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People On No-Fly List Can Sue In District Court
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "According to a new ruling, those put on the No-Fly List can challenge their inclusion in federal court. Previously, they had to go directly to an appellate court, which would deprive them of any chance to subpoena documents or witnesses and make gathering evidence difficult or impossible. Knowing the government, they will get around this by creating a 'No-Sue' list and making it even harder to change your name."
Finally, the US Courts are getting wise to the abuses we Americans have been subjected to in the name of battling terrorism. In fact, the nanny state has just used the 9-11 stuff as an excuse to do what they've always wanted to do--dig into our personal business. The hallmark of the creation of the US was its Constitution, which explicitly forbids the government from engaging in fishing expeditions. The protection against unreasonable search and seizure was so important they knew about it hundreds of years ago. Finally, someone is pushing back.
A recent CNN feature story was about 3 American males named James Robinson. Two were professionals, and one was a young boy. The mother of the boy says that she merely changes the form of her son's name (in this case, to J. Pierce Robinson, IIRC) and the family (or the other gentlemen) can fly unhassled.
Sorry, but the no-fly list is nothing compared to the forfeiture laws that were passed in the 80s where it has become the norm to sue the property instead of the person owning it in order to circumvent the Constitution and laws protecting person and property.
People act as if anti-terrorism laws infringing on our rights is something new cooked up by Bush and Co. but the fact is we have had a steady erosion of our rights ever since the the New Deal getting far worse with Nixon's War on Drugs which has been perpetuated by each following administration. Hell Clinton went so far as to make it a Cabinet position.
The government has show increasing disregard for the rights of people and when the law proved to be insurmountable they invented new means of accomplishing the same (look up asset forfeiture) Sometimes the good guy wins ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_v._$124,700 ) but the fact that there are judges who think otherwise is scary.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Muslim fundamentalists have never been an enemy worthy of the name. They're a bunch of hopeless dreamers; we're told they want to establish some terrible Caliphate over the whole world, but so what? While we're wishing, I'd like a Ferrari, and the Amish prefer to be called 'sons of the soil', but it's not going to happen.
The chief threats to the US global hegemony are the Chinese government, the Russian gas firms, the European Central Bank, and peak oil. A bunch of fuckwits in suicide vests shouldn't even be on the radar.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
And also Justices Scalia, Kennedy, Souter, Thomas, Ginsburg, Breyer, and Alito... oh yeah, and Stevens, wake up, naptime is over.
Let me call your attention to Article I, Section 9, Paragraph 3, of the United States Constitution. "No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed". Now, what is a bill of attainder? Why, it is a law declaring a person or group of persons guilty of a crime and imposing penalties on them without going through the aggravation of a trial. Sound familiar? With this "no-fly" list, we have a law which allows the executive to declare certain persons "terrorists" and impose upon them the penalty of not being permitted to travel by air.
Justice Scalia, stop flipping through the law books for that old excuse about how preventing people from flying is a measure necessary for public safety and not a punishment; that excuse was old when Justice Stevens was young, and it's crap. Even putting criminals in prison is also a measure necessary for public safety, it remains a punishment.
Justice Ginsburg, forget that nonsense about the contents of the list being determined by the executive and not the legislature. The executive isn't granted any power to declare a "no fly" list by the Constitution, so the only power it has in that area is that delegated by the legislature. The legislature is explicitly denied that power, so it doesn't have it to delegate.
Justice Kennedy, forget that stuff about flying not being a right. For one thing, you're treading close to the Ninth Amendment prohibition against disparaging rights not specifically listed. For another, even if flying isn't a right doesn't mean the executive or the legislature has arbitrary powers concerning it.