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White House Derails Attempts to End Illegal Wiretapping

P. Rivacy writes "If you recall, last month we discussed Congress's attempts to outlaw the already illegal NSA wiretaps authorized by the President. The White House is now using delaying tactics to derail the passage of that bill. Their tactic is to stall on providing documents related to the President's warrantless wiretapping program, despite requests from the Senate Intelligence Committee that is currently reviewing the proposed legislation. '"Another critical priority for congressional oversight is government wiretapping of Americans, conducted under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and, illegally, under the President's warrantless wiretapping program," Senator Russ Feingold said. "When the program was finally placed within the FISA process, an opportunity arose for the Administration and the Congress to move forward, under the law. Unfortunately, the Administration has yet to demonstrate a real interest in doing so."'"

14 of 647 comments (clear)

  1. Hint: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Hint to those warring on terror:

    Stop being such wussbags.

  2. The liberal hand wringing in this thread is: by Richard+McBeef · · Score: -1, Troll

    Priceless.

    It's a shame all you can - nay all you will - ever do about it is whine on Slashdot.

  3. Re:Just impeach his sorry ass by Jhon · · Score: 1, Troll

    Because it wasn't a CRIMINAL case, it was a CIVIL case. He was being asked about behaviour that was consistent with the claim of sexual harassment. That is SPOT ON a correct question to ask in a CIVIL case.

    He wasn't impeached for a BJ, he was impeached because a sitting President willfully lied under oath and derailed the legal system. Had he not been caught, he would have successfully circumvented the rights of the woman who claimed she was sexually harassed.

    Why is this so hard for people to understand? It wasn't about the leude behavior -- it was about lying about relevant facts of a CIVIL case.

  4. Re:I predict... by N3WBI3 · · Score: 0, Troll

    It very well may come to be remembered that way but history is seldom accurate. Many presidents have tried to erase these lines (Nixon, Regan, and Clinton come to mind) to one degree or another. Were GWB's recess appointments any less questionable than Clinton's? (Clinton's probably worse in this case) Was the firing of certain federal prosecutes by bush any less questionable than Clinton firing *all* of them? (Probably yes in this case) I mean this is a 200 yo power struggle between branches and the pendulum always swings, heck we have the speaker of the house trying to make herself the face of American foreign policy! all the branches are alwys bickering and its up to us the voters to wind the clock every now and again.

    --
  5. Wiretap all muslims for 2 generations by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    That alone would reduce chances of terror in the US by 90%.

    Why would they leave their savage countries to come here and continue living like savages (instead of adopting a proper way of life, for instance), if not to commit terrorist acts?

    Well, it may not be accurate for all of them, but certainly the taleban look-alikes and the burka wearing women are here only to live off of society and the support from other muslims. Guantanamo for the lot of them.

    We can still avoid becoming like the UK.

  6. Re:Blatant and ongoing violations of the law by neophyte13 · · Score: 0, Troll

    How did this debate get spun into impeachment and an "I hate Bush argument". I thought we'd all agreed on that point long long long ago? How did it get here without anyone first siting the articles, paragraph etc. of the constitution, bill of rights, etc. that define US Citizens are guaranteed the right to privacy in any circumstance what so ever from any branch of government during wartime? Shoot which President was it that was reading mails coming home from over seas...? FDR? I forget... How can you even site failure to protect the boarder, but flip flop like a Massachusetts senator on the eavesdropping as a means to secure the nation? It's the sniveling groups like this that ignore the fact that we are at WAR(!!!!) and whine about Karl Rove setting them (again, and again) rather than doing something about the WAR(!!!). Here's some cheese!

  7. How about some facts? by RealProgrammer · · Score: 1, Troll

    There is so much wrong with your post that I can't find anything accurate in it at all. That it got marked insightful is amazing to me.

    They are not spying on "everybody". Have you heard of anyone who has been spied on? Do you think the government could enforce secrecy perfectly on anything like "everybody"? But perhaps that's not persuasive. They could be monitoring "everybody" and not telling.

    Why would they do that? What possible good would it do them, compared to the harm?

    The FISA court is overseeing the spying program now. Feingold knows this, and is just trying to score cheap points.

    Who have they "tortured to death"?

    "Invade other countries for personal gain"? What, Haliburton? That's so stupid. They invaded Iraq because Iraq was run by a thug, a sociopath with expansionist tendencies. It looked to everyone that he was trying to resurrect his nuclear/biochem program. And he was training, and rewarding, terrorists. He isn't any more.

    The only "outing" of a CIA agent was done by Joe Wilson, non-Bushie Dick Armitage, or both. All Scooter Libby did was get caught telling conflicting versions. If there had been more than that, Fitzgerald would still be digging.

    The US Attorneys are low-level political appointees. If a cabinet secretary (a high-level political appointee) doesn't do what the President says, he gets fired. Per force, US Attorneys get fired for the same reasons.

    Cozy with the Commies in China? How, by not starting a war with them?

    "Extraordinary rendition" - Oh, you mean the terrorists. Good point. We should just let them blow up a city or two.

    --
    sigs, as if you care.
  8. Re:This is new how? by Hodar · · Score: 0, Troll
    It's one thing to grant equal rights - I think few would dispute that. I have no issue with same-sex couples having the same legal protection shared by normal people (yes, I do mean normal). Being gay is abnormal, that's why they are less than 10% of the population; they are outside the 'norm'.

    However, the purpose of "Marriage" is to create a family unit for creating and raising a family. Gay couples are incapable of reproduction, the primary reason for the institution of 'marriage'. Now, if they want to call this institution by another name, that's fine. But, like "Republic" and "Democracy"; "Marriage" is a word with a specific meaning. No religion on earth recognizes "Marriage" as anything other than a relationship between a man and a woman. Animals are not included either, so I guess those means Republicans are not only picking on homosexuals, they are picking on the bestiality crowd too.

    Don't look to me to defend some of the things the Republican party is doing. There are very few Republicans that know what their base is demanding.

  9. Re:I predict... by WarpSnotTheDark · · Score: -1, Troll

    This was insightful? Slashdot moderators; pull your heads out of your buttocks and read the posts before saying they are insightful - it's ranting drivel, not even close to an actual coherent thought. I think Bush has not been the president I would have wanted him to be, but Gore and Horse-face would have turned us into the Islamic States of Mexico as quickly as they could had they been elected. The Reps and the Dems are worthless; unfortunately the Libertarians and Green Party folks are an equally scary prospect. The country elects the president it deserves and I am saddened to admit that collectively, we deserve GWB. Until we, as a people, stop focusing on what makes us different and start focusing on what makes us the same, we will continue to deserve the worthless presidents.

  10. Re:Just impeach his sorry ass by Darby · · Score: 0, Troll

    3) Lying to Congress about the intelligence that lead us into Iraq.
    There is simply no evidence supporting this claim.


    Wow, you really are a deceitful lying sack of shit, aren't you Pudge?

    There are a mass of press conferences where he bald faced lied. All you had to do was spend 5 minutes and you could have actually known what you're talking about.

    As it is, you clearly have a religious belief in Shrub, since there is no path reason could have led you along to such an insane conclusion which is directly contradicted by every single scrap of information about the situation.

    Why don't you cowardly freedom hating shitbags move to China or Saudi Arabia or some place where they already live under your ideal system instead of fucking up my country because you're too much of an ignorant coward to live in a free country.

    Seriously, the fact that he lied through his teeth for years is an absolutely established fact which is part of the public record.
    Try pulling your head out of your ass long enough to look around once in a while, huh Pudgy?

  11. Pelosi's felony by mi · · Score: 0, Troll

    Nahw. She just said publicly the road to peace lay through Damascus. Not like she gave the tyrant state credibility or anything.

    Yes, she did give the tyrant state credibility. A law-maker is not supposed to make (or pretend to make) State-visits. If it was not such an incredibly hot-potato ("Repuke-nazis prosecuting the Democratic leader — to the barricades, comrades!"), she would've been justly prosecuted under the Logan Act of 1799:

    Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

    And let me pre-empt any attempts to weasel out of this felony charge by disputing the Act's "legislative intent". The act is named after a certain pacifist Dr. Logan (a legislator), who — in 1798 — tried to relay to France, that, essentially, the road to peace lay through Paris.

    What Pelosi did has been a felony for over two centuries...

    --
    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
  12. Re:Just impeach his sorry ass by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    All it does is lay out the general principle of the Fourth Amendment and the President's responsibilities

    Gee, how do I hire you to represent me? See, I just shot a guy in the face, and I need someone to tie it up in courts for a few years, and you sound like just the man for the job. All I need you to do is to convince the court that it needs to examine whether me pulling the trigger and making the other person's head explode was really "murder" or not. You can go endlessly into the minutiae of whether the bullet killed the person or not, etc. etc.

    international communications.

    And as soon as you point out the part of the Constitution indicating that any citizen that calls a foreign country immediately has their citizenship revoked without trial, you can continue to talk about "foreign". Until then, it's still a wiretap of an American citizen, on American soil, and under American law.

  13. And a defeated pudge creeps back under his rock by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    See ya, don't let the facts hit you in the ass on the way out. You have been roundly rebutted at every turn, your facts are shoddy half truths, and your opinions are ill-formed and juvenile. As always, you wade into a discussion like a madman, firing off posts willy-nilly unlike any other editor, and once your bullshit has been soundly called, you slink off to your dank little hole rather than admit another ignominious defeat.

    Oh, pudge! Thanks for giving us a laugh as always.