Bush Demands Amnesty for Spying Telecoms

The Bush administration and the Electronic Frontier Foundation are poised to square off in front of a San Francisco federal judge Tuesday to litigate the constitutionality of legislation immunizing the nation's telecoms from lawsuits accusing them of helping the government spy on Americans without warrants. "'The legislation is an attempt to give the president the authority to terminate claims that the president has violated the people's Fourth Amendment rights,' the EFF's [Cindy] Cohn says. 'You can't do that.'"

Comments

If Bush wants it...

[TubeSteak]

...why doesn't he just issue a blanket pardon?

My guess: he doesn't want to take responsibility for getting the telcos off the hook.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[TheFlyingBuddha]

I don't know how that kind of stuff works, but I'm not sure you can pardon the target of a *civil* suit. It's hard enough getting civil cases against telcos over this, we'll never see anybody face criminal charges over this.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[philspear]

...why doesn't he just issue a blanket pardon?

Maybe because a pardon could be seen as admitting something illegal happened. Bush has always seemed hellbent on elevating the executive branch. Early on I assumed it was because it meant more power for him, but even now he's just out to vindicate another terrible republican president who said "...when the president does it that means that it is not illegal."

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Fluffeh]

He wants to get himself off the hook for later, but can't be the one to do it. You can't pardon yourself, but if you stop anyone who will end up pointing the finger at you getting in trouble - they won't point the finger now will they?

Re:If Bush wants it...

[thtrgremlin]

I would love to see parent modded 'funny', as I really don't think any of Bushes decisions were ever influenced by what people might think of him when it comes to doing the right thing for the country... well at very least not this time. Also, in terms of "getting them off", I don't believe he is of the opinion that they did anything wrong, just that there is some kind of loop-hole that could be interpreted to say that what they were doing something wrong.

And how could it be wrong? It saved us from the terrorists, remember? </sarcasm>

Re:If Bush wants it...

[amRadioHed]

And how could it be wrong? It saved us from the terrorists, remember?

No way, I'm certain it was my terrorist-repellent rock that has been protecting us.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[jbeach]

I think the hangup there is, someone has to be convicted of a crime before they can be pardoned. And a conviction requires an investigation.

And Bush et al would much prefer there is no further investigation at all.

Because:

1) I am SURE none of those telcos would have participated in this activity without complete and total assurances from the Bush administration...which these companies will produce if they think for a second they will be convicted.

2) It seems quite likely that any convictions will occur during the Obama administration - which almost certainly won't pardon the telcos. Why would Obama put his neck out, for things which didn't even occur during his administration?

Re:If Bush wants it...

[jbeach]

I may be wrong re: pre-emptive pardon - but surely specific people have to be pardoned, at least. So there would have to be some sort of an investigation into who even is *suspected* of doing what, for a pardon to even occur...which the Bush administration would still rather avoid.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[zebslash]

Maybe because a pardon could be seen as admitting something illegal happened.

Isn't that the same with an amnisty?

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

Not in this case. The telecoms already had amnesty if they were presented with a lawful order. Bush classified those orders and the telecoms can't present them. Now keep in mind, when I say lawful order, I don't mean a legally sound one, I mean if they presented the documentation to the telecoms that the law required, they would have an affirmative defense.

If you read the immunity law, you will find that all it does is use a secrete court to discover if the government presented their orders. If they did, then all courts have to drop the cases against the telecoms surrounding that order. If they didn't and a tap was done, then it proceeds as normal. If there was no tapping, then it is made clear at that time. It is set up so that the AG makes the determination and then a secrete court validates it. The EFF will ultimately lose this one because the telecom immunity bill isn't really new immunity, it is a vehicle to realize the existing immunity while not threatening the classified state secretes. And it doesn't side step the courts like they are attempting to claim, it only side steps the transparency the regular courts provide which is why they are against it.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

Nixon was pardoned before any crime was charged formally. They didn't even impeach him. So it doesn't look like there has to be a conviction for a pardon to happen.

1) I am SURE none of those telcos would have participated in this activity without complete and total assurances from the Bush administration...which these companies will produce if they think for a second they will be convicted.

Current law and the law at the time of the TSP was that if a telecom was presented with a warrant or legal document claiming the legislative authority to do the taps, that the telecoms would have an affirmative defense. Bush wouldn't have had to convince them of anything, all he would have to do is present them with the ability to make the taps and they would follow them without question because they had their defense. Now, before you or someone else jumps in claiming a warrant is the only valid document, I suggest you actually read the laws- then and now- there was many ways to get warrants in both the FISA as well as domestic law without warrants then and now. And it is up to the government to make sure it is accurate in it's requests, not the telecoms. That is what color of law means and is why there are specific punishments for it in this regard.

2) It seems quite likely that any convictions will occur during the Obama administration - which almost certainly won't pardon the telcos. Why would Obama put his neck out, for things which didn't even occur during his administration?

Obama doesn't want to convict anyone. As soon as he does, all this existing immunity and such gets released as a defense claim and all the national security secrete stuff now becomes valid as a defense in a criminal case. There is a good change that he will not be successful on any of the convictions if it goes to court.

Then there is the situation of CYA. If telecoms officials are convicted for following the law or put in that jeopardy, they will fight every order for a tap to ensure it's legitimacy. This means valuable intelligence about crimes, the safety of people, international terrorism and so on will go lost while the telecoms attempt to determine if it will put them in jail if they comply. You might be thinking, well duh.. it's the government or it's the court warrants, but that is what they had when Bush ordered the taps so that won't work. You might think well, just pass a law saying that they have to help, well, there already is a law and there already is immunity if they follow the warrants and legislative authority presented to them and your talking about putting them in jail now.

So no, Obama doesn't want any conviction, he just wants it to end unless he is willing to accept a major pain in the ass in his own administration's ability to do the work it needs to do in regards to law enforcement and national security. Or at least I would hope he isn't that stupid. If he is, then get ready for the telecoms to resist every tap request and get ready for a lot of charges to be dropped.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[liegeofmelkor]

Obama voted FOR the telco amnesty bill. The man is not infallible, and I don't think anyone can count on him sticking up for our rights in this particular context given his voting record.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Anonymous Coward]

amRadioHed, I would like to buy your rock.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Windows_NT]

$20 says bush gets off without any penalties. He wil drag itout till its out of the public eye and hes out of office. No one will care anymore.. and he'll walk away laughing. Just watch

Re:If Bush wants it...

[AliasMarlowe]

... national security secrete stuff ...

So what kind of stuff do they secrete?
Enquiring sick minds want to know...

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Anonymous Coward]

amRadioHed, I want to buy your rock.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[bigstrat2003]

Obama doesn't want to convict anyone.

Yeah, we know. It's because, like damn near every other politician, he doesn't give a damn about our rights, and we knew this from the moment he voted for immunity for the government's spies.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[davewalthall]

I think the hangup there is, someone has to be convicted of a crime before they can be pardoned. And a conviction requires an investigation.

You do not have to be convicted of a crime to be pardoned. You do not even have to be accused of a crime to be pardoned. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pardon#United_States (I'm assuming that wikipedia is correct, but strong evidence is that Nixon was never charged with anything, but was pardoned by Ford.)

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

Lol.. It is the shit that someone thought needed classified for national security reasons.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

I'm not convinced that our rights were violated with the TSP in the first place.

Sure a law was broken but there is good standing that the law wouldn't even apply because of presidential powers and how other courts cases based around the FISA that says the president has the inherent ability to collect national security information. Either way, they aren't going to pursue it is because of what I already said as well as I don't think congress or the president elect actually believe it violated anything.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Creepy]

Part of the issue is that these are Executive Orders issued under National Security directives, so they are not public records. By exposing secret wiretapping, a judge could ask for the (probably illegal) executive order that allowed it and that, according to the Bush administration, would be a national security risk.

    In some respects, if true, this is as illegal as Watergate, but because it was issued as an EO and EOs are by definition law, a judge needs to review and strike down the order as unconstitutional, but that is hard to do when the only people that need to know it even exists is the National Security Council (if I remember right, its 7 members are the President, Vice President, Secretaries of Defense, State, and National Security, Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, and... National Intelligence Director? Some Intelligence guy).

    I personally think it's an illegal law and should be brought forward and into the public.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[Intron]

Executive Orders are not law, and neither are "signing statements", no matter what GB thinks. The big difference with Watergate is that this was done to combat terrorism and not for politics. I think many people disagree with Bush's beliefs and methods who don't disagree with his motives.

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

Part of the issue is that these are Executive Orders issued under National Security directives, so they are not public records. By exposing secret wiretapping, a judge could ask for the (probably illegal) executive order that allowed it and that, according to the Bush administration, would be a national security risk.

Just so we are on the same pages here. FISA already allow the government to issue papers prescribing and allowing wire taps. So that in and of itself is not in violation of any laws. Who it applied to and how the administration was attempting to wrangle the term terrorist into the definitions is most likely where the laws were broken if any. That is why the patriot act included terrorist and terrorist groups within the definitions of foreign agent and so on. And yes, Bush is claiming those records are national security risks to which he had classified. If they weren't classified, then under the law, then and now, they would be the telecoms get out of any lawsuit or criminal charge cards.

In some respects, if true, this is as illegal as Watergate, but because it was issued as an EO and EOs are by definition law, a judge needs to review and strike down the order as unconstitutional, but that is hard to do when the only people that need to know it even exists is the National Security Council (if I remember right, its 7 members are the President, Vice President, Secretaries of Defense, State, and National Security, Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, and... National Intelligence Director? Some Intelligence guy).

I don't think this is on any level close to Watergate. The fear with Watergate was that the snooping was used to gain a political advantage in the elections. There has been no accusations of that in this at all. But your tight in that is can be an abuse of power which some people could be charged and convicted of crimes they commited under the color of law. Both FISA and title III laws have provisions in them for public official acting under the color of law.

In case your wondering, color of law is where someone presents an authority or does something that appeared to be legal and authorized by law but is actually illegal or outside the scope of the law and authority. Wiretaps on American citizen while hiding their identity and claiming they are foreign agents is an example of this.

In some respects, if true, this is as illegal as Watergate, but because it was issued as an EO and EOs are by definition law, a judge needs to review and strike down the order as unconstitutional, but that is hard to do when the only people that need to know it even exists is the National Security Council (if I remember right, its 7 members are the President, Vice President, Secretaries of Defense, State, and National Security, Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, and... National Intelligence Director? Some Intelligence guy).

Someone else already addressed this but I want to add some clarification to it. Signing statements and Executive Orders are not law. They have the effect of law though. This is brought about when they either have legislative authority or statutory authority. Legislative authority is when the process of making laws gives you the right. An example of this is the constitution gives congress the power to make laws concerning interstate commerce. Another might be the constitution give the president the power to direct the cabinets and offices under him so an Executive Order requiring the justice department to crack down on illegal immigrants or to focus law enforcement efforts on the drug problems would be legal and have the effects of law.

A statutory authorization is where a law gives him some sort of power. Take the original FISA laws, it allowed the president to allocate or appoint people who could enact the surveillance and such instead of the president himself. One of President Carters first moves after signing it into

Re:If Bush wants it...

[bill_mcgonigle]

The telecoms already had amnesty if they were presented with a lawful order.

True, but the scuttlebutt is that the government wanted to do something now covered by FISA (building social network graphs using pen traces, probably) and so the companies were presented with assurances but were not served proper court orders.

So they acted on their own volition to impinge on their customers' civil rights and now they're getting called for it. But those who offered those assurances don't want to be dragged out into the light but the Telcos aren't going down without a fight.

It's fun as spectator sport. :)

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

True, but the scuttlebutt is that the government wanted to do something now covered by FISA (building social network graphs using pen traces, probably) and so the companies were presented with assurances but were not served proper court orders.

You didn't need court orders for all pen traps after 10-11-2001 and it. But the immunities to prosecution were already covered as pen a trap or trace devices were covered under the definition of "wire communication". Anyways, the telecoms would be immune because the original FISA law, including the patriot act versions said under title 18 sections 2511

(2)
(a)
(ii) Notwithstanding any other law, providers of wire or electronic communication service, their officers, employees, and agents, landlords, custodians, or other persons, are authorized to provide information, facilities, or technical assistance to persons authorized by law to intercept wire, oral, or electronic communications or to conduct electronic surveillance, as defined in section 101 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, if such provider, its officers, employees, or agents, landlord, custodian, or other specified person, has been provided with--

(A) a court order directing such assistance signed by the authorizing judge, or

(B) a certification in writing by a person specified in section 2518 (7) of this title or the Attorney General of the United States that no warrant or court order is required by law, that all statutory requirements have been met, and that the specified assistance is required,

setting forth the period of time during which the provision of the information, facilities, or technical assistance is authorized and specifying the information, facilities, or technical assistance required. No provider of wire or electronic communication service, officer, employee, or agent thereof, or landlord, custodian, or other specified person shall disclose the existence of any interception or surveillance or the device used to accomplish the interception or surveillance with respect to which the person has been furnished a court order or certification under this chapter, except as may otherwise be required by legal process and then only after prior notification to the Attorney General or to the principal prosecuting attorney of a State or any political subdivision of a State, as may be appropriate. Any such disclosure, shall render such person liable for the civil damages provided for in section 2520. ****No cause of action shall lie in any court against any provider of wire or electronic communication service, its officers, employees, or agents, landlord, custodian, or other specified person for providing information, facilities, or assistance in accordance with the terms of a court order, statutory authorization, or certification under this chapter.

You can find this in the original 1978 version of the FISA laws as well as the current laws.

So they acted on their own volition to impinge on their customers' civil rights and now they're getting called for it. But those who offered those assurances don't want to be dragged out into the light but the Telcos aren't going down without a fight.

Well, not necessarily... If the government presented them with the papers, they are in the clear and operated in no way other then their obligations under the law. It would then be the government who operated under the color of law which would leave them solely responsible. The color of law statutes however only provide immunity to officers and government officials if the order was a court order.

If the telecoms could simply present the paperwork, they would have the immunity the law provided before the immunity bill was passed. Sections 2520 provides for a complete defense against any civil or criminal law if

(d) Defense.-- A good faith reliance on--

Re:If Bush wants it...

[bill_mcgonigle]

Thanks for the insight.

This isn't a matter of the telecoms fighting because they are guilty of something. Hell, they might be but the law specifically gives them immunity if they were presented with certain papers and the only thing stopping them from presenting those papers in their defense if the fact that bush classified them as state secrets.

Have they asserted that they were served with court orders? The way I heard it explained was, roughly, "getting court orders will be too difficult, just do it and we'll make sure you don't have any trouble." I guess I don't know what they've cited and what's been sealed as State secrets. And if something is sealed as a State secret, is there any way to tell it's actually a court order, rather than a ham salad recipe?

Re:If Bush wants it...

[sumdumass]

Have they asserted that they were served with court orders? The way I heard it explained was, roughly, "getting court orders will be too difficult, just do it and we'll make sure you don't have any trouble." I guess I don't know what they've cited and what's been sealed as State secrets. And if something is sealed as a State secret, is there any way to tell it's actually a court order, rather than a ham salad recipe?

Not court orders, statutory orders. This is probably the biggest misconception surrounding the FISA and the TSP. FISA laws at the time allowed the administration to perform wiretaps without a court order up to a year if they made sure no US Person which was just about anyone under US jurisdiction who wasn't specifically excluded by the definition of a foreign agent and something else foreign (I forget the name and it's a pain looking through the images of the old laws) was likely to be party to the call or trace. Now, if they were, they had like three days to delete the information pertaining to them and wasn't allowed to use it ever unless they went to a court after the interception and got a warrant. This is what is called statutory authorization which is important because as far as the law is concerned, it carries just as much weight as the court warrant. A statutory authorization is where a law gives someone the ability to do something. In this case, it was to order wire taps without a warrant under certain conditions. It isn't the telecom's duty to ensure those conditions are/were met. The act of making the authorization certified that it was so if it wasn't met, it would be the government not the telecom.

Ok, so they don't need court orders to get he immunity. The law I listed, even though it is long and repeats itself says ****No cause of action shall lie in any court against any provider of wire or electronic communication service, its officers, employees, or agents, landlord, custodian, or other specified person for providing information, facilities, or assistance in accordance with the terms of a court order, statutory authorization, or certification under this chapter. I marked the relevant part with the **** on the previous page. A statutory authorization is where a law authorizes something. The laws, then and now, provide for the AG, the President, and so on to present authorization papers instead of court orders. If the telecoms got one, then they can't be sued.

NOw, your right in that if it is a sealed state secret, how does anyone know. Certainly the Telecoms can't present them because they would be violating another law which carried jail time. This is what the so called immunity bill did. If the Telecoms gets sued over the tap and says, we can't present the authorization, they make a statement to the Attorney Generals office.
He looks through his records to se if they presented the telecoms with a warrant of a statutory authorization. If they did, it gets passed on to a secret court that reviews it for legitimacy. If it is, the case is dropped per the law as stated before the immunity bill. If it wasn't legit, the case goes on as usual. If no tap was requested or acknowledged by the government, a statement to that effect is made and that's it.

There are a few things to remember here. The immunity isn't a blanket immunity. There actually has to be a legislative authority or court order presented to them in order to get it. The court hearing the case doesn't get access to the records but the secret court of review does. It is actually comprised of 3 judges empaneled ny the chief justice of the Supreme court. Their honesty in the matter is at the same levels as any other judges.

Now the secrete court of review has to check that along with a couple of other things.

(b) Judicial Review-

`(1) REVIEW OF CERTIFICATIONS- A certification under subsection (a) shall be given effect unless the cou

Re:If Bush wants it...

[bill_mcgonigle]

Thanks again, I understand much better now.

What could...

[lordsid]

What could possibly go wrong?

Re:What could...

[darkonc]

The problem with this law is that it attempts to provide immunity to parties that violate people's constitutional rights. If there are no available consequences for violating the constitution, then you have effectively made it legal to violate the constitution.

For all practical purposes the protections of the constitution disappear in a puff of legal logic.

" On tonights news, immunity for violating the provisions of Habeas Corpus, the right to remain silent, and the right to presumed innocent."

SF

[networkBoy]

Couldn't pick a better jurisdiction....

Re:SF

[brain juice]

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is the most overturned Federal jurisdiction. They might win at the district level and appellate levels but a case like this would definitely be granted cert to the Supreme Court.

Re:SF

[statemachine]

[citation needed]

Re:SF

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is the most overturned Federal jurisdiction.

Please stop listening to the propaganda of televangelists. Seriously. The 9th circuit court is overturned less often than the average if you base it on the number of cases they hear... they just hear a lot more cases than most courts.

Re:SF

[dgatwood]

More than that, the 9th circuit has a tendency to take on cases that are a lot more interesting than the other courts when it comes to people's rights, etc. Challenges to civil rights violations and other constitutional challenges tend to occur in the 9th circuit because the people who are motivated to file those challenges tend to live within its jurisdiction more often than in any other circuit. Thus, because of how high-profile and constitutionally important their cases are, they tend to be heard much more often by the SCOTUS.

When viewed as a percentage of cases heard by the SCOTUS, their overturn rate is higher than the average (about 90% compared with about 75%), but at least in 2006 nowhere near as high as some other circuits (100% for the 3rd (NJ, DE, PA) and 5th circuits (LA, MS, TX)). Source: volokh.com. The 5th, BTW, is probably the most conservative circuit court in the U.S.

So there.

You can't do that?

[hedronist]

Sure you can!

Just have Poppy buy you into office so that the people that have the strings attached to important parts of your body can pull what they want, when the want.

Seriously, we have just witnessed the greatest bald-faced rape of the Constitution since ... forever. The thing (or the most recent thing) that turns my stomach is that there is a very good chance they will get away with it.

Re:You can't do that?

[ThePeices]

How?

Re:You can't do that?

[JackieBrown]

Hoover and the Red scare?

What we did to the Japanese under Roosevelt after Perl Harbor?

Hell, what we did to the Germans during the first WW

This isn't the first time we (Americans) looked and saw the enemy in every corner and it won't be the last.

People that say Bush is the worst we ever had have no sense of history

Re:You can't do that?

[Frosty Piss]

Just have Poppy buy you into office...

"Poppy" seems to have stopped talking to "junior" some time ago. He may be regretting his decision to "buy" GWB into office...

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, Dad did 'buy' his seat in the big house, though not with cash, with influence, which Dad has been buying, selling, and trading since the 50s or 60s. The guy is a 33rd degree Freemason and sharper than most brand new razor blades.

The son however, is not quite as sharp as most bowling balls, and thus promptly alienated Dad and refused to listen to any of Dad's brilliant instruction.

Re:You can't do that?

[Dragonslicer]

Perl Harbor

Only on Slashdot?

Re:You can't do that?

[The Master Control P]

No one can ever be allowed to forget the day Wapanese script kiddies defaced perl.org with anime porn.

Re:You can't do that?

[Waffle Iron]

You know, I never get tired of that one clip they always show in History Channel documentaries where that battleship explodes into a huge burst of ampersands and dollar signs.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit? This is not Bullshit!
THIS! IS! SPARTA!

Re:You can't do that?

[ncgnu08]

Hoover and the Red scare?

What we did to the Japanese under Roosevelt after Perl Harbor?

Hell, what we did to the Germans during the first WW

This isn't the first time we (Americans) looked and saw the enemy in every corner and it won't be the last.

People that say Bush is the worst we ever had have no sense of history

I believe this post is the definition of irony...

Re:You can't do that?

[rlwhite]

Actually, Bush has a strong case for worst ever based on the combination of his catastrophes.

Sure, Eisenhower, Kennedy, LBJ, and Nixon each had a hand in a mismanaged war. John Adams, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR each violated civil liberties to stop alleged enemies of the state. Many presidents have overseen the causes of recessions and other economic maladies. How many have been through all 3? (I can't think of any.) How many have polled approval ratings in the low 20s? (Nixon and Harding since polling began almost 90 years ago.) It's pretty easy to objectively put Bush in the bottom 3 presidents now, without judging the extent of the current economic troubles.

If the predictions that this is the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression are at all accurate (and macro-economic predictions are often self-fulfilling for psychological reasons), and the many ethical allegations against Bush prove true, Bush would have a strong case as the worst president ever, on relatively objective grounds as far as the matter goes.

That is to say nothing of how far he has departed from the philosophies and policies he and his party campaigned on.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

People that say Bush is the worst we ever had have no sense of history

That may be. But then who is the worst president in history?

Harding? What about all the crap that happened before/after him?

Buchanan? What about all the crap that happened before/after him?

Pierce? What about all the crap that happened before/after him?

I hope you're getting the picture. Presidential rankings are subjective and relative. Some will rank Bush at the bottom and some won't. No one wants to say "I voted for the worst president in history" so it could be many decades before Bush emerges on the bottom. I wouldn't discount it as a possibility.

Re:You can't do that?

[sodul]

Perl Harbor

Only on Slashdot?

Harbor.pl

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where there tentacles involved?

Any pictures of the event... for evidence?

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't mind it.

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

I think Lincoln raped our constitution pretty hard with regard to interpretation the voluntary nature of statehood, state sovereignty, 9th & 10th amendments, and eminent domain to just name a few. I am not trying to justify slavery, just that had there been any other means to that end would have been preferable. Also, very little of the civil war had to do with slavery, and much more to do with a federal power grab, to over-simplify the issue. There were also a lot of things that Lincoln did / tried to do that had nothing to do with the civil war or emancipation proclamation that, imho, would have put him as one of the worst presidents ever.

ok, now flame away about how I have no idea what I am talking about.

yeah, and others mentioned, that whole Red Scare / McCarthyism was pretty nasty.

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

... because people are just naming off bad things that happened and completely neglecting the context of the issue, or some other irony?

Re:You can't do that?

[scubamage]

No flame here, I actually agree with you. People forget that Lincoln was a lawyer - someone whose entire trade is making himself look good to sway opinions and win a jury. People also forget that the entire emancipation proclamation was an ultimatum, NOT a law that said 'the slaves go free.' If the other states had said, "hey, the slaves go free if we don't come back." and returned then we'd still be calling our negroid friends farm equipment. The real causes of the war were financial, and state rights.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many have been through all 3?

Abraham Lincoln comes to mind.

Re:You can't do that?

[ameyer17]

I'd say that Bush is between Hoover and Nixon in the bottom 3.
That could change depending on such factors as the future results of the military occupation of Iraq, the extent of the economic crisis, how much money the bailout actually ends up costing, and the results of various hypothetical future criminal probes.

Re:You can't do that?

[NormalVisual]

The best part was when he spoke glowingly of "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" during a time when he was actively suppressing the rights of the southern states to pursue exactly that government. More than one historian has noted the irony within the Gettysburg Address.

Re:You can't do that?

[JackieBrown]

Based on the moderation, it's overrated flamebait.

There is something delicious in that description.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

In short: Fuck him.

Fuck everyone involved.

The immunity needs to be nullified, and nullified now. It's a blatant violation of the constitution. If a bunch of telecom execs and secretive politicians aren't in jail getting gang raped before this is all over, then we might as well just pull the constitution out of its glass case, grab every copy of it and the bill of rights, toss them in pile and toss in a lit match.

Yes, I really think it's that bad, and fuck anyone that says otherwise. They obviously don't understand (or worse, simply don't care) what's at stake if the precedent of violating the Bill of Rights with absolutely no consequences manages to stand.

Fuck them all. Take their immunity away and fuck them all like the money-grubbing, self-serving whores that they are.

Re:You can't do that?

[Omestes]

What context? That we have can lapse into complete paranoia from time to time? That blind nationalism can blind of more important matters of ethics and morality? That we enjoy dehumanizing people different than us?

I like the US, but I have a hard time identifying the rational of those who sit around saying we can't do any wrong, or that we are "the best country on earth". Nationalism is a proven evil, no good has ever come of it. We are just another country in the world, and someday we will be gone, just like all states. America is an arbitrary thing, a mere concept, and not worth forsaking human dignity and rights over, as they are far more important than a mere symbol.

We've made mistakes, and we refuse to learn from them. How many of the Japanese locked in camps, and deprived of their rights, were a serious threat to America? How many people in Guantanamo are a threat? Was Iraq really a threat to us? Was McCarthyism really a good thing?

We can do evil, and thus we have to be vigilant. Bush is proof of this. We let him get away with far too much in the name of faceless (and largely baseless) fear. Just like all of the things mentioned.

But then again I'd rather the terrorists "win" than compromise any individual rights, or any standard we profess to believe in.

Re:You can't do that?

[Barack Hussein Obama]

Notice that the original post by hedronist said that this was the worst rape of the constitution ever, not that bush was the worst president ever. Then JackieBrown's post--the one you are replying to--said no, greater violations of the constitution have happened under previous presidents, and provided examples. Your post is a red herring. The overall quality of Bush's presidency is not the topic at hand, it is his record on civil liberties.

Re:You can't do that?

[Boronx]

think Lincoln raped our constitution pretty hard with regard to interpretation the voluntary nature of statehood, state sovereignty, 9th & 10th amendments,

Besides the disaster your interpretation would have created, it's not born out in the Constitution, since Amendments 10 and 9 refer to powers not enumerated in the Constitution, but the power to dispose of US territory is given to Congress in Article 4.

I am not trying to justify slavery, just that had there been any other means to that end would have been preferable.

Of course the South should have pursued other options instead of open hostilities, as a democratic people should have, but a people whose economy rests on the back of slaves can't be democratic.

Also, very little of the civil war had to do with slavery, and much more to do with a federal power grab, to over-simplify the issue.

By federal power grab you mean the attempt to limit the growth of slave states, am I right?

Re:You can't do that?

[mrchaotica]

I think Lincoln raped our constitution pretty hard with regard to interpretation the voluntary nature of statehood, state sovereignty, 9th & 10th amendments, and eminent domain to just name a few.

I agree -- he and FDR were the worst presidents with regards to federalism/states' rights.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

We're still cleaning up after Nixon. Nearly every issue that was important to voters this year could be traced back to Nixon. But the stuff that Jr. got away with would make him say WTF?

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

I'm sorry, but your a fucking moron.

But then again I'd rather the terrorists "win" than compromise any individual rights, or any standard we profess to believe in.

Do you realize what "the terrorists win" means? It means your either dead or subject to their will. Your fucking individual rights and standards you believe in will be gone anyways. The only difference is that you will have no change of getting it back if they win.

I guess you just haven't been paying attention, it's the individual rights and standards we believe in that they don't like about us. It's why they don't want us on their "holey lands". You should really check into genital mutilation, Sharia law, the Afgani student who was facing a death sentence for converting to Christianity (and if your atheist, your even worse off because you need to be Muslim) or how about the stoning to death of women who have affairs? Or what about the kid who downloaded an article talking about the role of women in islam?

Check into those things and tell me how you will have your individual rights and standards that you believe in if they win. Have you even thought about that? MAn your a fucking idiot! "Oh, I would rather things be much worse then lose something I care about even though I will lose it anyways".

Re:You can't do that?

[Jeppe Salvesen]

The execs did as ordered by the politicians.

I'd wouldn't mind if Bush was gangraped in prison over his presidency and his crimes to mankind and western civilization. However, the execs only did as they were ordered to do. Is punishing people for failing to stand up against the law a good policy? In a democracy (or republic with general elections), the right thing to do is to expose the laws and the politicians and then hope the public will care when they vote in the next election.

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Except you really can't at all blame the current economic crisis on Bush. Or any of the Presidents of the past 20-or-so years.

Re:You can't do that?

[squizzar]

I think the point he was making was that if you give up your rights then you might as well have let the terrorists win. The belief that the only way to beat terrorism is to become like them is one of the most worrying things I see in people and their governments.

The expression 'Live free or die trying' springs to mind: Probably the easiest way to defeat the terrorists is to create armed militias, to lock up anyone who looks at a US flag funny, to subject every citizen to searches at every available opportunity to imprison without fair trial anyone and everyone who has the most tenuous of links to anyone tenuously linked to the perpetration terror. Finally it would be necessary to destroy the peoples and the homelands of peoples who would seek to harm us. I've heard statements like that last sentence before, care to guess where from? The choice we have is either to become like them, or to stand bold, proud and defiant in front of our freedoms.

People talk of giving their lives for their country, and that is what you must be willing to do, not on the front lines of a war, but in your own homes, at work and in your daily lives. You must be willing to accept that there will always be someone who hates you irrationally and will seek to kill you, and you have to accept that in order to enjoy freedom. You are competing against people who have a fanatical belief in what they are doing, and who will willingly give their lives for the cause. We too must believe in our freedoms above all else, and must be willing to give our lives for the cause of their preservation.

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

I think the point he was making was that if you give up your rights then you might as well have let the terrorists win. The belief that the only way to beat terrorism is to become like them is one of the most worrying things I see in people and their governments.

The point is completely useless. Even if you did have to give up the things you love and hold dear, without the terrorist winning, you can get them back. If the terrorist win, the only way you can get them back is by fighting and wining against the terrorist (gee, why give up and let them win in the first place?). Do you see, in the end, it will be you fighting the terrorist if the things mean anything to you at all. So why is it that something is so valuable that someone is willing to give up now over something they or their children will have to fight to regain later anyways? At least with the American government (European governments too but this is US centric) you have elections every so often and the longest you will have a sitting president is 8 years. You can easily regain all that you think you lost peacefully by choosing the right candidates. Instead, he wants to loose all that and set up a situation where he will have to fight personally to get them back.

The expression 'Live free or die trying' springs to mind: Probably the easiest way to defeat the terrorists is to create armed militias, to lock up anyone who looks at a US flag funny, to subject every citizen to searches at every available opportunity to imprison without fair trial anyone and everyone who has the most tenuous of links to anyone tenuously linked to the perpetration terror. Finally it would be necessary to destroy the peoples and the homelands of peoples who would seek to harm us. I've heard statements like that last sentence before, care to guess where from? The choice we have is either to become like them, or to stand bold, proud and defiant in front of our freedoms.

But that isn't what he said. He said my way or I'll just give up. He said if I'm going to lose it, I might as well loose it to the people we are fighting. And no, it hasn't come to what you mentioned, why? Because very brave people are not only fighting the terrorist, but there are some keeping the government in check. Sure, it isn't a perfect job, but those bastards aren't giving up.

People talk of giving their lives for their country, and that is what you must be willing to do, not on the front lines of a war, but in your own homes, at work and in your daily lives. You must be willing to accept that there will always be someone who hates you irrationally and will seek to kill you, and you have to accept that in order to enjoy freedom. You are competing against people who have a fanatical belief in what they are doing, and who will willingly give their lives for the cause. We too must believe in our freedoms above all else, and must be willing to give our lives for the cause of their preservation.

And you do realize that you are 100% contrary to what the guy said. Here is a refresher on it, He said "But then again I'd rather the terrorists "win" than compromise any individual rights, or any standard we profess to believe in." Look at that. He didn't say give up on individual rights, he didn't says lose individual rights, he said compromise them. Se he thinks it would be better to lose them all then to have a few threatened.

This isn't a statement of him fighting to keep the country straight or to correct what the country has strayed from, this is him saying if I can have it, I hope we all die. If he would have said "even though we are fighting the terrorist, we mustn't let the government take away our right and liberties", I would have said Hell YEA, preach it again brother pig. That is more or less what your saying. But it isn't what he said. He wants to lose to the terrorist who will take away anything he claims to hold dear just because the go

Re:You can't do that?

[h4rm0ny]

Do you realize what "the terrorists win" means? It means your either dead or subject to their will.

Or it might just mean your country withdraws troops from some of the regimes it supports. Which "terrorists" are you referring to? You seem to have fallen prey to the US governments rhetoric that they are some united, implaccable world-wide organisation? Are you talking about Hamas in Palestine, who want their own state? Are you talking about Al Quaeda who wanted US troops out of Saudi where they protect a powerful, oppressive monarchy of all things? Are you talking about some of the Indian groups that want Muslims dead or out of the country? Are you talking about resistance fighters in Iraq who want Sunni control / Shia control / independent Kurdish lands / US troops out of the country? Which and who are you talking about? I would like to know which "terrorist" group you think has plans to invade and occupy the USA, please?

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at you, with your lists and differences.... Everyone knows that the True American Way is to kill them all and let my God (who has a bigger dick than their 'god' by the way) sort them out.
YeeeeeeHAAAAAA!

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is punishing people for failing to stand up against the law a good policy?

If if comes to raping the constitution and our liberties, then yes, they need to be getting their asses pounded in prison. Fuck them. Zero sympathy.

Re:You can't do that?

[neomunk]

I'm sorry, I didn't realize that as civilians we were subject to any "orders" other than a proper court order, and even then we have the ability to disregard that court order, but at the expense of punishment. Doing whatever someone with a badge says is exactly how you go from democracy to totalitarianism.

Re:You can't do that?

[GuyverDH]

Each one of those scares only targeted one demographic / race / whatever, which was bad enough, and is a permanent blemish on the face of America.

Bush's illegal-under-the-constitution acts targeted Every American Citizen (well, I assume he has a personal "don't touch these people" list), and could warrant impeachment or possibly treason charges.

Re:You can't do that?

[elrous0]

Andrew Johnson gets my vote for the worst overall (it's a pretty telling statement about his incompetence that a Congress controlled almost entirely by his own party impeached him). And John Adams was definitely the most heavy-handed threat to the Constitution (The Alien and Sedition Acts came *way* too close to rendering a good chunk of the Bill of Rights meaningless very early on in our history). But Bush is certainly high up there among of the worst. If you factor in the massive damage he's done to the economy and nation's future by exploding the nation debt with epic irresponsible spending and an foolish war in Iraq; he's probably even ahead of Grant, Buchanan, and Nixon.

Re:You can't do that?

[Rob the Bold]

I'm sorry, but your a fucking moron.

Ok, I'll bite . . . my a fucking moron what?

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why does everybody always forget Andrew Jackson?

Re:You can't do that?

[bishiraver]

The terrorists/freedomfighters/whateveryouwanttocallthem "have" won on some of their wishes, and lost on others. They wanted:

- economic downfall (accomplished)
- reduction of the standard of living in the US (accomplished)
- reduction in US/western interference in the ME (not accomplished)
- more members to their radical agenda (accomplished, fueled by our evisceration of the Iraqi government)

Re:You can't do that?

[homer_ca]

Give the telecom execs the same deal we give the drug lords. Immunity for full cooperation and testimony against the higher-ups who ordered the spying. I don't care about the civil fines for illegal wiretaps either. If the EFF and ACLU cases get killed, the trail stops cold. That's the real problem with immunity.

Re:You can't do that?

[Golddess]

The execs did as ordered by the politicians.

There's a difference between being asked to commit an illegal act, and being threatened to commit an illegal act. If a police officer walked up to you and asked you to rob a store, entrapment arguments aside you would have no recourse if you went ahead and did it. If the police officer threatened you at gun point and you were later taken to court over the robbery, you'd have a valid defense.

Near as I can tell, the telecoms fall under the former, and thus share as much blame as Bush and friends.

Re:You can't do that?

[ahodgson]

Mod parent up. If a cop comes here and tells me to do something I don't want to do, I'll show him the door.

Well, probably I'll get tasered. But I'm still not wiretapping someone just because some thug wants me to.

Re:You can't do that?

[dogmatixpsych]

"How many have been through all 3? (I can't think of any.) How many have polled approval ratings in the low 20s? (Nixon and Harding since polling began almost 90 years ago.)"

You can't forget Truman - he had lower approval ratings at the end of his presidency than Pres. Bush has now (or at least pretty similar). Truman now is considered one of the better presidents we've had.

Yes, the Iraq war was mismanaged early on. Is Pres. Bush to blame? Or is Congress or military leaders (they run the war after all)? Or is it all of the above? The Civil War was mismanaged (on the Union side) too, yet people seem to not blame Lincoln for that (the military gets blamed). How can you blame Pres. Bush for mismanaging a war but not Lincoln? Lincoln suspended habeus corpus, yet we usually rank him as the best president we've ever had (and I agree). At the time, Lincoln was widely despised; he barely was re-elected. Is Pres. Bush as good of a president as Lincoln? I can't say without a number of years of hindsight. It's likely that he isn't but we will not know for many years.

You cannot fully judge the efficacy or "goodness" of a presidency while a president is in office. Look at JFK; many people for a long time thought he was the greatest president ever. As we look back, he was pretty good but nothing special (of course, his presidency was short). It's even too early to really rate Clinton's presidency.

Many of the economic problems started before Pres. Bush was president - things often take a long time to take effect.

I, for one, will suspend judgment of where Pres. Bush's presidency "ranks" for at least another 10-15 years when we see the long-term effects. That's context and perspective. Presidents can have short-term effects but the ones that really demonstrate how good they are as a president take a long time to see.

Re:You can't do that?

[Omestes]

So we must sacrifice our individual rights to protect the self-same rights?

The only thing that makes this country great is our history of expanding rights (ignoring the mentioned blemishes), and our fairly radical founding documents. Outside of that, I don't give squat about the US. To restate, I care about the US only insofar as it is a symbol for the right it represents. The second we care about a mere symbol more than what it represents, the symbol is meaningless and worthless.

Yes, "the bad guys" are bad. I think we all can agree that any extremist version of a religion is bad, and any time religion seeks to stomp on the rights of individuals is generally bad. But, I'd like to advance this a bit, and say that anytime government does so is just as bad. What is the different between a government doing it and a religion?

MAn your a fucking idiot!

And you suck at argumentation. For future reference, statements like that invalidate any point you may have had to begin with.

Re:You can't do that?

[ebuck]

Yeah, but we haven't been as lucky to have the Red Scare with the corruption of Tammany Hall all rolled into one!

Think of it, graft and scaremongering, it's like peanut butter and chocolate -> peanut butter cups. Why didn't politicians exploit them both so boldly in combination before?

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

So we must sacrifice our individual rights to protect the self-same rights?

I didn't say that at all. If you must paraphrase what I said, you might as well make it "don't throw the baby out with the bath water just because someone splashed mud on him".

The only thing that makes this country great is our history of expanding rights (ignoring the mentioned blemishes), and our fairly radical founding documents. Outside of that, I don't give squat about the US. To restate, I care about the US only insofar as it is a symbol for the right it represents. The second we care about a mere symbol more than what it represents, the symbol is meaningless and worthless.

Lol.. Here is your ignorance showing up again. Do you actually care about the United states or just the expanding of the right? You see, if you knew anything about the crap I told you to look into, you would find that giving up would take those rights and privileges that you hold dear and tear them from you. Instead of going through peaceful measures like court actions and elections and so on to get the rights back, you will have to fight the terrorist to get them back. So if you actually care about them and wish to keep them, letting the terrorist win only means you will have to fight them and win to get them back. Terrorist don't listen to reason, the heads of people attempting to reason with them have been cut off and held up high for the camera to see. so your not going to convince them that your way is better after they win. So just because someone might scratch your car or whatever it is you think is the most important thing in your life right now, your will to give all that up with the only way of recovering it being to fight them like we are doing in the first place. This is why your a fucking moron.

Yes, "the bad guys" are bad. I think we all can agree that any extremist version of a religion is bad, and any time religion seeks to stomp on the rights of individuals is generally bad. But, I'd like to advance this a bit, and say that anytime government does so is just as bad. What is the different between a government doing it and a religion?

If you would pull your head out of your ass and think for a minute, you would realize that you can change your government without resorting to violence. This can be done by court cases challenging the constitutionality of the changes, it can be done by electing people who will restore it, it can be done by you presenting a well argued case for why it is important to preserve what you think is being taken and possible even offer a better way to achieve the same goals that the government thinks it is achieving by infringing on your right. With a Extremist religions, you can either join or resist and die. There is no middle ground with them. The best you can hope to achieve is containment. If they win, they impose their beliefs in you and you either accept them or die fighting them. When a woman is stoned to death for a suspected affair, or a boy is sentences to death for reading a document they don't like, do you really think letting them win will do anything to help your side? Fuck, if it bothers so much that you want to get killed, either take up arms against the terrorist now or just kill yourself. I mean there are plenty of brave people who are willing to stand up to the government and say this isn't right, stop doing it. There are plenty of brave people saying we won't take this from your terrorist and they are standing in front of the bullets aimed at your and my heads and fighting back for us. then there are people like you who think if you don't get your way, we might as well screw everyone. Grow the fuck up! Taking your ball and going home doesn't mean preventing everyone else from having a ball.

And you suck at argumentation. For future reference, statements like that invalidate any point you may have had to begin with.

Re:You can't do that?

[Immerial]

THIS IS BULLSHIT!

I think you mean BUSHSHIT

Re:You can't do that?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry, but your a fucking moron.

No, his not.

The only moron (fucking or otherwise) in this conversation is you, as evidenced by this phrase:

it's the individual rights and standards we believe in that they don't like about us

Sorry, but the whole "they hate us for our freedom" is complete and utter bullshit. Nobody - as in ***NOBODY** with even half a brain would believe that.

What they don't like about you is that you bomb the shit out of them.

When you bomb innocent people, they tend to not like you anymore, and will use any means available to them to get back at you. All they have is terrorism, so that's what they use.

Re:You can't do that?

[esocid]

The execs did as ordered by the politicians.

The Miligram experiment comes to mind...hmm just following orders...
Not that I don't agree with you. What would have happened if someone (read Qwest) had refused?

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

I hope this isn't a complete butcher, but my understanding of the 9th and 10th amendments were to reiterate that the constitution was a contract that created a federal government whose only powers where those that were explicitly stated in the constitution, and nothing else. If it wasn't a right named as such in the constitution, then that means on whatever that issue was, the federal government had no such power. Further, if it was an issue not addressed by the states, the federal government still did not have the power to come in and have their way.

Of course the South should have pursued other options instead of open hostilities, as a democratic people should have, but a people whose economy rests on the back of slaves can't be democratic.Not sure what you mean with by 'open hostilities', or at least not which in particular, but in this context I think the important issue was that the north invaded the South, not the other way around. I also don't see how this was a democratic thing at all. The north spent drastically more on the war than the south. The south not only had home field advantage, but while many people volunteered in the revolutionary war, the armies of the north were all conscripted. There were terrible morale issues, and Lincoln didn't care how much was lost for the north to win.

And to look at it a completely different way, I think it is difficult to put slavery into perspective these days. We think about slavery as these plantations with many hundreds of slaves that were abused. That was not the only kind of slavery. I will apologize in advance for not having any references, but to my knowledge, abuse of slaves only took place on plantations with 500 or more slaves. This isn't to say that slavery is right, but look at the times: It was work that guaranteed food and housing. Yes, slaves were less than citizens, but at a tool, property, equipment or farm animal, it would be in the best interest of any slave owner to ensure the best health and well being of slaves. People are expensive to take care of, and good slaves are were expensive. Animals that are intended for food are abused a lot more, but what good is a dog or a horse that you abuse all day? And how bad is a farmer burned if a horse or dog dies?

Let us compare that world, to what was going on in the north, and in the west. In the north, you had factories. There were no safety standards, child labor laws, minimum wage laws, overtime pay, 2 day weekends, medical leave, non-discrimination, or anything else. You lost a finger or hand, you were fired and easily replaced. If you died, there was no liability to the employer. A place to eat, sleep, or bathe came out of your pay if you could afford it, and employers could do whatever they want to get the work done. And there were a plenty of people desperate to work. When it is impossible to make a livable wage, there is no freedom. Meanwhile companies were making big money, but market entrance was prohibitively expensive.

In the mid-west to west, we got the rail roads. More out doors than factory work, but not only was there no room or board, but 6 month accounting cycle, and 6 month pay cycles. You had to work your first year before seeing a pay check. Not only were accidents frequent, but there are many stories of railroads across the country being built without ever having to pay a single person (mostly Chinese) because of planned accidents for workers nearing that first anniversary.

This tells me it was a bad time to be a poor immigrant in the US PERIOD. Didn't matter how you got here. Personally, I think the treatment of the Chinese was the worst of any group of people, but it is really on par with factory work. The reality I see? The slaves got the closest thing to a livable wage of any minority group.

By federal power grab you mean the attempt to limit the growth of slave states, am I right?

No

I mean the right of the federal government to declare war against a state that no longer wants to be a member of a union th

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

I think this is what he means.

The one thing that I think needs to be straightened out is who hates who. We are in their country and have been long before 9/11. I think what he is saying is this whatever is going on in the world that is very sad, what we need to focus on is what we can do to help people in this country, the people that are United States citizens that are and want to be a part of something. I am not saying ignore the rest of the world, I just think that not only are we doing to much other places, more of those resources could be helping people here. I think this country isn't bad, and I don't think it is doomed. I just think in the same way people are often better often taking their own advise than giving it, we could do more for this country by making this land as good as possible for us right here.

You can agree or disagree with the war, just don't try to tell me it isn't imperialism.

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

I am really confused by your perspective. Not to sound totally crazy, I am going to say this is my understanding of Ron Paul's take on the war. We are the invaders. The middle east has been at war for a very long time. We are trying to police them and bullying them to be more like America. There are a LOT of people that really don't like this. A particular extremists has made it clear that they want American soldiers out of their homes, government and land by ANY MEANS POSSIBLE. 9/11 was a message to America that their voices will not be silenced.

You could call 9/11 a violent attack, but it was piss poor if you want to call it an invasion. They just want to leave. If "The Terrorists Win", which I would call nothing more than propaganda / rhetoric, the reality is that each side could get back to fighting amongst themselves.

I mean, you have noticed that the fighting isn't going oe here, but in their country, so a lot of your arguments don't make much sense, to me, in reality.

Re:You can't do that?

[Omestes]

Arguemnt? DO you really think I was making an argument? I was and still am saying your a fucking idiot. You are a moron, a dumbass, a spoiled little stupid bitch brat. What else is anyone expected to think of you when you make idiotic statements like that? Trust me, there was no reasoning in my statement, I wasn't attempting to convert you to anything, I would be just as happy if you killed yourself which isn't much happy at all. I was telling you how it is and how you appear to people. If you don't like it, do something about it- I would suggest pulling your head out of your ass and thinking about the shit your trying to say. If you do like it, get used to people telling you that. Judging from the calmness in your response, I think it is safe to assume that you used to hearing it.

Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?

That said, I see the difference of opinion here; I never stated we should stop fighting, but we should be mindful of our own rights more so. The odds of "the terrorists" ever taking over America is practically nill. "The terrorists" don't want to rule America, or make it into a fundamentalist Muslim state (if only the same could be said for our own homebrew Christian extremists), they want us to get the hell out of their business and let them be totalitarian theocracies in peace.

The merits of this view are a discussion for another day, but we can all agree that they have gone too far, and some level of violence is necessary to secure our Country and allies.

This argument is heavily into the discussion of "ends" and "means", in this case we have "combating terror" as the former, and "forfeiting out own rights" as the latter. You are of the the "ends justify the means" crowd, while I am on the opposite side of the spectrum. The truth, as always, probably lies someplace in the middle.

Here is your ignorance showing up again. Do you actually care about the United states or just the expanding of the right?

If by "right" you mean the religious or political right, you are wrong. I find both of them distasteful. If, though, by "right" you mean "rights", then you are correct. I don't care a damn about America as a mere fiction, I care more about what it means. If our government decides to fight against my rights, I'll fight back, just like I'd fight against "the terrorists". Please see my sig. Human rights are more important than any political body, or nationalistic fiction.

Yes, we could give them up temporarily to fight off "the terrorists", but power doesn't like forfeiting its gains. You might find that when you give up rights, gaining them back isn't as easy as you make it sound. I trust our government about as far as I can throw it, and I definitely don't trust them to ever reinstate my rights, I also don't trust voters. Here in Arizona we just passed a law by a wide margin to restrict the rights of a minority (Gays), things like this do NOT harbor trust. Rights are generally gained with a gun, and not a vote, our history has proven this again and again. Can you name a single time where we've gained rights from our government without bloodshed? This makes me very wary of power.

In conclusion, by all means resist the religious extremists (as long as you do it against our own brand of them as well). By all means protect the homeland against harmful forces. BUT... You'll pry the Constitution out of my cold dead hands, thats what matters to me, not our president, not our congress, not our flag, or our borders. If you revoke any of the Bill of Rights (even "temporarily"), I will fight back, since at the point the America ceases to be America, and our government is just another hostile foreign power.

Re:You can't do that?

[Conficio]

And what has all this to do with your sexuality or sexuality in general?

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?

If she wasn't dead I would you twit.

That said, I see the difference of opinion here; I never stated we should stop fighting, but we should be mindful of our own rights more so. The odds of "the terrorists" ever taking over America is practically nill. "The terrorists" don't want to rule America, or make it into a fundamentalist Muslim state (if only the same could be said for our own homebrew Christian extremists), they want us to get the hell out of their business and let them be totalitarian theocracies in peace.

Lol... Do you know what "the terrorist wins means" It was Al Qeada who declared war on the US first. If you mean that the terrorist almost win, then you should have said so and not said "I'd rather the terrorists "win" than compromise any individual rights, or any standard we profess to believe in." And yes, the terrorist have said that they have the right to kill Americans who aren't Muslims subject to Shirea law. Bin laden himself spent the majority of the 90's attacking what he called false Muslims and state anyone not a muslim did not have a right to life. His entire pitch about American involvement in Saudi and Israel was because we weren't Muslim and tolerated woman's rights, none muslims and so on. If you really think they aren't a threat to the US, then why did 9/11 happen and why have there been successive but failed attempt afterwords? Bin Laden's official reasoning is because we supported Israel not because we "were there". There is a reason why they are labeled muslim extremists. It isn't because they read the Qur'an a lot.

The merits of this view are a discussion for another day, but we can all agree that they have gone too far, and some level of violence is necessary to secure our Country and allies.

Then why let them win? You see, you don't even have to believe what you wrote, the concept is wrong from the start. You don't give up everything because something is temporarily infringed on when there are means of recourse and the only recourse with them winning is to fight them so why would you want them to win in the first place?

If by "right" you mean the religious or political right, you are wrong. I find both of them distasteful. If, though, by "right" you mean "rights", then you are correct. I don't care a damn about America as a mere fiction, I care more about what it means. If our government decides to fight against my rights, I'll fight back, just like I'd fight against "the terrorists". Please see my sig. Human rights are more important than any political body, or nationalistic fiction.

Right as in inalienable rights. And if you really only care about the rights, then you yourself should be able to see how stupid your comment is. Let's see, I would rather give up the fight and lose everything then to lose just something that I could possible get back without haven't to resort to violence.

Yes, we could give them up temporarily to fight off "the terrorists", but power doesn't like forfeiting its gains. You might find that when you give up rights, gaining them back isn't as easy as you make it sound. I trust our government about as far as I can throw it, and I definitely don't trust them to ever reinstate my rights, I also don't trust voters. Here in Arizona we just passed a law by a wide margin to restrict the rights of a minority (Gays), things like this do NOT harbor trust. Rights are generally gained with a gun, and not a vote, our history has proven this again and again. Can you name a single time where we've gained rights from our government without bloodshed? This makes me very wary of power.

lol.. You are one of those...

First of all, I never said you had to give up any of your rights. I said you can always fight for them, you can always get them back. Let

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

First of all, he is talking about the war on terror. Not the Iraq war or the Afghan war.

Next, he is talking about losing to the terrorists not any specific country. The terrorist aren't the legit governments of any state. Judging from your English, your not a native born American or your in a real hurry. Either way it doesn't matter but being of another country would help illustrate my point better. Imagine if you were originally from another country and come over to the US. Now imagine a group of people who use violence against your countrymen in your home country and against yourself at home because they don't like you here. Lets say the US government invites you here for whatever reason and the KKK burns your house down and blows up your car. That doesn't force you to leave so they blow up your neighbors cars and houses and kill them, they blow up a shopping mall that your children's friends visit killing some of them. Do you give them credit? Do they have valid opinions over you being in the country? No, they are criminals attempting to influence political opinion by attacking innocent people. The government of the country has the right to deny someone entry not some quasi criminal gang that are really murderers in disguise.

Now investing inside the county on American citizens and so on is a valid opinion, but you can't let people force you into that with violence. Especially when their idea of winning is wiping your country or an ally's country of the map. Al Qeada has claimed it had authority to kill Americans because they aren't Muslim, because they are false Muslims. This is the same reasons they gave when attacking Saudi officials. In order to be safe from them, you have to not only be Muslim, but their brand of Muslim subject to Sharia law and following their interpretations.

You can agree or disagree with the war, just don't try to tell me it isn't imperialism.

As far as imperialism. Unless you have some strange definition of imperialism, neither war is It. Neither the war on terroristm, the war in Iraq nor the war in Afghanistan. You see, with the war on terrorism, the goal is to stop extremists from attacking your own people. In the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the goals were to remove the political powers who were detrimental to the US security and to install a government of the people of the area. Now, in both places, there is no requirement for US cooperation or US control. The only requirements are that the people being governed ultimately decide on their own government and the note attacking the US which is inherent to any sovereign nation is that one country doesn't breed attacks on another- namely the US. But that requirement is the same for all countries of any country so no, it doesn't make imperialism.

The governments, while the democracy was initially selected because then people being governed have the right to chose their government, can at any time turn into a dictatorship, a theology, a true democracy, a republic, or anything that the majority of the people decide. Afghanistan has already became almost a theocracy as we can tell by people stoning women suspected of adultery to death and the student who was sentenced to death for downloading and reading a pamphlet about women in Islam. As for Iraq, Bush has already claimed that they are a sovereign nation and if they request us to leave we will. Of course even if Iraq wanted us gone, they won't ask until such time they have their own security under control which is approaching fast.

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

Ron Paul isn't really the historian you should be following on this. You should get your history from historians not politicians. There are reasons that Ron Paul Fizzled out fast when building up to the elections.

We have had relationships in the middle east since the beginning of the country. Thomas Jefferson created our first standing navy and the department of marines in order to address the Ottoman empires pirating of US trade vessels in the Atlantic at first and private transport ships near the end. They would pirate the ship and enslave the crews. Europe chose to pay for protection which was effective for short periods of time then they would pirate them again and demand more money in a never ending cycle. When asked what gave them the right, a representative of the Ottoman empire responded to Jefferson at an assembly in France, Allah give them the right. We took that right away from them.

But that isn't our only interaction. The port of Kuwait had long been a port of safe harbor and a vital port on the Asian trade routes. We have had a long standing and friendly relationship with Kuwait (*which was originally part of the ottoman empire but operated independently from it) from since before the country was even formed.

World War One started because of a cascade of events stemming from the assassination of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Anyways, the order of events isn't important as the outcome was the league of nations and the collapse of the ottoman empire which controlled most of norther Africa including the middle east. The league of nations attempted to repartition the ottoman empire up into tribal boundaries in which the US who was not part of it continued trading with them. Most of them had done so and became countries of their own rights before the start of WWII and the US was entwined with the creation of the countries as well as trade within them mostly because of our involvement after the Tripoli invasion of Jefferson.

We are not invaders, we never were. After our invasion to Tripoli was won by us, we dropped all claims and remained friends in trade with the ottoman empire once the Barbary pirates were out of the way. After the collapse of the Ottoman empire, we were still friendly with the countries and tribal leaders and even the plebiscites. We were there by invitation. For the most part, we have been friendly with all of the middle east until the 1950's cold war when Russia started using their influence against us and aiding the republican revolutions who were anti westerner. It started in Egypt in 1954, in Syria in 1963, in Iraq in 1968 and in Libya in 1969. The US started aligning itself with it's remain allies in the area and took steps to protect them (Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iran and the Persian Gulf emirates) even though we didn't agree with their methods of rule. Then theology had started taking over in 1979 when the Shia's clergy took over Iran. Of course this had some to do with resentment over President Carter's actions towards Iran that angered the people of Iran as well as the stopping of US aid and sales to the shah after the Brown & Root port scandal.

This led Iran to be against us as well as the institution of radical Islam as a state. Iran made threats to it's neighbors and Kuwait paid Iraq to defend it. Kuwait also convinced Carter and Reagan to supply Iraq with Military aid which had previously been allied with Russia. They agree to sell military truck and small arms ammunition, they were going to supply helicopters but congress put a stop to most of it before the transfer happened because Iraq invaded Iran claiming it was the other way around. Of course after the Iran-Iraq war, Iraq accused Kuwait of slant drilling after one of the public officials equated Iraqi women with 10 dollar whores and Iraq invaded Kuwait prompting for the First gulf war when Kuwait, still an ally in the area, asked for help.

Anyways, we are not the invaders before 9/11. Sure, we haven't had good times always but we weren't the invaders. And the people who claim we w

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

My apologies, I was in a bit of a hurry and did not check what I wrote as thoroughly as I likely should have.

I know plenty of people disagree with me, but it has not been my impression that we are a safer nation because of our occupation of the middle east. As far as our occupation of Iraq, you say that if "they" asked us to leave, we would. Which group of people would have that type of influence? The major opinion of Americans hasn't seemed to matter, so I am skeptical to believe that the people of Iraq would do better. Further, I thought Bush and McCain had said that we will leave when they are ready, and it was more of an afterthought or interpretation of everything that the Iraq people are grateful to have us there. I know there are groups of people with a lot to gain by us being there, but as some kind of gallop poll that says "We love Bush even if Americans don't" I find unlikely. I would still prefer a little more be done for Americans rather than helping other people because a better world (policed by us) will some how have the side effect of making a better America.

Since this is really a very depressing subject, it might just make more sense to stereotype myself as one of those Ron Paul loving and quoting die hard Libertarians. I don't think we are safer. I think more of the world is rightfully upset at us, and we have enough problems here at home with our own government and people, we don't need to be going around telling other people to have a government.

Just opinion without supporting facts. I know that doesn't do anything to encourage an intelligent dialogue, just all I can say is that that what Ron Paul says makes a lot more sense to me than what anyone else has said trying to explain what this whole "War on Terror" thing has been about, in a way that justifies our military occupation around the world.

Re:You can't do that?

[sumdumass]

I know plenty of people disagree with me, but it has not been my impression that we are a safer nation because of our occupation of the middle east.

Your not safer because of our occupation in the middle east, In fact, we aren't occupying anything in the middle east. Both Iraq and Afghanistan are sovereign nations with governments of their own elected by their own citizens in internationally monitored free elections. You are safer now because the old regimes in charge of those countries who sponsored terrorism are out of power now. Saddam wasn't as much as a threat in reality as he was thought to have been but we know the Taliban was supporting Al Qeada.

As far as our occupation of Iraq, you say that if "they" asked us to leave, we would. Which group of people would have that type of influence? The major opinion of Americans hasn't seemed to matter, so I am skeptical to believe that the people of Iraq would do better.

Try the sovereign government of Iraq. It's the governments that matter. We have an obligation to the people to at least give them a somewhat stable environment do they can be the masters of their own destiny without fear of being taken over by another brutal dictator. If the majority of the people want to do that, then they can by election, not by force of the person with the most guns because we left them undefended.

Further, I thought Bush and McCain had said that we will leave when they are ready, and it was more of an afterthought or interpretation of everything that the Iraq people are grateful to have us there.

You though wrong or you got your information second had from someone purposely attempting to mislead you. Bush and McCain said when the job is done. That is measured when the governments of Iraq can and does take over for their own protection both domestically and from their neighbors. Again, it is what the government of Iraq thinks, they are the elected representatives, not some pole conducted by a newspaper. Currently, this looks to be on track for around 2012 assuming that nothing sets them back.

I know there are groups of people with a lot to gain by us being there, but as some kind of gallop poll that says "We love Bush even if Americans don't" I find unlikely. I would still prefer a little more be done for Americans rather than helping other people because a better world (policed by us) will some how have the side effect of making a better America.

I'm not exactly sure what your attempting to say here. If by policing the world, you mean our involvement in Iraq, then your completely off. If by policing the world you mean by sending military personnel as aid workers to Georgia, your off. We don't police the world. If we did, we would have troops in the Palestine territory as well as darfur and several other parts of Africa. What we do is look out for out national interests and allies when asked. You should really look into that a little more before making such unfounded statements.

Since this is really a very depressing subject, it might just make more sense to stereotype myself as one of those Ron Paul loving and quoting die hard Libertarians. I don't think we are safer. I think more of the world is rightfully upset at us, and we have enough problems here at home with our own government and people, we don't need to be going around telling other people to have a government.

It's not depressing at all if your paying attention to what's actually going on. And yes, you do seem to be one of those idiot Ron Paul Supporters. Less then 20% of the ones that I have met either on line or in person actually have a clue about what they are talking about. Most of them don't even get Ron Paul himself correct. Some of the world is upset with us, Lets see, Russia is upset because we are putting a Missile defense shield in west

Re:You can't do that?

[thtrgremlin]

I appreciate your time in responding. Certainly sounds like something that you keep up on. I know that my assumptions are not the result of keeping up on what is going on in great detail, certainly not as much as other things.

Your outlook is very positive, and I hope things are going as well as it sounds. I am in California, so most everything I hear is very negative, but I do have friends in Iraq that say things are going well and that we are making a positive difference there.

As far as the Paul rhetoric, I have been planning on rereading "The Revolution", as I only read it once in an afternoon. You've given me a good reason to go through it, doing a little fact checking along the way with some of the statements he makes about how much military we have and where around the world. Thanks again.

The tense is wrong...

[GrpA]

Actually he did that. You can't say that "You can't do that", because he did that. The Bush Administration is asking for retrospective immunity - that's a lot worse than asking for permission to do it.

The rest of the world is watching this one closely as well - it's not just the US that's interested in the outcome of this incident.

GrpA

Re:The tense is wrong...

[NiceGeek]

retroactive

Re:The tense is wrong...

[kilgortrout]

If he did it, he didn't do it by himself. He did it with the aid of a Democratic Congress in passing the requested retroactive immunity legislation and IIRC our president-elect voted for that law as well. Democrat or Republican, big money from big telcos talks very loud. Meet the new boss; same as the old boss.

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry dude, the word is retroactive. Retrospective is "I ate what?"

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Maxmin]

Interestingly, the Bush admin is reported to be tracking American journalists' phonecalls, in an effort to catch leakers from his own team.

Government Begins Tracking Phone Calls of Journalists

That was back in May '06. Fuck knows if this is technically legal, given all the executive orders and constitutionally dodgey laws this decade...

But the First Amendment seems to want to apply here.

"Aging constitutional amendment seeks job. Superpowers include: protecting freedoms of speech, press, assembly and religion, occasionally acting as governmental grievance liaison."

"Work history: 1791-2001 United States, job title: First Amendment. Fired for insubordination, by leader of Republican party."

Last seen along I-495, holding sign: "Will work for freedom, liberty and democracy."

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Migity]

Well, in retrospect, I suppose you're right.

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

In all fairness, the immunity was injected into a security bill. The president elect and many dems voted to remove that from the bill in a separate vote, but the repubs lined up to keep it in. Apparently our national security is paramount to the republican agenda, unless you're talking about putting the legal spotlight on their rich buddies in the telco. And that's a fair analysis.

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the last line of the song, and I heard it just before I read that. :\

Re:The tense is wrong...

[LunarCrisis]

Actually he did that. You can't say that "You can't do that", because he did that.

Actually, he said that. You can't say that "You can't say that", because he said that.

Re:The tense is wrong...

[Rich0]

Obviously at least some dems must have voted with the repubs.

I really hope that the dems take 80% of the senate. Then at least people won't be blaming the repubs for hampering progress when the dems go and do more of the same. I'm sick of both parties. Maybe they'll surprise me - nothing would make me happier...

Pardon Them

[Anonymous Coward]

The president should just issue a blanket pardon for all the telcoms and people who administered the wiretaps. I has always confused me as to why the same people who are afraid of the govt infridging on their civil liberties are the same bunch who want to register my firearms and then outlaw them.

Re:Pardon Them

[neomunk]

That's funny, I've been confused about how some people who demand the freedom to own a firearm (like me) can passively accept being wiretapped by the government for NO DAMN REASON whilst actually SUPPORTING such foolish measures under the saddeningly thin guise of 'national security' (unlike me). Personally, I think that many of you 'gun enthusiasts' are really just terrified children in grown up bodies, scared that some big tough boogyman is going to get you if you don't have layers upon layers of blanket over your heads...

I have firearms, I also fully believe that the probability of me having to use them against invading Muslims is very near 0. On the other hand, I have another entity that has already made it's decision to wiretap me and hold me in suspicion just because I might be thinking or doing something they don't like. I find that orders of magnitude more threatening.

Yay! America the freest country in the world!

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, in the BSD sense, not in the GPL sense. In that the people are free to do whatever they want, even abuse the rights of others.

This isn't a criminal case.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

... why doesn't [Bush] just issue a blanket pardon?

Perhaps because pardons apply to criminal cases (government vs. person-to-be-punished-for-wrongdoing) while these are civil cases (wronged people demanding damages be paid by those who wronged them). I think the pardon power only applies to the former.

Re:This isn't a criminal case.

[HUADPE]

No, he can. Famously, Gerald Ford pardoned the (not yet convicted) Richard Nixon.

Re:This isn't a criminal case.

[witherstaff]

Don't forget poppa Bush pardoning the Iran 6 before they had even been charged.

Let's Get Serious

[fibrewire]

All slashdoting aside, how would we deal with this situation? I know we're mainly a bunch of nerds, but aren't we the most influential people on the planet in today's society? What could we seriously do to circumvent this policy? Any ideas? Come on people, we're the brains of the world!

Re:Let's Get Serious

[SpiffyMarc]

I dunno, I mean I guess we can ... ahhh... fuck dude, I've got a raid tonight, can this wait?

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Free the Cowards]

Don't kid yourself. Nerds are good with technology, not politics. These people are as good at bending laws and manipulating courts as the average slashdotter is at recompiling his kernel. Just as the average politician's political expertise doesn't help them at all in the world of technology, our technological expertise doesn't help us at all in their world.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[rtconner]

I strongly disagree. Nerds are smart people who like to solve hard problems. I have every bit of confidence that is todays nerds were given the power to create a governmental system, it would be completely awesome. If open source and shared information in the technology world are any indication, transparency and security can surely both be achieved.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Anonymous Coward]

Nerds are smart people who like to solve hard problems.

I solve my hard problems every day.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Bad D.N.A.]

Nerds are indeed smart people. But we have nerds running all over the place and we have not achieved transparency nor security. To have "every bit of confidence" would imply some sort of religious belief in some futuristic vision (of something). While my first impression would be to trust a bunch of nerds over a bunch of slick-talking politicos, there is every evidence that nerds become the "enemy" when given the opportunity to do so. If you were offered millions to become an ass, wouldn't you take advantage of that? Don't ask me the same question.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[keithjr]

Moneybomb the EEF? You know, if the feared power of Slashdotting can offline unprepared servers, the same should be possible with cash and unconstitutional laws.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Anonymous Coward]

Too much fight club.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[AmberBlackCat]

I understand that there are all kinds of open source projects out there, and some better than others. But based on my personal experience with some of the more prominent ones, I seriously believe a government run by open source types would be as terrible as what we have now. The following thoughts are based just on those projects.

It would respond to complaints about the government with comments like "Go build your own government! Ours is done right! Anybody who is not a constitutional lawyer is an idiot who just doesn't know enough about government!"

People who want to report potholes, or suggest an amendment to the constitution, would have to check their clocks. Everybody whose name starts with A through K has to file their complaint in the morning, K through P in the afternoon, and the rest have to file their complaint in the evening. Because good user experience is second to efficiency and having the complaints partially sorted as they're filed will make the database sorting algorithm run faster.

It would have a stupid name. Probably something like UNITED, which is an acronym in which the U stands for "united".

NASA would get more than 70% of all federal funding. The N would stand for NASA. Eventually it would be replaced with another organization that is exactly the same, except it's called GNASA. And even though it's NASA, the N stands for "Not NASA". Nobody really knows what the ASA stands for. Probably the same thing the NITED stands for.

The national anthem would be forked into two songs because we'd never agree on whether it should say "O'er the land of the free (as in speech)" or "O'er the land of the free (as in beer)". The pledge of allegience would be the most forked project in the history of the earth.

Boundary lines would be drawn so that every state has exactly the same number of citizens, so they make a nice Beowulf cluster.

The military would be the drones from Star Wars. The guy who set them up insists we should not complain about their horrible inaccuracy because they're still in beta.

The drones would be running android, which is actually working pretty well but none of the drones have bluetooth capability.

Some guy will come up with the best amendment to the constitution in years but he'll get locked up for killing his wife, so we won't use it.

The Chewbacca defense will actually work.

And if it were run by Slashdotters, censorship would be guaranteed by the constitution. Because censorship is basically what moderation is. You take the comments you like and make them more prominent, while taking comments you don't like and making them disappear. So whoever was in power in the beginning will crush anybody who introduces new ideas, resulting in old-boy network groupthink. I'm pretty sure that 24 hours from the time of this post, either it will be at +5 Funny, or only people browsing at -1 will see it.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[deblau]

I have every bit of confidence that if today's nerds were given the power to create a governmental system, there would be a Secretary of Video Games, a Secretary of Silly Blogs, and a Secretary of Meme Enforcement. I leave it to you to decide whether this would be a good thing for the country.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[complete loony]

I have no doubt we *could* do it right. I also have no doubt we could do it very very badly.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought it was funny.

Really I look at things like SSH, SVN/CVS, RSS, Firefox, MySQL and rather stand in good awe of what the nerds have done.

But I do suppose if we can't even decide on an HTML 5 standard, how would we ever be able to write forgiegn policy document.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Furmy]

that is(sic) todays nerds were given the power to create a governmental system, it would be completely awesome.

If the 'nerds' are waiting for the power to be 'given' to them, then it won't happen and you're no help to the GGP's post.
Taking responsibility is step 1. Taking action is a close Step 2.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Anonymous Coward]

For starters, anyone wanna import the whole US code into a subversion repository, then commit each bill as a new revision, so that people could view the actual implications of each bill in a powerful diff tool like fisheye? Seriously, I'm going to do this, and I encourage others to seed their own attempts at it. Once something emerges, we'll have a better tool for understanding what's really in a law. (Have you ever tried reading one as-is? "Strike section 2, sentence 3, from 'the people' through 'small goats', and add the words..." There's just no way to read the big ones without seeing the change in a better tool.)

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Enter the Shoggoth]

I strongly disagree. Nerds are smart people who like to solve hard problems. I have every bit of confidence that is todays nerds were given the power to create a governmental system, it would be completely awesome. If open source and shared information in the technology world are any indication, transparency and security can surely both be achieved.

I'm not sure why but your post made me think of this:

I would like to be present everywhere

Grace is the "update" program, which simply issues a sync system call.

I've received two pieces of email that imply that somebody recently
posted the entire world with a flood, to remove all rational obstacles
to believing something revealed by God.

I have to pass a tuple containing the existing Unix technology.
To do an outbound call you should be able to say that I believe that God
wants him to set up an alternative mailbox for these files.

If this is exactly the thrust of Larry McVoy's paper on "Extent Like
Performance on a sysV f. s.", he cannot have salvation, except in the
production of the forgiveness of sins.

I would like to be present everywhere.

This is supported by Jesus's use of low cost eight bit micros
and small amounts of RAM. When you find salvation.

For the sinner deserves not life but death, according to the disk
devices. For example, start with Plan 9, which is free of sin, the
case is different from His perspective.

The Roman Church has always been a part of a file system semantics.

Grab the cat torture shit. Lets be real familiar with these braindead
but safe solutions. We have to look further into this possible
interpretation.

Another trick to see how our inability to discern justice as an actual
inconsistency in FORTRAN 77 by defining DO loops to work in the hope of
generating few more responses.

Female clergy are widely but not quite.

I have modified the "standard" Berkley ftpd to allow for various types of
failures in Scripture.

That's not very important, because the deception of one being good
entails being loving, merciful, just, and many other names; one per
symbolic link.

Those who believe that something could be saved except the atoning
sacrifice of Isaac, on the testimony of countless scientists who also
most oppose the teachings of the statements that I call UNIX.

ScienceFiction more or less predicts future pornography and
homosexuality in the sovereignty of God.

Wouldn't that mean that the Father too may live anew dev log to ftp
after login?

Probably first choice of block size on all of their salvation.

If God truly loves humankind then why does He create sinners? If human
is His creation, then who is the ultimate in all shells?

I know at one point Jesus said "no one may come to grips with the cpio
header blown away".

It speaks of the original ftpd.

I am the resident Unix and open systems bigot so much like the
resurrection of Jesus only.

Geoff modified relaynews to write an essay on prayer.

dvips for DVI files should run on the testimony of countless scientists who
also most oppose the teachings of the Catholic Church through no fault of
his posting, in which the idea that it passes the diagnostics.

And I get real turned on by a good English translation of the Bible;
because there is sufficient response I would want to change the nature
of the points of Catholic theology would immediately have to be God and
satan who is a free variable :-)

Christian theology is not seek optimization, which the means pertain, as
was said above

Good. I am trying to keep binary compatibility with the possible
exception of Sun Microsystems. Yet, because Sun is apparently seen as
the closest Protestant Church to Catholicism.

That observation doesn't get one anywhere. One might as well as the
law as can be meritorious of life everlasting, but so as to he

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Anonymous Coward]

I, for one ... oh, screw it - just leave me out of that crazy experiment! It would end in a horrible, senseless technocracy.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[arotenbe]

I'm pretty sure that 24 hours from the time of this post, either it will be at +5 Funny, or only people browsing at -1 will see it.

You've got a solid +3 right now. Keep trying!

Actually, I think the scarier thing is that it's +3 Informative...

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Capt James McCarthy]

Which is why lawyers keep getting elected.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[Ogive17]

You know most people probably get into politics with ideas of making the world perfect... then they get to Washington and become corrupted. After a few years they are no longer concerned with their constituants wants/needs but only do what is necessary to remain in office.

I am sure the typical nerd would follow the same pattern. Unless the new government disolved capital hill and were forced to live in their district and video conference in for 10 hours every day...

Re:Let's Get Serious

[dkf]

I understand that there are all kinds of open source projects out there, and some better than others. But based on my personal experience with some of the more prominent ones, I seriously believe a government run by open source types would be as terrible as what we have now. The following thoughts are based just on those projects.

[...]

The Chewbacca defense will actually work.

[...]

No it wouldn't, since open source types will remember that Chewie is able to pilot a starship and is hence able to live wherever he wants.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[gbickford]

Didn't you see the Simpons episode where Lisa was invited to join MENSA which then became the acting governing body over Springfield? They suffered from severe organizational issues and from being out of touch with the real problems that Springfield faced. The truth of the matter is that nerds, politicians, and leaders form more of a Venn diagram. Being part of one group does not implicitly include or exclude you from another.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[dogmatixpsych]

I agree. The best evidence that nerds are good with politics is that none of us are politicians. Q.E.D.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[ebuck]

Yes but the problems of politics aren't the problems of discrete mathematics. Political problems are less well defined, more sticky, and rarely have any real solution.

For example, take the current political problem of defending our country against a terror attack. Clean cut solutions tend to be in violation of civil liberties, theatre security solutions tend to cost a lot and deliver little, and technological solutions are weak at defending against primitive technology attacks.

What about inadequate health care? Yes, it happens here in the USA. I'm not talking about expensive health care, I'm talking about treating the homeless so they don't pose a risk as walking disease carriers. Pay for it with tax dollars and that's not solving the problem of taxation. Let them go untreated doesn't solve human health issues. Treat them and you're providing incentives to be homeless (yes, some people are stupid enough to believe this argument wholeheartedly). Treat some of them or limit treatment to certain diseases, and you run the risk of failure too.

What if the "nerd" solution to voting comes back out of the symbolic logic quagmire with a proof that you cannot have anonymous, secure, reliable, error free, auditable voting? Computer Science has already proven that some problems cannot be solved by any Turing machine, after pissing off the whole world by stating that they can't do as good of a job as we can, then are you going to be the one to tell them it is not a solvable problem?

Re:Let's Get Serious

[jafac]

Nerds ARE in power.

Obama played D&D as a teen, and collects comic books. His favorite is Spider Man (Peter Parker was a Science major).

Oh, and Obama just put his government web site under the Creative Commons license.

I hope he can fix that utterly broken White House email backup and archiving system. It's been broken since the Bush 41 administration.

Re:Let's Get Serious

[jafac]

. . . and FoxNews would still lie about it all.

Haven't we gone over this before?

[boxless]

Doesn't someone need to be harmed in order to sue? And in order to prove you were harmed, you'd need to have access to state secrets, which can't happen in the new America. Therefore, no harm, no standing to sue, no case.

I don't think you can sue for a general affront to the Constitution.

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not a general affront to the constitution, they're suing on specific constitutional protections being violated, thus claiming harm.

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[Anonymous Coward]

Therefore, no *revealable* harm, no standing to sue, no case.

There, fixed it for you.

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[digitalunity]

The courts could quite literally make a judgement ruling that violation of the 4th amendment itself is not a tort and there is no harm unless specific action is taken on information obtained without cause. The effect of such a ruling would be tremendous.

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[MorePower]

I wish that was true, but it isn't. Remember that atheist dad who went all the way to the Supreme Court over the "under God" part of the Pledge of Allegiance? When they found out he didn't have legal custody of the kid, they dropped the case since he had no standing to sue (since it wasn't "his" kid legally, he wasn't personally "harmed").

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[jtcm]

The GP is correct. You need standing in order to bring a consitutional issue to court.

In the United States, for example, a person cannot bring a suit challenging the constitutionality of a law unless the plaintiff can demonstrate that the plaintiff is (or will be) harmed by the law.

Re:Haven't we gone over this before?

[dkleinsc]

I can create standing very easily (as can any lawyer worth his salt):

My client is under a non-disclosure agreement with his employer that prevents him/her from discussing work-related business over insecure channels. However, because this law essentially allows unlawful wiretaps, s/he can't conduct business over the phone or Internet connection without violating that agreement. Therefor any communications, such as those between different branch offices, must be done using slower and more expensive methods like US mail or physical traveling to those offices, or my client is in violation of contract.

Interesting timing

[Kohath]

Interesting timing for this now that we've learned that the gunmen in Mumbai used Blackberries to communicate. I'm sure no one violated their rights by eavesdropping on their communications.

Re:Interesting timing

[Fluffeh]

So, does that mean that you are okay to effectively have anyone and everyone who wants to listening to your calls or reading your emails in case you are a terrorist waiting for the right moment?

Before you really answer, think about all the stuff that you write in email to close friends, or in sms to loved ones, or over the phone. All that embarrassing stuff that isn't meant for any audience outside you and the receiving end. All THAT stuff becomes open.

I might be naive in my thinking, but why spend billions on listening to everyone's conversations when you could spend the same money to make their lives good. Happy content people don't go blowing themselves up or shoot random (or not so random) people by the bucketful. Happy content people lead happy content and productive lives. Eavesdropping on everyone won't make everyone happy.

Re:Interesting timing

[sammy baby]

Considering none of the attackers were American citizens or were on US soil, I think it's fair to say you're right: nobody infringed on their Constitutional rights. They had none.

But assuming for a minute that the attacks had taken place in the US, that the attackers had been American citizens, and that they were communicating with parties outside the country. Under FISA, their communications could still have been tapped just so long as the someone filed the paperwork for authorization sometime in the 72 hours following the tap.

In other words, if this had happened here, the wiretap could have happened then, authorization could be issued now, and it all would have been above board.

Anyway, sorry. Discussions that revolve upon spurious "wanh wanh cry me a river for terrorists' rights" arguments get me all het up.

Re:Interesting timing

[LockeOnLogic]

The terrorists also used a tool of communication known as "spoken language" to transmit information to other terrorists.

Telescreens are now being installed in your house to make sure that you do not transmit terrorist information when using the aforementioned tool in your home.

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

your logic fails, because you will never make everyone happy...

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

wait just one minute there.

using your logic lets go through a scenario.

Rape. I'm sure that no one has to say how terrible an experience that is. and it is almost always males attacking females.

we can stop rape completely. we just need to completely remove the genitalia of every single man. without the tools to commit the crime there will be no possibility of rape happening.
it will be completely stopped.

Is that worth it to you?

now i hear you saying, "that is completely different and barbaric". no it's not. you want to take away everyone's right to something just so that you can stop the >1% of the population that uses that same right for deviant behavior. it's asinine.

the right to privacy is no different.

if you want to give away your rights that fine.

Don't try to take away mine!

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

At the very least, it means there are two sides to the "eavesdropping" question. It's a question for thoughtful discussion, not the sloganeering and bumper-sticker Constitutional Law pronouncements everyone has heard a thousand times.

Eavesdropping on terrorists could save hundreds or thousands of lives. That's a benefit that has to be weighed against the costs. But most of the partisan discussions on this subject don't fairly acknowledge that benefit. Terrorism is real -- the terrorists have reminded us of that again.

The preventable damage caused by terrorism can be seen stacked in body bags on the news broadcasts (again). What was the damage caused by the eavesdropping? Are we all 100% sure the eavesdropping is so much worse that it could never even be considered, even with safeguards? I'm not.

Re:Interesting timing

[Fluffeh]

If you want to be like that, then so does yours. You will never be able to eavesdrop on everyone.

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering none of the attackers were American citizens or were on US soil, I think it's fair to say you're right: nobody infringed on their Constitutional rights. They had none.

Thank god they don't have e-mail and cell phones over in that "3rd world" I keep hearing about on Fox News...

Anyway, sorry. Discussions that revolve upon spurious "wanh wanh cry me a river for terrorists' rights" arguments get me all het up.

"wanh wanh cry me a river for my strawman arguments" that anonymous cowards point out are false dilemmas.

Re:Interesting timing

[The Master Control P]

(!happy) !=> suicidal killer
hopeless => suicidal killer

There are plenty unhappy people in America but no homegrown suicide bombers. What we don't have is a system that explicitly sets out to systematically oppress and render voiceless segments of the population - that is what's behind suicide bombers, because it takes away any value life has.

Then for the most part we get into a bullshit pissing contest of "your voice can't be heard because you're violent" and "we turn to violence because you won't let us be heard" to avoid anyone having to admit they're wrong.

Re:Interesting timing

[Fluffeh]

Eavesdropping on terrorists could save hundreds or thousands of lives.

But the problem is that we don't know who they are. You need to listen to millions of conversations to have a chance of getting down to what you are interested in.

And lets face it, it's not like they aren't going to be talking in coded messages to one another. I am sure that "Hey Terrorist friend, that bomb you asked for is running a day late, but we will still get it down there and blow shit up good" might sound like "Hi Bob, I will be picking up the milk on the way home, but I am running a little late."

As for the thought that there is some lowly paid government worker listening in on a conversation over the phone I have while away on business with my partner? Yeah, great. That just really works for me.

I hate to follow to logical conclusions, but correct me if I am wrong here:
1) Eaves dropping law gets passed.
2) Terrorist learn that they can be snooped on via phone.
3) Terrorists change communication method to avoid snooping.
4) Everyone else gets snooped on as the law is already enacted.

Did I miss something obvious?

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

...to effectively have anyone and everyone who wants to listening to your calls or reading your emails...all the stuff that you write in email to close friends, or in sms to loved ones, or over the phone. All that embarrassing stuff that isn't meant for any audience outside you and the receiving end. All THAT stuff becomes open. ...listening to everyone's conversations...

Do you really think that the US government (or any organization, for that matter) has the resources to monitor everyone's communications? Our intelligence agencies operate with limited resources--in fact, one of the biggest problems facing them is the backlog of intercepted communications awaiting review. They don't have time to listen in on "all that embarrassing stuff." They barely have time to listen in on people who are actually talking about doing harm.

The way I see it, there are only two ways that you have even the slightest chance of being listened in on:

1: You make a call to or receive a call from a phone number associated with a known or suspected terrorist. Frankly, if you're making or receiving such calls, I want all sorts of people listening in on you. Hell, if I get a random phone call from such a number, I want it recorded, because odds are that a person calling me from such a number is calling to make threats.

2: You use words that trip the automatic filtering software they use to pre-screen this stuff. Like I said before, they don't have time to read every single line of text and listen to every single minute of conversation in the world. To help them out, they have computers look for phrases like "place the bombs," or "kill the hostages." Assuming that you use such a phrase in a non-terrorist planning context, the agent who reviews your conversation will quickly realize this and move on to more important things instead of wasting his time listening to your dirty-talk.

If you honestly think that your privacy has the slightest chance of being violated by government spying, you need to go straight to your doctor and request emergency ego-reduction surgery. The agents involved in these monitoring programs are working overtime trying to stay ahead of the bad guys, and none of them gives two shits about the pathetic details of your anemic sex life. Get over yourself and take off the tin-foil hat.

Re:Interesting timing

[excesspwr]

Happy content people don't go blowing themselves up or shoot random (or not so random) people by the bucketful. Happy content people lead happy content and productive lives. Eavesdropping on everyone won't make everyone happy.

Some people are only happy or content when they are blowing themselves up or shooting random (or not so random) people by the bucketful.

You can't make everyone happy. You just can't. Ever. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to make most of the people happy by ticking off the few. This time it ticked off more than a few. *shrug* Chalk it up to a bad social experiment or a learning experience of societal voting or some other nonsense that won't change anything and don't take me too serious.

Re:Interesting timing

[TechWrite]

Ok, many things here:

1. Yes, eavesdropping can save lives if done correctly. No one is disputing this. What is at issue is compliance with the laws and traditions of this country - if you wish to do something against the current laws, you had best change them BEFORE you do that something. That's how democracy works; we all get to weigh the pros and cons of changing the laws, the government DOES NOT get to just tell us that the broke the laws for our own good.

2. There is a real cost to simply breaking the laws to suit whatever the government wants to do at the time. At the least, it is a gross breakdown of democratic principles and the rule of law. We, as citizens in a democracy, have a right to know the laws we are all held to account to. We also have the right to hold our own government to those same laws. There is no president/king exemption. This isn't a slippery slope, or it could be; the point is that if our government simply ignores laws it finds inconvenient, and is allowed to so, we don't know what the laws are and who is really compelled to follow them.

Further, the government is not a collection of pure hearted do-gooders. It is made up of individuals just like you and me. Can you honestly say that there isn't a Nixon at the NSA using data illegally obtained from domestic spying for political purposes? Or to blackmail a neighbor? Or to steal credit card numbers? Or who the hell knows? Without oversight, we just don't have any idea.

3. Illegal domestic spying is also a tremendous waste of resources, as the recent revelations of NSA employees listening in on US soldiers' phone sex conversations. While they were illegally getting off, they could have been doing real work in the war on terror. Instead, they were listening in on conversations that had nothing to do with terrorism made by people who were suspected of nothing. Good going NSA, keep up the good work.

One of the most important things about requiring warrants is that it enforces some level of discipline. Not only are we relatively confident that the people being spied upon have something to do to with a criminal or terrorist act, we can also be relatively confident that valuable intelligence resources are not being wasted. Without warrants, we have neither. Without warrants, we are neither safer from terrorists or from our own government.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

But the problem is that we don't know who they are.

What if we do? Or what if we know enough to listen to a few different conversations to find out which one might be the right one? The "domestic spying" question (or scandal, if you prefer) wasn't about randomly listening in to every conversation in the world. It was about listening on some specific phones of suspected terrorists.

In other words, you can't say "we should never consider doing it except in situations where we're 100% certain it will prevent a specific future event". Because no one can perfectly predict the future.

"Eavesdropping" (or Signals Intelligence) is a tool. It's either in your toolbox or it's not. If you prohibit it, then you won't be able to use it when you need it. The authorities in Mumbai might have used it to prevent part of the massacre.

Re:Interesting timing

[eltaco]

I might be naive in my thinking, but why spend billions on listening to everyone's conversations when you could spend the same money to make their lives good. Happy content people don't go blowing themselves up or shoot random (or not so random) people by the bucketful. Happy content people lead happy content and productive lives. Eavesdropping on everyone won't make everyone happy.

couldn't agree more, but, respectfully, it is naive thinking.
they won't ever do this, because they either want the money for themselves or the power to themselves. investing in fairness or equality means they become less powerful. the only thing more powerful than money is control. thus, steps like eavesdropping are taken.
if we had governments, that actually cared about the people and not just trade and money, then they'd be doing their actual job of uniting humanity, stopping wars, ending world hunger, all that good hippy shit.
the motives of politics and politicians is the actual problem here.

also, let's not forget the brainwashed fanatics. Mumbai, 9/11, London, Barcelona, etc didn't happen because of a lack in equality or wealth. Islam is a bloodthristy religion and (islamo) terrorism is a real threat (on that note, I do not condone the actions our goverments have taken, including this current article).

Re:Interesting timing

[Fluffeh]

I don't have a problem with wiretapping or eavesdropping if the people wanting to do it go out and get a warrant. If you can prove to a judge that there is sufficient need to listen to a particular person's conversations without their knowing, that's fine. Before anyone goes down the "There isn't always time..." bollocks. If the need is there, then any paperwork can be rushed to the tune of insignificance.

What I do have a problem with is effectively taking off any and all controls about who does what and when. A blanket "telco's can't get into trouble" makes it much too easy for anyone to tune into anything they want.

Re:Interesting timing

[HangingChad]

I'm sure no one violated their rights by eavesdropping on their communications.

That's such an ignorant argument. They could have just as easily used walkie-talkies available at almost any department store, or spent some money and got some military grade communications for the cost of a few hand grenades. Or cell phones. Or satellite phones. Or wi-fi. Or broadband internet. You going to scan every frequency? Monitor every mode of communication? And it's not like they were sending detailed plans back and forth on their Blackberrys, it was tactical comm.

The type of wholesale spying the Bush administration is trying to promote and you seem to be trying to protect not only undermines the Constitution, it doesn't work. All the monitoring we have in place around the world didn't stop these yo-yo's. And it won't stop the next group. So what are you going to do then? Your philosophy is a failure. It's a false sense of security that provides no value in protection.

Combating terrorism by spying on Americans. Brilliant.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

I'm not seeing where your analysis takes terrorism seriously.

And it's all predicated on the disputed point that the "domestic spying" (or Signals Intelligence) was "illegal" And so nothing else matters. We can't save lives. There are procedures to be followed instead.

I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack -- even if the law were clear and undisputed regarding the procedures.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

This argument relies on pretending to know that warrants are always available for any situation where the conversation may be useful to save lives. Agents fighting terrorism will tell you they are not always available for those situations. People have died because no warrant was available in time.

Also, there's no need for an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. No one has proposed such a policy. A policy requiring independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices of the agents involved would be adequate. Also, any evidence gathered would be excluded from court proceedings.

If agents were found to be malicious, they could face charges. If they were found to be careless, they could face discipline. If they made an honest mistake, they could be told to be more careful next time. If they took a good-faith chance and it didn't pay off, they could be encouraged. And if they ended up saving lives, they could be commended.

It seems like a reasonable policy that might work.

Re:Interesting timing

[QuantumRiff]

??? Why aren't you asking why it wasn't prevented with the newest civil liberty destroying monitoring?

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, but goatse is really bad. If you've got nothing to hide (private or not), you've got no problems. Think about it, you're operating on a huge level of trust: Your phone call is digital, which means it is subject to routing, firewalls, logging and the lot.
  If the internet is always 'public', why not a phone call?

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

What we don't have is a system that explicitly sets out to systematically oppress and render voiceless segments of the population...

That's what Slashdot's Moderation system is for.

Re:Interesting timing

[TechWrite]

Why can't we save lives and follow the law? What was so desperate that we couldn't change the laws during the 8+ years that this was going on?

This program was against the law and the constitution of the United States of America. Period. This is not in serious dispute, that's why the immunity deal was necessary. Immunity was granted to prevent this from ever going to trial and bringing out the facts of the case. If everything was above board, why not prove it in a court of law?

And you are right, there is little in my post about terrorism. It wasn't about terrorism. It was about our government and how they are trampling the laws and traditions of this country.

The choice is not breaking laws to catch terrorists or doing nothing and letting them kill Americans; that's a false dichotomy. We can, and have for many, many years, held to the rule of law and protected our citizens. We can continue to do so.

The choice is protecting our citizens while adhering to the rule of law or not. This government has chosen not to. If the laws were insufficient, they had the option of trying to change those laws. They chose not to. This is completely unacceptable in any society that wishes to be considered democratic and those responsible need to be held to account.

Re:Interesting timing

[Skjellifetti]

Nor would they have had their rights violated under FISA as it stood before 9/11, which would have allowed eavesdropping on those Blackberries under these circumstances but would also have required the Feds to get a warrant within 72 hours after the fact. This protects individual rights under the 4th Amendment, but allows for emergencies such as happened in Mumbai. The issue here is that Bush Feds made a broad sweep of everyone's phone records after 9/11 with no attempt to obtain warrants as required by law. If the request had been legitimate, then they should have been able to obtain warrants from the FISA court which has approved such retroactive warrants something like 95% of the time. The Bush administration pulled a similar stunt with airline passenger data after 9/11, too, although unlike phone records, there was no specific law requiring warrants in order to obtain that data.

Re:Interesting timing

[Skjellifetti]

Agents fighting terrorism will tell you they are not always available for those situations. People have died because no warrant was available in time.

Those agents would be lying. FISA allowed for retroactive warrants to be issued 72 hours after the fact.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

That's such an ignorant argument. They could have just as easily used walkie-talkies available at almost any department store, or spent some money and got some military grade communications for the cost of a few hand grenades. Or cell phones. Or satellite phones. Or wi-fi. Or broadband internet. You going to scan every frequency? Monitor every mode of communication? And it's not like they were sending detailed plans back and forth on their Blackberrys, it was tactical comm.

Apparently it's an argument that's "ignorant" of a bunch of stuff that didn't happen. I agree. I claim ignorance of the non-facts about the things that didn't occur.

What did occur was that they used Blackberries. The ability and the willingness to intercept signals from those Blackberries might have come in handy. Also, the ability to look at all the calls to and from those Blackberries in the last few months might have helped. You could then listen to the phone calls on those phone numbers. And maybe find out which ones are still active in the hotels and triangulate the signals.

But they could have used WiFi, I guess, so there's no use even thinking about it (because of the "ignorance"). That's your point, right?

Re:Interesting timing

[TechWrite]

Actually, this is indeed an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. If there is no oversight, then no one looks and no one ever discovers wrongdoing. Therefore, there are no consequences. Ever.

Re:Interesting timing

[syousef]

What we don't have is a system that explicitly sets out to systematically oppress and render voiceless segments of the population - that is what's behind suicide bombers, because it takes away any value life has

You think people give a shit about having a say in how the country is run? What you don't have is a bunch of people who've watched their friends and relatives killed off with no recourse. You come pretty close on the religious fanaticism in some parts of the US, but you don't have a system where vast numbers of people believe that blowing up other people is your ticket into heaven.

Re:Interesting timing

[TapeCutter]

"I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack"

So by that logic the cops who followed that kid from Brazil into the London underground and shot him point blank in the head did the "right thing", after all he was wearing a backpack.

Your parinoia over terrorists will ruin far more lives than they could ever hope to save.

Re:Interesting timing

[ljw1004]

(!happy) !=> suicidal_killer

I had trouble reading this at first. Then I realized it's just boolean logic. "X => Y" is shorthand for "Y \/ !X". Expanding out your sentence we get

Happy /\ !Suicidal_killer

Good!

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

Actually, this is indeed an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. If there is no oversight, then no one looks and no one ever discovers wrongdoing. Therefore, there are no consequences. Ever.

So, when I said "independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices", that's a policy with no oversight? You want to elaborate on that?

Re:Interesting timing

[Fyzzler]

You are either seriously confused or totally ignorant of the law.

The legal, Constitutional and approved way of wiretapping terrorists was under the auspices of FISA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act

Under FISA, there was/is always time to get a warrant, as you can begin the wiretap immediately and have 72 hours to fill out the paperwork and get the warrant after the fact. So your comment on there not being enough time is utterly wrong.

FISA also provides the appropriate supervision by a panel of judges who do precisely what you claim needs to be done. Unfortunately, completely eliminating the point of your entire post, is the fact that what the Bush administration, the telco's and the NSA have done is warantless wiretaps, that didn't follow the law (FISA) and were ENTIRELY an example of your "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy . Basically your whole post describes FISA as your perfect ideal. When the facts of the matter are that what actually has been done is in complete violation of FISA.

Since I linked to wikipedia and this is slashdot, I will finally end with this request:
People have died because no warrant was available in time. [Citation needed]

Re:Interesting timing

[TechWrite]

Where is that "independent after the fact oversight and examination of the choices" policy today? It was a part of FISA with the 72 hour after the fact warrant provision, but with the new legislation it no longer exists. They SPECIFICALLY and PURPOSELY took out the part that provided for after the fact oversight, examination and consequences. Until this is amended, it is a policy that has no oversight, no examination and no consequences. And this is apparently by design.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

See above.

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1047557&cid=25955599

I was wrong. The guy in question didn't end up dying. And you are wrong. There's not "always time", regardless of what your talking-points say. Unless you're saying the NY Post story is false.

Re:Interesting timing

[Kohath]

It's in my post. Where did you think it was? It was a suggestion.

It's an example of a thoughtful approach to the problem. That's what I've been arguing for. Because terrorism is real and it deserves a thoughtful, balanced approach instead of the partisan games and talking-points and bumper-sticker nonsense we usually hear on this.

You want to complain about Bush. I want terrorists to succeed less often and kill fewer people. Bush is gone in a few weeks. Can we start taking terrorism seriously now that you don't have to win a partisan game any more?

Re:Interesting timing

[QuasiEvil]

I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack -- even if the law were clear and undisputed regarding the procedures.

Seriously, show me where following existing laws would have caused a terrorist to succeed in the last eight years. I mean, go ahead, just try...

(pause)

Oh wait, that's because there are no known situations. We have to take the government's good word for it. I personally don't trust anyone's good word. Show me proof. Let it be independently validated. Then we'll talk. And let's not whip out the "compromising state secrets" bit - surely if they've thwarted more than a few terrorists using this method, there must be a couple of examples that wouldn't give much away.

Even then, I personally would rather accept some risk than live under an increasingly invasive government. I would rather live - and possibly die - by the principles I believe in (strictly limited government power with checks and balances) than give them up.

Re:Interesting timing

[TubeSteak]

Also, there's no need for an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. No one has proposed such a policy.

Of course someone has proposed such a policy.
The best they could get passed as law were expanded National Security Letters as part of the PATRIOT ACT
And so far, issuing illegal NSLs has come with no serious consequences.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Letter

A policy requiring independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices of the agents involved would be adequate. Also, any evidence gathered would be excluded from court proceedings.

You mean like the FISA courts which Bush & Co. have been skirting in order to conduct mass surveillance?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Court

Your argument relies on pretending that the avenues and resources legally available to the government and police were not adequate to the task of protecting America.

Re:Interesting timing

[c-reus]

please define "terrorist". At which point does a pissed off citizen become a terrorist?

Re:Interesting timing

[Falconhell]

Right, your bombers like McVeigh dont kill themslves.

Why is that better than a suicide bomber. I would argue the suicide bomber has more courage frankly.

Re:Interesting timing

[Falconhell]

If you honestly think that terrorists would say stuff like "place the bombs," or "kill the hostages" on an open phone line, I have a bridge for sale you might like.

Re:Interesting timing

[Falconhell]

Christianity is a bloodthristy religion.

Fixed that for ya.

Ever hear of the crusades for example?

The IRA, funded by US christians?

Christians are the only people to have used nuclear wepons as I recollect.

Islamo terrorism is no more of a threat than any other type of terrorism. Demoizing Islam will not help anything, it will radicalize moderates, exactly what is not needed.

 

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

No he's saying that the problem outlined in the NY Post story wasn't caused by the FISA law, but by a DOJ that was horribly mismanaged under the Bush administration. There have been numerous other examples of mismanagement under this administration (Heck of a job, Brownie!) that make this a very plausible interpretation.

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

People have died because no warrant was available in time.

Then they should die. Jefferson may have been heartless, but he was certainly wise, when he said that the tree of liberty must be watered every now and then with the blood of tyrants and patriots.

To save the maximum number of lives, we need a totalitarian state. Do you think that this would be worth the price?

Re:Interesting timing

[jonaskoelker]

I might be naive in my thinking, but why spend billions on listening to everyone's conversations when you could spend the same money to make their lives good.

Most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small, green pieces of paper, which is odd, because on the whole, it wasn't the small, green pieces of paper which were unhappy.

;)

Re:Interesting timing

[ion.simon.c]

Is the sole piece of supporting evidence for your "there's not 'always time'" position that NY Post story?

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

Please provide an example of people dying because warrants weren't available.

Even if you can find one (doubtful), one isn't nearly enough.

Re:Interesting timing

[smoker2]

When the government removes your right to privacy, only criminals will have privacy.

Re:Interesting timing

[mrchaotica]

But the problem is that we don't know who they are.

What if we do?

Then you can get a fucking warrant to do the surveillance legally!

Re:Interesting timing

[mrchaotica]

This argument relies on pretending to know that warrants are always available for any situation where the conversation may be useful to save lives. Agents fighting terrorism will tell you they are not always available for those situations. People have died because no warrant was available in time.

That is a LIE.

Why? Because FISA already allowed warrants to be issued RETROACTIVELY. Or in other words, AFTER THE FACT. Or in other words, LATER. (Did I repeat myself enough?)

But that wasn't good enough for Bush, because he SPECIFICALLY wanted to be able to wiretap people that he KNEW he did not have probable cause to surveil, and for which the warrant would be DENIED!

It's not possible to be more blatantly unconstitutional than that!

Also, there's no need for an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. No one has proposed such a policy. A policy requiring independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices of the agents involved would be adequate. Also, any evidence gathered would be excluded from court proceedings.

WTF?!! You're completely ignorant of the situation, because that's EXACTLY what this whole fucking thing is about!

What you describe is the way FISA worked before Bush's "warrantless wiretapping!" What Bush is trying to demand is a system that has no oversight at all.

If agents were found to be malicious, they could face charges. If they were found to be careless, they could face discipline. If they made an honest mistake, they could be told to be more careful next time.

What part of "amnesty" do you not understand? The EFF is trying to do exactly what you propose: call for discipline and charges for careless and malicious agents. And Bush is trying to prevent that from happening!!!!!

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

There are plenty unhappy people in America but no homegrown suicide bombers.

Timothy McVeigh?

Re:Interesting timing

[Jason Levine]

You're thinking too small. People could talk outside of the home or in other places the telescreens couldn't see. Obviously, we need mandatory implantation of tiny microphones into everyone's mouths. The microphones would pick up what people are saying and transmit it to the Department of Homeland Security which would only use terrorist related information. (We promise! Cross our hearts! No, the hand behind our back doesn't have crossed fingers.) Now that I think of it, you also have the problem of sign language. So we can install sensors in a person's fingers and shoulders to provide real-time tracking of that movement.

If you aren't in favor of this then you're obviously a terrorist supporter!

Re:Interesting timing

[sammy baby]

I guess when he starts shooting people or blowing stuff up.

But to be clear, I'm not suggesting that everyone wiretapped in the US was a terrorist. I was speaking specifically about the example of the Mumbai gunmen.

Re:Interesting timing

[neomunk]

I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack -- even if the law were clear and undisputed regarding the procedures.

Those procedures are the safeguards of freedom, lives lost by following them is the COST of freedom. You've undoubtedly heard "freedom is not free", well, this is the price we pay. Yes, it's in blood, but every one who's ever thought about the subject with more than a gut reaction is already well aware of that.

"Freedom is not free" is not just an expression to be used as a balm on your conscience when you hear about a soldier dying, it reveals a fundamental truth about self-governing, that some people will govern themselves badly, and effect you in the process. Well, tough. Freedom is worth it.

Re:Interesting timing

[neomunk]

How, exactly, were the listeners supposed to know that THOSE Blackberries were the Blackberries that they should listen to? That's the part everyone here is asking you without directly asking you. You seem to be implying that the correct answer is to listen to ALL Blackberries, and only really pay attention to the 'terrorist' ones... Am I mistaken, or is this the actual solution you're advocating?

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

He didn't say it's better. But it's sure as hell different. The guy wasn't hopeless enough to risk (very much) his life at the tactical level (though strategically, he still ended up killing himself).

McVeigh was also pretty anomalous. That bombing was a pretty big historic event in America, not a routine thing like what we hear out of the Middle East every week.

I would argue the suicide bomber has more courage frankly.

I think you're probably right, but they might be hopeless instead. If life and death look the same to you, little courage is needed. I've never really gotten into their heads, though, so I don't know what they're thinking. Like I said, intuitively I think you're right, but I'm skeptical about their courage too.

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

What I don't understand is why the people here seem to think that the retroactive warrant system could be constitutional. Snooping without a warrant is still snooping without a warrant.

Saying "oh, yeah, we'll take care to get a warrant for this sh*t later on, eventually..." doesn't change the fact that the search was done, and without a warrant having been approved.

Re:Interesting timing

[securitytech]

The type of wholesale spying the Bush administration is trying to promote and you seem to be trying to protect not only undermines the Constitution, it doesn't work. All the monitoring we have in place around the world didn't stop these yo-yo's. And it won't stop the next group. So what are you going to do then? Your philosophy is a failure. It's a false sense of security that provides no value in protection.

Combating terrorism by spying on Americans. Brilliant.

It doesn't work? I'm as ready as anyone for Bush to go and also deplore unwarranted spying on Joe America, but we have not had another major terrorist attack on our soil in over seven years. To suggest certain terrorists aren't really trying is silly. Although it does look like they are going after softer targets now.

This might be the ONLY Bush policy that has worked.

Re:Interesting timing

[HangingChad]

but we have not had another major terrorist attack on our soil in over seven years.

It was six years between attacks on the World Trade Center. Guess that means the Clinton administration was doing a good job preventing attacks on American soil...without the Patriot Act, NSL's or wholesale spying on Americans.

They waited for the arrogant and incompetent to take over before trying again.

Imagine if Clinton had proposed the Patriot Act in the wake of the first WTC bombing. Pick up trucks loads of right wingers would have taken to the streets with guns. Right wing hate radio would have been spewing about an unconstitutional power grab. The hypocrisy force runs deep in the right.

Although it turns they did one thing right in Mumbai, they tried to warn India. Apparently they're not just spying on Americans. It's somewhat comforting to imagine there are a few competent people in the intelligence community and not totally handicapped with political appointees who's claim to mid-east intelligence experience was running the Arabian Horse Association.

Re:Interesting timing

[mrchaotica]

I don't think most people here (aside from idiots like Kohath) think FISA is constitutional; I think they just consider it to be less unconstitutional than wiretapping without ever bothering to get a warrant at all.

You could attempt to rationalize it by saying that if the search turned out to be unjustified, and a warrant were not issued, that any information found from that search could not be used as evidence. This line of reasoning is flawed for several reasons (e.g. authorities could try to use information found during an unwarranted search as probable cause for a second search; the information could be damaging even without being counted as evidence, such as in the "court of public opinion;" etc.).

Re:Interesting timing

[dogmatixpsych]

I like Jefferson as much as the next guy, maybe more, but is his view the only one that matters? His ideas of government were very different than many of the other Founding Fathers. Our country was founded on a mix of ideologies. We have a mix today. Just because one brilliant and well-respected Founding Father had one view does not make that the only or best view.

I generally agree with the statement, by the way, I just think we need to be cautious in accepting what Jefferson said as canonized scripture.

Re:Interesting timing

[securitytech]

You seem to be suggesting that terrorist/counter-terrorist strategies don't evolve.

No previous terror attack on US soil is comparable in any shape to 9/11. For the US, and Bush (since we're discussing Bush policies), that was the beginning.

We could go back to the 1960's/70's if you wanted to contrast/compare minor "terrorist" attacks between presidents. Heck, in the civil war half the country was "terrorists" according to your insinuated definition.

And to suggest that Bill Clinton prevented an attack like 9/11 (since we didn't have one, right?) is so woefully naive on it's face, it doesn't require a serious response.

As I said, I'm ready for Bush to go, but every problem in the country/world is not his fault and to suggest so only takes away from any meaningful valid points you might make/have made.

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

Kohath, you are completely ignoring everyone's argument..

To spy on their blackberries would not have been illegal in the US, they just would have had to put it on record within 72 hours after the fact that they did.

They do not want to (and did not in the past) because then there would be records showing them using it for purposes OTHER than catching terrorists.

That's why you REQUIRE these safeguards be followed, because given the immense power of the ability to listen in on any communication you like it is GUARANTEED to be misused and abused for personal/political benefit.

Do you really believe that having this power abused and no more privacy on any communication anyone anywhere makes (except those of whoever is currently in power), is not worth the trivial amount of effort to require it to be put it on record AFTER THE FACT?

Re:Interesting timing

[Anonymous Coward]

also, let's not forget the brainwashed fanatics. Mumbai, 9/11, London, Barcelona, etc didn't happen because of a lack in equality or wealth. Islam is a bloodthristy religion and (islamo) terrorism is a real threat (on that note, I do not condone the actions our goverments have taken, including this current article).

I have to pretty strongly disagree here. All the examples you listed are derivatives of exactly a lack of equality and wealth. Somewhere else in this thread, someone rather accurately corrected one of my posts: I identified people who turned to suicide bombings and similar actions as deeply unhappy, while I was corrected (wisely) to identify them as deeply helpless.

People who resort to such measures aren't following the mainstream of any major religion. they are the extremists. Extremist/fundamentalist groups of Islam have performed terrorist acts. Extremist and fundamentalist groups of Hindus have perpetrated terrible violence on Christians while denounced by the vast majority of peaceful Hindus. Christians had the IRA and the KKK. Look at what recently happened in Tibet! It's not limited at all to any one religion. It's the splinter groups who end up feeling utterly helpless that end up perpetrating these sort of actions.

Where you might be somewhat misled at the moment into thinking that it's somewhat more of an Islamic thing is that, lets face it, overall in our world today, Muslims are generally taking the brunt of poverty and helplessness to do anything at all about it. Going by the numbers, they might have more out there currently, but the again, we are also watching our western media companies, and lets face it - they love to show Muslim extremists doing these sort of things. There isn't much better news than seeing some dude holding a AK-47 and burning a flag while having his face covered up by something akin to a tea towel. Why? Because we have been CONDITIONED to be scared/fearful of those images.

They even hacked Obama!

[Anonymous Coward]

The telecoms involved should be seriously fried for their eager collaboration with unconstitutional, Orwellian no-probable-cause surveillance. I am pleased to know that they overstepped themselves to the point of hacking Obama's old flip-phone account.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2335143,00.asp

They deserve to have an incoming President on their hands who knows how untrustworthy they can be.

Vote with your dollars: go over to Credo.

Re:They even hacked Obama!

[TechWrite]

He knows it so well that he voted for their immunity? Yeah, good thing Obama's coming into office, I'm just sure he's going to do something!

Re:They even hacked Obama!

[The Master Control P]

I would say "must be a troll," but Poe's Law says otherwise.

You do know it was a few dipshits working for Verizon who have now been fired, right?

Re:They even hacked Obama!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, I do know that. Means nada. "A few bad apples." Same story they give about crap like Abu Ghraib. Punish a few noncoms when orders came from the tippy top.

Am I saying Verizon execs ordered Obama's account hacked? No, I am not aware of any evidence of that. What I am saying is that Verizon execs (and those at most other big telecoms) created an atmosphere where this type of wrongdoing was not considered radioactive even to consider.

Question for study: would they have been caught and punished if Obama lost the election? What if they did the same thing to somebody far back in the pack, say Kucinich. Would you even have heard this story?

Silly gun nut

[EmbeddedJanitor]

All these gun nuts say they need unlicensed firearms to protect there freedom.

You're full of shit. If you really were protecting freedom you'd have done something by now. Bush has violated more freedoms than any president before and you gun nuts have done absolutely nothing. I call your bluff!

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order. Ed Howdershelt

We are not as nutty as the anti-gun "nuts" like to label us.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

A bit off topic, but you both have valid points.

So called "gun nuts" often couldn't care less about the erosion of many other freedoms including those involving free speech and unlawful search and seizure, and many actually think that the war on drugs is a good thing, etc.

On the flipside, the so called, "hippy liberals" want all the freedom in the world when it doesn't involve guns.

What needs to happen is both types of people need to get together(over a budweiser and some granola perhaps?) and realize that it's EVERYONE who is having their freedoms taken away.

A society works best when it's citizens have as many freedoms as possible, in my humble opinion of course. What we need is cooperation and education, not fear mongering from either side.

Re:Silly gun nut

[tsotha]

Bush has violated more freedoms than any president before and you gun nuts have done absolutely nothing. I call your bluff!

This is the most historically ignorant thing I've read in awhile. Bush is way, way down on that list. Wilson goes at the top. Above Bush we'd find FDR, Jackson, Nixon, LBJ... and probably a few others I don't know about.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

No one is gonna like it but Lincoln was the worst of all, guy was a total asshole he seems to get a free pass historically because of the civil war.

Re:Silly gun nut

[HUADPE]

The winner is FDR, with Japanese internment. Second is John Adams, with the alien and sedition acts. The president with the net record for granting most freedoms goes, strangely enough, to Andrew Johnson, under whom the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments came into effect (no slavery, and equal protection under law).

Re:Silly gun nut

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"unlawful search and seizure"

Pretty sure most "gun nuts" are all about private property. Also pretty sure most of them have that "Trespassers will be shot, survivors will be shot again" sign every 15 feet around their property.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Sephollyon]

Property as in your house and the things inside maybe. As far unlawful search and seizure of data, well I've too often been told by people that could be classified as "gun nuts" the old chestnut, "I don't have anything to hide..."

Re:Silly gun nut

[ncgnu08]

Bush has violated more freedoms than any president before and you gun nuts have done absolutely nothing. I call your bluff!

This is the most historically ignorant thing I've read in awhile. Bush is way, way down on that list. Wilson goes at the top. Above Bush we'd find FDR, Jackson, Nixon, LBJ... and probably a few others I don't know about.

Or maybe this is the definition of irony.... Ever notice the ones calling others ignorant are usually just that?

Re:Silly gun nut

[skam240]

I reject your claims in regards to both LBJ and Nixon (and I would definitively ad Lincoln to the list). I ask you to support your statement in regards to these presidents and why they would rank above our current president in regards to limiting our freedoms.

Re:Silly gun nut

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Have you considered the possibility that the whole civil war thing was more than a "free pass"? FFS, the civil war was the only conflict post 1812 that featured more than a pitiful quantity of hostile forces on American soil and was all around a dicey prospect. I'm not a huge fan of elaborate presidential war powers; but the civil war, where large swaths of the US were quite literally battlefields, is about the most plausible and least objectionable place they could have been employed. You had a conflict of limited scope and duration which significantly imperiled the survival of the nation. Had these powers been extended beyond the war proper("Why yes, the survival of the nation depends on my having absolute power until the War on Successionism(tm) has been won forever") then that would have been a much, much more serious issue.

Now, I write this not because I agree with Lincoln's policies; but because I think the "free pass" characterization is seriously questionable. In a number of respects, the civil war was a uniquely threatening conflict and, if they apply anywhere, the place in American history where such powers would apply.

Re:Silly gun nut

[MostAwesomeDude]

In addition to your other replies, don't forget about Lincoln. Suspension of habeas corpus during wartime; isn't that one of the things we've criticized Bush for?

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

The most freedoms gained would go under Washington (bill of rights).

Re:Silly gun nut

[slashqwerty]

Suspension of habeas corpus during wartime; isn't that one of the things we've criticized Bush for?

No. We've criticized Bush for suspension of habeas corpus during peace time. Congress has not declared war since 1941. The constitution specifically states:

The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it.

During Lincoln's time there was an official, declared war. The nation was routinely being invaded by confederate soldiers. Some may say the entire confederacy was a rebellion.

Also, the war had a clear enemy and ending point (as opposed to a 'war' on a concept) and the suspension was lifted after the war ended.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the most historically ignorant thing I've read in awhile. Bush is way, way down on that list.

It's not clear to me that it's even possible to make a list.

A lot of the things Bush has done weren't even (technologically) possible for other presidents. This creates two problems. First, you've got to somehow rank a set of very different violations and, second, you'll never really know what a president would have done had that president governed in another time.

Have said that, Bush was bad. The system he set up in Afghanistan was to pay bad people (war lords, thugs, bounty hunters, etc.) to kidnap people in Afghanistan and turn them over to the US military. The US military would then torture the kidnap victims into some sort of confession and ship them off to Guantanamo for indefinite detention.

Civilized societies have known for hundreds of years that rounding up random people and torturing them into confession isn't not the way to run a criminal justice system. Somehow, the Bush administration didn't have that one figured out.

Not surprisingly, a number of innocent people got tortured to death by the US military. The actual stories of the victims are quite sad but I'm tired of typing at the moment. Also, huge numbers of innocent people had years of their lives brutally taken from them in detention at Guantanamo.

So, getting back to the original point - the gun nuts really haven't been much help on preventing the Bush administration from doing the terrible things that it has done.

Re:Silly gun nut

[tsotha]

Well, Johnson was using the FBI to gather information on people he considered subversive. For example, Martin Luther King Jr's phone was bugged by the FBI - he had a huge file detailing every part of his life, including personal stuff like marital infidelities. They bugged phones and kept files on almost every anti-war or civil rights leader at the time.

Nixon did the same thing, but to a greater degree. Not only did his administration watch "subversives", he also used government personnel to keep tabs on political opponents. The Nixon administration was the closest we've ever had to a surveillance state. The only reason he didn't do more of it had to do with the limits of technology, not the limits of law. Hell, FISA was written as a result of some of Nixon's shenanigans.

From what we know the Bush program tapped phones of people making calls to or receiving calls from a person in a foreign country who is already suspected of being part of a terrorist organization. That's way, way more restrictive than the other two. As far as Habeas Corpus not applying to enemy spies and saboteurs... meh. That was never a provision of the law until the Supreme Court conjured it out of thin air. When German saboteurs were apprehended in the US during WWII, they were tried and executed by military courts without ever having access to the civilian court system. I think you'll find now that the election is over everyone will start to remember this isn't a change from how things have always been done.

Re:Silly gun nut

[DeepHurtn!]

Regarding habeas corpus -- well, it's as much "thin air" as any of the common law is. Make of that what you will, but I'd suggest that the character of the "War on Terror" is quite different than that of WWII, and that more civilian oversight is certainly called for.

Re:Silly gun nut

[thtrgremlin]

which is ironic, cause the civil war was pretty much death to the 9th and 10th amendments, state sovereignty, and the voluntary nature of statehood as the constitution had intended. The end of slavery was inevitable. The US was the LAST civilized nation in the world to abolish slavery, not to mention the fact that it was abolished long after everyone else. The idea that the the civil war was about protecting human rights, despite whatever happened in retrospect or coincidently, it a really sick interpretation. I'll say I wish it wasn't so... but...

The north was struggling through an industrial revolution while the south was prosperous. Lincoln felt it necessary by any means necessary for the south to share the burden. Part of the "final straw" was when Lincoln attempted an embargo on European farming equipment for the south, despite the inferiority and expense of goods from the north. A war here was inevitable.

The civil war was an atrocity in so many ways. If it was about slavery, more could have been done in the case of Dread Scott. It really hurts how generalized that war has become in our history.

Re:Silly gun nut

[thtrgremlin]

I think one reason "free pass" doesn't make a lot of sense (not to conflict necessarily with other things I have said) is that he was president during the only (what we call) civil war in this country. I think as far as history lessons go, schools really don't go into the issue of the flow of policies and their regard to constitution. Anything that might be characterized as "evil" by any president is quickly forgotten. No offense, but I am pretty sure the whole "Bush was the worst president ever" will soon be forgotten (relatively) once he is out of office.

Re:Silly gun nut

[thtrgremlin]

What? I thought Lincoln personally drafted and signed all those onto law!

Re:Silly gun nut

[thtrgremlin]

That's cute

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree, and I am a person where the two sides come together. I love granola (homemade by mom, no less!) and beer. I'm a liberal that believes in gun rights. Or a conservative that doesn't mind weed and wants church out of state out of church. Take your pick. All I know is I want ALL the freedoms they try to take from me, and I won't take no for an answer. On any of them. Period.

You spent my childhood touting how these freedoms are the one thing that makes my country great, then try to take them away and think I'll just put up with it? What's wrong with you? Fuck you, give 'em back. Give 'em all back and keep your damn hands off of 'em till the end of time.

Re:Silly gun nut

[shutdown -p now]

You know, Lincoln had suspended habeas corpus and introduced censorship and military tribunals for civilians during the Civil War (and was smacked by SCOTUS for doing so). Why is he not on your list?

Re:Silly gun nut

[shutdown -p now]

During Lincoln's time there was an official, declared war.

There wasn't. An official declaration of war can only be made against another recognized country. Of course, the Union did not recognize the Confederacy!

The nation was routinely being invaded by confederate soldiers.

In case you missed your history class, it was the North which invaded the South (to suppress the rebellion), not vice versa.

Some may say the entire confederacy was a rebellion.

Of course it was! Furthermore, it's not "some" that say it, but was the official position of the Union at that time (and to this day):

DOMESTIC INTELLIGENCE. A PROCLAMATION.

By the President of the United States of America:

Whereas, It has become necessary to call into service, not only volunteers, but also portions of the militia of the States by draft, in order to suppress the insurrection existing in the United States, and disloyal persons are not adequately restrained by the ordinary processes of law from hindering this measure, and from giving aid and comfort in various ways to the insurrection. Now, therefore, be it ordered, that during the existing insurrection, and as a necessary measure for suppressing the same, all rebels and insurgents, their aiders and abettors within the United States, and all persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia drafts, or guilty of any disloyal practice affording aid and comfort to the rebels against the authority of the United States, shall be subject to martial law, and liable to trial and punishment by courts-martial or military commission.

Second: That the writ of habeas corpus is suspended in respect to all persons arrested, or who are now, or hereafter during the rebellion shall be, imprisoned in any fort, camp, arsenal, military prisons, or other place of confinement, by any military authority, or by the sentence of any court-martial or military commission.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. Done at the City of Washington, this Twenty-fourth day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventh.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN. By the President.

WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Falconhell]

Yeh, I can see how getting a head job is MUCH more serious than blatantly flouting your constitution.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't Lincoln suspend the Constitution? I would consider that a "violation of freedom" (if I was an American)

Re:Silly gun nut

[AlexBirch]

-> The nation was routinely being invaded by confederate soldiers.
In case you missed your history class, it was the North which invaded the South (to suppress the rebellion), not vice versa.
Funny I thought Gettysburg was in Pennsylvania. Need to brush up on my

Re:Silly gun nut

[AlexBirch]

er I need to brush up on my geography.

Re:Silly gun nut

[shutdown -p now]

What does Gettysburg have to do with it? The American Civil War began with the North attacking and invading the South. In the course of the war itself, the South has reciprocated, but they didn't start it, and their initial stance was "live and let live" as far as foreign relations were concerned.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

Government cannot grant freedom, because freedom precedes government. That is why we call them "inalienable" (or natural) rights: because they are moral and just no matter what the power pyramid says. If freedom was subjective and defined by the law, then freedom would be arbitrary and meaningless. (Indeeed, that is exactly what most of the power elite want you to believe.)

Put another way, freedom is the natural state of human existance. In the absence of centralized power and its special right to employ coercion, there is 100% freedom. From there, government can only reduce the amount of freedom, never add to it. In the case where a guarantee of some sort is issued (such as the amendments you mentioned), it is not a grant or gift of "extra freedom" but merely a limit on what freedoms centralized power may attack.

To be sure, the organization holding the unique ability to employ coercion over the individual as their means (government) cannot logically be a source of freedom (defined as the absence of a coercive master) for that individual. The source of freedom is simply human nature: the desire to be free of a coercive master.

Re:Silly gun nut

[UdoKeir]

You need to brush up on your history. The American Civil War started with the Battle of Fort Sumter, where the South was the aggressor.

Re:Silly gun nut

[shutdown -p now]

Fort Sumter was on the territory of CSA. One can't be an aggressor on one's own territory.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Anonymous Coward]

Fort Sumter was US government property. The early campaigns were the confederates invading the north to try and force them to the bargaining table quickly as it was fairly well known among the southern commanders that a long protracted war could not be won by the south.

Re:Silly gun nut

[oddfox]

April 12, 1861 - At 4:30 a.m. Confederates under Gen. Pierre Beauregard open fire with 50 cannons upon Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. The Civil War begins.

Every single other source of information I can find supports that the Confederates were the first to open fire on anyone in this civil war. Here is the link where that came from. The Confederacy attempted to lay claim to federal forts, and that is a big no-no, then and now and forever.

Re:Silly gun nut

[Golddess]

You should ask them if you can install webcams facing all of their toilets.

Re:Silly gun nut

[dogmatixpsych]

Which is funny because Johnson is pretty low on the list of "best presidents." FDR and Adams are near the top, at least Adams is near the top 10. Isn't is strange that many of our "best" presidents were the ones who squashed personal liberties (whatever that means) the most?

What would John McClane do?

[Hal_Porter]

He'd catch the terrorists first, worry about paperwork and suspensions afterwards.

I think that's a lesson for all you Fourth Amendment Nazis.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Lost Penguin]

"He'd catch the terrorists first, worry about paperwork and suspensions afterwards."

Yet, his childhood "pal" Osama Bin Laden is still free.
How long has Bush been "Pal'n around" with terrorists?

Since the Republicans want to blame Obama for Ayers misdeeds, this is a legitimate question now.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Dragonslicer]

He'd catch the terrorists first, worry about paperwork and suspensions afterwards.

And yet FISA already let the government do that.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[TechWrite]

And as long as he filed his paperwork no later than 72 hours after starting surveillance, there would be no problem under FISA. This "we need every power imaginable with no oversight or you're a pot smoking terrorist loving liberal commie bastard" false dichotomy has just got to stop. FISA was more than enough as it was and this new legislation is a power grab, plain and simple.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Anonymous Coward]

But what would Brian Boitano?

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Hal_Porter]

Yet, his childhood "pal" Osama Bin Laden is still free.

John McClane is not a pal of some Iraqi terrorist asshole.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Woosh.... - Sound of a joke going over your head. John McClane not John McCain. "Yippee ki-yay, motherfucker"

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets see now, the forth amendment or the Bush ego, which is more important?

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Anonymous Coward]

John McCain would have a stroke and saturate his adult diapers. And thus he would forever redefine the term, "patriotic duty."

Re:What would John McClane do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Calling defenders of the Fourth Amendment Nazis?

Too.... much..... irony.... ARGH!

Re:What would John McClane do?

[neomunk]

lol @ Iraqi terrorist.

That's the good stuff right there.

Re:What would John McClane do?

[neomunk]

...and then Palin would pull a Burns and "release the hounds".

(P.S. the OP said McClane, not McCain. If you don't know who John McClane is, google it. The joke is pretty funny.)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Government Secrets...sure...

[ITEric]

From the full article...

The administration also says the immunity is warranted because the lawsuits threaten to expose government secrets.

So if the government wants to get away with (insert atrocity here), all that would be necessary is for them to say "shhhh, it's a secret!" I see they've been to the Cheney School of Government:P I thought in cases where secrets were involved the court just reviewed that evidence behind closed doors...maybe I'm wrong.

Not just Bush's fight

[SuperKendall]

Obama voted for it too you know.

If he were really against it as some of the more delusion supporters claim, then he would issue a statement at this time supporting making it unconstitutional. Expect no statement.

Re:Not just Bush's fight

[Anonymous Coward]

Obama made it pretty clear he only voted for it as part of a larger bill, feeling that the benefits of having it pass outweighed the down side. He doesn't support this; however, it just isn't quite as much of an issue for him as many of us would like it to be.

Re:Not just Bush's fight

[WilyCoder]

I think if Obama voted against it his opponents would label him a terrorist. Well they did that anyway I suppose....

Re:Not just Bush's fight

[internic]

Obama voted for an amendment to strip the immunity provision. IIRC, he also voted against an early version of the Protect America Act that included the immunity provision. When they couldn't strip the immunity and Bush had let months go by refusing to vote on any version not including immunity, only then did he vote for the bill containing the immunity. He stated something to the effect that he opposed the immunity but felt that other portions of the bill continuing/clarifying certain surveillance powers were too important to vote against.

Essentially this was the standard game where supporters of the controversial provision tack it onto a larger, important bill. The president vows to veto any bill that does not contain the provision. Then the two sides play chicken as time goes on and the important bill is not passed to see who will flinch first. This is the same thing that happened with Iraq war funding, where the president would veto any bill with a time line and then complain about how the Democrats don't "support our troops". Bush would go on to criticize John Kerry on this, despite the fact that Kerry had voted for the funding, with a time line for withdrawal. Something similar happened over the budget, causing a government shutdown in the 90s. People in congress are then left with the choice of whether to delay something really important (legitimate surveillance, troop funding, funding government agencies) and play chicken with the other side or to relent and vote for something they don't agree with in order that other good and necessary things happen. You don't have to agree with the decision, but don't buy into the lobotomized sort of ignorant debate that gave us "he voted for it before he voted against it".

So, is Obama the messianic savior embodying everything that each of us wants in a politician? No, of course he's not. And I personally really wanted to see him fight harder on the FISA issue. Why didn't he? I'm not sure. It may be the stated reason, that he thought the other stuff was too important. Or it may be that he recognized it was an unwinnable battle (they didn't even have enough people for a filibuster, much less to strip the immunity) that would likely prove to be political suicide, because the already more hawkish Hillary Clinton could paint him as weak on defense (not to mention an eventual republican opponent). While I think that sometimes a good politician must fight the good fight no matter the cost, I understand that a smart and effective politician must pick his battles most of the time. I also recognize that a president must be representative of a wide national consensus, not the mirror of my positions on every issue. So, given the alternatives I'm still quite glad it will be Obama in the White House.

Government secrets AKA covering their asses

[LockeOnLogic]

The administration also says the immunity is warranted because the lawsuits threaten to expose government secrets.

This was why immunity should NOT be warranted! And before you start screaming national security, exactly what kind of information that could be brought out in a civil case which would damage national security? Methods? Competent terrorists aren't going to be caught by dragnet style filtering anyway unless its technical prowess is far beyond what most experts agree is currently possible.

This is either protecting corporate cronies, protecting themselves, or most likely both.

Re:Government secrets AKA covering their asses

[Running Fool]

Competent terrorists aren't going to be caught by dragnet style filtering anyway unless its technical prowess is far beyond what most experts agree is currently possible.

I don't know about you, but I'd like to catch the incompetent terrorists too.

Re:Government secrets AKA covering their asses

[LockeOnLogic]

Incompetent terrorists are likely to be unable to orchestrate highly damaging attacks. They are also more likely to be caught by other less invasive and more effective techniques of law enforcement.

Time to talk to your local ACLU chapter

[$criptah]

If you have not considered getting involved with ACLU, then now it is the perfect time. There is much more at stake here than just a law. From the article:

SAN FRANCISCO - The Bush administration on Tuesday will try to convince a federal judge to let stand a law granting retroactive legal immunity to the nation's telecoms, which are accused of transmitting Americans' private communications to the National Security Agency without warrants.

This is retoractive! First of all, it means that the companies cannot be sued for breaking the law. Secondly, this action opens the door for other retroactive cases. If we can grant immunity for something that has happened in the past we can sure as hell find a way to sue for something that has happned many years ago as well. What will this action mean for cases with expired statutes of limitations? Will the gov't be able to put you behind the bars just because you have done something long-long time ago? Given some of the recent cases, like the MySpace.com guilty verdict, stuff like this raises hair on my back. What strikes me the most is that most of the laws are pro-active. This means that if a prisoner is serving the time for an action that has recently became legal or has been downgraded (e.g. felony became a misdemeanor), it is not likely that the prisoner will be released out of jail without any serious judicial proceedings and yet companies get a get-out-of-jail card.

Before he gets away with it

[c4str4t0]

Bush should be tried in a similar manner as Saddam. Let the courts decide what to do with him and his god decide where to send him after they've ruled.

You have no constitutional right to privacy

[Saysys]

No where in the constitution is there an express 'right to privacy', this is a fact, if you disagree try reading the document.

The 'right' to privacy is a right made by the USSC and though we have a long standing tradition of following laws made on the bench there is nothing that the court can do to enforce its own laws.

If we want to live in a society free of totalitarian style thought policing and information scanning then we need more than simple rulings against warrantless wiretaps. What we must have in order to protect us from unchecked power in the executive branch is both an independent judiciary and a legislative branch that values personal freedom.

Without a constitutional amendment to hold anyone who violates our rights to privacy like this again accountable for treason we are doing nothing less than tacitly consenting to such despicable acts whenever the executive branch finds it convenient.

Re:You have no constitutional right to privacy

[c4str4t0]

dude...read the 4th amendment.

Re:You have no constitutional right to privacy

[Running Fool]

Without a constitutional amendment to hold anyone who violates our rights to privacy like this again accountable for treason we are doing nothing less than tacitly consenting to such despicable acts whenever the executive branch finds it convenient.

From Article III Section 3 of the Constitution: Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

Sedition perhaps, but I think it's a bit of a stretch for treason.

Re:You have no constitutional right to privacy

[PPH]

No where in the constitution is there an express 'right to privacy', this is a fact, if you disagree try reading the document.

Fourth Amendment:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue; but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Fifth Amendment:

No person shall .... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

The 'right' to privacy is a right made by the USSC

...simply by interpreting knowledge of one's private affairs as property no less deserving of protection than papers and effects. This isn't really a big stretch, as the government's interest in ones 'papers' is for the information contained therein. Spying on the activities of people is no different than seizing their 'papers and effects'. Intellectual property is just like any other private property.

Re:You have no constitutional right to privacy

[Legion303]

"No where in the constitution is there an express 'right to privacy', this is a fact, if you disagree try reading the document."

That is indeed a fact. On the other hand, if you *understand* the constitution (as opposed to just skimming over the words while moving your lips), you know that the founders understood that rights are inherent, that no one can take them away, and that it would be impossible to enumerate this infinite number of rights. They revisited this idea in the ninth amendment after listing some of the more important rights in case you forgot what they wrote at the beginning, but I see it didn't help in your case.

So which box are you on?

[EmbeddedJanitor]

Seen lots of soap boxing at NRA conventions.

Seen no ballot boxing, jury boxing or ammo boxing by NRA types. How far do liberties have to be eroded before you kick into another gear? With the worst president in history - both popularity and in terms of liberty - you're still on the soap box, so to think you'd ever go as far as the ammo box is just the beer talking. Face it, you're never going to need that gun for the cause of liberty.

Again I call your bluff!

I see good reason for having a well armed, but well trained and regulated, body of gun owners - like the Swiss.

What is bullshit is a bunch of untrained, unregulated couch cowboys that claim to need their weapons for freedom but really do nothing apart from subscribing to Soldier of Fortune magazine and lube their dicks with cammo paint.

And yes, I have owned and used guns and been in the military.

Re:So which box are you on?

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"Seen no ballot boxing..."

Yeah, I mean, the NRA has NEVER endorsed or opposed a political candidate. And even if they did, it's not like their members would be swayed to vote for them. Nope, never happened. Not. Ever.

Oh wait, except always and forever. Other than "always" and "forever" it never happened.

Re:So which box are you on?

[skam240]

I call bullshit. They only support candidates who are pro-gun. They aren't pushing forward any political agenda other then gun ownership. The NRA could give a rats ass about political freedoms outside of this. This should be apparent in their wide spread support for our current administration. If they were so liberty oriented then they would have been campaigning against Republicans quite some time ago.

Re:So which box are you on?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." Thomas Jefferson

Again I call your bluff!

Not again as I am not the AC whom you tried to call but the AC who requested you not to bundle us ( supporters of the second amendment or ACs ) under the same labels. I believe in the rest of the Constitution as well but disagree with much of the interpretation including the ideas that you can have "gun control" laws without violating the 2nd amendment and that includes this foolish idea that gun registration will stop a single criminal from obtaining a firearm. Only those willing to delude themselves with false security would ever believe such nonsense. Further I am not now nor have I ever have been a member of the NRA.

Militias in those days were but the general body of able men. In case of invasion or hostile inside takeover of the government, the militia would be endangered by having their guns registered. And yes, one could argue that membership in the NRA provides a similar danger to them. Everyone must make their own decisions there. Registration with many other groups could cause similar problems including the ACLU. Now I guess you can hop back on your soapbox and add paranoid to your name calling. Enjoy your freedom of speech.

Re:So which box are you on?

[thtrgremlin]

I am actually happy they stick to an issue. They are the National Rifle Association. I would rather join multiple groups that support my various beliefs than try to find the one that best represents all my opinions. I don't really want their opinion on other issues any more than I want to eat a Linux powered sandwich...

Re:So which box are you on?

[NormalVisual]

If they were so liberty oriented then they would have been campaigning against Republicans quite some time ago.

You probably should actually look at the candidates that they endorse. NRA support for Democratic candidates is not a rare thing by any stretch of the imagination, provided the candidate's positions are consistent with the NRA's stance. As a matter of fact, they endorsed the Democratic candidate for the state House in my district.

Re:So which box are you on?

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't need to kick in another gear...just to kick in your head because we support him, JACKASS!

Re:So which box are you on?

[mrchaotica]

The NRA works to defend the 2nd Amendment; the ACLU works to defend the other nine (in the Bill of Rights). I see nothing wrong with this, except that the ACLU ought to care about #2 too.

Re:So which box are you on?

[roguetrick]

ACLU is a group of idealists interested in a safe and free democratic system in which killing would never be necessary.

NRA is a group of idealists thinking they could actually do something if killing became necessary.

Despite all of that, I wish we didn't have our kids pledge allegiance to the flag and instead had them spend more time respecting the constitution and its interpretations.

Re:So which box are you on?

[Anonymous Coward]

I see good reason for having a well armed, but well trained and regulated, body of gun owners - like the Swiss.

When was the last time Switzerland was invaded? That's not a very good example. Let's look at two countries recently invaded - Iraq and Afghanistan. Both countries have plenty of rifles readily available. Both countries turned out to be much more difficult to invade and control than the experts said they would be. The gun owners weren't particularly well trained and regulated like the Swiss, but they have kept Afghanistan "free" in parts, in the face of overwhelming force.

Your average Iraqi might be clutching his rifle tightly, thinking it's the only thing that's kept him out of Abu Ghraib prison. Your average Afghani was probably given his first rifle soon after he could walk, and taught to shoot at the Soviet invader forces with it.

But some people think that the world is a really nice place, and it's okay to disarm your entire population. They think it's a good idea to teach people that guns are bad and mustn't be touched. They think that the army or the police can handle everything for them. No need to even try to defend yourself. Let the government handle it. The government does so well with everything else, surely it'll do a good job of defending everybody's very lives.

Some people don't agree with this viewpoint, so they are branded "gun nuts". Fine if that's the way you want it. How about if "gun nuts" are allowed to have guns if they want, and "people afraid of guns" can have none. Then everybody can be happy surely?

If you think guns are bad and that people shouldn't have them, then don't keep any. But respect other people's right to decide for themselves what is best for them? Can you do it? What's next? Ban meat eating and force everybody to be vegetarian because "it's better for the planet"?

How about we let each person decide for themselves how they want to live? How about we let each person decide for themselves whether they own a gun? Fair compromise?

Re:So which box are you on?

[Anonymous Coward]

During WWII, before the American involvement so you might not have heard of this, the Swiss and Germans had a wee bit of fighting going on

Admittedly with fighter aircraft

Re:So which box are you on?

[FireFury03]

I don't really want their opinion on other issues any more than I want to eat a Linux powered sandwich...

But penguin sandwiches are just yummy!

Re:So which box are you on?

[Dark_Gravity]

Seen lots of soap boxing at NRA conventions.

Seen no ballot boxing, jury boxing or ammo boxing by NRA types. How far do liberties have to be eroded before you kick into another gear?

I am a lifetime NRA member who has been summoned to jury duty. One of the times I was summoned, I was empaneled as a juror. I also vote regularly in both primary and general elections. I would respectfully request that you lose your vitriol and self-righteous indignation, as it is completely unwarranted.

Perhaps you can find the answer to your question of when the citizens will take up up arms against the government by looking within yourself. Apparently you have not found it necessary to take up arms over all of the injustices being committed by the US government, so who are you to accuse anyone else of not firing the first shot? As long as the population is fat, dumb and happy there will be no violent uprising over infringement of civil liberties.

Here's some food for thought on why those that champion firearms and liberty aren't as eager for bloodshed as you seem to paint them. Today's firearms activist is more intelligent and diverse than you are willing to acknowledge, because it sabotages your stereotype of the NRA member as a drunken, homicidal, cousin-humping redneck.

Just because I haven't had to break open the ammo box yet doesn't mean I should surrender it. How many household fires in your home have required a fire extinguisher? Yet you probably still keep one, don't you?

Perhaps you should put as much effort into expressing your ideas as you put into your ad hominem attacks.

Re:So which box are you on?

[Anonymous Coward]

The NRA stick to the issue of having guns but ignore the reason why they are supposed to be able to have guns in the first place.

By supporting politicians who abuse their power in a manner that guns were supposed to protect them from, they have rightly shown themselves as JUST a party for "gun nuts".

Concentrating on the lesser of these intertwined issues at the neglect of the other, causes more damage to the system than it prevents. Basically they are approving of (electing) someone taking your rights away as long as you get to keep your guns, which were meant to protect your rights which have just been taken away without any complaint!

Now if they only supported candidates who supported gun rights and the rest of their rights then I might take them seriously.

Re:So which box are you on?

[thtrgremlin]

Well, gun owners really are not news worthy. Gun nuts are much more interesting. I also think all responsible gun owners know it is best not to advertise that you are a gun owner considering the black market value on weapons. You would need to be a nut to advertise that you keep expensive equipment worth stealing in your house.

Re:So which box are you on?

[skam240]

As far as I know this mostly happens in conservative districts like those in the South. Honestly, I think it's adorable that people are so easily hoodwinked by Southern Democrats into thinking that the party will endorse "gun rights" just like "California Republicans" (AKA: fiscal conservatives but social liberals) think that their votes don't push forth the Religious Right's agenda.

Re:So which box are you on?

[NormalVisual]

The Democratic Party as a group doesn't consider Second Amendment rights as a civil rights issue and would much prefer the whole idea go away completely, but that attitude doesn't necessarily extend to individual members. I'm not really concerned with the party's position on a given bill - I'm concerned with how my particular representatives will vote on it - are they going to toe the party line, or are they going to think for themselves and vote accordingly?.

As a group, neither party has a particularly good track record regarding individual liberties. Talk is cheap, and one should pay closer attention to a candidate's past actions than their words.

Re:So which box are you on?

[skam240]

The thing is, is that if your representative is in favor of a key issue you support but belongs to a party that does not support this issue and said party has a majority in either the House or Senate then your representative is helping them to maintain this majority. This grants the party all kinds of advantages in pushing forward their own agenda and marginalizes your representative's ability to push forward with your key issue. This is why in congressional elections I generally only vote one party (unless my favored party is putting up a complete incompetent) because even if the other party has a candidate that I like more I find their party on the national level, in general, so unappealing that I can't vote for the individual and risk giving their party a majority in the House or Senate. On the local level this changes dramatically as I have a descent amount of respect (as much as you can have in politicians I suppose...) for the local branches of both parties and third parties are a much more practical option.

Donate to EFF!

[Anonymous Coward]

I have been a member for two years. Nice T-shirt too.

Sue the government, not the parties

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't anybody else see it as incredibly toxic to permit lawsuits against the telecoms?

Allowing such lawsuits to go forward means that every cooperating witness, and every party whose cooperation is requested by the government now needs to involve lawyers to determine their legal liability.

The traditional remedy in these cases is to sue the government. Why is that inadequate in this case?

The answer is simple, unfortunately. The goal is not to end the practice, it is vengeance.

Re:Sue the government, not the parties

[QuasiEvil]

Uh, yes, that's the desired effect. We don't want corporate co-conspirators helping the government do covert and unconstitutional things. The telecoms, like all big companies, have entire legal departments and no doubt numerous policies about these sorts of things, and they almost certainly had fair notice that what they were doing was at best fuzzy and most likely blatantly illegal. I've been all for suing their asses off since day 1, and even more so since their government cronies tried to cover them.

Call it a deterrent, call it vengeance, but I call it justice.

Re:Sue the government, not the parties

[neomunk]

I agree, but I'm willing to meet your PP half way; if say the telecoms had immediately cooperated with the governmental agencies involved, but after a quick (day or three) legal research period had discovered that they had acted unlawfully and then immediately STOPPED cooperating, I'd be much more forgiving of those couple of days. I'd likely even offer a commendation for the bravery of the final denial.

I understand that this is a bit of a slippery slope too, but it is far preferable to the complete immunity being discussed.

Innocent until... eaves-dropped-on?

[Fluffeh]

Not to jump on the postback wagon, but isn't the whole concept of the American judicial system based on the fact that you are innocent until proven guilty? Doesn't listening in on anyone's conversations sort of take a 180 degree turn on that whole concept?

For the record, I am neither in America or American.

One Flaw In The Argument...

[maz2331]

The one issue that the parent missed here is that a huge majority of the "gun nuts" absolutely LOVE Bush. They'll just say that ter'ists have no constitutional rights anyway and excuse away any violations.

But try to restrict the guns or their religion, and they WILL kill.

Re:One Flaw In The Argument...

[TechWrite]

I'm a pretty big fan of the "ter'ists have no constitutional rights" thing too and how they completely miss the point of the issue at hand. Of course terrorists don't have the same constitutional rights as US citizens (provided they are indeed foreign and on foreign soil and all that), the point is that they are trampling the rights of US citizens. The government is trampling my rights, your rights, gun nut rights. Why they think this is about terrorists is just beyond me.

Re:One Flaw In The Argument...

[skam240]

If we are to take the moral high ground in this fight then we can't be holding foreigners at mere whim and disregarding international law in regards to torture. We need to apply are social equity on a global level.

I do agree, however, that too many people associate those who fight against the limiting of our rights as being "pro-terrorist".

Re:One Flaw In The Argument...

[TechWrite]

I never meant to imply that we should hold and torture foreigners, only that they aren't guaranteed the same constitutional protections. I agree that torturing anyone, foreign or otherwise, is a horrible crime and should never be acceptable under any circumstances in the United States or anywhere else.

There are, however, legal differences in spying on foreigners and US citizens and if we are talking about the rule of law it is important to note those distinctions.

Re:One Flaw In The Argument...

[Falconhell]

Well said Sir.

  As a citizen of another country, I have in the past admired the US. Since Bush has been president, that admiration has reduced considerably. The election of Obama is a step in the right direction.

I want the US to be the beacon of freedom and liberty it once was.

The terrorists unfotunately won the day we changed our laws.

Re:One Flaw In The Argument...

[mrchaotica]

Of course terrorists don't have the same constitutional rights as US citizens (provided they are indeed foreign and on foreign soil and all that)

O RLY?

Please cite the clause in the Bill of Rights where it says that it applies to "citizens" or "people in U.S. territory." Here's a hint: you won't find it, because the Bill of Rights affirms rights of all people, everywhere!

The fact that he did

[Jane Q. Public]

has nothing to do with whether he can -- legally.

And this is exactly that kind of case in point... this last Presidential administration -- and Congress, too -- have done quite a few things lately that they probably can't do... legally. The fact that they did do them has no bearing on the law.

Re:The fact that he did

[Anonymous Coward]

>The fact that they did do them has no bearing on the law.

Sure it does: It has the same effect, if not corrected. And, from here in the "cheap seats" (i.e. the perspective of long-suffering US citizens whose interests have been repeatedly ignored, abused or neglected by ALL branches of the US Federal Government, for what seems like ages now), it's all the same thing.

But, I'm not cynical, nor bitter :)

9th Amendment Too

[maz2331]

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

The 4th specifies the groundwork for it, and the Supreme Court has ruled that it exists.

Also, the wiretaps can be a violation of the 1st as well, because they could chill protected speech.

I'd say one good definition of "epic fail" (as they love to say on Digg) is to have an argument beaten, crunched, and steam-rollered by three Bill of Rights amendments.

Re:9th Amendment Too

[shutdown -p now]

All well and good, but GP's point was that there's still no explicit right to privacy in the US Constitution. Yes, your Supreme Court has ruled that it exists; and it can rule that it does not tomorrow. There are precedents for SCOTUS overturning its own decisions, you know.

Given how persistently the right to privacy is attacked (not just today, but at any time of a crisis - Civil War, Red Scare etc), it may well be worth a new amendment specifically to protect it, written in plain and unambiguous wording so that no asshats could possibly try to reinterpret it to suit their agendas.

Re:9th Amendment Too

[maz2331]

I could go for that suggestion.

But let's not kid ourselves either - asshats have been trying with some success to limit, destroy, and overturn explicit provisions in the Constitution for many years.

Warrants

[Midnight Thunder]

Interesting timing for this now that we've learned that the gunmen in Mumbai used Blackberries to communicate. I'm sure no one violated their rights by eavesdropping on their communications.

I believe this is where a warrant comes into play. You indicate there is a case for eaves dropping and if there is the judge gives you a warrant. Basically what a warrant gives you a sanctioned action for a specific circumstance, so that you aren't using your powers for things that otherwise affect the freedoms of your populous.

I agree with previous poster

[Jane Q. Public]

today's politicians were yesterday's Harvard Law, Business, and Poli-Sci students. You don't get much more nerdy than that.

But I still think we could take 'em.

Re:I agree with previous poster

[Free the Cowards]

Except that law, business, and political science students aren't what are generally meant by "nerds". And even if it were, it's not what are generally meant by "we".

It's just hubris. It's like a star lawyer thinking that his experience in winning an underdog case in front of the Supreme Court is going to help him build a PC from parts. If he's that smart he can probably do it, but no way is he going to be as good at it as an expert.

But that begs the question.

[Jane Q. Public]

First, "what if we do" doesn't wash, because we don't. That's a very unlikely hypothetical.

Second, that is, in effect, what they were doing: eavesdropping on "everybody", in order to try to single out a few individuals who might be conspiring to commit terrorist acts.

And the answer is: No. From an individual's standpoint, the miniscule chance of my being a victim of terrorism is NOT worth giving up my right to private conversations. Especially when you consider that private conversations are essential to maintaining a free society.

Well said!

[Jane Q. Public]

And to the other poster here:

What the hell are you blathering about? We DO in fact know that the actions of the telcos (and the government people who setup / enabled it) were acting illegally. There is no reasonable question that this is true. Though, by our own rules, it will need to be proved in court... which is a different matter.

As for taking terrorism seriously, do you? As an individual, you are quite literally much more likely -- by orders of magnitude! -- to die in your bathtub than from a terrorist attack. So why aren't you advocating government cameras in everybody's bathroom? It would save so many lives! More than any "war on terrorism" has any chance of saving.

If you think that is a ridiculous example, then you are beginning to get the point. Because it is real.

Re:Well said!

[Kohath]

I'm not sure why you want to change the subject to something about bathrooms. But changing the subject doesn't seem to take terrorism seriously. Terrorism is serious.

Re:Well said!

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice trolling, troll. That being said, in response to the sentiment you are playing:

"What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" - Patrick Henry, March 23 1775

Re:Well said!

[Anonymous Coward]

And drowning while still conscious, but concussed and immobilized after slipping in the bath, isn't serious?

Re:Well said!

[TapeCutter]

Sure terrorists need to be taken seriously but you only have to look at public communications in China to see what is wrong with your proposal, they have totalitarian control over their people and yet amazingly their omnipresent Orwellian state security armed with a complete knowledge of all electronic communications still can't stop terror attacks.

Thank God that nobody takes you seriously. To some people here your zeal to remove their rights just so you can delude yourself into feeling safe makes YOU the enemy.

Re:Well said!

[Kohath]

So you're saying that Chinese state security has never stopped a single terrorist attack? Not even once?

Or, I guess you're saying that stopping one terrorist attack and saving all the victims' lives is completely worthless unless all terrorist attacks are stopped forever.

Either way, I disagree.

Re:Well said!

[Anonymous Coward]

It goes like this:

You claim terrorism is serious. Looks like you claim that because of the potential for loss of life. So, since there is more potential for loss of life in the bathroom, that must be more important, and is worthy of monitors in the bathroom. More worthy than anything in the "war on terror", as there is a much greater potential savings of lives.

Re:Well said!

[TapeCutter]

"So you're saying that Chinese state security has never stopped a single terrorist attack? Not even once?"

YES!!!! Sure they got a few and if you count the rebranded dead civilians then they got thousands. Not a single one was from eaves dropping and I dare you, nay triple dare your trollish arse to prove otherwise!

"Either way, I disagree."

No you don't. :oP

Re:Well said!

[ion.simon.c]

I made this just for you, boss!

http://simoncion.livejournal.com/306396.html

Thank you for making that point.

[Jane Q. Public]

The statistics from NSA, Homeland Security, and TSA already show that this is a waste of time if what you want to do is actually stop terrorism. And I have no choice but to believe that the "decision makers" have seen these statistics. But they have opted to bull ahead anyway. The only logical conclusion, then, is: their main interest is NOT to stop terrorism.

Gee, what could it be?

We only know

[Jane Q. Public]

that a few dipshits working for Verizon got blamed for it. We really don't know anything more. And I am skeptical: I have no love or trust for Verizon.

It just can't be expressed any clearer than this.

[AlphaLop]

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin

What part about this do most of my fellow Americans fail to comprehend?

Re:It just can't be expressed any clearer than thi

[Anonymous Coward]

All of it.

Although there IS a right to privacy

[Jane Q. Public]

as you point out it is not spelled out verbatim in the Constitution.

I would agree with you that it SHOULD be spelled out... until then we have to work with what we have.

I do agree also that a President (or Congresscritter, for that matter) who deliberately attempts to deprive the people of their Constitutional rights, except in dire emergency (which does NOT exist here), should be held accountable for treason. At the moment I cannot think of a better charge to fit the crime.

Perhaps we need a "+1 Sarcasm" mod?

[waferhead]

Only I'm not 100% sure that parent post was being sarcastic...

Obama will fix it...

[PinchDuck]

Well, he already voted for FISA, so I guess he won't. Damn.

Re:Obama will fix it...

[QuasiEvil]

I voted for Barr. He would have fixed it... Probably would have screwed up a bunch of other stuff, but at least worked to put protections of our civil rights in place.

Re:Obama will fix it...

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, Barr helped write the PATRIOT ACT. He was a terrible "Libertarian" candidate. Barr just wanted attention. -- Don't blame me, I wrote in Ron Paul.

NO, it is not.

[Jane Q. Public]

First off, we are NOT "at war". There hasn't been a Congress with the guts to actually declare war since Korea. The president can't do it, Congress must. And voting to support a president's "police action" is not a declaration of war.

Suspension of Habeas Corpus "just" because of a war is probably not justifiable. But... what do you call a president who suspends Habeas Corpus when you're not even at war?

I'd say that rates a few more points.

Re:NO, it is not.

[Sparky McGruff]

But we have a "War on Terror", and of course, a "War on Drugs". And of course, the local car dealership has declared a "War on High Prices". I'd say that justifies just about anything.

Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Kohath]

Here's the story. I guess they didn't die though. I remembered it wrong.

From the NY Post:

WASHINGTON - U.S. intelligence officials got mired for nearly 10 hours seeking approval to use wiretaps against al Qaeda terrorists suspected of kidnapping Queens soldier Alex Jimenez in Iraq earlier this year, The Post has learned.

Read the rest of the NY Post story. Are you saying everyone involved was lying and your partisan talking-points are right instead?

Do you care which is true and which is false?

You are right about the NRA

[Jane Q. Public]

but you are wrong if you think the majority of their members feel this way.

The NRA is a single-issue organization. It was created to be a single-issue organization. And it concentrates (as it was designed to do) on that single issue.

You seem to be blaming them for that. Why? They are not "Republican lobbyists" or anything like that. I think you have your people mixed up.

You are making a big mistake if you confuse the NRA with the people who support the NRA. There is a vast difference.

Of course there will always be a few exceptions, but you find those anywhere.

Re:You are right about the NRA

[skam240]

See, I have a bit of problem with th whole blind single issue thing. Say we had a Nazi party in the U.S. who took a stance on gun control identical to the NRA's. Would it be ethical for them to endorse such a party?

Re:You are right about the NRA

[Jane Q. Public]

Well, I certainly agree with you about deciding who to VOTE for over a single issue. Sure. In most cases. But where do you draw the line? Candidate A believes in the Second Amendment and the right to defend oneself with arms, but is otherwise a complete Fascist; Candidate B wants more "gun control" but is a complete Communist.

Who to vote for? Either one will help to continue the destruction of America.

That's why there is now LOTS more support for third parties! People are tired of the "big 2" bullshit.

Re:You are right about the NRA

[skam240]

I'm afraid I don't see either of the two major parties as so ideologically extreme as you seem to be implying (and I generally vote against one of them in regards to national politics). In regards to where to draw the line, it's really a matter of personal judgment. One most weigh the pros with the cons in terms of how one votes and what groups to endorse. My example of a Nazi party and the NRA was an example of an extreme case where any descent person would have to give up support for the NRA were the NRA to support a political party with an agenda like that of a Nazi party. Unfortunatly, the choice of who to endorse and support is rarely so black and white. For myself, since both parties seem set on spending boat-loads of money I choose (on the national level) to vote for the party that is generally more in favor of spending our money on programs domestically rather than abroad and doesn't have a solid support base that is anti-science. I also participate in the process with my money and donate to groups that I feel push my favored party in the right direction.

In regards to voting for a third party, history has shown that our system will not support a third party. Short of major electoral and political reform, voting for a third party in a national election really is a wasted vote (and can sometimes be a negative vote for the major party candidate you would rather see win). I would argue the same for a member of the House or Senate although that gets a bit murkier.

I have EVERY right

[Anonymous Coward]

No where in the constitution is there an express 'right to privacy', this is a fact, if you disagree try reading the document.

The constitution only gives rights to the government. Any rights/powers not explicitly given to the government remain rights of the people.

So, I have EVERY right to privacy because there is nothing in the constitution saying the government can take it away.

How about this:

[Jane Q. Public]

(In the context of the current administration): "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain the grossly transparent illusion of temporary safety, deserve to go down with the ship." - Me

What part of "grossly transparent" do most of my fellow Americans not understand?

Simply not true.

[Jane Q. Public]

A large (and rapidly growing) number of advocates of gun ownership (what I presume you mean by "gun nuts") are Libertarian, and even Democrat.

True, the most outspoken of them to be in the religious right, but then the most outspoken of ALL conservative-leaning people have tended to be in the religious right. Don't confuse the loudest with the most. That could get somebody shot.

No

[Jane Q. Public]

You are confusing cause and effect.

A law is in effect until it is repealed or invalidated. Failure to repeal or invalidate it does not mean that it is legal! It could be grossly unconstitutional, and unless and until someone successfully challenges it, it will remain in effect.

Historically, however, such laws have not lasted. Sooner or later, they have tended to be invalidated.

I did not change the subject.

[Jane Q. Public]

You just did not understand me. Okay. I will make it plainer.

You say we should take terrorism seriously. Well, then, how seriously should we take it? The only reasonable way to judge how seriously we should take it is to weigh the danger vs. the cost. That's the way we (as rational people) judge everything else, from using tanning beds to driving on the highway.

So: are you in danger of being a victim of a terrorist attack? Well, we do not know that figure for you as an individual, so we have to use statistics, just like we do for everything else. How serious is YOUR danger of being a victim of terrorists, here in the US?

As it turns out, the danger that YOU will be a victim of a terrorist this year is, statistically, a lot smaller than the danger of you dying in the bathtub this year.

So: why are you so concerned about terrorism, and not concerned about bathtubs? Since they are provably more "serious".

It is because you are ignorant of the true danger of terrorism, or because you are ignorant of the true danger of bathtubs?

And let's not even bring up driving. You are so vastly much more likely to die driving your automobile than you are to die of terrorism, that if you are REALLY concerned about the "seriousness" of terrorism, you should sell your car immediately and start bicycling to work.

Do you think I am joking? I am not. Either you do not understand how "serious" terrorism is, or you are being a hypocrite. You can't have it both ways.

Re:I did not change the subject.

[Kohath]

Again, terrorism is serious. This latest incident in India has the possibility of starting a war between India and Pakistan. Both of those countries have nuclear weapons. If this incident doesn't start a war, then maybe the next one will. It really is a serious subject.

I'm not interested in talking about your bathtub. If you don't understand the difference, then I'm not sure what you have to add to the discussion.

Re:I did not change the subject.

[Falconhell]

More people than died in Mumbai die on the roads every day worldwide.

We beat terrorism by not changing our laws and freedoms, but by proudly holding to them, and saying you cannot influence us with violence.

Re:I did not change the subject.

[Killjoy_NL]

Exactly, this is how the US capitulated (together with a lot of other countries sorrily enough) after 9/11

If Obama ends up pardoning Bush...

[Anonymous Coward]

I sincerely hope Bush faces charges for his crimes. Because if Obama ends up pardoning him, it will be pretty clear that they both serve the same masters.

Nixon

[Joebert]

How did Nixon say that again ?

I'm not saying the President is allowed to do illegal things, I'm saying when the President does it, it's not illegal.

Beware the fork.

[Anonymous Coward]

I have every bit of confidence that is todays nerds were given the power to create a governmental system, it would be completely awesome.

All the way up until the fork.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Xylantiel]

You have drawn the wrong conclusion. This is incompetence at the justice department, nothing wrong with the law. The 72-hour grace period that the GP refers to exists for precisely this situation. The justice department lawyers were simply too incompetent to have their act together ahead of time for such a crisis situation.

There is a fair case to be made that 9/11 could have been prevented if the justice department had just been doing its job getting warrants for the FBI rather than playing games with the FISA court at the time. The bar is low, but the procedure exists for a reason and should be respected.

Yet another example of the birth of Amerika

[macinit]

Lol... What a nakedly crooked administration. But like Carlin said, "Everyone in this country has cell phones that make pan cakes so no one wants to rock the boat."

I Wouldn't Worry About That

[Greyfox]

I'd worry about the Obama administration turning everyone in your administration who had any involvement in Gitmo over to the UN to stand trial for crimes against humanity.

A corrupt administration may very well say that it's not torture because they say it's not. A ineffectual Congress might not be able to stand up to it. A corrupt justice department may have been subverted by cronies and yes-men. At the end of the day, the rule of law must be restored if the USA is to retain any credibility on the world stage.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Kohath]

Yeah, I'm sure you're a better lawyer than the guys at the DoJ. That's how you know the rules and they don't.

president...

[dilvish_the_damned]

pardon thyself...

Oh wait, thats what your doing. Carry on.

You are the one who does not understand.

[Jane Q. Public]

I was, from the beginning, speaking of the relative danger to a US citizen, this year. (As were most of the people on this forum.) You want to conjecture about citizens of India and Pakistan, next year or ten years from now. THAT is changing the subject.

And even with that, I do not get the impression that you even understood my point.

"Bush demands"

[KlausBreuer]

Yes, of course he does.

He's in power for a couple more weeks, and has to make the most of it. Obviously he'll do his very best to help his friends and cronies one last time, while he still has the power to do so.

Don't tell me you're surprised?

Make the telecoms keep the govt honest

[Alain Williams]

In the telecom immunity challenge, the government argues that the telecoms should not be punished, or suffer the threat of punishment, for a surveillance program that the Bush administration claims was designed only to fight terrorism.

You must not allow the telecoms to hide behind ''We were only doing what Bush asked us to, we thought that he knew the law better than we did''. If you do, when a future government tries a similar stunt the telecoms/whoever will simply roll over and accept the cash for doing the evil deeds.

Future companies need to question what they are asked to do, they are the first line of defense of your freedoms. If the telecoms pay large fines there will be good motivation for companies in the future of making the government justify what they ask for.

Freedoms need to be fought for, they need to be protected.

Re:Make the telecoms keep the govt honest

[shentino]

Disobeying an executive order has consequences of its own.

I seriously doubt that every telecom went with this willingly.

I'd bet my bottom dollar that a good few of them got forced into it through the likes of NSL's and stuff.

With our lame duck president on his way out, impeachment is moot.

We need to just let this go. The guilty parties are already dead, so it's nothing more than a tragedy.

Re:Make the telecoms keep the govt honest

[Dionysus]

We need to just let this go. The guilty parties are already dead, so it's nothing more than a tragedy.

By letting it go, you are signaling to the next administration and all future administrations that what was done is OK.

Re: Irony?

[bussdriver]

nope.
4th Amendment Nazis??

Give up our liberty for security from a misunderstood minority group by allowing officials to be above the law??

Huge contradiction! (laying aside how the Nazis did not support anything like the 4th.)

Presidential rankings discussed on Wikipedia

[jesterzog]

Sure, Eisenhower, Kennedy, LBJ, and Nixon each had a hand in a mismanaged war. John Adams, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR each violated civil liberties to stop alleged enemies of the state. Many presidents have overseen the causes of recessions and other economic maladies. How many have been through all 3? (I can't think of any.) How many have polled approval ratings in the low 20s?

Wikipedia has an interesting discussion article about historical rankings of US Presidents in the sense of who made a good president and who made a bad one, including citations of a variety of surveys that have taken place over time.

Personally I think the argument for James Buchanan is quite a good one. Not many presidents have seen their country fall into a devastating civil war.

Re:Presidential rankings discussed on Wikipedia

[mrchaotica]

Not many presidents have seen their country fall into a devastating civil war.

Hey, don't count Bush out yet -- he's still got a good two months to make it happen!

Another theory

[Anonymous Coward]

The telecos own Bush. The telecos own Obama. Nothing new here, just standard massive corruption.

Of course it will happen.

[mosb1000]

If it doesn't, what company would ever work with the government willingly ever again?

Re:Of course it will happen.

[evil_aar0n]

It's called a properly authorized warrant. If you do not comply, you can be punished. In fact, as a matter of principle, companies should _not_ comply with government requests without one. That's the whole point of seeking immunity: because the telcos were wrong to comply without warrants.

Re:Of course it will happen.

[mosb1000]

"Wrong" is a subjective term. You say it's wrong for them to comply without literally being forced to, some government officials may say it is a corporation's "patriotic duty" to assist the government (I think I read a statement from the mayor of NYC to that affect earlier this morning).

Of course, it's the congress who writes the federal laws, so their version of "right" and "wrong" is what will be codified into our nations laws. Do you honestly expect them to write a law that would encourage corporations to not cooperate with them?

I love you.

[mosb1000]

Thanks, this is the funniest thing I've read all day. I sense a steep learning curve ahead for you.

What we have seen in the last eight years has been the same as what we've seen since our government's inception. "Great" leadership means a willingness to bend the rules to achieve your goals. A lawyer/politician from Chicago, of all places, is not going to change the realities of how our government works. Anyone with any honest intention to do that would not run for president. . .

Obsfucation and an Ominous Orator

[Jaazaniah]

The main difference between then and now is that common people who would otherwise have no clue about what went on now have access to the discrepancies, and other peoples' interpretations and compilations of them. Sure, no one in America loved the Japanese immediately after Perl Harbor, but most of them also weren't aware of the economic warfare that was going on leading up to the attack, so they felt vindicated in ripping the constitution when it came to the Japanese Americans. It was controlled ignorance. It's much harder to do these days.

On a slightly scary, related note, now that we have a President-Elect who built his campaign using the internet, and who was able to control leaks so tightly that no one outside the circle knew who was being talked about for appointments, what else might he be able to hide under his hat? I'm a mild fan of his, barring the FISA vote, but the ability to direct his staff with such precision on information policy might not bode well if he has a shady agenda. I suggest we watch closely and listen where we can.

Re:Obsfucation and an Ominous Orator

[Delwin]

who was able to control leaks so tightly that no one outside the circle knew who was being talked about for appointments You haven't been looking hard enough. There was far more control over information when they were a campaign and not a proto-administration. There hasn't been a single appointment that we haven't known about weeks ahead of time.

Fuck Bush

[Anonymous Coward]

Just.. fuck him.

America grow up or die, sooner rather than later.

[Anonymous Coward]

Im sure the Bush administration will get away everything they need, as the American population are a bunch of bullshit eating idiots.

Please America grow a fucking backbone or die soon.

Thanks

Re:It just can't be expressed any clearer than thi

[Icarium]

Try defining what liberties fall under the umbrella of being 'essential' in such a manner that everyone agrees with you. (Although on /. you could contend that all liberties are essential and that all safety is temporary and little and find a fair number agreeing with you).

I liked the first part!

[Lost Penguin]

Bush Demands Amnesty!

Re:I liked the first part!

[Anonymous Coward]

How about "Bush Demands Amnesia"?

A lesson learned

[DataBroker]

You're exactly right. It's the same as the lesson Niemoller wrote in "First they came..."

Our politicians have learned from history and strive to avoid the public's wrath though. They've learned that as long as you take rights away from one group at a time, the whole of the group won't retaliate.

This was a lesson learned in the US previously. Take the traditional example of the Boston Tea Party. Despite the Brits raising taxes bit by bit on small groups, the increase of a tax that impacted everyone - a tax on tea drinkers - incited violent rebellion.

Had the Brits not levied a tax on everyone, we'd still be speaking English!! ;)

A lesson from Mom.

[DataBroker]

I know that this will be taken as a troll-post for any Obama advocate, but that's not my intent. I feel this way for all of our representatives.

My mother taught me that actions speak louder than words. That means to me that when you stated his action, "he only voted for it", then it was much more important than his words "he doesn't support this".

My real problem with your post is your acceptance of Christmas Tree Bills. I personally feel those are a crime because it allows our reps to slide anything they want into law without being able to be blamed -- after all, "I 'only voted for it as part of a larger bill, feeling that the benefits of having it pass outweighed the down side.'"

Re:A lesson from Mom.

[canuck08]

Chritmas Tree Bills.. or omnibus bills as they are sometimes called around here are an abomination. They should be outlawed.

Re:A lesson from Mom.

[internic]

My real problem with your post is your acceptance of Christmas Tree Bills. I personally feel those are a crime because it allows our reps to slide anything they want into law without being able to be blamed -- after all, "I 'only voted for it as part of a larger bill, feeling that the benefits of having it pass outweighed the down side.'"

So basically you're against pretty much everyone in Congress (and probably state and federal executives who sign these bills). Let me guess, you voted for Ron Paul?

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[neomunk]

I seriously hate to say it like this, but if you're not up to the challenge of living in a free society (this includes your possible death because someone was free enough to plan an attack that killed you) then you should perhaps think of relocating to somewhere with tighter controls. I (and the Constitution of my nation) do not feel that your life (or my own, or my children's) is worth destroying the concept of a free society. I am even less willing to destroy the concept of a free society because of a perceived need to jump at every shadow when only 1 out of 1,000,000 shadows could possibly cause you harm.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Skjellifetti]

Check the timeline in your Post story. The kidnapping occurred at dawn Iraqi time but the NSA lawyers (likely in D.C., but not specified in the article) did not even meet to discuss the issue until 10 AM EST (6 PM Iraqi time). That means that the NSA didn't even bother to discuss the problem until approximately 10-12 hours after the kidnapping. Why?

BTW, asking Are you saying everyone involved was lying and your partisan talking-points are right instead? is a logical fallacy known as an argumentum ad hominem since you are not attempting to address the facts presented but seek to divert the argument by making spurious claims that I am somehow partisan.

Hah!!

[rts008]

My tiger repelling rock predates your 'terrorist-repellent' rock, and is endorsed by Lisa Simpson!!!!

Re:Hah!!

[tsm_sf]

Ernie had a banana in his ear decades before lisa found that damn rock.

I agree with Bush

[Dog-Cow]

The telecoms should get immunity. It's Bush himself that should be punished as a traitor to the country.

Chill, dude

[spun]

You will convince more people if you refrain from lashing out in anger. If all you are trying to do is feel better about yourself by putting other people down, your strategy is sound. If you are trying to, you know, argue a point, calling someone a moron is hardly the most effective strategy. Take it from someone who has been calling people morons for decades, it doesn't work.

Re:Chill, dude

[sumdumass]

Can we say all of the above?

I think we have a long enough history at opposite ends that I can just be frank with you. What he said was idiotic and contradictory as well and being very dangerous. It needed to be pointed out that his statement basically lost any ways of peacefully keeping your rights and freedoms while presenting the only option of retaining them to be fighting for them. Terrorist don't listen to reason, they blow things and people up to inflict their will and reason- that's why they are called Terrorists. Quitting fighting them because something you hold dear might be infringed when the alternative is that the same things will be gone completely, is stupid, stupid, stupid. The only way to get them back at that point would be to fight for them so it doesn't make sense to stop the fighting in the first place.

My main goal was to get this guy to see the insanity of his position and to rethink it. Then it was show that it doesn't make sense to not fight because of something that might be happening to part of what you hold dear when it is all lost when the terrorists win and the only option to get it all back is to fight. I know I seems to be repeating that, but I don't see how else it can't be seen. I'm not sure how someone could have invested the slightest bit of thought into it and came to any other conclusion if they have been paying attention to just half of what the Terrorists are saying. Think about what he said "But then again I'd rather the terrorists "win" than compromise any individual rights, or any standard we profess to believe in." If something is compromised, he would rather give it all up.

so basically, Obama cooperated with the evil?

[ClioCJS]

Nice 2-party thinking there, but if he signed the bill, he supports it. Saying "wah wah, I wanted to cooperate with the enemy so i could get something done instead of nothing" is not an excuse. But of course, the cult of personality that worships Obama (I voted for Nader!) thinks that somehow he is something different from past presidents. He's not. The democrats have done nothing to improve society; they just don't erode it as fast as the republicans. If that's what YOU want, I'm gonna buy a gun for the inevitable future that people like you, who think cooperating with the enemy is the answer, will bring us: a future of violent revolution, because cooperating and forming coalitions with the enemy doesn't fix things. It just brings things more to the center. Centrist politics have done JACK SHIT for our country in the past 20 years.

You said a mouthful!

[rts008]

I don't think Obama is infallible, superman, or any other form of 'fix it all'. I do think him being elected opened a lot of 'closed doors' in this country that badly needed opened.
I hope he proves me wrong, and achieves all of what his platform and fans claim he can/will.
What I expect is a slow, gradual change in a slightly different direction.

Heck, any direction orthogonal to where we were going seems good to me.
You are right to question his voting record as it applies to electing him Prez, but I don't think the USA could survive another 4 years of a Bush re-run.

*disclaimer*
I have always (until 2002)been a registered Rebuplican, but after helping vote GWB into office in 2000-seeing how fscked up it turned out, I have since recanted...McCain picking Palin was the last straw. (yeah, I'm dense sometimes-but I CAN learn still)
I again refused to deal with the situation in 2004, and abstained from voting.
I feel badly about this. I know that my one vote would not have likely changed anything, but I gave up the chance to have a say.
This time, I voted for ANY independent/3rd party on the ballot, and then voted straight Democrat for the remainder.
It made no real difference, as the rest of my fellow Oklahomans voted in both a Republican House and Senate.
But I do at least feel better about myself for participating, and even more so for being able to look at it somewhat objectively.

It isn't IMPOSSIBLE to teach an old dog new tricks, but sometimes it isn't easy to do so.

It makes me want to move somewhere else sometimes, but I was raised to not give up without a fight.

Re:You said a mouthful!

[cyberchondriac]

Oi, you finally bought into everything they've been shoving down your throat here for years?
Do you sincerely believe the POTUS is personally responsible for everything that's gone wrong in this country? That Congress has no bearing or effect and is to be absolved of all blame? Man, when will people get over this idyllic assumption that the man in the White House controls everything? It's too simplistic, too black and white. If that were the case, we wouldn't bother with 3 branches of government, we wouldn't have a Congress. Sure the president does have some powers (especially during wartime) but he's a convenient scapegoat for the opposition party for the most part.

In regards to the whole wiretapping thing:
Personally I don't think Bush is "power hungry". And actually, it was Cheney who started up the wiretaps, not Bush, who found out about it later (according to an NPR interview). I think Bush has allowed it though, whether you agree with him or not, simply because of 9-11, not because of some power trip, and I'm shocked at the number of people who no longer feel AQ is any kind of threat. That's exactly the complacent, cocky mindset that allowed 9-11 to happen in the first place, and here, a scant 7 years later, it seems we haven't learned our lesson.
That's the irony of a government who's managed to do a decent job of suppressing terrorism (the pathetic FAA aside); the threat is perceived to be non-existent and the gov't gets no credit for anything other than being oppressive. I suspect years from now, when current documents are declassified, we're going to shuddering with the number of close calls we never knew about.

The greatest tool in fighting terrorism is intelligence, not bombs; and getting that intel in time.
So just how do you guys propose we get that intelligence inside our own country? Going through the current bureaucratic system, by the time you get a warrant, the threat has likely caught on and moved. Also, I don't equate wiretapping within the country as spying on our own citizens: more likely, we're wiretapping on illegal aliens within our own country. Big difference.
I don't like losing any constitutional rights anymore than anyone else, but I seriously doubt they're wiretapping me - or any of you.
Of course, that brings us to the classic "slippery slope" argument - the wiretapping starts small, but never gets repealed, the practice expands and soon Big Brother is watching everyone. Well, not if we keep an eye on it, it won't. It was done for anti-terrorism purposes - and let's keep it that way. But I'm not convinced of the wisdom of doing away with it entirely right now. We could lose very valuable information.

This brings us to the next argument: the old adage, "Those who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither". A brilliant saying, but I think it's being used grossly out of context in the here and now. When Ben Franklin said that during the revolutionary war, the colonists were the ones practicing subterfuge within a British government - in a way, we Americans were the terrorists. Franklin simply meant that those who weren't brave enough to fight were cowards who didn't deserve a free country. Now those words are being twisted into something completely different. I wonder: would Ben Franklin approve of such wiretaps, given the threat to the US? I wouldn't be shocked if he did. The young, fledgling US of A was no idyllic Utopia then either. Lastly, the fact that the wiretaps are constantly used to slam Bush, but the same people usually fail to mention Obama's support for them too suggests that it's more a political ploy than a genuine issue of concern.

Re:You said a mouthful!

[hesiod]

the wiretapping starts small, but never gets repealed, the practice expands and soon Big Brother is watching everyone. Well, not if we keep an eye on it, it won't.

I'm not trying to detract from some excellent points you make, but the whole point of wiretapping is that you don't know about it, and therefore we can't "keep an eye on it."

Re:You said a mouthful!

[DiamondMX]

But terrorism as a potential threat may vary in strength, but it will never go away.
Therefore this wiretapping will never stop.
By your rules, they shouldn't remove the wiretapping until they no longer need the information.

But never mind wiretapping laws, Bush should be convicted as a war criminal for endorsing and using torture, and he should be locked up for a very long time.

Re:You said a mouthful!

[liegeofmelkor]

I agree with your assessment of the Obama administration. I expect some gradual changes in a new direction. I'm happy he got elected.

What annoys me is the Obama zealots who presume that he is perfect i.e. all of his political policies will agree with every political position the zealot holds, despite statements/votes/actions that indicate otherwise. This oversimplified thinking is particularly prominent in Germany (where I live), where the average citizen assumes (without being able to give a concrete reason if pressed) that John McCain was a carbon copy of GWB and Obama is the perfect socialist candidate with no weaknesses. In short, I was just venting at optimists.

Re:You said a mouthful!

[rts008]

"What annoys me is the Obama zealots who presume that he is perfect..."

Yes, it annoys me also.

What Obama represents is change. Nothing more.

I hope he can get some worthwhile things accomplished, and even better yet, some current things changed.
We shall see.

But irregardless, having some of those new doors opened here was long overdue. These past 8 years have been pure hell for us, and the rest of the world. Thanks GWB & Cheney! :-(

"In short, I was just venting at optimists."
No harm, no foul. I've been doing the same venting, but I also kind of understand the optimists and their enthusiasm. It was a huge relief that McCain/Palin lost. The thought of Palin being that close to the White House is scary, IMHO.

My enthusiasm for Obama is lukewarm at best. I never got the feeling that I could trust him, that he was only telling us what we wanted to hear.(after checking his voting records on issues)

I was actually leaning towards McCain (better the devil you know, than a new unknown devil) until he picked Palin. That was the last straw for me.

*disclaimer*
Here in Oklahoma, there were no other choices on the ballots, and no write-ins allowed.
Now we have a Republican majority State Congress and Senate for the first time in many decades, and the Rep.'s are already planning a new voting bill that will require showing a state issued ID to vote. This is seen to be a blow against the Dem.'s, while enhancing the Rep.'s chances of victory.

Re:But that raises the question.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, no, it "raises" the question.

you ever heard of a class-action lawsuit?

[ClioCJS]

Apparently not. Dumbass.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Kohath]

... a logical fallacy known as an argumentum ad hominem since you are not attempting to address the facts presented ...

The idea that "there's always time" was asserted with no supporting facts or evidence. It's a talking-point. It would be an argument if it were put forth with a specific example of how there was plenty of time during a specific time-critical event. Or many events, because it's a lot harder to indicate something is true "always".

I have posted a specific counter-example of when there wasn't plenty of time and lives were endangered by the legalistic wrangling around this issue. I am the only one who has presented any facts.

Do you consider facts useful in understanding a topic, or are they just a barrier to be overcome on the way to some understanding that transcends reality?

I kind of liked the movie W.

[bodhisattva]

It made me feel sorry for the poor, dumb bastard. However, he can still kiss my ass.

Obama keeps reminding everyone that Bush is still president so they remember that he has nothing to do with with anything the administration does until he assumes office.

ITT

[Anonymous Coward]

Mostly people that don't live in America.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Skjellifetti]

I have shown you that the Post story you cite has easily identifiable, significant holes. You have chosen to ignore inconvenient facts presented by others and instead attack the messenger. Perhaps you should take a basic course in logic or rhetoric before posting again.

Instead of...

[hesaigo999ca]

See, this is what I mean Bush...is just too slow.... he has the power NOW to do something to help them , yet too slow to know it. Sure he could let the companies get prosecuted, sure they coudl get sentences, and 5 minutes later (as many president's before him at the end of their term) get pardons for all their crimes committed ....seriously, did he forget???

My understanding is . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

there was a law that made the behavior of the telecoms illegal, and it was retroactively changed. The suit is whether retroactively retracting laws is constitutional.

Re:My understanding is . . .

[mosb1000]

I'm not talking about the specific incident as much as I'm talking about cooperation in general. It is often not prudent for the executive to wait for congress to pass laws, as it takes some time. Does congress really want to send the message to corporations that if they don't wait they can be sued? It will hinder the operations of the government.

It's everywhere! Thanks "REPUBLIKAN SCUMBAGS"

[Anonymous Coward]

"This is either protecting corporate cronies, protecting themselves, or most likely both." - by LockeOnLogic (723968) on Monday December 01, @10:00PM (#25954783)

Speaking as a tax-paying U.S. Citizen? That's what's making the rest of us sick to our stomachs!

Man - that type of outright CRAP is rampant in this nation, & not just @ political levels.

I mean, WTF is WRONG with our nation?

(... & more importantly, our leaders?? They're not acting any better than crooks in "KORPORATE AMERIKA", where cronyism, nepotism, & other things are rampant).

I hope the rest of the planet realizes that "BUSHBY + Darth CHENEY" represent the very WORST of the United States, not the best of us, @ least. I actually hate "putting down my own", but in THEIR case, I have to... they did such a SHIT JOB, & have ruined this nation.

I only hope that President Obama (as far as I am concerned he is already president) & the primarily DEMOCRATIC majority House & Senate (Congress) can clean the huge mess up the REPUBLICAN idiots & crooks have made for them... I don't expect miracles overnight though.

The "REPUBLIKAN POWERS THAT BE" in both politics & "KORPORATE AMERIKA" will create all kinds of snags to make sure that the insane fiasco by which they profited by keeps going, & so that the next democratic leadership has a HELL OF A TIME, stomping them out.

It's always that way, & all I can say to the rest of my fellow good citizens in the U.S. is, BE PATIENT - we've got a wait ahead of us, to fix this lunacy, before it gets better (& that's what the scumbag "republikans" hope for, huge delays in fixing it, so they can say "LOOK! The Dems didn't fix it, any better than we did...")

1 good thing resulted though: I would strongly wager that the "REPUBLIKAN PARTY" (who didn't win the last 2 elections & everyone KNOWS it, they "fixed' it) has ruined themselves for DECADES INTO THE DISTANCE (we won't see those scumbags around again, for hopefully, @ least another century... this nation can't take it!)

Re:maybe it is just me

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. I hope Bush, Cheney, Rove, Rice, Rummy, Wolfie, and the rest of that rotten bunch of terrorists gets to feel the full force of the law for their crimes. The biggest problem will be deciding if they get life w/o parole, or just fry em. Personally, I'd hope for life (a long, 100+ year life) in a supermax facility--23.5 hours a day in solitary, 30 minutes in a small, bare, grey, concrete yard with naught but a couple guards for company. It would be political suicide for any president to pardon them once a thorough, fair, impartial, and public trial had gotten through with them so life is the far greater punishment for these terrorists.

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep in mind how many in the justice department under BushII were put there for political purposes, not because of their competence.

The FISA 72-hour option provided everything needed in this circumstance; that someone didn't use that law shows incompetence (or worse).

The past? Hey, live in the PRESENT fool!

[Anonymous Coward]

"People that say Bush is the worst we ever had have no sense of history" - by JackieBrown (987087) on Monday December 01, @09:50PM (#25954693)

First of all: Listen pal - who gives a flying "F" about the past, when you have to deal with the present mess?

AND?

Secondly: In your case, seeing as how you like to toss around critique??

Spelling "PEARL Harbor" as "PERL Harbor" isn't helping YOUR case a bit - others may need a history lesson, but, you need "hooked on phonics" & some good solid 1st grade remedial training!

----

Yes - It makes me laugh whenever some "wannabe history guru" recites his 'memorized simpleton b.s.' (because that's all history is, a story, & many times it's been rewritten by "the victors" of conflicts, so you are NOT reading a TRUE history, period)... so much for knowing "history".

Now, no matter how much people say "Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it" cliche crap?

People usually repeat it.

Yes, we have yet another "prestidigitation" spinmaster, from the "REPUBLIKAN PARTY", saying:

"Watch this hand"

(while his other money-grubbing mitt pickpockets your wallet)

Eliot Sptizer was a terrorist???

[Anonymous Coward]

Eliot Spitzer is the poster child for the perils of widespread total surveillance.

I'm pretty sure he wasn't a terrorist, either. He was just really persistant going after the crooks at AIG.

Gang raped?

[pjt33]

Doesn't your constitution also have something to say about cruel and unusual punishment? Or is it okay for you to ignore the bits you don't like, but not for other people so to do?

Give Obama a chance...

[Dark_Gravity]

I think Lincoln raped our constitution pretty hard with regard to interpretation the voluntary nature of statehood, state sovereignty, 9th & 10th amendments, and eminent domain to just name a few.

I agree -- he and FDR were the worst presidents with regards to federalism/states' rights.

Obama has at least 4 years to to try to break Lincoln & FDR's records.

Re:Give Obama a chance...

[mrchaotica]

First of all, I don't think he'll come close anyway. Second, after Lincoln and FDR shot states' rights all to Hell, there's nothing left to break.

It's the Second Amendment we have to worry about with Obama. (Well, and the Interstate Commerce Clause wrt health care and bailouts, but that's already shot to Hell too anyway.)

Re:Read this NY Post story. Is the NY Post lying?

[Kohath]

I have shown you that the Post story you cite has easily identifiable, significant holes.

Really? What holes? Do you have any information that suggests it didn't take 9 hours and 38 minutes? I don't think you do.

You have chosen to ignore inconvenient facts presented by others and instead attack the messenger.

What facts? How could "facts" ever be "inconvenient"? I'm trying to argue for a reasonable, thoughtful approach to the problem. All facts would need to be considered for such an approach.

Perhaps you should take a basic course in logic or rhetoric before posting again.

This is a logical fallacy known as an argumentum ad hominem since you are not attempting to address the facts presented but seek to divert the argument by making spurious claims that I am somehow uneducated.

Equilibrium

[Farnite]

Anybody see the movie? Talk about hitting the nail on the head in an artistic fashion. Maybe what we all need is a nice happy pill that removes any individual thought or freedom. Only -then- will we truly be free from terrorists. /sarcasm off

No Amnesty.

[JonathanPDX]

Interesting to see just who was willing to sell out Americans in the name of "security" and without due process. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself (and idiots continually invoking it to frighten us even more.)

Suing

[bruceslog]

The President and each and every Congress-person took an oath to defend and uphold the United States Constitution while in office.

Is there not a penalty for breaking the Oath of Office ?

Treason, maybe ?