Slashdot Mirror
Justice Department Censors ACLU Web Site
phr1 writes "According to the Washington Post, the ACLU was forced to remove a paragraph from their online press release, that specified what kind of information FBI agents could request under the Patriot Act that the ACLU has been suing over. "
I have posted a copy of the censored paragraph on my weblog. Enjoy!
Mod down, disgusting dead baby jpeg.
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
The paragraphs violated court secrecy rules.
The case is ongoing. You aren't allowed to publish details of ongoing cases that could taint a potential jury pool, and there's no doubt in my mind that that was the entire point of the ACLU's press release.
This is why grand jury testimony is done behind closed doors.
The word "censorship" is just spin. When the cases are over, the ACLU can say whatever the hell it wants.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Note that the Post article itself quotes the paragraph that the ACLU was forced to remove. Heh.
The dispute over the ACLU's April 28 news release centered on two paragraphs. The first laid out the court's schedule for receiving legal briefs and noted the name of the New York-based judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero.
The second paragraph read: "The provision under challenge allows an FBI agent to write a letter demanding the disclosure of the name, screen names, addresses, e-mail header information, and other sensitive information held by 'electronic communication service providers.' "
And three paragraphs up...
The second paragraph read: "The provision under challenge allows an FBI agent to write a letter demanding the disclosure of the name, screen names, addresses, e-mail header information, and other sensitive information held by 'electronic communication service providers.' "
Nice one, Washington Post!
Kerry voted for PATRIOT.
He's no savior.
Here's Google's cache of the offending press release. Judging from the story link, this looks like the censored text:
"The ACLU has led opposition to controversial portions of the Patriot Act, filing a challenge to Section 215, another provision that allows the FBI to gain access to sensitive records, and filing briefs before the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to oppose expanded wiretaps. With support from a broad right-left coalition, the ACLU has also encouraged passage of approximately 300 local resolutions against anti-civil liberties portions of the law, and has urged Congress to leave in place the "sunsets" for Patriot Act provisions set to expire in 2005."
"The parties have agreed to a briefing schedule in the case. The ACLU will file a summary judgment motion on May 17, 2004; the government will respond on June 7, 2004; all briefing will be completed in July 2004. The court is likely to schedule arguments in the case in late summer 2004. The case is assigned to Judge Victor Marrero."
But wait! I went to the ACLU's actual page and found the same text. Cruising through the most recent press releases turned up a new release that tells the story. Long story short, this story's already out of date (the info has been reinstated)! That doesn't mean that the government didn't fuck up, just that at least one judge hasn't lost his/her mind.
A provider of electronic communication service or remote computing service shall disclose to a governmental entity the -
(A)
name;
(B)
address;
(C)
local and long distance telephone connection records, or records of session times and durations;
(D)
length of service (including start date) and types of service utilized;
(E)
telephone or instrument number or other subscriber number or identity, including any temporarily assigned network address; and
(F)
means and source of payment for such service (including any credit card or bank account number),
of a subscriber to or customer of such service when the governmental entity uses an administrative subpoena authorized by a Federal or State statute or a Federal or State grand jury or trial subpoena or any means available under paragraph (1).
(3)
A governmental entity receiving records or information under this subsection is not required to provide notice to a subscriber or customer.
we have a law which allows secret investigations and arrests, and prohibits the accused from telling anyone about what's being done to them
I've wondered, when someone receives a "National Security Letter" -- since it's illegal to reveal you've gotten one -- how does the recipient go about getting a lawyer?
"Law Offices."
"Uh, hi, I think I need a lawyer."
"What sort of legal services do you need sir?"
"Uh, I can't say."
"You can't say?"
"No, that's illegal, but I need a lawyer, to help me with this thing I can't talk about. You know, a secret lawyer for secret charges."
This is not the United States of America I learned about in school.
But then neither is sending Canadian Maher Arar to Syria to be tortured, or exposing an undercover CIA agent for petty personal revenge, or setting up secret U.S. prison camps for 10,000, or Military Intelligence encouraging torture in those prisons, or lying about the reasons for going to war.
Wake up -- this is the same administration that ignored warnings of 9/11. Why do we keep rewarding this secretive, authoritarian, and incompetent administration?
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
You can get a lawyer, but the PATRIOT act allows the feds to monitor all your conversations with your lawyer, and charge your lawyer as a conspirator. If they can spin a criminal investigation as a terrorist investigation, they play by a whole different set of rules: sealed charges, secret detentions, secret courts.
I've been voting Libertarian every election since Reagan, and it's not working.
More music, fewer hits
Huh? I am from Wisconsin. Feingold was the only one who voted against it. Thank God for him.
The record is here.
Wellstone voted Nay... don't you just love misinformation. Conspiracy theorists love that!
untrue - they've only filibustered a few. the rate at which judicial nominees have been confirmed is far faster than it has been in the past few administrations.
here are two links to MP3s that every person should listen to. you might not like howard, but his points are valid and the things he speaks about are scary.
stern speaking with rep. serrano, d-ny; 8MB
rep serrano speaking on the house floor; 1MB
sure, this is mostly about the fcc and indecency fines, but it's also a first amendment issue
What's this? Bush has appointed Federal judges? I thought the Democrats had stone walled every judge he's nominated in the past four years. If Kerry comes in, you can be sure the Republicans will return the favor.
No, they blocked the 4 most objectionable nominees out of 100+. The rest were confirmed.
Get your facts straight.
It is goddamn scary that a U.S. citizen even has to consider posting information on foreign ground to achieve freedom of speech and press.
Sami Al-Hussayen is being tried under the Patriot Act right now for giving "aid and comfort" to "designated terrorist groups."
Al-Hussayen's "crime" was to set up a web site for groups the government claims support terrorism, and acting as few as sixteen times as a "moderator" in a discussion forum on that web site.
Ironically, Sami Al-Hussayen came to america to avoid arrest in Egypt for condemning Islamic violence.
Basically, Al-Hussayen's crime was to be associated with a web site that praised suicide bombing in Chechnia and Israel.
Now, I'm against terrorism in Israel (and also against the hard-line Likud land grabs, for that matter), but I'm not convinced the Chechens are not freedom fighters in their fight against the Russians as much as were the Afghans who fought the Soviet invasion in 1979.
Does that mean that if I set up a web site calling for support of Chechen independence, I'd go to prison? Apparently so. What happened to the right to hold an opinion and freely speak it?
Yes, today in the country that calls itself the "Land of the Free", where George Bush claims our enemies "hate us for our freedoms", you can go to Federal Prison for helping to set up a web site that the government later decides to outlaw.
This is liberty?
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
Ha. Ha. Ha.
'court-related' material includes a paraphrasing of the law that's already published on the books, eh?
Oh, and maybe you should be more frightened that this is a law that is secret enough to:
1. Force you to stay quiet if you get hit with a PATRIOT information request (they don't even need a fucking court order, that's enough to scare me)
2. Force you to stay quiet if you question the law, which aspects of it you are challenging, etc.
In fact, noone here as said anything about Bush trying to shut down the ACLU, we've ranted and raved about the pure, contemptible and unconstitutional evil that has befallen the nation.
But hey, we shouldn't blame Bush for what his Administration does, that just wouldn't be FAIR to his retarded, bumpkin, drunk driving, coke snorting, AWOL ass.
That seems to be the case for most Democrats. Voting against the "Patriot Act" would have been political suicide at the time.
Three points:
1) Russ Feingold voted against it. It'll be interesting to see if this comes back to bite him in the ass - he's up for re-election this fall. I hope he makes it; he's one of the few politicians in either party that I respect (even though I think the campaign finance reform bill is unconstitutional).
2) Most politicians didn't even read it before they voted on it, which is why there's a minor backlash against it now from both parties. Fortunately, at least some people paid attention. The Republican committee chairman responsible for vetting the bill before it hit the floor (I forget his name) actually read the original version that Ashcroft submitted, and deleted significant portions. Apparently the original allowed suspension of habeas corpus, and the chairman's response was something along the lines of "WTF?" (Of course, the administration seems to be getting away with that on its own; I hope the SCOTUS slaps them down.)
3) The bill was designed to fix some of the more obvious intelligence failures leading up to 9/11. Although there's a lot of nasty stuff in it, people recognized immediately that some changes would need to be made. So, they were in a hurry to pass the bill because it was obvious that they'd been caught with their pants down. Which, of course, meant that they voted without thinking.
The restriction of freedom of speech really is about as slippery a slope as you can get. If we started imposing restrictions on the opinions of people who wished to "take away our rights," but who would interpret what this means?
Indeed, in some cases, this could result in the silencing of both sides of an issue. Take abortion, for example. Pro-lifers think that pro-choicers are taking away the embryo/fetus's right to life. Pro-choicers think that pro-lifers are taking away a woman's right to choose. Which one of these positions would be censored because they wish to take away peoples' rights?
Instead, even though you (or I) do not agree with the positions of these people, you should support their right to voice it in the marketplace of ideas. To do otherwise would start the country on a downward spiral of censorship and absurdity. That is why I support the ACLU via donations - because, while they may support the rights of groups whose opinions I do not agree with, in doing so they support my rights, too.
Many Bothans died to bring you this sig.
You might want to actually review his story. He was not a citizen of Syria. He fled Syria many years before, came to Canada (and IIRC had a family in Canada), traveled in the USA, was detained, sent to Syria, tortured for information based upon US accusations, held in a tiny jail cell, and finally returned to Canada. How can you say this is a small thing? To this man, it will likely change his life. How would you fare under the same circumstances? If you're not a US citizen on US soil, apparently the US government can do anything to you they wish. Oh, and in case you meet that description, don't get complacent. Patriot II is designed to allow your citizenship to be revoked so that you can be treated in the manner outlined above. Great country, eh?
Yup, Apparently so. Luckily, the two recent ones are only temps. He still needs those meddlesome people in Congress for lifetime appointments.
Avoid The Faux News Channel, and you may learn that "The battle is over a relatively small number of judges. Since President Bush took office in January 2001, the Senate has confirmed 173 of his judicial nominees. But Democrats have used filibusters to block six nominees, including Judge Pickering and Mr. Pryor, to the appeals court, the level just below the Supreme Court."
Seems to me that the Democrats have handed the Republicans nearly every judge they've asked for. Talk about a rubber stamp.
= 9J =
He is also being charged with transferring large sums of money to a terrorist organization. I'm not saying it's right that he's being charged for moderating a web board, but you're presenting just one of the charges against him and implying that he was thrown in jail solely for that reason.
Actually, during recent times of divided government, the Democrats have blocked more judicial nominees than Republicans.
"The defense of freedom requires the advance of freedom" - George W Bush
Give me a break. Castro hasn't stopped torturing and murdering his enemies. Yeah, what the US is doing to prisoners violates the Geneva Convention, but they're all walking out with their body parts intact and alive, which is still a lot better than a lot of people get in places like Cuba.
This is not entirely true. A number of the pictures show prisoners that have been severely beaten. One picture showed a prisoner that had been stuffed in a body bag packed with ice; the photo showed the man after he died.
Three prisoners in Afghanistan have been killed during interogation (the investigations are ongoing after 18 months), two at Army bases and a third at a CIA facility on the Pakistan border. There are also at least 25 cases of Iraqi prisoners dying in US custody, 13 of them under suspicious circumstances.
On Meet the Press, Republican senator Lindsey Graham pointed out, "This is not just about humiliation, Tim. The allegations in this report involve rape and murder. Please, don't leave this whole scenario thinking that this is just about a humiliating experience. This is about system failure. This is about felony offenses."
Granted, the abuses in the US run Iraqi prisons do not match those under Saddam. They are worse, however, than most Middle Eastern countries.
Errrr.... Bush himself: 'If you are not with us [in the 'War on Terror], you are against us."
Here are the paragraphs that were removed, (per the Washington Post)
[The dispute over the ACLU's April 28 news release centered on two paragraphs. The first laid out the court's schedule for receiving legal briefs and noted the name of the New York-based judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero.
The second paragraph read: "The provision under challenge allows an FBI agent to write a letter demanding the disclosure of the name, screen names, addresses, e-mail header information, and other sensitive information held by 'electronic communication service providers.' " ]
In the newspaper article:
The second paragraph read: "The provision under challenge allows an FBI agent to write a letter demanding the disclosure of the name, screen names, addresses, e-mail header information, and other sensitive information held by 'electronic communication service providers.' "
so the ACLU can't disclose that, but the newspaper can.
Uh-oh, I think I just heard the sound of more legal filings to get that redacted from the story
e to the pi i plus one equals zero
Another funny thing, you could argue that modern US presidents, and especially this one, have more sweeping powers than Augustus Ceasar did. Augustus was CINC of the Roman armed forces (which were prohibited from being deployed in Italy), could propose but not enact legislation, and had personal control only over the frontier provinces, through military governors. Sound familiar?
However, you made several statement that were blatantly wrong, and remove credibility from your argument:
Bush illegally invades a sovereign country, based of fake evidences shown to Congress and the UN
Wrong: Bush was enforcing a UN resolution that had been in place since 1991. As of 1997, the UN inspectors knew Saddam had stockpiles of WMD. They tried pressing their investigation; Saddam kicked them out. We should have attacked immediately after this - as this was a flagrant violation of the cease-fire agreement, as was Saddam shooting @ our planes patrolling the NFZ, massing his army along the Kuwaiti border in 98, etc. In the 13 years after Gulf War I, Saddam had broken every single condition of the cease fire multiple times. If anything, Gulf War II was five years overdue.
violates the Geneva convention repeatedly in Guantanamo Bay
You haven't read the Geneva Conventions, have you? If you had, you would know that they do not apply to Al-Queida fighting abroad. The Geneva Conventions apply to regular soldiers - in uniform - fighting at the behest of a recognized state. Al-Queida are none of these. They are enemy combatants. Enemy combatants are not covered by the GC.
Ok, prisoners at Abu Graib are POW's covered by the GC. Yes, the GC, and US military law have been violated by the atrocities that occured there. However, those who committed these acts are facing Court Martial. They may even be tried for War Crimes. Justice will be served. Is this Dubbya's fault?? Hardly. It is the fault of those who acted, and those who ordered them to act (or turned a blind eye while they were acting). I've been following this story very closly. No investigator has said or even implied that these abuses go up to the White House. The official report states that accountability only goes as far as the Brigadier Commander level.
Xenon, where's my money? -Borno
No, the republicans did NOT do the same thing under Clinton. All of the Clinton nominations were brought before a Senate vote, and some were blocked because they didn't have enough votes to be confirmed. This is how it supposed to work.
Bullshit, you ignorant cretin. When Clinton was president and Orrin Hatch was chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, dozens of nominees were held up by blue slip vetoes, by which a nomination wouldn't make it out of committee unless both of the candidates home state senators approved him. In fact, a Clinton appointee has the record of waiting the longest for a hearing, 4 years, because the Republican senator from her state did not return his slip.
Of course, now that a Republican is in the White House, Republicans don't want that policy anymore. They whine and carry on about constitutionality and obstructionist politics, nevermind that they blocked 10 times as many Clinton appointees using the same means.
GOP=POH: Party of Hypocrites.
That is factually incorrect. I can not know wether you intentionally lied or are merely ignorant. The ACLU in no way attempted to prohibit the publication or private distribution of any book that promotes the "Intelligent Design" mode of promoting theism. Rather, they have worked to prevent it being 'taught' in public schools along side science. "Intelligent Design" is not science becuase it can not be tested. It is an offshoot of religion, and as such, should not be promoted in public school science texts or classes. (Except, perhaps, in University level psychology classes that discuss pheomenological frameworks?) At issue is the fact that theists are attempting to promote religion through public institutions by presenting this pseudo-theory as comparable to actual cosmological theories.
They also support restricting religious speech in many, many venues, such as student-initiated prayers, spontaneous group events, etc.
Furthermore, the ACLU is not acting to restrict religious speech, per se, in any way. Rather, they are attempting to prevent situations where publicly funded events and facilites are used to promote religion and, in some cases, coerce those who believe differently from the mainstream. Nothing prevents Christians from meeting at a nearby chruch before a football game and having a prayer rally. There is no reason to, immediately before the start of a game, use the stadium PA system to perform a religious ritual, other than to 'stake a claim' on the the proceeding, regardless of the sensitivities of those attending. At issue is the use of the publicly owned equipment. If, at the middle of the second quarter of every game, members of the crowd broke into a vocal prayer that did not use the school's equipment, but was simply spoken aloud, the ACLU would have no problem with that.
Imagine what it would be like for a Christian to move to a town and pay taxes, only to have the Pagan majority in the town use tax dollars to buy and sacrifice a goat on the field before all their home public high school home games. The ACLU would be all over that!
On 2) - actually, its a good deal shadier than that. The Bill that was voted on was not the one that most of the members of the House or Senate were given to read and told they were voting on. The committee chairman did manage to remove some of the more offensive provisions, but according to the account I read, even he didn't get a chance to read the whole thing.
On 3) - current evidence shows that there were no intelligence failures. The decision to ignore the intelligence and warnings about Osama bin Laden came from the top. There were plenty of warnings hand-delivered to the President himself - warnings that never got acted on.
Referance for militia:
militia n.
1. An army composed of ordinary citizens rather than professional soldiers.
2. A military force that is not part of a regular army and is subject to call for service in an emergency.
3. The whole body of physically fit civilians eligible by law for military service.
Pay particular attention to the bolded parts for why the Guard isn't a militia.
Otherwise, I tend to agree with you. Bush's moves have been fairly straightforward if you wanted to take the US into a dictatorship. Oh, there might be other reasons, but that's a quite logical conclusion from his actions.
I'm not shy, I'm stalking my prey
That's really a narrow minded, uninformed perspective you have there, no doubt propagated by the media. It's as accurate a characterization of the ACLU as the myth that Al Gore Invented the Internet or the woman who sued McDonalds for spilling coffee was frivolous. If you do the research you find the media spins these things wildly out of control, or else finds the most atypical fringe examples and amplifies them as if they're locoust-sized plagues about to decend upon all mankind.
Here's a classic example of how left-wing the ACLU is:
It's funny how right-wing pundits will harp for hours about three hippies chaining themselves to a tree for hours, and conveniently ignore the arrest of several hundred people who gathered in a park in Washington D.C. to protest the war.
The ACLU has done much to help all different groups regardless of political ideology. Here's just a sample:
Reno v. ACLU
The Court struck down Congress' Communications Decency Act, which was an attempt to censor the Internet by banning "indecent" speech, ruling that "the interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship."
Board of Commissioners v. Umbehr
Government contractors cannot be subjected to reprisals, such as the loss of a contract, for expressing their political views.
McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission
A state prohibition against the anonymous distribution of political campaign literature violated the right to anonymous free speech.
Lebron v. Amtrak
An artist argued successfully that Amtrak had been wrong to reject his billboard display because of its political message. The Court extended the First Amendment to corporations created by, and under the control of, the government.
Ladue v. Gilleo
A Missouri town's ordinance that barred a homeowner from posting a sign in her bedroom window that said, "Say No to War in the Gulf - Call Congress Now!" was deemed to violate the First Amendment.
Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. Hialeah
A city's ban on the ritual slaughter of animals as practiced by the Santeria religion was overturned as a violation of religious liberty since the city did permit such secular activities as hunting and fishing.
Cruzan v. Director of the Missouri Department of Health
In the Court's first right-to-die case, the ACLU represented the family of a woman who had been in a persistent vegetative state for more than seven years. Although the Court did not go as far as the ACLU urged, it did recognize living wills as clear and convincing evidence of a patient's wishes.
Grutter v. Bollinger/Gratz v. Bollinger
Providing a strong endorsement of affirmative action in higher education, the Court held that public universities have a compelling interest in creating a diverse student body and that race may be treated as a "plus" factor in the admissions process.
Lawrence v. Texas
The Court struck down a Texas sodomy statute that criminalized private acts of sexual intimacy between same-sex couples, expanding the privacy rights of all Americans and promoting the right of lesbians and gay men to equal treatment under the law.
Chicago v. Morales
Struck down Chicago's anti-gang loitering law which disproportionately targeted African American and Latino youth who were not engaged in criminal activity, and resulted in the arrest of 45,000 innocent people
Actually, no, the Constitution doesn't specify 51%.
Relevant paragraph in Article II:
He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.
So it looks like treaties take 2/3 of the Senators that show up that day (assuming there is a quorum), but no fraction is specified for the rest. As the Senate is pretty much left to work out its rules by itself, and those rules provide for unlimited debate (what is currently stopping the vote), there's not really anything unconstitutional. Also, the closing of unlimited debate (for this stuff) only takes 3/5 of the entire Senate.
True true true.
Red Herring magazine ran an article during the Gore/Bush race that measured USA economic performance depending on which parties occupied the WhiteHouse/Congress. Much to their chagrin (but kudos to them for publishing it), in rank order, higher is better:
Best: Democratic White House, Republican Congress
Next: Republican White House, Democratic Congress
Next: Democratic White House, Democratic Congress
Worst: Republican White House, Republican Congress
interesting ain't it.
(In the same issue, I think, they had an interview with Gore... that pissed off the editor no end, because he hated Gore, and the reporters/interviewers ended up all impressed and Gore-positive. He wrote a frothing-at-the-mouth Editor's Comment essay but published the interview.)
You want a gun? Join a well-regulated militia.
Since you brought it up. At the time that the Constitution and Bill of Rigths were written, any male that so desired could be part of the militia. During times that a militia was required, all of the male citizens were asked if they would like to join the militia. They brought there own weapons for use in combat. This militia did not get together to train and they were not part of militia during times of peace. The militia was quite simply a group of volunteers brought together in a time of crisis. Because of this the second amendment, as worded, "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." clearly shows that being part of a militia is not a prerequisite to owning a firearm, but that individuals owning firearms is necessary for the security of the US and therefore a prerequisite for having a militia.
Here is a little background - source link 1982 Report of the Subcommittee of the Consitution
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them." (Richard Henry Lee, Virginia delegate to the Continental Congress, initiator of the Declaration of Independence, and member of the first Senate, which passed the Bill of Rights.)
"The great object is that every man be armed . . . Everyone who is able may have a gun." (Patrick Henry, in the Virginia Convention on the ratification of the Constitution.)
And a particuallry eerie quote that seems applicable to this discussion, emphasis mine.
"The advantage of being armed . . . the Americans possess over the people of all other nations . . . Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several Kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." (James Madison, author of the Bill of Rights, in his Federalist Paper No. 46.)
"Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats." --Howard Aike