Bush Backed Spying On Americans

jb.hl.com writes "President Bush allowed security agents to eavesdrop on people inside the U.S. without court approval after 9/11, the New York Times has reported. The report says that under a 2002 presidential order, the National Security Agency has been unconstitutionally and illegally monitoring international communications of hundreds in the U.S. When asked about the programme on U.S. TV, the Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, said, 'The president acted lawfully in every step that he has taken.'"

Comments

Palpatine loses one

[beforewisdom]

Palpatine loses one:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10496539/

Re:Palpatine loses one

[MarkGriz]

"The Republicans coined a term for this kind of politician as they also have a few mavericks who refuse to toe the party line...they call 'em RINOs (Republicans In Name Only). We have a DINO in Mr. Lieberman."

Yes. God forbid a politician think for him or her self, instead of doing what they are told.
It's politicians like Lieberman (not that I'm a big fan) and McCain who stand up for what they believe in *despite* party affiliation that keeps me from losing respect for the political process entirely.

In related news..

[PhrostyMcByte]

The senate recently rejected extensions to the patriot act.

None of this is tied a book release, oh no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks, Drudge Report.

Nothing new ..

[Entropy]

Not that I am defending Bush, but the NSA spying on Americans is nothing new. Read "The Puzzle Palace" and "Body of Secrets" by James Bamford if you want a good look inside "no such agency" .. the only things to change from the book would be the tech, not the policies, politics and yes, paranoia.

Re:legally done

[isotope23]

Bush followed all the applicable laws, and members of congress knew about it. I don't see what the problem is.
Bullshit.

From the article :

"Some NSA officials were so concerned about the legality of the program that they refused to participate, the Times said. Questions about the legality of the program led the administration to temporarily suspend it last year and impose new restrictions."

When people inside the NSA have a problem with its constitutionality,
I think thats a pretty clear indication of just how legal it is.

It won't just be the NSA reading your mail

[Stalus]

There's a part of the Dept of Homeland Security known as NVAC (National Visualization and Analytics Center). I'd suggest taking a look at their research agenda. Particularly the "Grand Challenges" section, and particularly the "Scalability Challenge" part of that.

Their target is to handle 1 billion structured messages/transactions per hour and 1 million unstructured messages/documents per hour. For reference, there are 6.5 billion people in the world, according to the CIA world factbook. 296 million in the US. When these numbers were presented to the IEEE Vis conference in 2004, questions arose as to whether they were going to get warrants for all of these transactions. The basic response was that they were going to 'anonymize' all of the data. First, do you honestly think that will happen? Second, how much do you trust the anonymizer? And lastly, do you trust the government to not turn off the anonymizer switch? It's a nice, warm, fuzzy feeling, isn't it?

Re:No, he didn't really say that.

[isotope23]

It is absolutely not real. It was from an editorial piece written by Doug Thompson.

From the article :
"I've talked to three people present for the meeting that day and they all confirm that the President of the United States called the Constitution "a goddamned piece of paper." "

from the followup

"When a GOP operative first emailed me about the White House meeting where Bush called the Constitution "just a goddamned piece of paper," I put it aside as one of many reports I get about the President's temper tantrums."

"We get tips about Bush's temper and his comments all the time. Most of the tips don't get used because we don't go with information from just one source. The tip about "the goddamned piece of paper" seemed destined for the byte bin until a second aide, in casual conversation, mentioned the comment.

So I called a third source who has confirmed information in the past. At first he was defensive.

"Who told you about that?" I told him I'd picked it up from two other sources.

"Look, you know how the President is," he said. "He gets agitated when people challenge him."

All I wanted to know was did the President of the United States call the Constitution a "goddamned piece of paper."

"Yeah. He did." "

It was not an imaginary converstation

We were the first news outlet to identify the names of women who claimed sexual abuse by Bill Clinton when he was attorney general and later governor of Arkansas. We were the first news outlet to report on the ethical problems of many members of Congress in our series: America's Criminal Class: The Congress of the United States. And we were the first to report on the abuse of underage girls on teen model web sites. Links to all of these award-winning stories can be found on our home page.

That doesn't mean you should take everything we print as gospel. Never do that with us or any other news source. Do your own research and reach your own conclusions. And consider the record of the sources you use for news and information. We've published more than 25,000 stories since going online on October 1, 1994, and we've had to retract two of them. That's a record I'm willing to stand on.

My bio can be found on this link. I put my name on everything I write. And I stand behind what I write. I'm an arrogant, stubborn, driven bastard who takes no prisoners and backs down from no one. When I'm wrong, I admit it. Thankfully, I haven't had to do that very often. When I'm right I don't give a damn who doesn't like it or what they say about it.

An editor who taught me a lot once said: "If you piss off both sides you're doing your job."

That's good enough for me.

Re:Wow, there's a shocker.

[lawpoop]

You sound like an armchair fiscal conservative.

I suggest you travel the world a little and see how different political systems pan out. You will probably come to the realization that:

1. Communism doesn't work. Old News.

2. Capitalist countries with social services and little governmental corruption do the best for their average citizen -- i.e. Japan, Australia, Northern European countries. They have a large middle class, with social mobility.

3. Purely capitalist countries fare the worst -- they have no middle class. Most of the people live literally on the street or in shanties -- I'm not talking crazy homeless guy, but mom, dad, and kids. There is a small class of wealthy elite who run the entire economy and government, and they keep it all for themselves. It never trickles down. They have unchecked power, and they have no interest in letting go of *any* of their power and money.

You want to know what country has the most productive economy? Finland. Yes, Finland, a country with cradle-to-grave social services. It also has a high standard of living and a large middle class.

I'm sick of these neocon hucksters trying to destroy the middle class. If you like corruption and business elites running everything, MOVE TO SOUTH AMERICA. You are trying to destroy the American dream. You and your ilk have worn out your welcome.