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Wiretapping Program Ruled Legal
BuhDuh writes "The New York Times is carrying a story concerning that well known bastion of legal authority, the 'Foreign Intelligence Surveillance' court, which has ruled that the National Security Agency's warrantless eavesdropping program was perfectly legal. It says, 'A federal intelligence court, in a rare public opinion, is expected to issue a major ruling validating the power of the president and Congress to wiretap international phone calls and intercept e-mail messages without a court order, even when Americans' private communications may be involved, according to a person with knowledge of the opinion.'"
Why is President Bush repeatedly warning Obama that he is 45 seconds away from his family and that the job is not easy and he will feel the weight on his shoulders?
Obama knows exactly what a dirty soup he has got into. He has been a Senator for at least one term. He has fought the Republican media propaganda. He knows what MIC stands for, he knows what a considerable threat to his life there is.
Why does George Bush behave like a gangster and warn him that his daughters are like this or his wife is like that and he wil need their help and so on? And why does Bill Clinton say that he loves that particular rug?
Has anyone given a thought to Richard Nixon and the Watergate scandal? What if Bush leaves behind a bugged White House? What if flowers around the White House are already laced with biological weapons and anthrax? Why has the anthrax scientist suitably committed suicide? Do these things add up to a bigger pattern? Hush up the attack and spring it up so that 45 seconds will not be enough for Barack Obama to get help? Julius Caesar? Brutus?
Remember: Bush NEVER talks meaningful specifics. How then did he utter "45 second commute"? google bush obama tough 45 seconds family
Why has Bush repeatedly been talking about Obama's shoulders? Is there a suit that Obama is supposed to wear? Are suits bugged at the shoulders? Is there a history of any such bugging? Why does everyone assume that the White House staff actually has no loyalties to Bush or the Republican Party?
It is human enough to fall to one side or the other in a normal conversation, so in a situation like the White House being occupied by a Black man, ending centuries of monopoly, everyone in the White House is going to be all loyal to Barack Obama? This would be a folly of the highest order.
If Barack Obama is hurt in any way on Inauguration (unlikely) or a few days later (VERY LIKELY) what will happen to America? What will happen to change? And what will happen to the future of this world? Who will be blamed this time? Iraq? Osama? Russia? Hamas? Israel? China? India? Brazil? Where are the hottest selling minerals coming from today? Which is the mineral that can change dollar hegemony that USA needs to sustain? Which is the mineral that they do not want Russia or China to get?
What other pretext to start a war can be thought of? Why do we think that riots across America can produce a Constitiutional situation where Obama cannot issue orders of his own accord?
What about Lasers and Tasers? What about wireless power? What about biological attack? what about chemical attack? What if someone tasers Obama's family from a distant tower like Kennedy was shot from a distant tower? Why do you think that rogue Republicans will not stoop to this level?
The Obama Inauguration is probably not given enough importance from some of these points of view. Surely Obamanation needs an assurance. They needed only one Monica Lewinsky to destroy the Democratic party's hopes by impeaching Clinton for a shameful, non-Christian act.
What will they do with Obama? The White House staff have been fed on pride and power. It is the WHITE House !! The "centre of white supremacy" for the racist and criminal minded - exactly "the type that assassinate Presidents".
Throughout history regimes, rulers and dynasties have been toppled overnight by palace coups? Is President Bush telling certain investors that in 45 seconds, their game will be happily back in their hands because Obama will be "neutralised" in that much time. Obama's life in the White House is a dangerous life. I hope I am wrong.
PS: Why did Clinton like the rug so much in the photograph?
First be free, then strive to serve. Serving without freedom means adding to the problem. Or so I thought.
I'm surprised, because during the last major ruling (Can D.C. residents own guns?), it was the conservatives who voted "aye, the Constitution protects that right" and the liberals who voted "nay".
It seems the judges are not ruling based upon what the Constitution says, but purely upon partisan lines. Liberals hate guns so they vote "nay, guns are not allowed" but they like drugs so they vote "aye, throw out the warrantless search". And ditto the conservatives in the opposite directions.
It's as if the judges are randomly choosing to protect the parts of the Constitution they like, and rejecting the parts they dislike.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
District of Columbia v. Heller [wikipedia.org]: The Liberals all dissented in this case, which held that the 2nd amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. Apparently that's too much freedom for them.
The liberal justices were correct in this case. All available precedent, as well as the conventional interpretation of the amendment itself, has supported the theory that the 2nd amendment gives a collective right to gun ownership. It only gives an individual right if you ignore the first half of the sentence. The ACLU prevents a clear explanation of the position.
I do not support overactive gun control and may even support an amendment that includes individual gun ownership, but the idea that the Constitution does as written is ridiculous.
The majority opinion even presented a compelling argument for Kelo v. City of New London, arguing that eminent domain could be used for public purpose. From Wikipedia:
Kennedy fleshed out this doctrine in his Kelo concurring opinion, in which he sets out a program of civil discovery in the context of a challenge to an assertion of government purpose in the eminent domain context. However, he does not explicitly limit these criteria to eminent domain, nor to minimum scrutiny, suggesting that they may be generalized to all health and welfare regulation in the scrutiny regime. Because Kennedy signed on to the Court's majority opinion, his concurrence is not binding on lower courts. He writes:
"A court confronted with a plausible accusation of impermissible favoritism to private parties should [conduct]â¦.a careful and extensive inquiry into âwhether, in fact, the development plan [chronology]
[1.] is of primary benefit to . . . the developerâ¦, and private businesses which may eventually locate in the plan areaâ¦,
[2.] and in that regard, only of incidental benefit to the cityâ¦[.]â(TM)"
Kennedy is also interested in facts of the chronology which show, with respect to government,
[3.] awareness ofâ¦depressed economic condition and evidence corroborating the validity of this concernâ¦,
[4.] the substantial commitment of public fundsâ¦before most of the private beneficiaries were knownâ¦,
[5.] evidence that [government] reviewed a variety of development plansâ¦[,]
[6.] [government] chose a private developer from a group of applicants rather than picking out a particular transferee beforehand andâ¦
[7.] other private beneficiaries of the project [were]â¦unknown [to government] because theâ¦space proposed to be built [had] not yet been rentedâ¦."
The Gonzales v. Raich case was not about anything you cited. The decision was based almost entirely on the Commerce Clause. Their decision was iffy, but it does fit very well with precedent, which has established the Commerce Clause as almost infallible in these situations.
Honestly, I can not say one of your examples is solid. If you really want a questionable liberal legal decision, take a gander at Roe v. Wade. (Disclaimer: I am a Democrat and support legal abortions in the United States.) That decision was a legal travesty: the foundation of the decision was the 4th Amendment, insinuating that the right to have an abortion is equivalent with the right of the people to be secure in their persons. The decision in this case was just so broad and overreaching that I see its legal foundation as almost laughable.