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Congress Tries To Strip Power From Anti-Wiretap Judge
palegray.net writes "Congress is attempting to strip US District Chief Judge Vaughn Walker of his power following his ruling against the government regarding immunity for telecoms in the NSA wiretapping case. Walker was appointed to the bench by President Bush, and has attempted to enforce existing prohibitions against warrantless wiretapping. From the Wired article: 'Walker, the chief judge of the Northern District of California, affirmed that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is the exclusive legal method for conducting surveillance inside the United States against suspected spies and [terrorists]. The Bush Administration argues that Congress's vote to authorize military force against Al Qaeda and the president's inherent war time powers were exceptions to the exclusivity provision.' The article makes the observation that Congress seems to be having difficulties bringing itself to enforce the laws that it has previously passed regarding wiretapping, and seems more interesting in silencing opposing viewpoints."
Update: 07/06 16:15 GMT by SS: As several readers have noted, the vote would only limit Judge Walker with respect to this particular case. His other responsibilities would be unaffected.
Reminds me of Nixon, "I am not a crook!", yes I broke the law but the laws don't apply to The President.
The Bush Administration argues that Congress's vote to authorize military force against Al Qaeda and the president's inherent war time powers were exceptions to the exclusivity provision.
So maybe this is why the "war" keeps dragging on and on? As long as we have a war going, he thinks he can do anything he wants? (and is often the case)
We had a "war" going on with Nixon in the house too. I see a pattern developing.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
"He doesn't feed people feet first into plastic shredders." - Neither did Saddam, or any of his henchmen. That was just a bit of War propaganda.
"He doesn't use chemical weapons against citizens of his country." - Um.. Yes he does. Mace is a good example. Almost all the vicious weapons, chemical or mechanical, that are used for torture today were first developed in the US.
"He doesn't have women raped and children tortured in front of their parents." As far as I know, you have me there. I don't think he allows parents into Guantanamo. But he does use torture, there and elsewhere on a regular basis. In fact, he probably does arrange for this to happen on some extraordinary renditions....
"He's going to be out of office via the normal process come next January." We hope. He should have been thrown from office for many crimes via the normal process already, but has managed to suppress it so far. At the least he has broken the constitution.
When I started to write this I thought it would be hard to make any kind of comparison between Saddam and Bush, but it turns out that it's quite easy. Of course, a lot of things that were said about Saddam were wartime propaganda and lies - I have little trouble believing that if the two men had each taken up the other's role they would have behaved very similarly. And of course, Saddam has not actually taken over another non-threatening country and stolen all it's raw materials.....