victory against terrorism might not be possible.
Asked "Can we win?" Mr. Mr. Bush said, "I don't think you can win it. But I think you can create conditions so that the ? those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."
________________
BUSH YESTERDAY:
And we have a plan to achieve victory [in Iraq]. Victory is a state -- a democracy that can sustain itself and defend itself and join America in fighting the war on terror. That's the goal of victory. That's the definition of victory.
REPORTS ON THE IRAQI ELECTION:
BAGHDAD, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Sick of bloodshed that has hit their economy and inflamed sectarian wounds, Iraqis held little hope on Monday that Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari could cure in his second term the ills he failed to heal in his first.
As prime minister, Jaafari angered the Sunni Arab minority by visiting Shi'ite Iran and describing ties between the old foes as "very friendly and strong and expanding".
Patrick Cockburn, Middle East Correspondent for the British newspaper The Independent:
Iraq is disintegrating. The first results from the parliamentary election last week show the country is dividing between Shia, Sunni and Kurdish regions. Religious fundamentalists now have the upper hand. The secular and nationalist candidate backed by the US and Britain was humiliatingly defeated. . . .
Islamic fundamentalist movements are ever more powerful in both the Sunni and Shia communities. Ghassan Attiyah, an Iraqi commentator, said: "In two and a half years Bush has succeeded in creating two new Talibans in Iraq." . . .
Iran will be pleased that the Shia religious parties which it has supported, have become the strongest political force. . . .
__________________
BUSH YESTERDAY:
Generally, people in a democracy don't campaign and say, vote for me, I promise you war. They say, vote for you -- vote for me, I work for the peace. I want your children to grow up in a peaceful world. That's what people say to get elected.
HOW THE GOP WON THE 2002 MID-TERM ELECTIONS:
To summarize: within the Bush administration, even before their first days in power, there had always been both the motive and the rationale to invade Iraq. The events of 9/11 worked to add a sense of urgency to this predisposition by offering both a window of opportunity and a stronger motive to make this confrontation seemingly inevitable. Yet there was a more compelling reason to talk about invading Iraq in the summer of 2002 than can be explained by these predilections alone. And sadly this had more to do with political strategy than it did with national security. . . .
Karl Rove's strategy to campaign on military issues, leaked reports about a possible invasion of Iraq from military sources, Bush's State of the Union speech citing an "axis of evil" and Bush's initial tough stand on Iraq before relenting and asking for Congressional consent on the brink of the midterm elections; are all dots that can be connected to show how impressive the forethought and planning of the Republican party's midterm campaign strategy actually was.
Going into the 2002 election cycle, no one would have thought that a war with Iraq would come to dominate the political dialogue. And yet the efforts of the Bush administration combined with media coverage worked to push this issue to the forefront.
____________________
So, to recap:
We're at war - we're not at war.
We will win the war on terror - the war on terror can't be won.
We're in Iraq in order to bring democracy there because the Government will help us fight the war on terror and that's how we'll have "victory" -- a Shiite theocratic party with close ties to Iran now controls the country.
Democracies never wage war because politicians can't promise war and win elections - Americans should vote for Republicans because they will start a war in Iraq and never stop waging that war.
There are links in the original post.
Posted by bX (Member # 419) on :
I see you're back in fine form, Jay. No, but I'm glad you're feeling better (even if that means I'm now totally depressed). I guess the part that worries me the most is the bizarre lack of concern among the population at large. That for the most part mainstream media seems ready to drop the ball and not pursue these blatant contradictions.
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
You forget that the media is the governments little brother who follows Big Brother around like a lost puppy and does everything he says.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Has the report that came out from the Human Rights Lawyers association (whatever it was they were actually called) about the hundred-odd deaths of Iraqi/Afghan detainees in US custody, at least 10 of which were directly down to torture, been covered in the US media at all?
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lee: Has the report that came out from the Human Rights Lawyers association (whatever it was they were actually called) about the hundred-odd deaths of Iraqi/Afghan detainees in US custody, at least 10 of which were directly down to torture, been covered in the US media at all?
No. And dont expect it to be either because the official line now is...that he recinded the use of controversial interrogation techniques for detainees at Guantanamo Bay in early 2003 because he had learned that Pentagon lawyers thought some of them were illegal and verged on torture.
quote: "We didn't want to be doing something that people had concerns about in the department," Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon news conference.
So, as you can plainly read, Rumsfeld (that great civil rights advocate) put an end to all that potential "torture" nonsense over three years ago.
Nothing to see here- move along. Those prisoners died of natural causes. Really.
Also of great hilarity (buried waaay in the back of the newspaper and not covered by CNN at all). Whoops!
quote:Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday that the Pentagon is reviewing its practice of paying to plant stories in the Iraqi news media, withdrawing his earlier claim that it had been stopped.
Rumsfeld told reporters he was mistaken in the earlier assertion.
Remember that- the administration does not lie to the public- it's only been caught "mistaken in the earlier assertion" several dozen times. Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
But there is clear evidence that an Iraqi general got tied upw ith electrical cord, stuffed the wrong way into a sleeping bag and sat on by several US servicemen until he suffocated!
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Nope- that must have been....er.... 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! 9/11!
So, to sum it up, it was all because of 9/11.
Posted by Saiyanman Benjita (Member # 122) on :
So the Shiites now control the country. How much time until this government falls into civil war? Wait, it already has. Democracy doesn't work for everything, but it sure sounds good to us Americans, doesn't it?
Let's see. Are we going to stay until we're sure that women have the right to vote, and all people are equal (Trying to change a society that has been hard-coded that women have no social standing)? Are we going to but in if they have constant Civil Wars?
And how does this tie in with the War on Terror (The question I still have yet to find an answer for.)
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Saiyanman Benjita: So the Shiites now control the country. How much time until this government falls into civil war? Wait, it already has. Democracy doesn't work for everything, but it sure sounds good to us Americans, doesn't it?
Let us not forget that we ourselves, in the midst of our being a Democracy, had a horribly destructive civil war from 1861-65.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"Are we going to stay until we're sure that women have the right to vote..."
What, like the last country we liberated from Saddam Hussein...?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Shhhh! That was a resounding success! Really, we could have given a fuck about Muslim women's rights back then...or "democracy building". It was a good war.
Besides, it's not as though Afghanistan is even back to it's pre-Taliban levels of civil freedoms.
So: is this out chance to bug out of the country and avoid taking sides in a civil war? Really, it's not as though we can get on either side's bandwagon for three reasons: 1.)Neither side wants to be "America's allies". 2.)We'd have to turn a blind eye to excesses of our new "ally" (including their acts of retaliatory terrorism). 3.) Any winning side would turn on us as soon as our usefulness was over and then we'd be back to square one, with the losers starting an all-new insurgentcy.
Call me paranoid, but I see Iran having something to do with this latest mosque bombing- it serves their purposes all too well....and they're not calling for an end to the violence by any means either.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"Besides, it's not as though Afghanistan is even back to it's pre-Taliban levels of civil freedoms."
I can't quite tell if you were confused here, or just changing subjects slightly. You know I was talking about Kuwait, right?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
I was just changing subjects- our american imperial subjects, that is.
It's amazing how the administration flip-flops from "they have their own unique culture" to "we are promoting freedom and human rights" as is convienent when dealing with social reforms (or the lack thereof),
Bush this week made the funniest comment of his entire term in office this week- he said (of the port sale contraversy) "The American people dont need to worry about security at the ports"
Man, I almost fell out of my chair laughing! His whole presidentcy has been based on playing off America's security fears, and now he's saying "dont worry about it"?
It's blowing up in his face nicely though. Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"It's amazing how the administration flip-flops from 'they have their own unique culture' to 'we are promoting freedom and human rights' as is convienent when dealing with social reforms (or the lack thereof),"
Don't forget the masterpiece : "Free people are free...to commit crimes...."
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Talk about irony...Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, Robert Kimmitt said this in a recent Senate hearing on the sale of the ports:
"...I don't think we do the country a justice when we politicize national security...."
That's all this administration has going for it is the politicization of national security and the fear card.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Speaking of Security: looks like we'll have to send a LOT more troops to "ensure" Iraq's security.
Backsliding. Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Things are afoot!
In my ongoing effort to keep my fellow Flarites up to date on the happenings on the Domestic Surveillance front, I�m here to let you know that there are indeed developments.
By Charles Babington Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, February 26, 2006; A11
The federal government would have to obtain permission from a secret court to continue a controversial form of surveillance, which the National Security Agency now conducts without warrants, under a bill being proposed by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.).
Specter's proposal would bring the four-year-old NSA program under the authority of the court created by the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The act created a mechanism for obtaining warrants to wiretap domestic suspects. But President Bush, shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks, authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on communications without such warrants. The program was revealed in news reports two months ago.
----
What's that you say...the federal government is already obligated by law to obtain permission from a secret court, which we'll randomly name the FISA Court, to engage in the for of surveillance that they are currently engaged in? I�ll have you know that you�re are engaged in Pre-9/11 thinking when you think like that.
Glenn Greenwald, from Unclaimed Territory has much to say about the situation and the proposed legislation.
I particularly enjoyed this bit because it's so true.
quote:An analysis of Specter�s legislation must begin with the still-staggering observation that this legislation would become effective not merely by Congress enacting it (even over a veto), but instead, only by the President agreeing to be bound by the law.
In our country today, having Congress enact legislation is no longer enough for a bill to become an actual, binding law. What is now required as well is that the Administration agree to be bound by the legislation, because we currently live in a country where -- with regard to national security -- the President believes he has the power to obey only those laws that he agrees to obey (while having the power to break those laws which he does not agree to obey).
The Administration, of course, is already violating the current Congressional statute designed to regulate its eavesdropping activities and it has stated that it has the power to do so. Thus, the only way this legislation would ever matter is if the Administration agrees to adhere to this law.
In sum, under our current system of Government, what used to be called a "law" is now more like a contractual offer or a suggestion. When the American people pass a law through our Congress, we have to hope that the President will agree to obey it. But as the President has repeatedly made clear, he believes he does not have to and he may decide � in secret � to violate the law. That�s the profound crisis and scandal plaguing our country that few seem to want to acknowledge.
There is of course, actuall legal analysis of the proposed legislation.
quote:Highlights of Specter's proposed legislation
In essence, Specter�s proposed legislation abolishes FISA�s requirement that FISA warrants be obtained for each eavesdropping target. Instead, the Administration would be free to eavesdrop without warrants as part of any warrantless eavesdropping program provided that it obtains permission for each such program from the FISA court -- permission which it must obtain every 45 days (Sec. 702(a)).
For any warrantless eavesdropping program the Administration wishes to implement, the Attorney General is required to submit an affidavit to the FISA court every 45 days detailing a wide range of information about the program (sec. 703(a)(1-14)), including:
(4) a statement that the surveillance sought "cannot be obtained by conventional investigative techniques" or by obtaining a FISA warrant;
(6) "the means and operational procedures by which the surveillance will be executed";
(7) a "statement of the facts and circumstances . . . to justify the belief that at least one of the participants in the communications to be intercepted" is an agent of a foreign power" or a "person who has had communication with the foreign power" and,
(14(D)) "the identity, if known, or a description of the United States persons whose communications. . . were intercepted by the electronic surveillance program."
Even under such warrantless eavesdropping programs, surveillance of a person without a warrant is authorized only for 90 days, after which a warrant is required (Sec. 703(a)(12)).
Specter�s bill requires submission to the FISA court for approval of all warrantless eavesdropping programs -- i.e., not only the specific warrantless eavesdropping program which the New York Times disclosed, but any and all currently illegal eavesdropping programs. It thus requires FISA court approval of the program "sometimes referred to as the �Terrorist Surveillance Program� and discussed by the Attorney General before the Committee on the Judiciary . . . on January 6, 2006," and further requires "approval of any other electronic surveillance programs in existence on the date of enactment of this title that have not been submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court." Sec. 702(e)(2).
For each program for which the Administration seeks approval, the FISA court is required to authorize the program if, in essence, it finds (Sec. 704(a)(2-3)) that the eavesdropping program is consistent with constitutional guarantees (i.e., the Fourth Amendment) and that:
[T]here is probable cause to believe that the electronic surveillance program will intercept communications of the foreign power or agent of a foreign power specified in the application, or a person who has had communication with the foreign power or agent of a foreign power specified in the application.
But critically, beyond this provision, the legislation vests substantial discretion in the FISA court to determine "whether the implementation of the electronic surveillance program supports approval of the application . . . " (Sec. 704(b)).
In other words, the FISA court is required to compare the information obtained by the program to be approved for three prior 45-day periods to determine that it has been implemented in accordance with the proposal submitted to the FISA court by the Administration. The FISA court may approve of the program only if it finds that the "benefits of the electronic surveillance program" justifies its authorization, and that it is being implemented consistently with the proposal previously submitted to the FISA court by the Administration. If it does not so conclude, it can (and must) reject the application. That is rather substantial and broad discretion to vest in the FISA court.
There is also a provision in the legislation for Congressional oversight. Section 705 requires submission of a detailed report to the Chairs and ranking members of the Senate and House Intelligence Committees every 45 days. The report must include a description of the information obtained by the program and the means and procedures by which the information was obtained.
A few other notes about the legislation:
(a) it allows warrantless eavesdropping programs not only for international calls from or to the U.S., but purely domestic communications as well;
(b) it expressly excludes from the approval requirement pure data mining activities or the obtaining of information reflecting the details of one�s communications short of the content of the communications -- i.e., the requirements "do not apply to information identifying the sender, origin or recipient of the electronic communications . . . that is obtained without review of the substance of the electronic communication." Sec. 702(d)(2); and,
(c) this legislation is clearly intended to supplant, not supplement, Specter�s prior announced intention to require submission to the FISA court of the question of the program�s legality.
Potential Democratic White House Contender Feingold Proposes Censuring Bush Over Eavesdropping
By DOUGLASS K. DANIEL Associated Press Writer The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - A liberal Democrat and potential White House contender is proposing censuring President Bush for authorizing domestic eavesdropping, saying the White House misled Americans about its legality.
"The president has broken the law and, in some way, he must be held accountable," Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., told The Associated Press in an interview.
A censure resolution, which simply would scold the president, has been used just once in U.S. history against Andrew Jackson in 1834.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., called the proposal "a crazy political move" that would weaken the U.S. during wartime.
The five-page resolution to be introduced on Monday contends that Bush violated the law when, on his own, he set up the eavesdropping program within the National Security Agency in the months following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Bush claims that his authority as commander in chief as well as a September 2001 congressional authorization to use force in the fight against terrorism gave him the power to authorize the surveillance.
The White House had no immediate response on Sunday.
The resolution says the president "repeatedly misled the public" before the disclosure of the NSA program last December when he indicated the administration was relying on court orders to wiretap terror suspects inside the U.S.
"Congress has to reassert our system of government, and the cleanest and the most efficient way to do that is to censure the president," Feingold said. "And, hopefully, he will acknowledge that he did something wrong."
The Wisconsin Democrat, considered a presidential contender for 2008, said he had not discussed censure with other senators but that, based on criticism leveled at Bush by both Democrats and Republicans, the resolution makes sense.
The president's action were "in the strike zone" in terms of being an impeachable offense, Feingold said. The senator questioned whether impeaching Bush and removing him from office would be good for the country.
In the House, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, is pushing legislation that would call on the Republican-controlled Congress to determine whether there are grounds for impeachment.
The program granted intelligence officers the power to monitor without court approval the international calls and e-mails of U.S. residents, when those officers suspect terrorism may be involved.
Frist, appearing on ABC's "This Week," said that he hoped al-Qaida and other enemies of the U.S. were not listening to the infighting.
"The signal that it sends, that there is in any way a lack of support for our commander in chief who is leading us with a bold vision in a way that is making our homeland safer, is wrong," Frist said.
Sen. John Warner, R-Va., said on CNN's "Late Edition" that Feingold's announcement on a Sunday talk show was "political grandstanding. And it tends to weaken our president."
A longtime critic of the administration, Feingold was the first senator to urge a withdrawal timetable for U.S. troops in Iraq and was the only senator to vote in 2001 against the USA Patriot Act, the post-Sept. 11 law that expanded the government's surveillance and prosecutorial powers. He also voted against the 2002 resolution authorizing Bush to use force in Iraq.
Jackson was censured by the Senate in 1834 after he removed the nation's money from a private bank in defiance of the Whig Party, which controlled the Senate.
On Feb. 12, 1999, the Senate failed to gain enough votes to bring a censure resolution against President Clinton. The Senate had just acquitted Clinton after the House impeached him in December 1998, accusing him of committing perjury and obstructing justice in the Monica Lewinsky affair.
Impeachment is the only punishment outlined in the Constitution for a president. But the Constitution says the House and Senate can punish their own members through censure.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Treachery! Curse the traitor Emmanuruss Feingoldstein! Americania is at war with Irania! Americania has always been at war with Irania!
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lee: Treachery! Curse the traitor Emmanuruss Feingoldstein! Americania is at war with Irania! Americania has always been at war with Irania!
You've learned how to channel the Wing-Nuts well...maybe too well.
I don�t remember where I found the link for this but at the Blogs For Bush site they got it going on!
As Sister Toldjah noted earlier, Senator Russ Feingold (Defeaticrat-WI) has called for the censure of President Bush over the NSA program which gathers signals intelligence on our terrorist enemies.
Given that the only possible beneficiaries of such an action are the terrorist enemeis of the United States, I believe that we should urge the Senate to censure Senator Feingold for giving aid and comfort to the enemy. I would ask for his expulsion from the Senate, but as that requires a 2/3 vote its a non-starter - the Democrats, for whom political power is the be-all and end-all of existence, simply would not vote to harm one of their own. Censure, though, only takes a majority vote. There are 55 Republican Senators, and even a few Democratic Senators who haven't driven off the anti-war cliff.
It is way past time that we started holding Democrats accountable for their actions. For too long they have been able to slander President Bush, the Bush Administraiton, the American military and our allies in the War on Terrorism with no consequences for their destructive actions. How many people are dead today because the Democrats have chosen to use the war as a partisan political issue? How many more will die in the future because of it?
Every time a senior Democrats gets up in public and calls for an immediate withdrawal, or accuses American soldiers of abuses, or slanders the motives and statements of President Bush, it encourages the enemy. It helps the enemy to recruit more bomb-laden fanatics who can be convinced that the United States is about to quit because a Pelosi, Kennedy, Kerry or Feingold just said on national TV that "X" about the American effort is wrong or a failure. The free ride has gone on too long, and it is time for the patriots to smack down these people with firmness and let the enemy know that we will fight them until victory.
So, keep that in mind next time you engage in discussion about the alleged freedoms being protected by Mr. Bush.
Don't Slander our Dear Leader or else!
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
If anyone is interested, you can read the text of the Censure Resolution here .
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
What I want to know is, do these people really believe what they're saying? That anyone, even their own countrymen, who disagree with their own political views, are automatically the enemy? Or are they all fully aware that this is just a great methoid to use to cynically gain the upper hand in political debate?
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Of course they don't. It's all a game, about getting people to abandon rational thought and rally behind whoever holds the grandest speech on security and soaring eagles. It worked for the Nazis, and it works just as well for Bush.
Although some of them probably have their heads so far up their asses they buy their own crap for dinner.
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
quote:How many people are dead today because the Democrats have chosen to use the war as a partisan political issue? How many more will die in the future because of it?
YES!! HOW MANY, ADMIRAL??? *vein throbs on chrome dome*
I can't believe this, Bleeding-Heart conservatives? Well, we're tearing up all other conventions these days, so why not.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"What I want to know is, do these people really believe what they're saying? That anyone, even their own countrymen, who disagree with their own political views, are automatically the enemy? Or are they all fully aware that this is just a great methoid to use to cynically gain the upper hand in political debate?"
Your error here is the assumption of an exclusive "or". You yourself made a 1984 reference up above. These people are surely more than capable of the most artful of doublethink.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Yes, but can doublethink ever "really" exist? It's just another word for hypocrisy. As soon as one of these, er, wing-nuts says to himself or others "Boy, it sure is swell to be able to claim some sort of meta-partisan uber-patriotic moral high ground over our political opponents, so we can claim that anyone who disagrees with us is a traitor" then can they really be said to believe what they say in public?
I suppose that public assertions of faith by political leaders are the same thing. Bush professes to be a Christian, yet are his constant references to being one a reflection of his overwhelming belief, or because he knows there are plenty of people out there who lap it up?
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
Worrying political uses aside, aren't we all engaged in "doublethink," at least to some degree? I know Orwell was down on it, and maybe we should be, but isn't that, or something like that, how we deal (those of us who are able to) with the sure knowledge of our inevitable death? Or how we avoid becoming misanthropes while being aware of history? It isn't, I'd argue, just a matter of enjoying one thing in spite of knowledge of another, but an actual momentary denial of one or the other concept which we nevertheless fully believe in or recognize.
[But, then, and here I think I am getting way off track -- but I think we get tripped up by the concept of doublethink because we assume that there is some activity, or moment, or nexus of consciousness that we can point to and say "there is the house of the complete self," the part that is aware of all the others. I don't believe that any such unifying self exists. So I don't think it's a paradox that we can really know something, at least to the extent we can ever know anything, one moment, and then fully believe something contrary later.]
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
I don't think our "doublethink" regarding our certain death and the emotional hopelessness of human past and future has to do with denying these concepts, it has to do with focus. We don't focus on those things most of the time and so they don't pose a threat to our mental stability, or you'd stand with a cardboard sign and shout in the streets. It's the same way I, right now, choose not to focus on the assignment due to be turned in tomorrow at egg time, instead I allow myself a few more hours of wanton spare time; not because I know the solution "Fun first, then work" is a functional one, but because I choose not to focus on that fact.
Did I tell you I'm going to write an essay on "Virtual Escapism Within Youth Culture"? We'll see if I ever get around to submitting it, what with all the fieldwork to be done, haw haw. (oh shit)
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lee: What I want to know is, do these people really believe what they're saying? That anyone, even their own countrymen, who disagree with their own political views, are automatically the enemy? Or are they all fully aware that this is just a great methoid to use to cynically gain the upper hand in political debate?
If one spends any time in the blogs of the far-right side of the net, I think the answer to that question is yes.
I think some people strongly believe the sentiment expressed by the fellow I quoted and not just out of cynicism.
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
It's more than simply not thinking about it, I think.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Regarding Bush's religion, I suspect he's doublethinking himself silly on that point. I expect he fully believes that Jesus was infallible in his teachings which are portrayed 100% accurately in the gospels, while simultaneously believing that all the extra-super-hyper-non-Christian things he's doing are exactly WJWD.
Additionally : "egg time"?
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
*Vorlon Speak* NEVER ask that question!
(but it's probably just before the Hour of Scampering)
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
Egg time is, well, eight sharp. Something I haven't felt since...*scampers off*
Oh but to hell with all that, what matters is that I finished and turned in the assignment, and nothing matters more. Except domestic surveillance. We don't have that problem right now, although there was a lot of hubbub around that when our prime minister was assassinated, in 1987. The assigned task force wiretapped and bugged the shit out of Sweden's organized crime, which they caught a lot of flak for.
Nowadays I think we're reinstating the authorization for policemen to wiretap, but only against suspected criminals, I think. We don't do the populace. But give the conservatives a few years and we'll see. And that's just what my country seems to be about to do this year. I think almost all of western europe will be right-wing this year, except for France, Denmark, Belgium, Spain and the UK. What a strange zeitgeist for the early 21st century. I wanted meals in pillform.
Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
Meals in pill form? I suppose there would have to be some rationale for the development of those Swedish meatballs they sell in Ikea. . .
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
The New York Times won a Pulitzer Prize for its reporting on the domestic surveillance story.
quote:For a distinguished example of reporting on national affairs, in print or in print and online, Ten thousand dollars ($10,000).
----
Awarded to James Risen and Eric Lichtblau of The New York Times for their carefully sourced stories on secret domestic eavesdropping that stirred a national debate on the boundary line between fighting terrorism and protecting civil liberty.
----
The right-wing blogosphere quickly went on line to add their opinion about the Times and its reporters.
Last year we noted that the AP had won "The Pulizer Prize for felony murder" for its spot photographic coverage in Iraq. We followed up in a series of posts featuring the analysis of former New York Times photographer D. Gorton (here and here). Mr. Gorton recapitulated his analysis in a devastating column for the Standard. Below is the photo in issue. (I wonder if Bilal Hussein was the AP stringer who has enjoyed such a fruitful collaboration with terrorists.)
Following in the footsteps of the AP last year, New York Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau won the Pulitzer Prize today for their treasonous contribution to the undermining of the highly classified National Security Agency surveillance program of al Qaeda-related terrorists. As I argued in a column for the Standard, the Risen/Lichtblau reportage clearly violated relevant provisions of the Espionage Act -- a particularly serious crime insofar as it lends assistance to the enemy in a time of war.
Juxtapose the Times's award-winning reportage with the Times's highminded editorial condemnation of President Bush for allegedly failing to follow proper procedure in declassifying the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate key judgments. Today the Times instructs us: "Even a president cannot wave a wand and announce that an intelligence report is declassified."
Waving a wand is apparently a prerogative reserved to Times executive editor Bill Keller, who made the decision to "declassify" the NSA surveillance program in the pages of the Times. According to Keller, the publication of the NSA story did "not expose any technical intelligence-gathering methods or capabilities that are not already on the public record." Thus Keller waved his wand, and the Times blew the NSA program. Smarter folks than I will have to reconcile the trains of thought at work among the editors of the New York Times.
What about the Pulitzer Prize committee? When Walter Duranty won a Pulitzer Prize for the Times in connection with his mendacious coverage of Stalin's Soviet Union, he performed valuable public relations work for a mass murderer. He nevertheless did no direct harm to the United States. Today's Pulitzer Prize award to the Times brings a new shame to the Pulitzer Prize committee that builds on its disgrace last year via the award to the AP.
quote:Yesterday, James Risen and Eric Lichtblau received well-deserved Pulitzer Prizes for "national reporting" based on their (year-long-delayed) disclosure of the President's illegal NSA eavesdropping program. That award has set off a new slew of bitter commentary from Bush supporters, including Bennett, proclaiming that Risen and Lichtblau belong in prison. On his radio show this morning, the great free press crusader [Bill] Bennett said: "I think what they did is worthy of jail."
Powerline, as always, helpfully expounds on this definitively American principle of throwing reporters in jail who publish stories which damage the political interests of the Commander-in-Chief during a Time of War. In an item entitled "Pulitzer Prize for Treason," Scott "Big Trunk" Johnson says that Risen and Lichtblau won the Pulitzer "for their treasonous contribution to the undermining of the highly classified National Security Agency surveillance program of al Qaeda-related terrorists," which -- according to Johnson, "is a particularly serious crime insofar as it lends assistance to the enemy" -- all together, now -- "in a time of war."
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Treason is betraying the trust of the people that elected you to office.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Why do you hate America?
Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :
Because you don't realise that 90% of the world hates you.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Me?
90% of the world hates me personally? I had no idea.
Posted by Grokca (Member # 722) on :
Don't worry, as long as you love yourself and can afford hookers, you will be fine.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Well, if you're going to love yourself, what do you need the hookers for?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jay the Obscure: Why do you hate America?
To quote The Tick:
quote:Spelling "America with" a "K" are we?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
So...what do ou all think of this latest revelation- hat tens of millions of phone records are now being kept by the NSA? As one democrat asked "Are you saying that tens of millions of Americans are working for AlQueida?!?"
Meanwhile, the fucko most responsible for the NSA wiretappig and records-keeping programs is likely to become the cIA director.
Looks like more and more republicans are concerned over the degredation in privacy:
quote:"I'm not sure why it would be necessary to keep and have that kind of information," said House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, who wanted more details.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush's job approval rating has hit a new low, with 29 percent of the U.S. public saying he is doing an "excellent or pretty good job," down from 35 percent in April, according to a Harris Interactive poll in The Wall Street Journal Online.
The poll of 1,003 U.S. adults said 71 percent of Americans said Bush was doing an "only fair or poor job," up from 63 percent in April. It said the survey was conducted May 5-8 and had a 3 percent margin of error.
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
Just one more percentage point to beat Daddy.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
AMERICAblog links to a very interesting story from ABC.
A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources.
"It's time for you to get some new cell phones, quick," the source told us in an in-person conversation.
ABC News does not know how the government determined who we are calling, or whether our phone records were provided to the government as part of the recently-disclosed NSA collection of domestic phone calls.
Other sources have told us that phone calls and contacts by reporters for ABC News, along with the New York Times and the Washington Post, are being examined as part of a widespread CIA leak investigation.
One former official was asked to sign a document stating he was not a confidential source for New York Times reporter James Risen.
Our reports on the CIA's secret prisons in Romania and Poland were known to have upset CIA officials. The CIA asked for an FBI investigation of leaks of classified information following those reports.
People questioned by the FBI about leaks of intelligence information say the CIA was also disturbed by ABC News reports that revealed the use of CIA predator missiles inside Pakistan.
Under Bush Administration guidelines, it is not considered illegal for the government to keep track of numbers dialed by phone customers.
The official who warned ABC News said there was no indication our phones were being tapped so the content of the conversation could be recorded.
A pattern of phone calls from a reporter, however, could provide valuable clues for leak investigators.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Sweet. Just today I was listening to a NPR interview with a former NSA chief wherein he said that the notion of a "big brother" style government was not possible just now because there would need to me thousands of agents working with unlimited computer recources to monitor even a fraction of the population.
He did however point out that each time you go online, numerous private groups record your every move to build up customer demographics and the government (in their POV) should be entitled to the same access.
It was pointed out that with the phone records, internet records, financial tranaction records and the potential for cell phones to provide real-time GPS location, the U.S. government is already far more intrusive than the USSR was at it's worst.
Supoosedly though, it's all okay because there is no government group (that we know of) that coordinates all this information to make profiles on the citizenry.
The program also pointed out that most Americans are not trusting of the idea because the government was abused such power so often in the past (Nixon tracking Agnew's records, Bobby Kennedy tapping Martin Luther King's phone, the "red scare" of the 1950's etc.)
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Hiccup!
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
So, he pulled out the old "you have very little privacy anyway, so what does it matter if we read your mail, tap your phone, and track your online movements as well" stock defense. Imaginative.
"(...) the government (in their POV) should be entitled to the same access."
Because there is no and has never been a big brother.
Oh.
"...he said that the notion of a "big brother" style government was not possible just now because there would need to me thousands of agents working with unlimited computer recources to monitor even a fraction of the population."
And guess which organisation has both an employee count in the tens of thousands and the biggest cluster of supercomputers in the world?
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
NSA's crypto division?
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Cartman: And guess which organisation has both an employee count in the tens of thousands and the biggest cluster of supercomputers in the world?
I was going to say Wal-Mart.
Or the Post Office.
Posted by Da_bang80 (Member # 528) on :
I'm gunna go with IBM, I bet they've got a bunch of supercomputers.
Wal-Mart was gunna be my second guess Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
Wal-Mart's success is in large part attributable to its crazy advanced logistics.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
I thought it was low wages, cheap products from overseas and an unyielding music censorship policy.
Plus Voodoo, obviously.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
FEMA could learn something about logistics from Wal-Mart.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Naaa: FEMA is a traditionally Santeria organization- bad to mix and match when The Spirits are involved.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
AMERICAblog links to this interesting story from Bloomberg.
June 30 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. National Security Agency asked AT&T Inc. to help it set up a domestic call monitoring site seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, lawyers claimed June 23 in court papers filed in New York federal court.
The allegation is part of a court filing adding AT&T, the nation's largest telephone company, as a defendant in a breach of privacy case filed earlier this month on behalf of Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. customers. The suit alleges that the three carriers, the NSA and President George W. Bush violated the Telecommunications Act of 1934 and the U.S. Constitution, and seeks money damages.
"The Bush Administration asserted this became necessary after 9/11," plaintiff's lawyer Carl Mayer said in a telephone interview. "This undermines that assertion."
The lawsuit is related to an alleged NSA program to record and store data on calls placed by subscribers. More than 30 suits have been filed over claims that the carriers, the three biggest U.S. telephone companies, violated the privacy rights of their customers by cooperating with the NSA in an effort to track alleged terrorists.
"The U.S. Department of Justice has stated that AT&T may neither confirm nor deny AT&T's participation in the alleged NSA program because doing so would cause 'exceptionally grave harm to national security' and would violate both civil and criminal statutes," AT&T spokesman Dave Pacholczyk said in an e-mail.
U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Charles Miller and NSA spokesman Don Weber declined to comment.
One wonders why they needed to do this seven months before 9/11.
[ July 02, 2006, 02:42 PM: Message edited by: Jay the Obscure ]
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
Mr. Bush apparently personally prevented the Office of Professional Responsibility of Department of Justice from looking into the NSA's warrantless surveillance program.
President Bush effectively blocked a Justice Department investigation of the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program, refusing to give security clearances to attorneys who were attempting to conduct the probe, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales said yesterday.
Bush's decision represents an unusually direct and unprecedented White House intervention into an investigation by the Office of Professional Responsibility, the internal affairs office at Justice, administration officials and legal experts said. It forced OPR to abandon its investigation of the role Justice officials played in authorizing and monitoring the controversial NSA eavesdropping effort, according to officials and government documents.
"Since its creation some 31 years ago, OPR has conducted many highly sensitive investigations involving Executive Branch programs and has obtained access to information classified at the highest levels," the office's chief lawyer, H. Marshall Jarrett, wrote in a memorandum released yesterday. "In all those years, OPR has never been prevented from initiating or pursuing an investigation."
In testimony yesterday to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Gonzales said that in matters involving access to classified programs, "the president of the United States makes the decision."
"The president decided that protecting the secrecy and security of the program requires that a strict limit be placed on the number of persons granted access to information about the program for non-operational reasons," Gonzales wrote in a related letter sent to the committee's chairman, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.). "Every additional security clearance that is granted for the [program] increases the risk that national security might be compromised."
The eavesdropping program, begun after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and revealed in news reports last December, allows the NSA to intercept telephone calls and e-mails between the United States and locations overseas without court approval if one of the parties is suspected of links to terrorist groups. It is the focus of several lawsuits and months of wrangling between the administration and Congress over its legality.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
So, exactly how many times is a president allowed to nix inquiries he doesn't like before it becomes grounds for impeachment over abuse of power and obstruction of justice, again?
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
In wartime?
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Wartime or not the Pres should be held accountable for the actions of his administration.
Wartime means the gov't has the right to say to hell with the laws of this land, screw your right, and do as they wish?
No. If that is the case I would have to condone the overthrow of the U.S. government in any manner possible in a time frame that was as soon as possible.
Who doesn't beleive that anyone should defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic?
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
When does an undeclared war end?
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"So, exactly how many times is a president allowed to nix inquiries he doesn't like before it becomes grounds for impeachment over abuse of power and obstruction of justice, again?"
When he's a Republican, and the Republicans control the Congress? Infinity.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jason Abbadon: When does an undeclared war end?
You should watch this bit from Senate hearings, posted at Crooks and Liars.
And yet, the Right take no heed to comparing the current situation to World War II and saying that Mr. Bush is a wartime president when it suits their purposes.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
In a legally unprecedented move, the judge also wants to appoint an outside expert with a high-level clearance who can review such evidence to evaluate whether its release would compromise national security.
I'm a bit undecided about the rest, but this one part is definitely a good thing.
Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :
WASHINGTON, DC�In a decisive 1�0 decision Monday, President Bush voted to grant the president the constitutional power to grant himself additional powers.
"As president, I strongly believe that my first duty as president is to support and serve the president," Bush said during a televised address from the East Room of the White House shortly after signing his executive order. "I promise the American people that I will not abuse this new power, unless it becomes necessary to grant myself the power to do so at a later time."
The Presidential Empowerment Act, which the president hand-drafted on his own Oval Office stationery and promptly signed into law, provides Bush with full authority to permit himself to authorize increased jurisdiction over the three branches of the federal government, provided that the president considers it in his best interest to do so.
"In a time of war, the president must have the power he needs to make the tough decisions, including, if need be, the decision to grant himself even more power," Bush said. "To do otherwise would be playing into the hands of our enemies."
Added Bush: "And it's all under due process of the law as I see it."
In addition, the president reserves the right to overturn any decision to allow himself to increase his power by using a line-item veto, which in turn may only be overruled by the president.
----
Ok so yes, that was from The Onion, but when one reads other actual news articles, one can see it's not to far from what the Bush Administration wants to do.
A draft Bush administration plan for special military courts seeks to expand the reach and authority of such "commissions" to include trials, for the first time, of people who are not members of al-Qaeda or the Taliban and are not directly involved in acts of international terrorism, according to officials familiar with the proposal.
The plan, which would replace a military trial system ruled illegal by the Supreme Court in June, would also allow the secretary of defense to add crimes at will to those under the military court's jurisdiction. The two provisions would be likely to put more individuals than previously expected before military juries, officials and independent experts said.
The draft proposed legislation, set to be discussed at two Senate hearings today, is controversial inside and outside the administration because defendants would be denied many protections guaranteed by the civilian and traditional military criminal justice systems.
Under the proposed procedures, defendants would lack rights to confront accusers, exclude hearsay accusations, or bar evidence obtained through rough or coercive interrogations. They would not be guaranteed a public or speedy trial and would lack the right to choose their military counsel, who in turn would not be guaranteed equal access to evidence held by prosecutors.
Detainees would also not be guaranteed the right to be present at their own trials, if their absence is deemed necessary to protect national security or individuals.
----
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
So, how the fuck is that a diffrent system from what Fidel Castro has been useing for years? Or North Korea? Or China?
Nothing like making yuor enemies "disappear" for as long as you'd like "while waiting trial for undisclosed charges".
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
Posted by bX (Member # 419) on :
Just so as this doesn't get swept under the rug or anything...
In the latest judicial rebuke of the Bush administration's tactics against terrorism, a federal judge in Detroit ruled Thursday that warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens violates the constitution and federal law. The decision is an embarrassment for President George Bush, but it also should be a source of shame for Congress.
Eight months ago, The New York Times reported that the National Security Agency was monitoring the international phone calls and email messages of some Americans without obtaining a court order as required by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Several proposals for reining in the NSA operation were offered. But none of them were enacted before members of Congress left town for the summer.
Thursday's ruling by U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor should jump-start that stalled effort. It came in a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of journalists, lawyers and other scholars with business contacts in the Mideast.
Her decision convincingly rebuts two of the Bush administration's legal positions: that the president has the inherent constitutional authority to engage in surveillance of Americans, and that Congress approved such eavesdropping in 2001 when it authorized Bush to use "all necessary and appropriate force" against individuals and nations implicated in the 9/11 attacks.
quote:Federal Judge Orders End to Warrantless Wiretapping
By DAVID STOUT Published: August 17, 2006
WASHINGTON, Aug. 17 � A federal judge in Detroit ruled today that the Bush administration�s eavesdropping program is illegal and unconstitutional, and she ordered that it cease at once.
District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor found that President Bush exceeded his proper authority and that the eavesdropping without warrants violated the First and Fourth Amendment protections of free speech and privacy.
�It was never the intent of the Framers to give the president such unfettered control, particularly where his actions blatantly disregard the parameters clearly enumerated in the Bill of Rights,� she wrote, in a decision that the White House and Justice Department said they would fight to overturn. A hearing will be held before Judge Taylor on Sept. 7, and her decision will not be enforced in the meantime pending the government�s appeal.
The judge�s ruling is the latest chapter in the continuing debate over the proper balance between national security and personal liberty since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, which inspired the eavesdropping program and other surveillance measures that the administration says are necessary and constitutional and its critics say are intrusive.
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