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Judge Orders White House To Produce Wiretap Memos
sv_libertarian sends this excerpt from the Associated Press:
"A judge has ordered the Justice Department to produce White House memos that provide the legal basis for the Bush administration's post-Sept. 11 warrantless wiretapping program. US District Judge Henry Kennedy Jr. signed an order (PDF) Friday requiring the department to produce the memos by the White House legal counsel's office by Nov. 17. He said he will review the memos in private to determine if any information can be released publicly without violating attorney-client privilege or jeopardizing national security. Kennedy issued his order in response to lawsuits by civil liberties groups in 2005 after news reports disclosed the wiretapping."
3....2.....1.....
Assuming an Obama win on Tuesday and a serious shift towards Democrats (what polls largely suggest), are we finally going to see some serious investigations and accountability for this current administration?
I know the wheels of justice are often rather slow. But I do hope the courts eventually get around to reeling back in the egregious power-grabs of the current executive. I also hope the next executive doesn't attempt to maintain such.
Posted [...] on 2008-11-02
Kennedy issued his order in response to lawsuits by civil liberties groups in 2005 after news reports disclosed the wiretapping.
It has taken three to four years, roughly a whole term, to get a judge to dig up this bit of the current administration's {,mis,ab}use of power.
What will the consequences for the Bush et al. be, if their practices are found to be unconstitutional? Is there a real incentive to uphold the constitution if it takes so long to dig up the dirt?
FISA - The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act - of 1978 provided the president a method to tap communications without a warrant in a "Ticking Time Bomb" situation. FISA allows investigators begin surveillance without proper documents as long as the activities are reported to a judge for review within 72 hours. In any Time-Bomb scenario, 72 hours should be ample time for the investigators to gather the needed information to prove that their hasty wire-tap was legitimate. The judge will sign the warrant and everybody is happy.
In any other case, the judge will surveillance must be shut down and the records sealed immediately. This law has been so effective that out of the hundreds of FISA taps exactly ZERO have been denied.
This is why the Bush administrations new warrantless wiretapping is so distressing. The system wasn't broken! It worked very well. This is simply yet another attempt by the administration to do an end run around due-process. Bush and Cheney have done more to erode the constitution than any other duo in this country's history.
Lets all hope that our next president will restore some order to the land and respect the laws that provide his power. If we allow our executive to choose which laws he will follow, we're on a short trip to the disaster that won't be unlike Russia's "Democracy".
This one's tricky. You have to use imaginary numbers, like eleventeen... --Hobbes
The court order mandates an in camera (in chambers) review of the memos, and only those that have not been granted summary judgment. Meaning that there is still a chance that the most putrid examples of abuse of civil rights are screened out for "national security" reasons. The OUTCOME of this review will be far more interesting (and indicative of the amount of justice that will be serves) than the order for its release.
Attacking the legal government... setting off IEDs... That would make the Republicans... TERRORISTS!!!
I like how a self-professed Republican's response to (hopefully) losing a democratic election is to call it a coup and threaten setting off IEDs. I mean, that is really high-quality irony.
How did Bush put it? "If you're not with us, you're with the Ter.. err.. us."
"Won't get fooled again!"
Which after having done any test engineering, which I have, or reading practically anything by Bruce Schneier, which I also have, then you see that the percentages are against you on mass dragnets like this.
If you're looking for say, a dozen terrorists, looking through 120,000,000 phone calls, that's well under 1 part per million. A really good false positive rate might be 0.01%. That's still 1 part per 10,000 - you're looking for 12 terrorists in 12,012 hits. That's even assuming that your dragnet is 100% effective, that it's 12,012 hits and not 12,011 or 12,006. (12,000 false positives and 12, 11, or 6 true positives.)
This just isn't even a good way to start the job. Intelligence on the ground is, then you can refine your wiretaps and such before you even start, so you're not sifting through so much information. Oh, and FISA would be just fine for that scenario.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
How can you call us Nazis when Bush accepted every contrary media as part of free speech, and your guys first move is to try and squelch the other side?
In the first place, "your guys" doesn't apply. There are plenty of actual arguments to be made against Obama, including his vote for the telecom immunity act which was an act of treason. Of course, your guy voted for that too, so you're stuck with silly asinine arguments since McCain and the Republican party are far far worse than the Democrats.
I'm essentially a Classical Liberal which means I believe in small government, fiscal responsibility, freedom and all of that. You know, like the constitution lays out. So while I dislike the Democrats and their excesses, looking at just the 2 major parties, absolutely objectively, the Republicans are far worse in every area. Big government? Absolutely. Republicans win this hands down. Reagan beat FDR's record for *growth* of the government and Bush recently beat Reagan's record. Fiscal irresponsibility? Republicans again. They know no restraint and spend like mad at interest on crazy pork bullshit like Moose Fucker's bridge to nowhere. Anti-Liberty? Right, death camps, universal surveillance, kicking down doors of people's homes and dragging patriotic citizens off to jail like at the Republican convention.
How do you even live with yourself, and say the lies you say?
This is completely laughable. You are so far out on the loony fascist fringe that you assume anybody with legitimate complaints about your Fuhrer must be an Obama supporter, when disgust with the Republicans is all over the political spectrum and includes everybody *except* right wing extremists. You know, like the Nazis. That's where you fall on the political spectrum and the system that you are arguing in support of.
Arguing against your disgusting position doesn't constitute communism or even anything remotely near the left. It's called sanity. That's all it takes to see you for the big government police state fascist asshat you are.