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Court Orders Dismissal of US Wiretapping Lawsuit
jcatcw writes with a link to a ComputerWorld article about the dismissal of a case against the NSA over the wiretapping program revealed last year. The case was brought by the ACLU. A three-judge panel in the Sixth Circuit has sent the case back down to District court for ultimate dismissal. "The appeals court decision leaves opponents of the NSA program in a difficult position, said Jim Dempsey, policy director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, a civil liberties group that has opposed the program. The appeals court ruled that the plaintiffs could not sue because they can't prove they were affected by the program, and at the same time, ruled that details about the program, including who was targeted, are state secrets."
Enjoy your dictatorship, America. Bush and his cronies can do no wrong, and can block and dismiss any attempt to see JUST HOW FAR they have gone. At least until after the next election. If there IS an election. You guys still have them, right?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
prepare to be spanked in appeal!
The only way to prove you were affected is to be affected. The fact you were affected you can't prove even when you are affected because the fact that you were is to remain a state secret.
Gnnnn1st
menhehh
mmm
geh geh
Mngggg
Psot!
Have you read my blog? Neither have I.
There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. (Lt.) Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.
"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he [Yossarian] observed.
"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.
Instead, it's fear of terror that's the new catch, completely unaccountable in its all-enforcing secrecy from the people the system is supposed to represent, and completely against the constitution that gives it the charter it exists to serve.
Ryan Fenton
So, want to start taking bets to see if this actually makes onto the news tonight...?
Before or after the American Idol/You Think You Can Dance/Duh/Paris Hilton report?
I'd think they should be able to appeal to the Supreme Court though. How can you prove you have standing if it illegal for you to know whether you have standing or not. Even the current Court would find that one difficult I'd think.
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
...is the standing rulings that have collectively made it law that taxpayer participation (i.e. by paying taxes) in a program is insufficient standing for challenging that program. Is there a lawyer in the house that can explain why if I pay for something that doesn't give me the standing to complain about it? A rational explanation escapes me, but IANAL...
I mean, I can *kind of* see that if taxpayer participation was enough, then the courts would be come much busier with complaints about government spending and programs (perhaps paralyzingly so), but there must be a better way than just excluding the entire class as lacking standing.
All the techniques ever used to make men moral have been themselves thoroughly immoral... (Nietzsche)
Our government was set up on a basis of checks and balances to keep things on the straight and narrow. In a Democracy, however, the governmental checks and balances are tier 2 of the mechanism to keep things in line. The voting populace is tier 1. Without the ability to understand what the government is doing (the information is classified) we are unable to direct the government through elections.
We are looking at an example where the checks and balances system is being undermined at the most fundamental level.
We seem to be living at the period in American history that future peoples will point to when discussing the unraveling of our Nation.
Regards.
FUCK!
So the court has ruled that as long as the government keeps it's mouth shut about who it was spying on, no one can ever sue the government over un-constitutional spying. Great. No plaintiffs, no lawsuit, no broken laws.
Of course at SOME point, maybe in 20 years or so, the names of who the government was spying on will have to become a non-secret, and thus available under a FOIA request.
AccountKiller
This is a case where the only way the NSA would be found guilty is if they basically admitted to it-- but they don't have to because they can label their activities *state-secrets*. You can't win this one.
The appeals court ruled that the plaintiffs could not sue because they can't prove they were affected by the program, and at the same time, ruled that details about the program, including who was targeted, are state secrets.
Which is all true. So they should have chosen a better angle under which to file a complaint. Either find someone affected, or argue convincingly that such state secrets are unconstitutional. Should be a breeze given the current make up of the supreme court.
Otherwise, just put your money in the bank and wait until after 2008.
Religion is what happens when nature strikes and groupthink goes wrong.
I know it goes against the current liberal anti-Bush Slashdot crowd - If you aren't doing illegal activities over the phone / airwaves / Internet then why worry ? - They could probably get more useful stuff out of your garbage can. As far as I am concerned the NSA/CIA/FBI/??? can wiretap and monitor me to their hearts content I promise it will not only be useless but incredibly boring.
FTFA:
So, Mr. Roehrkasse, do you know what freedom is?
Do you even know what the fuck your organization is even defending?
I don't know about you, but if our freedoms are being taken away by our Government, than what is there for them to defend? I guess the status quo.
I'll do my best in the coming election to vote for someone that'll take our freedoms seriously and not just use the word as justification for eliminating the Bill of Rights - like Bush does. Sorry, when that idiot in Chief goes on national TV and says he's fighting for our freedom and then allows his henchmen in the DOJ and NSA to pull this kind of shit, it's obvious to me that he and th rest of his administration has absolutely no concept of what freedom is.
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
since the EFF was ineffective, support the NRA.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
IANAL I assume that the loss on appeal essentially erases the Michigan courts finding of the progral to be illegal, but at least it was overturned on the grounds of the ACLU not being harmed. I figure that's better than saying it is actually ok. or am I missing something?
Fortunately, the decision can be appealed. No guarantee that would do any good. Since we're in election season, judges are standing by their political affiliations on all sides. Even if the decision was favorable to the plaintiffs, though, there's no reason to believe that it'll do any good. How many Republican senators are going to want to look weak on national security right now? That means even if the matter does stay in the courts, it is very unlikely anything will happen before late in November 2008. Of course, if it does stay in the courts, the NSA could just plead guilty and have the President issue a full pardon the following day, rescinding the finding and penalties exacted.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Wow, so the appeals court upholds the violation of the fourth amendment, and at the same time pisses all over the first (petition for redress.) Truly, this is an awe-inspiring day. Surely, the men who signed the Declaration of Independence, almost exactly 231 years ago would sing from the rooftops in joy at what became of the nation that they pledged their "lives, fortunes, and sacred honor" to create.
What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
...but then they would have to kill you.
So this is actually a good ruling.
All hail the sham republic!
Maybe the question is naive and the game of chess is obvious to everyone else. The submission says this ruling puts the ACLU in a difficult position. They are not permitted to know whether they are affected by the program or not. Perhaps the difficulty of the ACLU's current position is an unintended consequence, but that seems unlikely to me. What seems more likely is that the court did this as sort of a gotcha, as in "better luck next time, smart guy." I get this feeling every time I hear a lack-of-standing ruling. I understand that it's a valid concept it just sticks in my craw.
I admit that it's just a vague sense of the way things are in this country that leads me to believe this way. I wouldn't really know how to begin looking for other examples of this legal maneuvering in the recent past (or any past.) Can anyone give me some insight into this or a place to start reading?
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
As far as I am concerned the NSA/CIA/FBI/??? can wiretap and monitor me to their hearts content I promise it will not only be useless but incredibly boring.
Would it be OK if a government clerk spied out your business decisions and passed them on to a competitor that could pay?
Would you mind if there was only one political party because it was able to identify and neutralize anyone who disagreed with them?
Would you mind doing some menial job for your new corporate masters for the rest of your life? Remember, though crime will result in relative economic hardships. The only thing more expensive then freedom is slavery.
I mind all of the above and resent paying for such abuse. If you want a life like that, pay for it yourself.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I'm sick and fucking tired of hearing this word tossed around like a pejorative. Learn the definition!.
Here's a snippet:
You might think twice before you start trash talking a philosophy whose principle tenets promote the very "freedoms" you conservatives claim to love, yet consistently take away.
It's time for the EFF and some supernerds to entrap the government.
Plant some communications that raise the government's interest enough to show up to investigate. Ensure the communications, once the plot is revealed, would not be judged to be a real threat or significantly illegal otherwise. But make sure it raises ire and causes a response that could not otherwise have been wise to the communications had they not been illegally snooping.
Bonus points if you can make it high profile enough that Cheney cannot absolve himself of knowledge of the details of the trap.
Apparently in the days of Echelon, there was an actual case where some mom said something along the lines of "Little Tommy bombed at the school play." The automated system flagged her as requiring a case file, and she was investigated and her future calls monitored. In this case, she was innocent, Tommy was innocent (except for bad acting), but the government decided it was worth expending resources to spy on her. Doesn't give me much confidence no matter how you look at it.
Just image what they'd do if you told someone you were going to nuke a tv dinner, pound it down, and crash for the night.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
Well, I guess I am about to be modded into oblivion by the anti-Bush crowd, but I don't see anything wrong with this ruling.
IANAL, but to my knowledge, in order to sue over an act (tort), you have to prove that you were not just negatively affected by that act, but affected in a specific dollar amount which the court can award you as compensation for the act. What measurable harm have these guys suffered? I don't think that the possibility that one of your conversations might be in a secret NSA database causes you any measurable harm that a court could compensate you for. If they have to ask the NSA whether they have any such records, that in and of itself serves as proof that they were not harmed in any way by the records (if they do exist), since if they were harmed in any way, they would be able to prove that in court.
I don't think it's a good idea either to seek to challenge laws in court on the grounds that you paid the taxes that support the program or somesuch. That is trying to place the courts in a role they were never meant to take - of judging the effect of laws. Passing and repealing laws is the job of our elected representatives in Congress and the President. Provided that the laws do not directly contradict the Constitution, the Courts have no say in what those laws are. (yes, I know that we seem to be steadily accumulating laws that do directly contradict the Constitution, but that's another post) If you don't like the laws, you're going to have to take it up with your elected Representatives, and you're going to have to accept that the American people do not necessarily agree with you on all issues, and they have as much right to their views as you do. If you want to change things, you have to convince your fellow Americans that you are right and they should vote your way.
I don't reply to ACs
If this ruling makes you angry, support the EFF!
Why? They talk a great talk (and they love to talk- seems they're always giving speeches) but when it comes down to court time, their record is less than stellar, particularly with larger cases. I really don't give a shit about CSS or encrypted music/movies. I do care quite a bit when the government is engaged in unconstitutional wiretapping.
Please help metamoderate.
Congress won't enforce the law. The Executive branch won't police itself. The Judicial branch rules citizens can't sue because the details are classified by the Executive branch. It's a perfect, closed system. No one in the government is accountable to us anymore.
The government no longer answers to the citizens, according the the system we set up to run it. It's a very short, swift step from where we are to where ordinary citizens disappear in the night (non-Muslims, that is). We won't know exactly when that moment arrives, because we won't be told, because no one in the government obeys or enforces the law anymore.
Let's assume for a moment that you're not someone who buries his head in the sand, saying 'As long as I'm not doing anything wrong, why should I care what the government does to others?' Let's assume that your response to crisis is not to hop in your SUV, drive down to the mall, and go shopping. And let's further assume that you're a red-blooded, patriotic American who really cares about freedom and the rule of law, and about protecting the country against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
So ask yourself, what recourse do you have now?
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Screw the NRA, start supporting CTD
FTA |"The plaintiffs cannot show they have been or will be subject to surveillance personally," Batchelder wrote.| Since you didn't find the 4 inch file folder on you it didn't happen... (Lets wait 30 years and see what shows up. On the other hand, no we do not have to wait this time to know what's happening.) |The plaintiff's attempts to sue for other reasons, including violation of their First Amendment, free-speech rights, are a "thinly veiled ruse," the judge added. None of the plaintiffs has shown that their speech has been hindered, she wrote.| The ACLU Lawyers should know that good old Abe Lincoln suspended "Habeas Corpus" back in the 1860's, cuz there was a civil war on. Well guess what, it must be the "Thinly Veiled Ruse 1860's" all over again, and they got the carriage before the horse this time. I didn't see congress issue a Declaration of War granting these powers, as a matter of fact I haven't seen one in the U.S. since December of 1941. I must have missed something. Also, now would someone explain to me how in the world, can we in the US have the right and/or moral authority to export this kind of democracy to the world (think J.E. Hover Justice if your unsure)? The really sad part is I voted for Bush, and was even protesting for him in the election recount. I wised up after Abu Grave and the associated White House Memos. BTW. May God Rest the soul of those fallen from the twin towers in 2001 to those that died in Iraq and Afghanistan today.
I have personally always been of two minds on the matter.
I believe that it's a ton of FUD that people are thinking that we're in the midst of creation of an awful big-brother type government. We have way too many people, and we're way too paranoid to let that happen. You need a semi-complacent population (you listening Britain??) that almost WANTS a nanny-state type surveillance for that sort of thing.
Do I think that international calls should be monitored with known/suspected terrorists? You bet your boots I want those heard. Do we need warrants for them? To a point, but there are quite a few spur-of-the-moment issues that occur here, and I doubt that anyone (including the government) understand the complexities of what is going on. Plus, there can be an argument for such a call being a military matter and falling under any President's purview as C-in-C.
That isn't to say that I am comfortable with the entire process and don't think that there may be some level of abuse or semi-dubious legality.
However, keep in mind that ANYTHING this administration has done in the last few years has had several automatic, thoughtless reactions from both sides of the aisle in attack and defense, with very little concept of historical reality and context(my common complaint of journalism, where it seems that everything happens in a 4-8 year vaccuum).
Well, that's a nice step 1.
Now, for step 2, how are you going to prove before the court that the government actually wiretapped you? That's the crux of this decision; you can't sue if you can't prove you're a victim, and who's a victim is protected by the nebulous modern legal construct of "state secrets."
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
What is the use of laws if they are to be loopholed and danced around? Laws were made in place to provide a groundwork for a healthy, thriving society. We have widdled these ideals so far down that the very foundation of these laws can be bypassed.
We don't need more laws, we need more JUSTICE. Nothing is going to f***ing happen in this country until people start standing up for their morals as a nation. No laws, MORALS.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
you are one of those who have a Bush/Cheney bumper sticker next to freedom first?
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
How about if you were a lawyer? Do you think the NSA would be bothered in the least about passing along information to the DOJ reguarding your stratagies in pursuing a $B class action case against the US for unlawful imprisonment?
The problem isn't that the NSA is tapping the phones of US citizens, it's that Nixon did it & the US govt expressly wrote laws forbidding exactly what the NSA is doing - unsupervised wiretaps. They created an entire court & post approval schemes to make sure that the approval process didn't interfier with priority/time sensative investigations. I don't care if you aren't breaking the law & don't care who listens in on your calls. I do care that the Federal Government doesn't give a shit about the very rule of law it's supposed to be upholding!
Bush & the NSA got caught with their hands in the cookie jar. Like the average 2 year old, they first denied that the facts were the facts. Once they couldn't get past that point they switched to beligerant teenager & just said 'fuck off the rules don't apply to me'. That's where we stand now. Bush & the NSA acknowledge that they broke the law & then hide behind the 'state secrets' act to shield themselves from any investigation/proscecution relating to it.
Note how they are even stonewalling the security subcommity that's trying to look into exactly how bad of a legal fuckup this is. "This stuff is so super secret that we can't even show 8 members of Congress with top level security clearances what we are doing. The fact that we are legally mandated to advise them & we can only perform these operations under their oversight is irrelevant."
I think this is eventually going to fall apart into a cluster fuck that's going to make Watergate look like a well coreographed ballet. This suit was turned down because the plaintifs couldn't show direct harm with the 'chilling effect' on free speech being completely dismissed by 2 judges as a 'concoction'. Eventually there's going to be an arrest made & it'll get tied to the NSA.
The game is over once that happens, Bush has already lost almost every aspect of the 'state secrets' cover he has. As more & more information is leaked out, he's got less & less coverage. The 'unable to show cause' requirement to continue these cases is one of the last pieces of the puzzle. Once a case is tied to the project, that's gone & he's down to 'fuck off'. There's one case that's already in play because of this very fact. Parts of it were thrown out, but the judge ruled that there is enough public knowledge about the project to continue, and the fact that the party suing was accidentally provided documents showing he was under survailance is sufficient to prove cause.
The Shrub has all the pieces he needs to do the job, he just doesn't like having to play by the rules that accompany those tools. Sorry, if he can't win playing by the rules, he needs to step asside & let someone else have thier chance.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Sound familiar?
@HbFyo0$k8 tH!$
Just spouting off, but what if you setup communication between a few computer that only you have access to, then began sending a bunch of "terrist" messages between them over the public internet?
When the FBI/CIA/NSA/SS shows up at your door and whisks you off to Romania, you file suit... oh fuck.
The ACLU needs to work more closely with congressional staffers. Joe Q citizen will always get the run-around against the executive branch. Without congressional subpoena power they are up a creek. Also, SCOTUS can't give them the denial of standing BS.
bash-2.04$
bash-2.04$yes "Don't you hate dialup connections?"| write USERNAME
That's right bitch. We will have our rights, even those the Conservatives in this country want to take them. Liberals are better paid, better educated and perform all the real services you require.
Any chump can work on a car, not many can work on computers. Guess how liberal the computer workers are?
Yeah.
DIAF.
Blar.
The reason why the 4th amendment doesn't apply to any of this, is because this is not about criminal cases. Understand?
This is about gathering intelligence to be used against foreign agents who are engaged in a war against us, and who are trying to kill Americans and attack this country. The executive branch has a legal and constitutional right to gather intelligence about our enemies and attacks on this country. These wiretaps remember are all dealing with people outside of the USA talking to people inside of it, or vice versa. To make things even more clear they've limited that scope further by only tapping those with known or suspected enemy agents.
None of what is gathered in these wiretaps can be used in a criminal court against you, to be honest I don't know if they could be used in a criminal court against anyone. They're solely for the purpose of gathering intelligence. Now I agree we should lean on the government to make sure that they're only used for that intelligence and not criminal proceedings, or harassment.
BTW, Clinton did this. So I'm very sure did all the prior Administrations. But the scope was much broader then, then they could use any phone call you made overseas as an excuse to tap all of your phone calls.
As a conservative, and an IT employee to boot, I resent your post.
I know plenty of conservatives who know what they're talking about, are well-educated and eloquent. Some are even of other ethnicities, like my Hispanic self, and most are not particularly wealthy.
By the same token, living in Madison, Wisconsin, I have met plenty of left-wing folks who are completely and utterly insane, closed-minded, and outright stupid. I've also met plenty of right-wing folks who are completely and utterly insane, closed-minded and outright stupid. It's silly to generalize one group as smart and the other as stupid, or one as crazy and the other as sane. There are idiots and smart people, whack jobs and reasonable folks on all ends of the political spectrum.
YOU may be innocent, but your spouse/child/parent/sibling/co-worker etc. may be suspected of wrongdoing. Unless all of your associates are innocent, you would be dragged into their web
Even if no prosecutions could result, you WILL be blackmailed and threatened. Nobody has done anything illegal, but the information could cost you your marriage, your job, future jobs, and your reputation in the community
Even if you and all your associates are innocent, with enough personal details, someone could plausibly accuse you of a crime and you would have no way to deny it
Because a government that believes it should be able to illegally wiretap at will and not be held accountable is exactly the government that we should fear engages in blackmail and fraudulent criminal prosecution
So let's see.... G W Bush has a few of his thugs break into your house, drag you off shoot you. You are never seen again. This is all part of his new "Pure Thoughts" program where they will eliminate people who they guess might one day think a bad thought.
Many people here may feel that this program is wrong and possibly illegal.
But under the NEW system...
1) GW would simply pardon (or commute the sentence of) his thugs if they were caught. With the promise of a pardon they can act with impunity.
2) There is nothing WE can do to stop it because WE were not effected. The courts hold that only those who were actually killed can sue. And the killing are a state secret.
When I was in school they told us we should study history so that we don't have to repeat it. Looks like a few people in our government were asleep when they covered the part about Nazi Germany in the 30's and 40'.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Piss off a slashtard, mod parent up!
...raise your right hand. Then make a fist and bring it down on your head. Repeatedly. Helen Keller could have seen this coming.
~Eien no Inori wo Sasagete~ Searching for my Hatsumi...
This could sound like a strange argument, but any government or agency has the ability to spy on you, and they will do it whether you like it or not, but at least they're telling you they're doing it.
"we've got trenchcoats and bad attitudes" - John Constantine, HellBlazer
The NRA has this to say about that issue:
Furthermore, in respect to your comment on ICBMs, logically, "arms" must include anything comparable to whatever a government holds. To say otherwise is to say that the founding fathers only meant that citizens could have slingshots against cannon (BTW, T. Jefferson had personal cannon, and private ownership of cannon was not unusual). If nukes are unreasonable for personal ownership, then so to for governmental ownership. After all, ultimate control of even govenment arms comes down to individuals. Logic concludes, and history proves, that governments are no more responsible than individuals, and there is good reason for "like-for-like" reciprocity. The natural and absolute right to self defense extends to the doctrine of mutually assured destruction.
If you want a more pure defense of the principles of the Second Amendment, then support the GOA.
Now, after my party hangs up, I just blow my whistle into the phone really hard. At least I get the satisfaction of hearing them scream.
Fortunately, there's still this lawsuit, where the government accidentally sent the defendant a transcript of his own phone records obtained without a warrant.
John Dingell (D-Mich) has an very good NRA rating.
I suspect that you fall into the ignorant (spelled "troll") category.
The supremes said years ago that growing your own crops is "interstate commerce." If you think they're going to do anything to undermine the power of the Federal Government, you're very sadly mistaken. The US hasn't been a nation of law since the 1860's and the illegitimate rise of unconstitutional Federalism.
Resent it all you want. Hard numbers of democrats vs republicans are hard to come by, but we can use campaign contributions (which at least are recorded) according to open secrets.org.
http://opensecrets.org/industries/indus.asp?Ind=B
Electronics/Computer Industry 2006 55% Dem .......44% Rep .......40% Rep .......40% Rep .......45% Rep
2004 59% Dem
2002 60% Dem
2000 54% Dem
In my personal experience its even more slanted to the dems. We just don't give as much as republicans do to campaigns.
I'm absolutely sure there are Republican IT workers, just like I'm sure there are Black republicans, they just aren't the majority. This is the crux of the parent post that you take offense to.
This is where I would normally insert a joke about How the competence of republican IT workers is equal to the competence of Republican Administrations, but that would just be cruel and possibly redundant.
OSGGFG - Open Source Gamers Guide to Free Games
You, of course, assume that they still teach about Nazi Germany in public schools. Unfortately, that isn't politically correct -- you know, you might offend those descended from German emigrants!
Personally, I graduated high school in 2000 from a relatively decent, middle-class suburban town. Although the school system received few much criticism it wasn't bottom of the barrel either. I clearly remember having an interest in this part of history, because I believe the same as you, "history repeats itself". Unfortunately, in my school, they jumped from the first World War to the Civil Rights movement. I don't believe they mentioned much about Watergate either.
I only imagine things are becoming worse. To what details are teachers now allowed to explain or describe violence, hatred, political abuses, and racism? School administrators are afraid that teaching students of these things, that at worst they will instigate these things, and at best they might draw lawsuits. Imagine the terror inflicted upon the school board upon the following:
What if the school was teaching about WWII when a student decided to bring a gun to school and shoot a jewish student? Surely, the school would be in hot water -- best to just not teach about WWII, that will at least cover the school board's ass.
I applaud all school teachers and their administrators that still care more about teaching our youth than they do about covering their asses.
The president has violated his oath to uphold the constitution
Your argument lacks any historical context.
In historical terms, Bush's wiretaps and even Gitmo are positively tame. Washingon shot suspected British spies in his army on sight. Lincoln flat out suspended Habeas Corpus to deal with Confederate spies / terrorists. Wilson basically suspended the constitution for citizens of German descent during World War I, and Roosevelt broke the Constitution in so many ways that it cannot even really be enumerated.
You talk about Bush's "secrecy", well, Roosevelt built the atomic bomb so secretly that his own VP didn't even know about it. Johnson had the government doing all sorts of crazy research projects on people, like the CIA's MK-ULTRA program or giving plutonium to retards.
And, if you want to talk about power grabs, Roosevelt set aside a long time national tradition of only serving two presidential terms to be elected to a third and a fourth, a tradition re-instated into law only by Republican insistence during the Eisenhower years. For that matter, Roosevelt tried to stuff more Supreme Court justices on the court so that he could get a majority of justices to side with him.
Kennedy and Johnson both used the CIA to spy on US citizens in flagrant violation of the CIA's own charter, Nixon used the CIA to spy on everyone and Clinton used the IRS to go after political opponents.
What Bush is doing is far, far more moderate than any of the above.
And similarly, any of the above is far far more moderate than what our enemies do. In Iraq, Al Qaeda, to terrorize a village, will invite a family that needs convincing to "dinner", and then serve them their own son cooked. Or, they will go and blow up your house. If you disagree with them, they will kill your whole family. You talk about the USA's effort to stop free speech, and to this day the government of Iran not only blocks all free speech in its own country, but has a million dollar bounty on the head of Salmon Rushdie, and has vowed to hunt down a couple of cartoonists for daring to draw a picture of Mohammed. You talk about Bush's oppression of woman's rights, but in the middle east, women are routinely stoned to death or whipped for the "serious" crimes of having an extramarital affair. You talk about the poor defendants in Gitmo, and the need for a Jury trial, but when did Al Qaeda in Iraq have a jury trial for the 75 people they blew up today, the 50 yesterday, and so on? Where was the jury trial for the occupants of the north and south towers of the world trade center? Where was the jury trial for the occupants of the lockerbee flight? For Klinghoffer and a host of others assasinated by the PLO? Where's the jury trial for all those "jewish criminals" engaged in the horrible crime of eating bagles in a restaraunt in Jerusalem?
So, yeah, I see your point about how on some level it is wrong that Bush is harrassing an Islamic organization, but after having carefully considering the track record of Islamic organizations, I can only sanely conclude that Bush's wiretapping of them is entirely appropriate. If it makes you feel better, write the law that says: "any foreign funded political organization is subject to wiretap without warrants", and I dare you to find any nation that does not engage in the same.
This is my sig.
I think the legal standing ruling is part of a chess game as someone said. The court might have been saying "this is not a strong enough case for us to rule on, make sure you can prove you were affected and then we can rule". Of course, part of the problem with that is you would also have to show that you were wiretapped, and not the person you were conversing with. If John is talking to Terror Suspect A, and the only reason John's conversations are recorded is because TSA was tapped, John would also have no standing to sue. There is another case brewing: http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007 /03/72811?currentPage=all posted on the main page as well. If W. Belew had conversations with this Al-Buthi, and the co-counsel Ghafoor had conversations with Al-Buthi, than how do they know it wasn't Al-Buthi who was wiretapped? If Al-Buthi is out of the united states, then the tapping could be covered by CIA/NSA.
And why do we still use this term "wiretapped"? Its from days when there was no wireless communication between regular people. Now, with cell phones, many (most?) calls take place over the electromagnetic spectrum. This is Public! Licensed through the FCC for commercial use. But why would anyone have any expectation of privacy when transmitting information over the "airwaves"? Anybody can listen in, as piggybackers should know.
1. This 1-1-1 decision (pdf) is just on technical grounds -- plaintiffs' lack of standing.
2. In view of the concurring and dissenting opinions, and the importance of the subject matter, it is likely to receive Supreme Court review.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful