Bush authorized NSA to spy on Americans

[The Drew]

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Thomas Jefferson

I count 3000 from 911 as the supposed patriots... But unfortunately, the tyrants kept it from sustaining the liberty tree...


So basically equating 1 death at the hands of terrorists, justifies killing the civil rights of 100000.... Yeah, that's worth it...

 

[Camp David]

So basically equating 1 death at the hands of terrorists, justifies killing the civil rights of 100000...

Minimizing the threat posed by terror plays into the terrorist mindset. it is also faulty logic.

An example for You to illustrate the bad logic:

"Since you have not been attacked in your home, you have no need for home defense weapons." See? Poor thinking yes?

Same with terrorism... we need to address the threat. If you choose to minimize the threat, you join with the terrorists.

 

[bogie]

The National Security Letters used to do this are real, and have been used on hundreds of people, the exact list of who they've been used on is available here: http://www.aclu.org/patriot_foia/FOIA/NSLlists.pdf

Impressive. Very impressive. Now, tell me - just how many "victims" can one fit on six pages of paper, when NONE of those pages is even particularly saturated with type?

I'll bet most of 'em were named Abduhl, or some variant thereof.

Guys, unless the government has been cooking up some supersecret superdupercomputers, with a literal secret army of people monitoring the things, I suspect that even the NSA is hard pressed to keep track of the data involved with tracking islamic terrorist communications.

Lots of folks are looking for something, anything, to use to bash Bush. This is this week's version of the same story.

Again: I trust our people, as a whole. There's some folks who I don't trust, but the vast majority, especially in the US military and intelligence services, are mission oriented, and that mission is to keep Abduhl and his buddies from doing nasty things.

How many of you folks _know_ someone who is currently in the middle east? Or, conversely, how many of you are _in_ the middle east, but speak/write passable 'merican thanks to our educational system?

The internet goes everywhere, and comes from everywhere.

Up with the Great Satan!

 

[The Drew]

Minimizing the threat posed by terror plays into the terrorist mindset. it is also faulty logic.

An example for You to illustrate the bad logic:

"Since you have not been attacked in your home, you have no need for home defense weapons." See? Poor thinking yes?

Same with terrorism... we need to address the threat. If you choose to minimize the threat, you join with the terrorists.

I'm not so sure that the terrorists haven't succeeded, They've done more to head us down the road to a police state than the drug lords ever did. Personally, I'd rather live with terrorism than live in a police state. The threat IS minimal. The threat IS overblown. I stand more chance of being struck by lightning twice than dying in a terrorist attack. And that has NOTHING to do with the Bush administration and the things they have failed to do....

 

[Beren]

If you choose to minimize the threat, you join with the terrorists.

Pfft. Once more:

"The logical fallacy of false dilemma, which is also known as fallacy of the excluded middle, false dichotomy, either/or dilemma or bifurcation, involves a situation in which two alternative points of view are held to be the only options, when in reality there exist one or more alternate options which have not been considered."

 

[Igloodude]

How about real proof of one (1) person being really harmed, rather than the hundreds you imagine and the outrage you assume? How about yourself? Have you been harmed?

Okay, here's proof of one (1) person being really harmed:

http://www.ctd.uscourts.gov/Opinions/090905JCH.DoeOP.pdf

I have not, that I know of, personally been harmed. But asking me that question is akin to me asking you if you've been helped by the USA-PATRIOT Act, or if you've been harmed by the 9/11 attacks. Your whole basis for supporting USA-PATRIOT seems to be that it prevents potential terrorist attacks that may harm you, so why would you knock the opposite argument, that it allows potential anti-terrorist acts that may harm me? You don't have to have police search your own house in violation of constitutional protections in order to legitimately object to them being authorized to do it by federal law, and any gun owner here knows that confiscating guns in, say, New Orleans is something that everyone should object to, whether they live in New Orleans or not.

 

[Igloodude]

Minimizing the threat posed by terror plays into the terrorist mindset. it is also faulty logic.

An example for You to illustrate the bad logic:

"Since you have not been attacked in your home, you have no need for home defense weapons." See? Poor thinking yes?

Same with terrorism... we need to address the threat. If you choose to minimize the threat, you join with the terrorists.

"Since you have not been adversely affected by USA-PATRIOT Act provisions, you have no reason to oppose it."

I agree, that logic is very poor thinking.

 

[Camp David]

Okay, here's proof of one (1) person being really harmed:

http://www.ctd.uscourts.gov/Opinions/090905JCH.DoeOP.pdf
.

That's a stretch! And here's proof of me being helped (this post and prevention of terrorism since 09/11/01 domestically). My testimony.

I have not, that I know of, personally been harmed. .

Neither have I. Neither has most Americans. Thus...

Your whole basis for supporting USA-PATRIOT seems to be that it prevents potential terrorist attacks...

As Homer Simpson might say: Duuohh! Bingo! You got it Igloodude! Did a light bulb suddenly alight over you head?

New Orleans? How does that relate to this discussion? Explain?

 

[Mongo the Mutterer]

... there's no way that the President would want to use dirty tricks or enemies lists or FBI records to investigate and subvert political opponents ...

Yeah... I remember now.... something about raw FBI files in the KLINTON "administration"... hmmm...

 

[The Drew]

How many DOCUMENTED terrorist attacks have been prevented by the patriot act and these new police powers?

If you can only give me a handful, then don't bother, I still think it's not worth it (as the real threat is MINIMAL) but if you can give me thousands.... Then THAT would be a good argument FOR this surveilance and the patriot act...

 

[Camp David]

How many DOCUMENTED terrorist attacks have been prevented by the patriot act and these new police powers?...

How many DOCUMENTED personal harms and denials of personal liberties by the Patriot Act have been accounted for?

If you can only give me a handful, then don't bother...

Yes, what you said.

 

[Fidel Castro]

I do not think that this is an abuse of power... Siccin' the IRS on political enemies... Now _that's_ an abuse of power... .

Icing on the cake?????? How do we know it's not done? We don't it's a Secret. How can any RedBlooded American be OK with the 'secret police ideal' of the communist era?? That's what Lenin said, 'Trust us, we are only doing this for your own good'.

I _trust_ the average American, even those in government service. If there was a wide-ranging campaign of listening to Americans, don't you think we'd have heard a major leak about it by now?

And risk losing a cushy gov. job and a Felony conviction and prison and the stigma of being called a convicted Felon the rest of your life??? Would you risk leaking it, bogie???

Did you not hear the president say two years previous that this is a different kind of war?

Yeah, and the War on Drugs was different too. But we weren't technically at war then and we aren't now either. It's a feel good saying. Don't you remember the speech from President Bush declaring the end of War? The end of high risk pay for our soldiers in Iraq. If we are still 'at war' why aren't the military still paid war zone hazard pay?

You say the same thing often enough, and people believe it.

You could say the same about these quotes:

You know, you must be right - these fears about terrorists must be irrational. I mean, there's no way that they could get a few folks together and do something like flying a couple of improvised cruise missiles into major buildings...

Have some of you already forgotten what happened a few years ago? You're already telling yourselves that it won't happen again...

Your life and national security rises higher in priority than your civil liberties; the president recognizes that and acts accordingly...

A few thousand, or even a few hundred thousand, folks get dead, because our politicians were more concerned about politics than about results.
Guys, we're at war here. It's been going on for quite a while.

There are people out there plotting to contaminate/poison our food/drinking water, distribute radioactive/biological materials in our population centers, and all sorts of other diabloical schemes that I cant even begin to imagine.

"It's reported that casualty rates are in the hundreds, but we don't know for sure, since some of the radiation doses may take days or even years to kill their victims.

Have some of you already forgotten what happened a few years ago?

One sure point... if our future holds another smoking crater in the center of a major American city, all these naysayers of monitoring of known terrorist contacts will be crying that "it was all Bush's fault 'cause he didn't do enough to prevent it."

I mean, there's no way that they could get a few folks together and do something like flying a couple of improvised cruise missiles into major buildings...

Will they seek a court's permission before they detonate bombs on buses, blow up stadiums, or worse?

And President Bush has also said that "there WILL be another terrorist attack and there's not a damn thing anyone could/can do about it." ie London subway, Spanish passenger train. Our close allies we share intel with and we didn't/couldn't prevent it.

9/11 was a surprise attack just as 12/7/41 was. After the first trade tower attack we could have paid attention also. Why weren't the airlines warned that hijackings were not ransom oriented but will/may be used as weapons. Armed marshalls, reinforced cockpit doors, strict immigration enforcement, expanded Customs and Coast Guard. We did know of these plans prior to 9/11, just not when!!

I see a hidden agenda that's why these common sense precautions were ignored so we could 'technically' have another war similar to the never ending war on drugs.




And the best yet, this Morning VP Chaney said:

If they don't agree with us they are assisting the terrorists!! and there has been an erosion of presidential power in the last few years.

HUH?? Oh yeah if you said it, it must be THE TRUTH!

We must try to follow the 'notion' of the Constitution.

Exactly what is the 'notion' of the Constitution?

If you choose to minimize the threat, you join with the terrorists.

Parrot toolbags.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

Bush DID follow procedures for using the NSA to intercept communications involving Americans. As I underatand it, FISA laws say that the NSA can perform such interceptions, provided the attorney general gives written authorization. Bush is taking heat right now precisely because he (through his AG) followed the proper procedure and made the authorizations.

If I understand the debate correctly, the AG is allowed to sign off on the monitoring of U.S. citizens who may be acting as agents for foreign powers. They way foreign powers is written seems to specifically exclude al-Quaeda and terrorist type groups from being included.

No, the president cannot do any "damn" thing he wants to under that authorization. But he CAN do just what the authorization authorizes. Namely, he can use all necessary and appropriate force against terrorists invlolved in 9-11 or plotting similar attacks. That authorization gave the president authority to go to war against them, and to do all that war entails. Surveillence of the enemy is a prefectly legitimate aspect of war.

Except that we don't necessarily know that the U.S. citizens being watched are the enemy do we? All we have to go one is that the Bush Administration and the Attorney General feel that they might be related to the enemy closely enough to bear watching. We don't know this because nobody but Bush administration officials have signed off on this. So the same administration that is admitting to keeping Quaker peace groups on a watch list for security reasons is also determining who is and isn't a terrorist worthy of NSA attention.

I see some real problems with that scenario that should concern all of us, regardless of political orientation.

The authorization is not the blank check you would have us all believe that it is. The authorization limits the president to "necessary and appropriate" actions precisely to prevent the kinds of off-the-wall situation you proposed. It also spells out who may be targetted, for the same reasons. The "Clinton II" scenario you describe is a perfect example of what would be an illegal use of that authorization. Note the differences between reality and the hypthetical you described.

Necessary and appropriate are hardly limitations, rather they are extremely elastic and vague terms that can be expanded to cover almost anything. "Terrorist" seems to be a pretty blurry term itself around 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. these days. Once we establish that under this order the President can detain people without resort to legal access (Hamdi v. Rumsfeld) so long as it isn't "indefinite" and can spy on U.S. citizens so long as they bear some relation to terrorists, we have some pretty interesting precedents. Just where else might we broaden the scope of this statute in the name of necessity?

According to Bush's recent remarks, congress was briefed on these wire taps numerous times. It seems he gave them every oportunity to object.

Select members of Congress were briefed, including Rockefeller, Pelosi, and Reid. These members should be held up to the same scrutiny rather than be allowed to pretend they were just now aware. They have definitely failed in their oversight role.

No, the question of the legality isn't my decision to make. Neither is it yours. But we each have the burden of weighing the evidence for ourselves, in our own minds. We each need to form our own conclusions.

I would argue that we should use the established system, including FISA to make those decisions. Letting the executive branch determine that for itself and then leaving the public to argue about it after its exposure, is not the way to do business from either a public policy or an intelligence policy standpoint. This story wouldn't have leaked had Bush gone to FISA because it wouldn't have been nearly as enticing to groups like the NYT.

Ultimately, it shouldn't surprise anyone that Bush is working right up against the edge of what is legal and proper. To do anything less would be a dereliction of his duties as President of the United States and as Commander in Chief during wartime. For better or worse, the American people would never forgive him for such a failure...

WHY? The whole point I have been repeating is that Bush had no apparent need to do such a thing. FISA is notoriously freehanded with its grant of authority to wiretap. What possible thing could Bush have been doing with this authority that made it unadvisable to put this in front of FISA? Doesn't that thought concern you just a wee bit?

 

[Camp David]

How can any RedBlooded American be OK with the 'secret police ideal' of the communist era??

Just a subtle observation... You might make more of a persuasive case here if your handle wasn't of Cuba's communist Dictator!

 

[Biker]

Just a subtle observation... You might make more of a persuasive case here if your handle wasn't of Cuba's communist Dictator!

Actually, 'The Beard' makes some great points. It's called satire. Him and rick reno...good stuff.

Biker

 

[carlrodd]

No, I don't like more government encroachment into my life. However, this just isn't on my give a sh** list.

Far more concerned about the 2 registered sex offenders within walking distance of my family.

this response is typical of people that have given up...sorry. distracting people with specifics, and then quietly diminishing basic freedoms on a much broader scale is par for the course for ANY government, even ours. you can't trust the person you pass on the street; why in the world would anyone then trust a large group of strangers that have inevitably become intoxicated with power, influence and control of others. this is the nature of the beast with politicians....people in general. politicians are NOT to be trusted under any circumstance. they are to be carefully observed, and their actions scrutinized by the public.
the only reason our nation has not yet become as ineffectual as say france, germany, great britain....any other nation for that matter....is because we have managed to retain the ability/freedom to question the actions, words and motivations of our leaders......and RABIDLY. and so it should always be. the government is a collective servant to the public. we are HIGHER than the body that governs us. the individual is inherently more worthwhile than the body that should be protecting it.
we should all be reacting vehemently to this current situation. i don't care if news agencies sat on this story, or even if, after splitting hairs, we find that the president's actions were technically "legal". what is important is that the american public has been taken advantage of yet again in the name of consolidation of power. apparently, the public is too stupid to be trusted with even the most basic details of how our government is "protecting" us. nonsense. if we need to be tricked or otherwise misled to be protected, then we have put the wrong people in office.
you can keep an eye on the sex offender down the street quite easily, but we need to be actively keeping a very close eye on our government.....COLLECTIVELY and continuously.
we cannot afford to drop this issue.

 

[Beren]

ust a subtle observation... You might make more of a persuasive case here if your handle wasn't of Cuba's communist Dictator!

"An Ad Hominem is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. Typically, this fallacy involves two steps. First, an attack against the character of person making the claim, her circumstances, or her actions is made (or the character, circumstances, or actions of the person reporting the claim). Second, this attack is taken to be evidence against the claim or argument the person in question is making (or presenting)."

 

[Igloodude]

That's a stretch! And here's proof of me being helped (this post and prevention of terrorism since 09/11/01 domestically). My testimony.

So without USA-PATRIOT, you'd be dead right now. Okay, sure.

New Orleans? How does that relate to this discussion? Explain?

There were several people in New Orleans that were forcibly disarmed by authorities. Many (I'd say pretty much all) people in this forum were opposed to the authorities' actions. No one, that I know of, on this board was directly harmed by the actions of the authorities in New Orleans, but there was a distinct feeling of "if it doesn't get stopped down there, it'll happen here next".

You don't have to be directly affected by erosion of civil rights to oppose their loss. On the contrary, if you wait until you are directly affected, you're probably screwed.

This is essentially your sum total argument in defense of the PATRIOT Act, so I don't know why you can't understand it being used in defense of civil liberties.

 

[The Drew]

How many DOCUMENTED personal harms and denials of personal liberties by the Patriot Act have been accounted for?

Yes, what you said.

It isn't about personal harms. It is about loss of liberties and protections that were guaranteed by the constitution... Nobody HAS to be harmed for Liberty to lose...

The justification for these laws is "it is needed to prevent terrorism" that is about the lamest excuse for a law that I've ever heard. So are you telling me that all the standard law enforcement tactics that are kosher by the constitution are completely useless in the face of terrorism?

You'll probably use 9/11 as evidence that it is. 9/11 wasn't due to a lacking of laws that prevented LEO's and intelligence from obtaining the proper information. It was a failure of PEOPLE, to recognize the threat (a threat that WAS identified by conventional means) and act on that threat to affect arrest. It was also due to lax security on airplanes, and the mindset of the passengers that "if we cooperate, we'll live".

I don't have to prove that these laws cause harm to innocent people. Those who support it must show that the potential abuse is outweighed by the tangible prevention of MANY terrorist attacks... Any law that has potential for abuse, WILL be abused.... It's just a matter of time.

 

[carlrodd]

.......and i forgot to mention the most ridiculous, laughable means that the current administration is using to distract the public......the terror alert. nothing like whooping the public up over ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. what's next?..."we're at war with Eurasia...we've always been at war with Eurasia"

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

Why risk the current tempest? There HAS TO BE A REASON... Here are two:

a.security and concern about leaks.
b.speed

If you can go after the fact to "legalize" your actions, speed is not a reason.

FISA is a secret court, so I don't see where going before it represents a security concern. Not only that but in 2002, the Senate passed legislation to loosen the standards it took for FISA to grant authorization to spy on terrorist groups. Further the standard for FISA to grant such a request is that there is "probable cause" the person is involved with a terrorist group.

If security is the issue, then who gets cut out of the normal loop of a FISA request? In a normal FISA request, the request goes first to the Department of Justice's Office of Intelligence Policy and Review. This is the group that is cited as being more of a problem than FISA in the abvove link. From there the request goes to FISA. The OIPR is established by the direction of the Attornery General and would also probably be seeing requests for monitoring under the current system of the Bush Administration since they act as the authorizing party for the Attorney General.

So just looking at stuff, it appears like DoJ is still in the loop even though they would seem to represent a larger potential for leaks than the smaller FISA court.

The best hint I've found as to WHY so far is that information cleared by FISA appears to require a higher clearance and that there is a shortage of linguists with that clearance to process information. Perhaps by shortcutting FISA they avoid that requirement?

 

[The Drew]

Since The FISA law has a provision for going back and getting warrants, after the fact. Why wouldn't they at least attempt to get those warrants? To me it says that they either didn't care, or that they KNEW those taps were illegal and didn't want the FISA court to deny them after the fact.

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

Caesar has crossed the Rubicon

Do you really want to suggest that the President can do any damn thing he wants under that statute?

The Bush administration certainly means to suggest this. This morning I heard the most frightening proclamation of my entire lifetime. I just listened to a program on Minnesota Public Radio discussing the Bush administration’s failure to obtain FISA warrants when wiretapping U.S. citizens. Andrew McCarthy, senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, was serving as the Bush administration apologist. His argument was that article 2 of the powers granted the president following 9/11 exempt him from having to obey any legal statute in the pursuit of domestic security. In effect, the Bush administration is claiming dictatorial powers.

Before the weaker minded among you attack the liberal source (public radio), this information came from Andrew McCarthy of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. Check out their website (http://www.defenddemocracy.org/) before you make asses out of yourself by attacking the "liberal" source.

 

[Lobotomy Boy]

Since The FISA law has a provision for going back and getting warrants, after the fact. Why wouldn't they at least attempt to get those warrants? To me it says that they either didn't care, or that they KNEW those taps were illegal and didn't want the FISA court to deny them after the fact.

I repeat:

It wouldn't be a non-issue if the Bush administration started wire tapping people in a reckless, unjustified, and possibly illegal fashion, say, for example, political opponents who have no connections to terrorism whatsoever. I assume that most of us are law-abiding citizens or we would have trouble purchasing guns and getting carry permits. If the NSA started spying on us, they might run into trouble getting FISA warrants to tap our phones and bug our houses.

 

[Biker]

Daaaayyyyuuum! My ears are ringin'!
Biker