Slashdot Mirror
NSA (partially) Declassified
Lally Singh writes "Posted yesterday on the National Security Archives was the NSA's "Transition 2001" report, prepared as an introductory report for President Bush (II)'s incoming administration. "The largest U.S. spy agency warned the incoming Bush administration in its 'Transition 2001' report that the Information Age required rethinking the policies and authorities that kept the National Security Agency in compliance with the Constitution's 4th Amendment prohibition on 'unreasonable searches and seizures' without warrant and 'probable cause,' according to an updated briefing book of declassified NSA documents posted today on the World Wide Web.""
Dick Gordon: National Security Agency.
Martin Bishop: Ah. You're the guys I hear breathing on the other end of my phone.
Dick Gordon: No, that's the FBI. We're not chartered for domestic surveillance.
Martin Bishop: Oh, I see. You just overthrow governments. Set up friendly dictators.
Dick Gordon: No, that's the CIA. We protect our government's communications, we try to break the other fella's codes. We're the good guys, Marty.
Martin Bishop: Gee, I can't tell you what a relief that is, Dick.
I can only assume the information declassified might intersect that which is already known...
You should view this lecture: of how they passed a bill on the day of Saddam's capture that allows them to search without a warrant... http://www.cato.org/realaudio/cbf-12-14-04.ram
Before anyone points out that now we'll find out the truth about the infamous NSAKEY in Windows or some dirty little secrets of Bush administration, I would like to remind you that according to Bruce Schneier "algorithms from the NSA are considered a sort of alien technology: They come from a superior race with no explanations." The most important implication of declassifying NSA would be a better understanding of the mysterious rationale of many of NSA decisions in crypto algorithms, because even many aspects of DES remain a mystery to this day. So please stop the explosion of crackpot conspiracy theories and focus on the most important issue: cryptoanallysis.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
he Information Age required rethinking the policies and authorities that kept the National Security Agency in compliance with the Constitution's 4th Amendment prohibition on 'unreasonable searches and seizures' without warrant and 'probable cause
Yet more "we should be above the law to protect you" crap. I don't usually wear a tinfoil hat, but 1984 seems to be approaching faster than I would like.
The 4th clearly wasn't tough enough. It is simply all to esay to make up phony causes "like the war on drugs", like "catching terrorists" as an excuse to do anything they want. The 4th should have been much more demanding, and demanded harsh punishment for those who do anything that has the effect of weakening it.
from page 32 (38 in PDF viewer of nsa25.pdf)
Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the fourth amendment and all applicable laws.
There is some concern at least. This would mean nothing if it were a public statement, but it's a bit reassuring that they think this even in documents not meant for public consumption
E = m c^3 Don't drink and derive E = m c^3
And if you want to help the NSAs comint mission to intercept keywords from the Internet, download and use random subsets of the following list frequently in your international communications:
_ chaff_valium_noforn_snie_winintel_orcon_oc/semioti c_war_lexical_chaff_valium_noforn_snie_winintel_or con_oc.html
http://www.spywarearcata.com/semiotic_war_lexical
This should greatly help the NSA to protect us from bad ideas. Please suggest improvements and additions to this list. 1836.15@gmail.com
Is it just me, or is document 26b missing? It's probably just a goof-up, really, but still, it's rather funny - you don't really see that kind of goof-up every day, after all, or at least not on the websites of a well-known university (which I think the GWU counts as).
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
The 4th is already void
No.
We as a society only exchange the 4th for the 84th. The 1984th, that is.
What? Are you against USA PATRIOTism?! Are you a comm-- I mean a terriest?! We may need to "investigate" you in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib then.
Guantanamo Bay Detention of prisoners:
See also:
Camp X-Ray
and:
Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse
No, it's not about SS and Gestapo in Nazi Germany, it's about our US Army. I wish it never happened but it did and we as real patriots have the responsibility to talk about it.
"The need for action was underscored in January 2000 when NSA experienced a catastrophic network outage of 3 1/2 days. This outage greatly reduced the signals intelligence information available to national decision makers and military commanders. As one result, the President's Daily Briefin - 60% of which is normally based on SIGINT - was reduced to a small portion of its typical size."
Oh, an a few paragraph above, they presented their favoured solution : outsourcing (to the industry).
#include "coucou.h"
I have only had a few discussions with those in the government security community as a civilian moderator on a government security forum. What I have learned is the following:
1) The NSA is the most likely to be concerned about "unreasonable searches and seizures" and other Bill of Rights issues. The FBI and CIA routinely take the "extreme circumstance" route and use common loopholes to justify citizen and non-citizen monitoring. I would argue, however, that I have yet to see an ill-intented abuse of their power.
2) Members from all branches of the Department of Defense are active Slashdot readers and contributers. They just never talk about what they do and some use "Tor" to post from work.
3) The NSA has an extremely bright team of civilians that do the bulk of their cryptoanalysis work. One of which is famous, and not for the work he does in cryptology. You'd actually laugh aloud if you knew. I guess it is his hobby, but someone is taking him seriously.
4) The FBI is nothing like you see in the movies. The brightest agents last about 2 years before moving to a different area. Internally, the FBI has some serious issues with "dinosaurs" and "micro-management".
5) There is one member of the CIA that is single-handedly responsible for saving us from the plan devised by Jose Padilla. Unfortunately, they will never get the credit they deserve. It only took one person to say, "Why is this American talking with Abu Zubaydah twice?".
6) If you join the NSA, you voluntarily give up your rights to unreasonable searches and seizures. In fact, you have to agree to have your phone tapped and everything you do is monitored 24/7. It's a life-long career choice, but they take care of you "very well".
Is it not possible that since they knew the document would be declassified at some point they wrote it as if it was meant to be for public consumption?
I'm not american, but mod parent up.
Things like this should be known to all, true or not, so they can be properlly investigated.
I'm assuming that, if they're declassifying parts of the NSA, there is another, more classified organisation taking over from it. I think they did something like that with Area 51 -- shifting everything important to new locations -- when it became so well-known to the public.
Freedom is never "won". It's not a battle that you fight, win, and from then on people can enjoy the victory.
It's always, ALWAYS hanging by a thread.
Every generation will have to keep fighting for it, over and over, until the end of time.
Those who look at things like Nazism as freak accidents are only fooling themselves. Oppressive governments are the rule, not the exception in history. People are easily convinced, either quickly in harsh circumstances, or in slow, careful and quiet measures in good times, to at first not care about others, and then not care about themselves.
Even if you're lucky enough to live in a country whose founding is based on some good ideals, you've still got to realize, that country will spend the rest of its history struggling to get anywhere near living up to those ideals.
Conspiracy theories, by definition, cannot be disproved.
Unfortunately, there is also no way to prove that something does not exist.
Have I talked about God yet?
we don't need no stinkin constitution.
those that drafted those never thought that our fellow citizens would have the apathy for tyrrany that we currently do. How could they have known? Kids didn't grow up with commercial TV for an education back then.
This comment has nothing to do with the NSA or this story whatsover.
Go post this in your journal, but this comment does not deserve to be modded up just because you agree with it.
Martin: "You know, I could have joined the NSA, but they found out my parents were married"
:-)
Dick: "Heh...." (holds back Wallace) "Hey, we're all FRIENDS here..."
Oh, and:
Carl: "The young lady with the Uzi. Is she single?"
Martin: "Carl. This is the brass ring."
Carl: "I just want her phone number"
Martin: "How about a lunch date? You can chaparone. The FBI will give 'em twins."
Abbott: "NO!"
Mary: "You could have anything in the world and you want my phone number?"
Carl: "....yes."
Mary: "342-4525. Area code 701" (sorry, I don't remember her number
Carl: "I'm Carl."
Mary(giggles): "I'm Mary."
Abbott: "I'm going to be sick."
Please help metamoderate.
I find it interesting that with all of the flag waving, and beating of drums to "protect America", we never hear urgent discussion of the greatest threat this country has ever faced.
If blowing up a building is terrorism, surely attempting to evicerate the Constitution and sacrificing every thing that makes the U.S. worth protecting is high treason!
If the terrorists goal is to destroy the American way of life, what does that say about those federal agencies and Congresscritters that are so anxious to dismantle the principles of the American way of life?
If terrorism is the deliberate creation of fear in the civillain population to further a political goal, what does that say about DHS's perminant orange alert telling us to be afraid.
What does the fact that I wonder if I should post this anonymously say?
If this report was first posted January 2000, then most of it was probably thrown out and re-written twenty months later. No wonder they declassified it.
Give a man fire, and you warm him for the night. Set a man on fire, and you warm him for the rest of his life.
I have read the quoted Briefing Book on the website non-profit organization The National Security Archive, and also the underlying NSA document Transition 2001.
A careless reading of that Briefing Book's comments on Transition 2001 might leave you with the impression that the NSA is calling for being freed from compliance with the 4th Amendment. However, that is NOT what the Briefing Book says, nor does the underlying NSA document do so. Slashdotters, please read the documents before making wild-eyed postings.
Here are the relevant paragraphs from Transition 2001:
SIGINT in the Industrial Age meant collecting signals, often high frequency (HF) signals connecting two discrete and known target points, processing the often clear text data and writing a report. eSIGINT in the Information Age means seeking information on the Global Net, using all available access techniques, breaking often strong encryption, again using all available means, defending our nation's own use of the Global net, and assisting our warfighters in preparing the battlefield for the cyberwars of the future. The Fourth Amendment is as applicable to eSIGINT as it is to the SIGINT of yesterday and today. The Information Age will however cause us to rethink and reapply the procedures, policies and authorities born in an earlier electronic surveillance environment.
Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the Fourth Amendment and all applicable laws. But senior leadership must understand that today's and tomorrow's mission will demand a powerful, permanent presence on a global telecommunications network that will host the "protected" communications of Americans as well as the targeted communications of adversaries.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
The accellerating attacs on civil liberties and human rights, in particular under Bush II, are very worrysome. The new General Attorney is the very same man that wrote in a memorandum that the Geneva Convention is obsolete when it come to "the war on terror". That torture could be done. Who are now the bad guys? It's sure is getting confusing :
Am I the only person in the world who understands that the grandparent post was making a reference to the book 1984?
...let's keep in mind that the NSA exists for a reason, and that reason is important.
/. tends to drift into Pollyanna-land where the only thing we have to fear is those 'debbils' in government that want to take our freedoms away. No. Let's keep our priorities straight and remember that while overzealous policemen certainly need to be disciplined and corrected, they are STILL the "good guys" as long as you are realistic and remember the really BAD alternatives out there.
In the same sense that tinfoil-hatters are constantly alert to the possibilty that "they are watching us", the NSA exists because there are countries and organizations and individuals whose interests ARE inimical to the United States. It shouldn't have to be said this shortly after the Cold War, or even Sept 11, but the security agencies of the United States have a serious and IMPORTANT function.
Do they go overboard? Once in a while, no question they exceed their mandate, usually from an overzealous interpretation of their duties. Yes, it's important to find a careful compromise between secrecy and oversight REQUIRED by a free society.
However, I think occasionally
-Styopa
I'd argue that you haven't been looking very hard then.
The Church Commission clearly showed that the FBI and CIA were in cahoots spying on legitimate political activity in the US during the 60s (ya know, all those pesky civil rights people, socialists). One of the positive outcomes of the Church Commission was that a firewall was erected between the CIA and FBI. Right now all the 9-11 ambulance chasing anti-patriots are busy trying to rip down that wall and have largely succeeded in doing so.
Or you could take a look at Echelon where the nogoodniks of the State Terrorist Superpower known as the USA were conducting industrial espionage against our "allies" in Europe.
Add to this that all this "declassification" crap relates to activities years ago instead of the shenanigans going on now which is necessary to inform our voting behavior and I'd say you're pretty complacent.
The NSA warned Bush that action must be taken to protect the 4t amendment.
..
Bush then passed the Patriot Act, with effectively suspends the 4th amendment (and 6th).
And the American people said
"thank you thank you! please take more of my inaliable rights away from me so I can feel safe from the enemies my government makes for itself!"
The average american decided it was ok to allow their fellow citizens to be arrested and held without charge, without being allowed to see a lawyer or even notify family. As long as the thousands of citizens that were now being abused was not them personally, then who cares.
When really, they should have carried out their own Constitutional Responsibility to fight for those rights to the point of overthrowing Bush.
But the average american stopped thinking they need to act on their responsibilities a few decades ago when suing everyone for any stupid reason became the norm.
America has died at the hands of its own people. Welcome back to 1930's Germany.
George Bush + Linux = "I will not let information get in the way of the fight against Windows"
An ex-NASA/Airforce acquaintance recently recounted how his group used some specalized technical services of "some people who don't exist". When I replied "oh, you mean NSA/CIA?" he responded "No they still don't exist, and I really shouldn't say any more". The Men In Black do exist!! :)
"You know, I could have joined the NSA. But they found out my parents were married."
Actually that movie was very important to some of us - it's actually the movie that got me interested in a career in information security, and ranks as my favorite movie of all time.
I've been doing infosec for a long time now, and I truly enjoy it. And I have Sneakers to thank for it.
And in case anyone is interested, you can check the quotes here.
I had heard before that he was very interested in that kind of stuff.
The new General Attorney is the very same man that wrote in a memorandum that the Geneva Convention is obsolete when it come to "the war on terror".
Anybody who understands the historical context of the Geneva Convention would agree that it is obsolete. Read the bloody document, then come back and participate in the discussion.
People who don't grasp even *that* are hopeless. It must be recognized and we must move on to decide what is acceptable.
But the court that is interpreting it now is manipulating and twisting the original founders intent far beyond what it was... just a thought.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Bush, as the Commander in Chief, has experienced no repercussions WHATSOEVER. He does a damn fine job of paying lip service though.
The House of Representatives did. The US Senate did by a margin 98-2 or similar. Even John Kerry voted for it and never went back to vote against it.
Kinda like the Kyoto Accords - they went down in the US Senate 95-0.
Hell, the US declaration of war against Japan after Pearl Harbor had more opposition.
I work there. You've got it backwards.
The rules for access to data are extremely strict and the NSA takes the 4th Amendment very seriously.
The governing directive is USSID 18 (here is an older declassifed version). Anyone requiring access to certain types of data is thoroughly briefed on this (even if you're a developer and just need data to work with).
If you're an analyst requiring an account on one of the search tools you get the above mentioned briefing and a more tailored briefing. In addition, before an account is granted two auditors at a supervisory level must be identified. Those auditors get a weekly report of every search you conduct.
People have lost their clearances over misusing the databases (which also means the loss of the job). No one at the NSA is cavalier with the data and access is tightly controlled. The NSA definitely works hard to remain within the law, and any violations are incidental, not some sort of secret big brother program.
Besides, anything found through the illegal use of data couldn't be used in court, and the loss of the public trust would hurt the NSA far more than catching you downloading "The Family Guy". The real bad guys (legitimate and lawful targets) though, we work very hard to take down.
Anybody who understands the historical context of the Geneva Convention would agree that it is obsolete.
You don't seem to know what obsolete means. Anyone who understands the role of the Geneva Convention in modern policy knows that it is not obsolete.
Once you accept this, we can try to discuss whether torture should someday be an internationally accepted practice. It currently is not.
Here's something rather important you might have, somehow, forgotten:
For Rudolf Hoess to say that was a blatant, conspicuous lie. For the Nazis, torture and mass murder were the rule, not the excpetion. The method, not the unfortunate incident. A Nazi officer or soldier would be trialed and punished, usually harshly, for refusing to participate in those horrible crimes.
Now, compare that to the Americans, and you'll notice the difference: for a Bush administration official would say something like that is pretty much telling the truth.
Your usage of this quote is demogogic. It's like a prosecutor quoting a denial of blame by someone, then saying: "After hearing the all the defendant's denials, you would think that he said this. Well, you'd be wrong. This was said by no other than Charles Manson, one of the worse serial-killers in history. Conclusion: the defendant is a serial killer. I rest my case."
The new General Attorney is the very same man that wrote in a memorandum that the Geneva Convention is obsolete when it come to "the war on terror". That torture could be done. Who are now the bad guys?
The new Attorney General is the very same man who was asked what the US could legally do to terrorists captured by the military. He gave a legal answer. Does the fact that something's legal make it right? No. But he wasn't asked what the US can morally do to al Qaeda prisoners.
Les Miserables Volume 1 now up with my reading of
Sure, we all know that the Bush Administration is telling always the truth, like about Iraqi WMD.
Dubya likes gooseberry pie. Nazis liked gooseberry pie. QED, Dubya is a Nazi.
You need to learn better debate technique, dumbass.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Do you feel comfortable with an Attorney General that is looking for legal loopholes to torture of people with impunity? This type of "legality" is what you can expect from corporate laywers trying to rationalize (after the fact) crimes committed by their CEO's.
Uhm, yeah. Had I been Bush, I'd have nuked Mecca on 12 September and cut straight to the end. I dislike Islam and want to destroy it. Terrorism is a good excuse.
Anybody who understands the historical context of the Geneva Convention would agree that it is obsolete. Read the bloody document, then come back and participate in the discussion.
I read it. It's not obsolete. It's only called "obsolete" by certain people who want to justify their "need" for systematical torture.
The Geneva Convention was designed for exactly the kind of crisis that we face, namely large-scale conflicts where a lot of people are threatened by certain forces. While it wasn't specifically written for the case of terrorism, its teleological ideas of human rights hold up, and it's the duty of democrat (as in "believes in the democratic system", not as in the political party) to rise up against a government pulling human rights through the dirt, for a very unspecific "war on terror" with badly defined targets.
Make no mistake, times will come where the US government will be punished for their self-righteousness they currently show to the world.
A monkey is doing the real work for me.
Do you feel comfortable with an Attorney General that is looking for legal loopholes to torture of people with impunity?
I feel comfortable with an AG who, when asked a technical legal question, gives a technical legal answer. This is what lawyers are supposed to do. Calling it a loophole or technicality is just rhetoric which means you don't like the answer. But that doesn't make him wrong.
Les Miserables Volume 1 now up with my reading of
- You have a 'them and us' mentality. IMO, the moment you start dividing the world into 'them' and 'us', the roots of trouble are sown. You start identifying with 'us', you start putting their goals and wellbeing over that of 'them'; you start treating 'them' unfairly; you start valuing 'them' as less important, worthy, or ultimately less human. This tribal mentality seems to be a natural human behaviour, but that doesn't make it a good thing.
- You have a simplistic Aristotelian notion that a person can be wholly 'good' or wholly 'evil'. The truth is that most people are some way in the middle. Even people who are mostly 'good' do bad things, and vice versa, whether through ignorance, carelessness, or just having a bad day.
- You somehow assume that every US citizen is a good guy, and by extension, that every non-US citizen isn't. Leaving aside the arrogance and parochiality which that displays, just how realistic is it?
The fact is that people in power will always want more power. It's human nature. Power corrupts, &c. There will always be bureaucratic empire-building, technological over-enthusiasm, pandering to the media and the mob; and while in a company those things are limited and to some extent correctable, in the government they are dangerous. So there must always be safeguards to stop them taking more power than is absolutely necessary.Do you implicitly trust every single person currently in your NSA? Do you believe that every one has only have your best interests at heart? Do you believe that every one is skilful and diligent enough that they'll always act in those interests, even if there's a conflict of interest somewhere? Do you believe that that will always be the case in future, however the organisation develops?
If you can't say 'yes' to every question there, I'd be a bit careful before you start calling them 'good guys' and all the baggage which goes along with that.
Of course the world isn't an ideal place, and some security forces are needed. But the dangers of a police state are known, unlike the somewhat nebulous and much exaggerated fears that the media and governments are using to scare the US and UK people into granting them such sweeping and, some would say, unnecessary powers.
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Its a real stretch to say that what they've been doing is even legal. Its no accident the U.S. is puting most of its prisoners in Gitmo or unnamed spots around the world and outside the U.S. They are using Gitmo because its mostly outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. legal system and its obviously not under the jurisdiction of the host country, Cuba. They are using Gitmo precisely so they can skirt the law and international treaties to which the U.S. is a signatory.
They are also using the CIA's semi secret rendition program for the same reason. They ship prisoners to countries who are eager to torture prisoners during interrogation, they take the usally bad intelligence that results(and most intelligence from torture is bad because people will say anything to make the pain stop) so they are completely complicit in the torture. This allows the American's to deny they are torturing anyone though in fact they are the ones snatching, often innocent, people off the street with no proof they are guilty of anything, cutting their clothes of with razors, shoving a tranquilizer up their ass and flying them to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria or Jordan to be tortured. These aren't "terrorists" for the most part, they are suspects. This is the whole problem with the civil rights abuses in the "War on Terror". There is usually little or no evidence most of these people being held indefinitely, tortured and sometimes killed have actually done anything. The extermely fallible agencies and agents involved are acting as judge, jury and executioner. When you do this you are flouting the rule of law, something the U.S. constantly preaches to other countries about. Well the U.S. circumvents the rule of law any and everytime they find it necessary so it is rank hypocrisy for the U.S. to lecture anyone else about it. Rendition is also clearly violating the sovereignty of countries where snatches have taken place without the consent and cooperation of the host country.
Fact is the U.S Senate approved the UN treaty on torture in 1994 and the Geneva conventions go back further than that and the U.S. is clearly violating these treaties. Countries sign the UN and Geneva conventions on torture as a measure of protection for their citizens to discourage them from being tortured if the are imprisoned. Now that America has established a clear track record of endorsing torture, its citizens will no moral high ground to protect them if they are imprisoned.
You might be able to argue stateless combantants like Al Qaeda don't fall under the Geneva conventions but I assure you every Iraqi tortured in Abu Graib did as did every Afghani in Afghanistan. When Gonzalez opened the pandora's box on torture for Al Qaeda he opened it up in Iraq and Afghanistan where it is clearly a violation of international treaties, to which the U.S. is a signatory, to torture citizens of an occupied country. When such violations occur they are normally considered war crimes, if it were any country doing it other than the precious U.S. with its double standards that is. The Geneva conventions, to which the U.S. is a signatory clearly defines how you treat citizens of an occupied country which both Iraq and Afghanistan are, and this covers all citizens of the country not uniformed combatants. There is a seperate article for uniformed combatants that clearly doesn't apply here which is something Gonzalez and company glossed over. The citizens of an occupied country rules clearly do apply to Afghans in Afghanistan and Iraqis in Iraq. The convention for treatement of people in occupied countries specificly bans torture and humiliation of prisoners.
@de_machina
...let's keep in mind that the NSA exists for a reason, and that reason is important.
... non-obvious. A lot of what they do is intended to make sure that the US's secure communications can be monitored by the "appropriate authorities".
The NSA is responsible for crypto and communications. "NSA" might better be expanded to the "National Signals Agency". They eavesdrop on communications, while trying to make "our" communications proof against the same. Note that I don't say whose communications they are eavesdropping on; it seems a fair bet that their net is cast widely. Likewise, the NSA's definition of "our" is rather
"Sneakers", for all the jokes, isn't too far off. The NSA doesn't get it's hands dirty with "wet" operations, like the CIA and the FBI are interested in. And the NSA is much too good at what they do to let you hear them listening in on your phone calls...
As far as the "we need the big government TLAs" argument goes, I generally agree, but I must ask: Who watches the watchmen? The traditional military, and your local PD, operate out in the open. They might be heavy-handed, dumb, or even outright evil, but at least you can see it. You can spot the abuses and, hopefully, keep things going in the right direction.
How do we know the NSA is telling the truth? The NSA says so! Well, can't they show us? Nope. Why not? The NSA says so! Sure, it might be true, but it also opens up a huge potential for abuse. Lord Acton's observation on absolute power remains apt and true.
dragonhawk@iname.microsoft.com
I do not like Microsoft. Remove them from my email address.
A. A federal judge for whatever reason says you are wrong.
B. All the precedents you site were enacted during a paranoid frenzy just like we have now. They don't prove much other than you can use armed conflict and "security" to dismantle basic civil liberties and the rule of law everytime and you usually regret it when the war is over. We certainly did regret siezing all the property and interning Japanese Americans during World War II. If you want to use World War II precedents, which you obviously do, then we should be rounding up all Arabs and Muslims, siezing their property and putting them in internment camps
C. No war has been declared. These are war powers you are talking about and you need Congress to pass a declaration of war for there to be any chance of invoking them. No such declaraion has been passed. In fact I'm not sure the U.S. has legally declared a war since World War II which is why most of the wars since have been a bloody mess, because we've been fighting them in a half assed and illegal way.
D. It is very likely that the "War on Terror" will most probably never end, because there are going to be Muslim extremists who may be out to get the U.S. from now until eternity, so if you let this precedent stand the President will have sweeping dictatorial powers in perpituity. If you want to plead war powers to justify this abuse of power this time you are allowing when no war has been declared and that undeclared war will most likely never end.
E. Padilla hasn't been tried by anyone to my knowledge, even a military commission. If he was it was done in secret. Not sure he's ever had access to a lawyer or if he has it was only every recently.
F. All of this precedent is based on a person acting on behalf of a belligerant foreign government. Al Qaida is not a government which is exactly why the Bush administration is claiming they are not protected by the Geneva convention. You can't have it both ways, they are a belligerant government to use this precedent, and not a belligerant government when it comes to the Geneva conventions.
Bottomline is you can go down this road, which you obviously are OK with, but you will for all practical purposes be imposeing martial law in the U.S. for most probably ever, and you will give the executive broad and perpetual powers to arrest anyone they choose. All in all they would have been far better served, if they care about our constitution which they obviously don't, to make a case against Padilla in a court of law, and let something other than a kangaroo court of a military tribunal either convict or exonerate him.
@de_machina
Just fyi, your sig:
Speaking to "the haves and the have-mores." George W. smirks: "Some people call you the elite, I call you my base"
It's a quote from a charity dinner in New York in 2000, where Presidential candidates are invited to come and poke fun at themselves. In the same dinner, Al Gore poked fun at the "Al Gore invented the Internet" joke by claiming to have invented that particular dinner tradition. See CBS News and a blog.
I can't tell you what a relief it is to have the Supreme Court of the United States weighing in on such an important issue as whether the 4th ammendment to the US Constitution is valid. I mean, for the longest time I was woried that people had rights independant of government. It's nice to see the government clairify the issue.
You see, government gives us our rights, and therefore can take them away. It's important, also, to remember that the US Constitution is a "living document." This means that it's much more like a EULA for citizenship than a restraint on, and plan for government. I can't tell you how relieved I am to know that all responsibility for my safety, and well being is under the management of caring government bureaucrats.
I thought I might have to exercise some of my freedoms to prove I'm still free. But my government has assured me that I am, in fact, still free as long as I don't try to exercise any of my freedoms.
Substantiate this assertion. Uttering the same words a Nazi once uttered is not proof that one is a Nazi, particularly when the Nazi was lying. In order to make the connection you'd have to 1) show that both the Nazi and the Dubya spokeshole were talking about comparable things, and 2) show that the Dubya man was lying.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
"All slashdot logs are belong to us"
- NSA
Seriously though, I could not agree with you more. What I FAIL to understand, though, is that when so many of you Americans see what is being done in plain sight (like the rest of the world), why does Dubya keep getting re-elected? How is this possible?
You mean to tell me that there are more people who don't see what's going on and that these people are more conscientious about voting than the otherS?
Find a job you like and you will never work a day in your life.
Or you could take a look at Echelon where the nogoodniks of the State Terrorist Superpower known as the USA were conducting industrial espionage against our "allies" in Europe.
Hmm... it's been well-reported in the past that France and China have conducted extensive industrial espionage actions in the US (just ask Boeing). Israeli intelligence has also been busted a couple of times as well.
State-sponsored/-sanctioned industrial espionage is very real.
The new General Attorney is the very same man that wrote in a memorandum that the Geneva Convention is obsolete
Well, have you looked at some of the things that the Geneva Convention mandates for P.O.W. treatment? There *ARE* some rather quaint things in there. If anything, those parts of the Geneva Convention need to be updated.
Of course, the good ol' Bible has some interesting things to say about slavery, fathers who sell their daughters into servitude, etc., too (i.e., it's just as justified now, if one really is a strict Biblist, as it was 2000 years ago), but no one in their right mind would really willingly do this to their children. Right?
Of course, the Geneva Convention was written to try and preserve some of the vainglorious honor amongst military men. The treatment of US POWs in Vietnam and Korea, however (as I recall, both countries had signed on to the Geneva Convention as well), probably has diminished the Geneva Convention amongst most of the military people.
"We should uphold the Geneva Convention, because it gives our potential PoWs...er, soldiers, the best hope that they will be treated well, if captured, by their captors if we treat PoWs well" is a noble, if just as quaint, notion for the US to hold, but it just doesn't hold up well in the real world.
Without a real judicial system with enforcement powers behind it (the Eurocourt is getting close...), these treaties and pronunciations are really just writing down best wishes and hopes that they will be practiced and upheld. Sort of like major league baseball drug testing.
In the end, it's actions that count, not words. So the US has stooped to levels that start to approach how some of its enemies have openly treated American POWs in the past.
It's too bad in the Padilla case, though, that the US can't come up with a better way to milk the system to keep someone like that locked up legitimately, at least within the confines of the legal system.
If a good defense attorney can drag out a case for years, while his client is out on bail essentially living his life, how come the Dept of Justice can't equally work the system keeping someone like that behind bars indefinitely just through court procedures, different charges, etc.?
... as far as you know :)
Make no mistake, times will come where the US government will be punished for their self-righteousness they currently show to the world.
Right. What will really happen is that China and India will become the economic superpowers, with enough military tech of their own to push back the US if they need to. By then, the US economy will be in the crapper, and Europe, having long ago sucked up to China and India, will be smuggly laughing, "suckers! got what you deserved!"
What is it now... 2-3 billion people, vs 600 million (Europe+USA)? The economic math behind this will catch up to both soon enough...
I know, the US government is far easier to attack than "terrorists", "rebels", etc., who do not wear an Officially Licensed Product of the World Military League to identify themselves.
But let's apply the sword equally to both sides, OK?
The *intent* of the Geneva Convention was to preserve some semblance of honor in treating military captives after WWI, and that is still as applicable today as ever. But should it really be binding on one side that has signed on to it, fighting against some amorphous blob that hasn't?
Of course, it doesn't prohibit PoWs from being shot if they're trying to escape their captors, either. It also doesn't apply to soldiers acting deceptively (i.e., by trying to infiltrate by wearing their opponent's uniforms, attacking after showing signs of surrender, etc.), spies, etc.
Come back to us after you manage to have a real-world discussion with al-Zarqawi about teleological ideas of human rights.
Pity you, you're mixing up Third Geneva Convention with Fourth Geneva Convention. And just because the enemy doesn't honor human rights doesn't give you the right to throw all human rights over board. Think about it.
A monkey is doing the real work for me.
Duh, I know where it came from. Makes no difference to me. Either it falls under
- Much truth is said in jest
- Or he has such poor tast in humor that he doesn't grasp saying something this offense, and anti-democratic, as a joke is not something a sane President would do. Its right up there with his "joke" about the photos of him looking for something in the Oval office, and joking that he couldn't find the missing WMD's from Iraq. Well 1500 Americans are dead, more than 10,000 wounded, and hundreds of billions of dollars squandered looking for those fabricated WMD's. Great joke, ha ha. Such a comedian.
@de_machina
Yes and China and France also have a long history of torture and illegal wars in foreign countries. What's your point? That all governments are asshats? My dislike of the government of the USA is surpassed only by my dislike of governments that I don't have any say in de-electing.
To claim that this is forced on us by Bush is moral cowardice. The buck stops here.
I fail to see the value in trivializing what has happened under Bush's regime, simply because he was voted into office. The fact is that someone has to run the country...unfortunately, we always get stuck with people who are FAR better politicians than they are leaders.
In the case of Pulp Fiction, I can accept an opinion which says it lacks artistic merit, because it's just that -- opinion, and I'm sure you know the old saying about opinions. You can debate this back and forth, because there are many different schools of thought.
However, if you judge it on a more objective basis, you get different results. Commercial success is easy to measure: did the movie bring in more money than it cost to make? If so, it's a good movie, at least for a given value of "good". Entertainment value, while personal, is still quantifiable: watch an audience's reactions. What percentage of the audience is distracted or not involved in the story? How often do they look away from the screen? How much of the movie do they remember a week later? Etc...
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
Why is it important for the US to follow (the spirit of) the Conventions, even if the other parties do not? Several good reasons:
- Simple respect for basic human rights
- Only way to be able to claim the moral high ground
- We've agreed to the spirit of the Conventions; why would we want to play in the "gray areas"?
- It will come back to haunt us when other nations use the same arguments against us
That last one is my biggest concern. Look into the future, and picture the US getting into a conflict with someone like China. They use the Bush Doctrine to assert that the US is an iminent threat. (I.e. the USA has weapons of mass destruction [indisputable] and intends to use them.) They then go on to claim that US soldiers are "illegal combatants" and there are therefore no rules prohibiting any actions against them.OK, perhaps both situations wouldn't be likely to happen in the same incident. But still, I guarantee that the precedents we are setting now will be used against us much more effectively than we are using them to protect ourselves.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
doesn't give you the right to throw all human rights over board.
'All' is a very expensive word, and I do not think you meant to use it the way you did.
Think about it.
Crypto-phalluses !?!?!?
Is that like a chastity belt with a public key infrastructure?
I am a firm believer in the torture of terrorists, but with a twist.
Bind the terrorists hand and foot, hang them upside down from a hook, then...
Let the families of their victims into the room with blow-torches. Film it, and then put it on
El-Jizz-ear-ache TV. With a narrator voicing over the screams - "If you kill someone for Bin Laden, you're not going to heaven, you're going to personally supply the weiner for the roast at 'camp toasty', where your victims families will be invited to burn your b@lls off"
Then see how many recruits *that* gets them...
"Sic Semper Path of Least Resistance"
The sad thing is that you're obviously so ravingly blinkered that you can't even notice month's old news reported in very mainstream media, e.g. The New York Times which has detailed the spending of tax dollars on propaganda for DOMESTIC CONSUMPTION by exactly those people:
So, here's a thought experiment for you to try: how about you assume that you're totally wrong, that there is propaganda being produced by the government, by people in the Defense Department (DOD) and that you are a blinkered bigot that has wilfully ignored the evidence. Acting on this premise do a Google search, spend some time reading and then come back and tell us to "get real".
You said that you don't see how one could fight insurents without resorting to torture. The Shiite Iraqis are handling the terrorist attacks quite well, maybe we should take a lesson from them. When someone suicide bombed their mosque, they didn't go firing indiscriminately into Sunni areas, knowing that would only escalate the conflict. Instead, they're working with the Iraqi national guard to step up security and patrols.