Why DOJ Didn't Need a "Super Search Warrant" To Snoop On Fox News' E-mail

awaissoft writes "If attorney general Eric Holder wanted to perform even a momentary Internet wiretap on Fox News' e-mail accounts, he would have had to persuade a judge to approve what lawyers call a 'super search warrant.' A super search warrant's requirements are exacting: Intercepted communications must be secured and placed under seal. Real-time interception must be done only as a last resort. Only certain crimes qualify for this technique, the target must be notified, and additional restrictions apply to state and local police conducting real-time intercepts. But because of the way federal law was written nearly half a century ago, Holder was able to obtain a normal search warrant — lacking those extensive privacy protections — that allowed federal agents to secretly obtain up to six years of email correspondence between Fox News correspondent James Rosen and his alleged sources."

Comments

Not News to Fox

[Frosty Piss]

And although Fox is playing the indignant victim all over the news right now, they've know about this for a long time.

Re:Not News to Fox

[mc6809e]

And although Fox is playing the indignant victim all over the news right now, they've know about this for a long time. [cnn.com]

Did you even bother to read the story at the link you provided?

The story there tells us that FoxNews knew of a telephone records search, but not of an email search.

"CNN and other media outlets have previously reported a separate Justice Department query into Rosen's e-mails. With the approval of Attorney General Eric Holder, Justice officials obtained a warrant from a federal judge to access Rosen's e-mails.

While Fox News is now acknowledging that the Justice Department notified its parent company about the phone records search, that notice apparently did not include anything about the separate search of Rosen's e-mail."

Re: Not News to Fox

[hsmith]

Not shocking this is flagged informative by the left leaning slashdot. Gotta circle the troops around the commander and chief. God forbid he is worse than GWB, which is a feat in itself no one could have imagined.
An administration spying on journalists and using the IRS as a political tool is chilling as fuck and every single American ought to be scared as shit of it. Oh wait, you voted for him? Makes it ok I guess!

Re:Not News to Fox

[craigminah]

Fox is the most honest mainstream new outlet in the US with CNN coming in second. Every news outlet has bias but I think Fox provides less fluff and candy-coated "news". Ms. Crowly at CNN and many many others at CNN are in love with the President. While that is fine, it seems to shape what they say regarding news. For example, the only thing on CNN this week was the Jodi Arias trial which to me isn't newsworthy but they did this to hide the fact the administration (e.g. IRS, DOJ, and President) are all involved in various scandals. Fox reported this and barely mentioned the trial, which is how it should be. You got to hope the news outlets report on things that matter, on things that could screw or unscrew the country. I don't like or dislike President Obama, but I absolutely despise how the media is ignoring the administration's lack of regard for the Constitution, for federal laws, for state laws, or for American values. The only way to keep our politicians in check is to report on the things they do that we don't agree with.

You can attack me all you want but in the end you're just parroting liberal talking points and are unable to think about the future and what's ultimately good for our country. Socialism is where we're headed. Seems good on the surface because you get "free stuff" but when they run out of money to give away the free stuff they tax and tax and tax. When that's not enough they confiscate everything to redistribute it to who needs it. It never ends well so we need to find something short of Socialism. President Obama may be on track or may not be, I personally think he's gone a little too far, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. In the end, it's the media's fault for not holding politicians accountable.

Re:Not News to Fox

[icebike]

Under the law they used for the warrant, they didn't have to notify until 90 days after the termination of the intercept.
But since the intercept was continuous, and for all we know, still on-going, they never notified about Rosen's mail.

The whole article is a mess of obfuscation until you read to the bottom of the the story where it FINALLY gets to the point:

The gradual supplanting of the POP protocol, where messages typically were not left on mail servers and available for law enforcement, by the newer server-based IMAP protocol also encouraged this shift.

Any mail you keep on a service for more than 6 months is considered abandoned, and fair game. This means ANY IMAP account outside of your premises is wide open to seizure.
Which means every google/microsoft/yahoo mail account is fair game under the obsolete 68 law unless you take careful pains to only and always use POP, and never leave a copy on the server.

The law is clearly being deliberately misused, and the mail is not abandoned, as long as the account is being used.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are an honest individual, the easiest way to show you that you are wrong is to have you look at youtube for the times where they have taken news from elsewhere and spliced it together to try to make something which never existed... for example, fox took a segment from the daily show during the 2008 election and did just that.

I am being polite here, the alternative to the above would just be a troll fest.

Re: Not News to Fox

[gandhi_2]

Funny...

When it's a shitbag PFC posting to wikileaks, it's all Save The Whistle-blower around here.

Re: Not News to Fox

[bignetbuy]

Nonsense. Rosen reported that the DPK was going to detonate another nuke. That isn't sensitive material. Rosen didn't go into the means and methods in his reporting. Just that a detonation was coming up. BFD..

Re: Not News to Fox

[amiga3D]

Especially as the PFC actually raised his right hand and swore to be a good and obedient soldier. His was an act of treason whereas reporters are generally depended upon to be all about the story they are after. This is Fox News though. A lot of the left hates them enough to not mind if the administration they worship pisses all over the First Amendment. I noticed most of the leftist media though wasn't so happy about it however. They, unlike the liberals here, are smart enough to realize that one day there might be another Republican administration (I doubt it but I guess it could happen) and they don't like the precedent this sets. To me this is just another sign that using e-mail is not a good idea. If I was in the news business I'd start raising pigeons.

Re:Not News to Fox

[amiga3D]

I'd love a link to that.

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

When the PFC posted a leak, everyone wanted to know where the leak was. He should have lost his clearance, but not his liberty. The same for the "unnamed person from the Department of State". Nobody called for a hanging, it was about whether leaks can be identified. They should be. Then dealt with - not killed or imprisoned, but restricted from doing it again. That's consistent between this and the previous cases. You see inconsistency only because that's what you want to see.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you explain the fact that viewers of Fox News have been shown, through objective and repeatable testing, to be less-informed about current events than viewers/listeners of any other US news network?

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

When the PFC posted a leak, everyone wanted to know where the leak was. He should have lost his clearance, but not his liberty. The same for the "unnamed person from the Department of State". Nobody called for a hanging, it was about whether leaks can be identified. They should be. Then dealt with - not killed or imprisoned, but restricted from doing it again. That's consistent between this and the previous cases. You see inconsistency only because that's what you want to see.

This PFC posted classified information to the public, after having signed documents never to do so. Sorry, but I don't give a shit who he's blowing the whistle on, that's jail time. You go through the proper channels, or you can rot.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

The pfc gave classified government documents to a foreigner. That's treason. He should spend a decade in jail, and have a long time to think about how stupid he was. He's kinda like you, I guess.

Re: Not News to Fox

[ebno-10db]

Not shocking this is flagged informative by the left leaning slashdot. Gotta circle the troops around the commander and chief. God forbid he is worse than GWB

Uh, you did read the summary at least, right? This is extremely critical of Obama and Holder.

Re: Not News to Fox

[the eric conspiracy]

So suppose I'm in the NPK counter intelligence agency and see this report.

It wouldn't take a giant step to come to the conclusion that there is a plant in out organization.

Just the report is enough.

Re:Not News to Fox

[ebno-10db]

Fox News only cares because it's happening to them.

At least they care about it for some reason. They may be hypocrites and only care about their own, but things like this make the press more sensitive to such issues and people in general more aware.

Re:Not News to Fox

[I'm New Around Here]

Does that "current events" selection include all of Obama's scandals and coverups? Or is it limited to who won American Idol and how big Kim Kararshian's ass is?

Re: Not News to Fox

[Dcnjoe60]

IRS is one thing

but the news thing, they reported what was classified info which is illegal. no reason for the government not to try to find out who gave it to them

Unless you believe in a free press which means their sources are protected. Otherwise, if the sources fear they will be found out by the government, they won't come forward.

Re:Not News to Fox

[kermidge]

The simple solution is to fold email into current law so as to enjoy the same protections as snail mail.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

In his situation you have to risk the time, is it worth it? Will public groundswell save you if you are found out? Neither Wikileaks, nor any intermediary can be held responsible under the First Amendment unless they bribed or coerced him somehow.

But reporters, they're just receiving this info. It should be protected under this super search warrant.

I hope these past few weeks have been instructive in the wisdom of forbidding government certain powers on principle. It will be misused. Don't fall into the trap that, well, it's OK because it's my guy wielding the power. Some day, the shoe will be on the other foot. See also the "nuclear option" in the Senate. The Republicans almost got rid of it not too long ago.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

says the parrot for Faux News. And here I thought they renamed Fox the "We Hate Obama and Love Benghazi" channel. And Obama going "a little too far" is 100 times better than Bush and Cheney going overboard and starting not one, but TWO wars - one under completely false pretense. We can all do the body count together if you like.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Bartles]

First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the socialists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Bartles]

First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the socialists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Catholic.

Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Bret Baiher, 60 minutes each weekday. Shepard Smith, 60 minutes each weekday.
Chris Wallace on weekends 60 minutes each weekend.

Right there I showed you lied, I could go on listing other ones. Why should we listen to anything else you have say?

Re:Not News to Fox

[redkcir]

And did this allow the wire tapping of his parents and Fox employees? Taking their PHONE records? There was more to this than some emails. Of course it was OK to lie about the circumstances to the court to obtain the warrants when they knew Rosen wasn't possibly a criminal "co-conspirator" as shown by, Surprise! Surprise!, No charges filed. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/23/correspondents-association-concerned-government-too-aggressive-in-tracking/

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

No, that's not treason. The foreigner wasn't an "enemy", so it couldn't have been treason, if you are going to make up shit, you might as well name it more interestingly. He committed data rape.

When you figure out basic definition, feel free to come back.

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

The "classified" information, in most cases, was improperly classified. When everything is classified because it's easier (and illegal), then a breech of shouldn't-be classified information should be lauded, and the classification laws/rules changed.

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

The reporter should not be "protected" in allowing them to conceal a crime. If leaking classified documents is a crime, then the crime of sharing the documents is something the reporter has direct knowledge of. They didn't go after the reporter because he repeated it or held it, but because he received it, indicating he had information about who leaked it.

Of course my stance is that almost nothing should be classified, so that things like this couldn't happen, but that won't happen. If you are going to have a law, you should enforce it. But having no law is better.

Re: Not News to Fox

[funwithBSD]

You have no idea what you are talking about.

It is NOT illegal to receive classified information and publish it if it is just dumped in your lap, like the Pentagon Papers.

It is if you asked for it and conspired obtain the information, which is what they are trying to proveby naming him an coconspiritor.

Add to that the fact tht Holder testified he knew nothing about it and did not condone it.... And yet it turns out he signed the warrant.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Pubstar]

Oh FFS can't we all just agree that ALL news in the US is a load of shit, spun by their respective parties in order to blind us to what's really going on? Seriously, this bickering between the two parties gets us nowhere, and keeps us blind to the corporations slowly stealing our rights. If we stay divided over petty shit, we're all fucked in the long run.

Re: Not News to Fox

[jelizondo]

Here is the official oath, directly from the Army's website.

I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God." (Title 10, US Code; Act of 5 May 1960 replacing the wording first adopted in 1789, with amendment effective 5 October 1962).

You see, first he swears to defend the Constitution and then to obey.

By his lights, the PFC was defending the Constitution against domestic enemies.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Not shocking this is flagged informative by the left leaning slashdot. Gotta circle the troops around the commander and chief. God forbid he is worse than GWB, which is a feat in itself no one could have imagined.

There are plenty of engineers that are conservative that visit /. and if their weren't it would still be irrelevant to the validity of the post. In other words, debate his post instead of crying foul of the system from the beginning. Your arguments would be much more persuasive if you simply stated them.

An administration spying on journalists and using the IRS as a political tool is chilling as fuck and every single American ought to be scared as shit of it. Oh wait, you voted for him? Makes it ok I guess!

Except for the swearing, the first sentence at least lets us know what you're talking about. The second sentence is just an attack. You're not trying to make the case for your ideas nor persuade the opposition. Currently you're rated insightful on 'left leaning slashdot'

Re:Not News to Fox

[Thor Ablestar]

unless you take careful pains to only and always use POP,

It's NOT a solution. The only working solution (vulnerable to sniffer only) is your own encrypted SMTP server on encrypted partition, with your last will to physically destroy the boot flash. The more radical means (I2P or possibly TOR) are incompatible with existing mail.

The simple solution is to fold email into current law so as to enjoy the same protections as snail mail.

Can you personally fold your email into current law?

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

I have to disagree with you. PFC Bradley Manning was/is subject to the UCMJ, NOT civilian law. While I agree that he did do the Right Thing by blowing the whistle on the abuses that were happening at the hands of serving military and para-military forces, he did knowing that what he was doing would be seen as damn near treason during a time of war.

Specifically, he was arguably in violation of articles 106a (treason) and 104 (aid and comfort to the enemy). Both of which are worth the death penalty; if the courts martial panel believes it is warranted. Pvt Manning can't claim he didn't know this applied to him, this sort of thing is VERY CAREFULLY explained to recruits and again when they attend advanced training aimed at a security sensitive tasking.

It's difficult for civilans to understand not only the difference in law between them and soldiers, but also the deep sense of betrayal felt by fellow soldiers when Pvt Manning was revealed. I still think he did the right thing, I'm not sure I would have the guts to do what he did. One thing seems clear, this was a deeply emotionally disturbed young man who was NOT getting the help he needed and was as much lashing out as he was actually trying to shed light on serious abuses.

The only wrong thing I see in his treatment after his arrest was the incredibly extensive solitary imprisonment he was subjected to. As a fomer soldier myself, I strongly suspect the Marines emotional reaction to the nature of his crime AND his sexuality were the real reason behind his treatment.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

And the blatant hypocrisy of the leftist vermin that infest Slashdot is laid bare once again.

Had this been done by a Republican Administration to one of their favorite news organization such as the New York Times, etc. you would have been flaming the Administration and anyone who even mildly defended them.

You are a indeed a frosty piss head with no ethics and no moral compass except your brain dead, face painting, homer attitude.

I hope you and your entire family dies in a fire. Well, maybe you should survive as a scarred stump so you can remember what you lost until they decide to turn off your feeding tube.

Re: Not News to Fox

[sycodon]

So you are all for putting most of the NYTs staff in jail for their role in releasing classified information over the past several decades?

Re:Not News to Fox

[blackraven14250]

For example, the only thing on CNN this week was the Jodi Arias trial which to me isn't newsworthy but they did this to hide the fact the administration (e.g. IRS, DOJ, and President) are all involved in various scandals. Fox reported this and barely mentioned the trial, which is how it should be.

I guess you didn't watch CNN at all last week, when all of the scandals first broke, and there was nonstop coverage of it (including about a solid hour of live testimony in front of Congress from Miller) and nearly no coverage of Jodi Arias. Funny how small sample sizes work, eh?

Re:Not News to Fox

[meta-monkey]

But that would be a Sudden Outbreak of Common Sense, and those have been illegal for neigh on 30 years now.

Re:Not News to Fox

[MickLinux]

There is no "most honest". There is only honest or not honest. Now, by my memory, Fox news did not cover the Libertarian Party when they were doing well in the elections, going so fvr as to explain their position that if Libertarians WON the election, they would not support it. They have performed similarly with Libertarian leaning Republicans, supporting instead fascist-leaning Republicans.

As such, they fall into the category of "dishonest".

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Report, not support. Fox news said that if the Libetrians won, they would not report it. Sorry , brain-o. Anyhow, Fox is as socialist and dishonest a news organization as I have seen.

Oh, and your ad hominem attacks (just parroting) don't strengthen your argument.

Re:Not News to Fox

[phantomfive]

He didn't say Fox News is great, he said it was better than CNN or MSNBC. Which unfortunately is a low bar......

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, that's nice. And a court of law decides whether he did or did not do so. That's the way justice works.

Re: Not News to Fox

[bryan1945]

The Supreme Court has already ruled on this issue. They said reporting on something, even if it was obtained illegally, is fine. It was in the Wall Street Journal's Saturday edition, back in the editorial section. The write cited the various applicable cases.

Re:Not News to Fox

[narcc]

Will this one do instead?
Fox News Faults Obama For Not Saying What They Edited Out

I have some vague recollection of the one the parent mentioned, but not enough to find it quickly. There's a good chance I ran across it here:
Fox News Bias Playlist

Re: Not News to Fox

[ppanon]

This is Fox News though. A lot of the left hates them enough to not mind if the administration they worship pisses all over the First Amendment.

Well, that's because the First Amendment guarantees freedom of the press (generally considered to apply to an independent investigation and reporting organization), but the left typically considers Fox News to be a propaganda arm of the Republican Party, and partisan propaganda purveyors shouldn't qualify for 1st Amendment rights (although individuals from those organizations would still qualify for the other amendments in the Bill of Rights where appropriate). The left's opinion of Fox News is mostly accurate, but there is unfortunately just enough journalism occasionally done at Fox that they should continue to be afforded 1st Amendment rights.
The other news [entertainment] organizations are smart enough to not want Fox News to set a bad precedent and for them to have to defend their qualifications for a 1st Amendment defense after the fact. The latter would have a huge chilling effect on their sources and their ability to collect information.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's not treason.
When you figure out basic definition, feel free to come back.

According to Dictionary.com, treason includes:

the betrayal of a trust or confidence;

as well as

giving aid or comfort to the enemies of one's government

Are you claiming PFC Manning did not betray the trust the government gave him?
Are you claiming that enemies of the US did not use the leaked documents to their advantage, in both factual intelligence (aid) and public sympathy (comfort)?

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

If PFC Manning thought he blowing the whistle, he should have used the appropriate channels to do so. Leaking classified documents to the press was not the proper way to go about it. There are several legal outlets available for doing just that. They all lie outside the chain of command such that retaliation by the chain of command is neigh on impossible. Hell, he could have even gone to the FBI if he thought he couldn't trust the military. They do a pretty decent job of bringing down high ranking officials when they have actual evidence to go with. But no, PFC Manning was just an idiot that couldn't follow the rules, and put people's lives in danger. He deserves the full penalty of law.

   

Re:Not News to Fox

[davester666]

Yes, it's something "new" [as in, invented after the constitution was written], therefore no existing laws/rules/precendents apply.

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

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.

Dictionary.com doesn't trump the Constitution.

Re: Not News to Fox

[AK Marc]

You didn't read what I wrote. Reporting on it was fine. They aren't investigating the reporter for any illegal acts. They are investigating the reporter's source for illegal acts. The reporter has a connection to a crime, which is why they are looking into his papers to identify the only one who may have committed a crime.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

They all lie outside the chain of command such that retaliation by the chain of command is neigh on impossible.

What planet are you from again?

Re: Not News to Fox

[Holmwood]

Ever hear of the Pentagon Papers? The NY Times and WaPo published those back in 1971, the Nixon administration tried to prosecute them. The Supreme Court held 6-3 (with nine different opinions) that the newspaper(s) had a compelling interest in publishing. Largely since then, First Amendment rights have trumped governments interests in secrecy.

You can suddenly try and change the legal standards that have evolved over decades, but I do find it amusing to suddenly see soi-disant liberals arguing that Richard Nixon was right after all, and that journalists should routinely be accused of crimes when they commit acts of journalism.

If your standards hold, pretty much any future administration should be able to jail most journalists in the US that have ever reported on government, foreign affairs, or the military. Be careful what you advocate for.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Cederic]

You have a problem. You think everything is done as a partisan statement for or against.. well, maybe Obama, maybe republican/democrat split, maybe.. I don't know.

But maybe, just possibly, the original post to which you replied was merely stating a fact. Incorrectly, as it happens.

An administration spying on journalists is a bad thing. Nobody you replied to said otherwise, or linked it in any way to voting for anybody. So why did you?

Re:Not News to Fox

[craigminah]

What does listing reporter's names prove? Cite specific examples. Did it ever occur to you that it's YOU that are biased? Can you realize and comprehend your own bias and how it affects your judgement/ You are another mindless zombie...

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

By his lights, the PFC was defending the Constitution against domestic enemies.

Ah, that explains his completely uncritical dumping of hundreds of thousands of unrelated classified communications including, for example, the names of threatened resistance organizers in Iran. Yes! What a fine example of supporting the constitution! It was absolutely essential, in his selfless defense of the constitution, to make sure that the financial arrangements between operatives and locals working in, say, Yemen, to defang a murderous, militant jihaddist insurgency be supplied to the very people who want to kill anyone coordinating against the insurgents. Yay PFC Manning! A true hero!

He couldn't be bothered to illustrate any particular thing he thought was counter-constitutional, but sought instead to simply have a tantrum over his personal despondency and frustration at his posting and daily life, and thought he'd see about 15 minutes of fame by working with Assange to make a politicized media splash with hundreds of thousands of documents he hadn't bothered to read, let along comprehend and put into any sort of context. What a man.

Re: Not News to Fox

[silentcoder]

>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.

Yes, and of course, all politicians since the birth of the United States have held all clauses of the Constitution as sacred and equal. Like when Thomas Jefferson paid heed to those clauses about due process and a fair trial by not shooting an accused traitor on the White House lawn... oh wait.

Re:Not News to Fox

[MickLinux]

Correction: that they would not support^h^h^h^h *report* it.

Re: Not News to Fox

[gl4ss]

If PFC Manning thought he blowing the whistle, he should have used the appropriate channels to do so. Leaking classified documents to the press was not the proper way to go about it. There are several legal outlets available for doing just that. They all lie outside the chain of command such that retaliation by the chain of command is neigh on impossible. Hell, he could have even gone to the FBI if he thought he couldn't trust the military. They do a pretty decent job of bringing down high ranking officials when they have actual evidence to go with. But no, PFC Manning was just an idiot that couldn't follow the rules, and put people's lives in danger. He deserves the full penalty of law.

 

Main part of the leak was that the official channels ALREADY KNEW and APPROVED.
Including cia, fbi and the president.

duh.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

The simple solution is to fold email into current law so as to enjoy the same protections as snail mail.

That's not simple at all, not even a tiny little bit.
Snail Mail is run by the Post Office and there are many, many legal protections which would be a nightmare to apply to a slew of private, unregulated email providers.

The plain and simple fact is that email never was intended to be a secure or private means of communication, so people should stop treating it as such.

Re: Not News to Fox

[JWW]

Wow. So that the ticket. All the Imperial President needs is the appropriate doublespeak labels for his enemies in the press and they can be destroyed. No first amendment issues here, the Emperor says so.

Re: Not News to Fox

[gandhi_2]

Diplomatic cables are evidence of Enemies of the Constitution?

Re: Not News to Fox

[greenbird]

Especially as the PFC actually raised his right hand and swore to be a good and obedient soldier.

How the hell does this get modded insightful? It should be modded "Clueless Moron". At no time and no where does the US military require an oath to be "to be a good and obedient soldier." In the US military it's drilled into you that you have an obligation NOT to follow illegal orders and will suffer the full consequences should you knowingly do so. At least it was when I was in. Hope THAT hasn't changed. The oath is to the constitution and to obey per the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Note that is to obey within the limits of the law. "I was just following orders" is NOT a valid defense in the US military.

His was an act of treason whereas reporters are generally depended upon to be all about the story they are after.

I think he should be given a medal for showing how obscenely lacking the security is. Strangely absolutely no one latches on the that aspect of the story which I think is the most important aspect. The fact that one PFC had the ability to leak that volume of secret information is enough to make any security professional's head explode.

Treason would have been selling it for personal gain to some foreign power or organization that would use it for nefarious purposes. Whether what he did rises past whistle blower to the level being criminal is arguable. But given his stated motivations coupled with the fact that he got no gain of any sort out of the leak puts forth a pretty strong case that from at least his perspective he was following his oath "to be a good and obedient soldier" by leaking the information.

Re: Not News to Fox

[greenbird]

You see, first he swears to defend the Constitution and then to obey.

Note that is to obey within the scope of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Knowingly following an illegal order makes you just as guilty as the person giving the order. "I was just following orders" is NOT a valid defense in the US military.

Re: Not News to Fox

[amiga3D]

And my point is that while the left is all happy now they'll sing a different tune if a Republican President is ever elected again and the other side starts doing this to people like NBC and ABC that propagandize for the Left. I'm thinking though that they are pretty confident that the Republican party is through and so they wont have to worry about payback in the future. They're probably right too given that fewer and fewer Americans work for a living every year and socialism is taking over. The Republican party is going to have to change and that will cause it to split. We may have a 3 party system after all before long.

Re: Not News to Fox

[minstrelmike]

Well, that's nice. And a court of law decides whether he did or did not do so. That's the way justice works.

That's the way _society_ works. Justice is something else entirely and usually outside The Law
The Magna Carta was an illegal attempt to enjoy justice for nobles. The US Revolution and current constitution was an _illegal_ attempt to enjoy justice for all white males in the country.

Don't confuse The Law with Justice. Most of our heroes were anti-law revolutionaries. Most of the major events in history were illegal.
The reason the feminist bumper sticker is true has nothing to do with feminism:
Well-Behaved Women Rarely Make History is true because history is not the record of good, legal behavior.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Hentes]

What makes it ok is that the Murdochs did quite a lot of snooping of their own, this is just giving them a taste of their own medicine.

Re:Not News to Fox

[kermidge]

Saying that email requires the same procedure and justifications as now done for snail mail is quite simple; including a few words in existing law might not be thoroughly trivial, but it's near as damn it.

For reasoning in some 'physical' sense, saying that either the server wherein the email lies, or the last slash in a path, acts as an envelope would suffice.

It's just not that complicated. The fact that email is usually plain text does not make it necessary to consider it to be in plain view, because it is not - not until someone sits at a keyboard to find and display it, thus performing a physical act to in effect open an envelope. This compares quite well to existing law, last time I looked at it.

Re: Not News to Fox

[demonlapin]

partisan propaganda purveyors shouldn't qualify for 1st Amendment rights

Pushing partisan propaganda is the entire reason we have a First Amendment. Is your political belief system so weak that the only way it can succeed is if you silence everyone who disagrees with you? And doesn't that bother you, even a little?

Re: Not News to Fox

[demonlapin]

The current POTUS has a lot in common with Nixon, both positive and negative (Nixon, too, got Americans out of an unpopular foreign war).

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

I think he should be given a medal for showing how obscenely lacking the security is. Strangely absolutely no one latches on the that aspect of the story which I think is the most important aspect. The fact that one PFC had the ability to leak that volume of secret information is enough to make any security professional's head explode.

What a sensationalist statement in an otherwise intelligent post. It's obvious you have no attachment to the reality of the situations that lead to these events... if he's working intel, why on Earth would he not have access? That tool has caused real problems for real people in his arrogant, selfish act. Clearance to KNOW the difference. It's up to you to actually adhere to it.

The real core of the problem is why did an individual with risk factors not lose his clearance sooner.

Treason would have been selling it for personal gain to some foreign power or organization that would use it for nefarious purposes. Whether what he did rises past whistle blower to the level being criminal is arguable. But given his stated motivations coupled with the fact that he got no gain of any sort out of the leak puts forth a pretty strong case that from at least his perspective he was following his oath "to be a good and obedient soldier" by leaking the information.

Treason requires no gain, it's subverting your government/forces and aiding the enemy. That happened here, end of discussion. The only question was did he have ANY legitimate reason to cause that damage. Agreed with you wholly on that part.

Re: Not News to Fox

[greenbird]

What a sensationalist statement in an otherwise intelligent post. It's obvious you have no attachment to the reality of the situations that lead to these events. if he's working intel, why on Earth would he not have access?

Man I hope you don't work in any field that requires even the most basic security. It's anything but sensational. He's as a PFC. He's a friggin clerk. That's the third lowest rank in the Army and you typically get it a couple weeks out of basic. It's the sheer volume of what he had access to that's completely idiotic from a security aspect. The detachment from reality is a PFC having access to all that.

Second massive security lapse, when anyone accesses secure information it should be logged exactly when and what. There should have been Hollywood alarm bells and flashing red lights at anyone accessing everything he did. You can buy commercial DLP systems that alarm on that type of stuff. HIPAA and PCI DSS rules are apparently more stringent that that of the US military.

There should be a line of court marshals due to the fact he was able to do what he did. Instead they're persecuting him.

Treason requires no gain,

I never said treason required gain. The two typical motivations for treason are ideological or personal gain. It should be obvious he didn't do it due to ideological differences and he made no gain. Lake of motive is a strong part of his defense. Or it should be if he wasn't being railroaded.

it's subverting your government/forces and aiding the enemy.

He never talk to the enemy. He didn't give information to the enemy. He gave it to an organization that did it's best to ensure nothing was published that would cause direct harm to anyone. That organization asked for help to accomplish this. As I said he also brought to light the criminal lack of security exercised by the military. Nor was his motivation to aid the enemy. His motivation was to bring to light potentially illegal operations by the US military. This does even come close to the level of treason. At least before Obama took office. His administration thinks any leak that makes him look bad is treason. He's prosecuted more whistle blowers than every other president before him combined.

That happened here, end of discussion.

Yup. No trial. No defense of any kind. Just lock him up and torture him. (Yes I consider what they did to him crossed the line to torture.)

Welcome to the new America.

Re: Not News to Fox

[amiga3D]

It's typical for low ranking people to have access to all kinds of classified material. I don't know if you've ever been in the service but I assume from your know it all attitude you must have at least some experience and think you're the expert. I know from my experience that low ranking enlisted are often given high access to classified material. That is the beauty of the military, everyone has a job to do and they do it regardless of rank. This idiot betrayed his country and his uniform. He is the rarity in the service. The guy that thinks his feelings or opinion on something is more important than doing his duty. Yes the oath is to the Constitution. Being given orders to rape or murder or even torture is illegal and should be disobeyed. Making a decision on what material should be released to the public is hardly his to make. If you think we should let every soldier decide for himself what should be released for public viewing then you are the clueless moron.

Re: Not News to Fox

[greenbird]

It's typical for low ranking people to have access to all kinds of classified material. I don't know if you've ever been in the service but I assume from your know it all attitude you must have at least some experience and think you're the expert. I know from my experience that low ranking enlisted are often given high access to classified material. That is the beauty of the military, everyone has a job to do and they do it regardless of rank.

Duh. Low ranking people have access to classified material? I never would have guessed that. Yes I did 4 years in the infantry. My "know it all attitude" as you put doesn't stem from my military experience. My "know it all attitude" comes from doing computer security consulting. And it's not know it all. It's knowing the basics of security. I don't care what his job was. He had no reason to have access to what he did. No one person had reason to have access to all the stuff he had access to. That volume of secure material should have had some sort of access control. Credit card numbers and healthcare information require it. Don't you think material the government has rated secret would have at least the same level of controls as they do? It doesn't taken a genius or knowing it all to come to that conclusion. Give me one even vague or remote reason anyone should have access to 250,000 United States diplomatic cables and 500,000 army reports much less someone doing operational intelligence in a war zone. I have no friggin idea how anyone with half a brain could come up with any way to rationalize that. But then again I'm the clueless moron.

Making a decision on what material should be released to the public is hardly his to make. If you think we should let every soldier decide for himself what should be released for public viewing then you are the clueless moron.

It is if it's illegal operations being performed by the military he is required to bring it to light if the chain of command isn't working. That's part of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. It requires you to bring that information to light. So i guess the Uniform Code of Military Justice is the clueless moron. Having military experience I'd think you'd know that.

Mind you I'm not saying what is did was right. I don't have all the information. What I do know is from what I have seen and do know it doesn't rise to the level of treason. He shouldn't be on trial for his life. And it certainly doesn't justify locking him up for 5 years without a trial and torturing him.

Re: Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually it is worse than you state for that PFC, when you are entrusted with a security clearance you are under even more laws and are made aware and required to sign that you understand and agree to be held accountable. That is a condition of a security clearance. The PFC in question is a fscking traitor during time of war.

Re:Not News to Fox

[Anonymous Coward]

Why in fucks sake is this comment scored 2! it should be scored at 5+!

Both parties are the same, the left lies and the right lies, both try to lessen our rights and ignore our rights to increase the power the gov't has over us.

Re: Not News to Fox

[ppanon]

Sorry, I'm not a US citizen, let alone a constitutional scholar, but there's a few parts to the First Amendment and one clause specifically regarding the press:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

My understanding is that that explicit press clause has been used in traditional case law to strongly defend the confidentiality of the operations of US news reporting organizations, and that they are thereby provided additional protections from search that are less available to individuals, due to their "impartial" role in keeping the government accountable to the people. It's those specific traditional protections that I was referring to, not freedom of speech in general. It's arguable that an organization that engages primarily in propaganda shouldn't be the benefactor of freedom from search if its propaganda often fails to be consistent with verifiable facts.

People aren't up in arms because the DoJ tried to stop the news organizations from publishing the stories (freedom of speech), they're up in arms because the DoJ obtained and executed specific types of search warrants against news organizations to try to track down sources of information leaks.

Re: Not News to Fox

[amiga3D]

I will agree on the last sentence. A swift trial is his right and torture is definetly wrong.

Re: Not News to Fox

[demonlapin]

That is indeed the spirit animating the Pentagon Papers decision, for example, but as Citizens United pointed out, political speech is the most highly protected form of speech that exists in the US, regardless of how accurate it is or is not. The DOJ didn't try to stop publication because they can't - prior restraint is essentially impossible under US law.

Re: Not News to Fox

[ppanon]

I appreciate the confirmation. However, at the risk of sounding like a Monty Python skit, if you're going to argue with me, you need to find points of disagreement.

Political speech may be protected, but it doesn't prevent you from being searched, wiretapped, or charged if you are involved in the breaking of another law. Otherwise Bradley Manning would have used that as a defense and would be running around free. Hence an organization that calls itself a news organization but in fact only engages in politcal propaganda should not expect the additional protections traditionally afforded to news organizations.

Re: Not News to Fox

[demonlapin]

Political speech is more highly protected than newspapers. People involved in propaganda have greater protection than those merely reporting the news.

Re: Not News to Fox

[billd10]

If Fox News is a right wing propaganda machine, then MSNBC and most of the other networks are left wing propaganda machines. Who cares how the left justifies violating other peoples' rights? Sure, Obama uses government agencies to punish those who don't slobber all over him. Frankly, it is a sign of weak character, just like it was when Nixon did it. Unfortunately, Congress doesn't have the guts to impeach Obama for his illegal activities, unlike when Nixon was president. And, in spite of being illegally spied upon by the Obama administration, the press will soon forgive him, for he is their emperor who must be served by the fawning media.

So

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm guessing this relates to some big news story in the US. Possibly wouldn't have hurt to provide a little background though.

Re:So

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm guessing this relates to some big news story in the US.

Nah, it has to do with the Obama administration's gigantic overreach and efforts to stifle free speech by those in the media who would dare question his Obamaness, so it's therefore a very minor and unimportant story, like the Benghazi coverup, the illegal IRS profiling, and the AP wiretaps.

It's not surprising you haven't heard of it, it's not about tornadoes in Oklahoma and how they're TOTALLY the fault of Bush's environmental policies.

Re:So

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, why read slashdot at all when you can just use "The Google"...

What did Fox News do?

[Nyder]

I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, but what did they do that requires wiretapping?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

> "I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, "

Hahaha. Well played, Comrade! You spout the party's talking points well, my friend!

But you should call it, "Faux News". Didn't you get the memo?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Investigative journalism apparently. You know, the stuff that the major networks gave up on years ago.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, but what did they do that requires wiretapping?

Perhaps the more relevant question should be what does anyone do to justify wiretapping, which in this police state, amounts to jack shit.

(I didn't use the word "warrant" here, because that might imply they need to follow the law and obtain one. They don't.)

But hey, keep arguing red vs. blue and vote for that two-party system. You see how much fucking good it does...

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

rofl

Funniest comment in years-
"FOX News doing investigative journalism...."

lmao

Re:What did Fox News do?

[BitterOak]

I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, but what did they do that requires wiretapping?

It's not what they did; it's what the person talking to them was allegedly doing. The Executive branch was investigating a leak from one of its own, and Fox News was on the receiving end of the information, apparently, so by wiretapping Fox News' communications, they were hoping to find the source of the leak.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Retard,

The reporter in question, Rosen, published a story about North Korea's nuclear program citing an unnamed State Department source. That IS "investigative journalism.

If you want to be a "me too! me too! Can slam Faux News like a retard, too?" try cricitizing the quality of their reporting, rather than going for the ludicrous and instantly refutable claim that they don't do any reporting at all.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[_xeno_]

I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, but what did they do that requires wiretapping?

Journalism.

No, seriously: James Rosen asked someone at the State Department questions about North Korea.

Because that apparently could involve classified information (not that it necessarily did), Obama's Department of Justice pulled six years of Rosen's email.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[mc6809e]

I know they are stupid and shouldn't be called a news show, but what did they do that requires wiretapping?

Rosen reported that,

"U.S. intelligence officials have warned President Obama and other senior American officials that North Korea intends to respond to the passage of a U.N. Security Council resolution this week... with another nuclear test,"

And now the "Justice" Department is telling us that they consider him an accomplice to espionage.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[braeldiil]

Essentially, the reporter in question wrote an article just to say that we had a high-level asset inside the North Korean government. There was no new factual information in the article otherwise - just the need to out a spy in an article about North Korea responding to sanctions. Similar to the AP case, where the reporter felt the need to out the fact that the British had an undercover operative inside Al Qaida who delivered them a sample bomb for analysis.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[mysidia]

It's not what they did; it's what the person talking to them was allegedly doing. The Executive branch was investigating a leak from one of its own, and Fox News was on the receiving end of the information, apparently, so by wiretapping Fox News' communications, they were hoping to find the source of the leak.

This is exactly the kind of activity that is supposed to be prohibited by the 1st amendment; attempting to force the press (covertly or not) to reveal the identity of their sources.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Austerity Empowers]

They investigate what they choose to investigate for their own ends. No network has given that up. Fox News just tends to be investigating a lot more now, with a left leaning president, while during W they mostly just pandered. Now MSNBC is in pander mode, having done the "investigating" thing during W.

Pretending anything else is just exposing your personal bias. The crime here is our news outlets have such blatant bias, and very little dedication to journalism and conveying the facts to the masses. Worst, people actually think that what these organizations are doing is truth.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

> "And now the "Justice" Department is telling us that they consider him an accomplice to espionage."

And...

"The Obama Administration fought to keep a search warrant for James Rosen’s private e-mail account secret, arguing to a federal judge that the government might need to monitor the account for a lengthy period of time"

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2013/05/how-justice-fought-to-keep-rosens-warrant-secret.html

Yeah, that's the reason Obama fought to keep this hidden. Because Rosen might be some kind of super-spy.

Nigga please.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[F.Ultra]

Yes but Gouvernments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?".

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Numbnuts-
I will never pass up any opportunity to bash FOX, even if the rare ACTUAL news item is reported by them.

They are a joke.

If you choose to defend them, along with all the other "Me Too! I LOVE FOX!" clowns out there, go right ahead.

Fox IS a joke, end of story.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Very good point, no news source has ever been in existence that didn't have an ulterior motive. Weather it was for profit, pander or ideals. The news has always been spoon fed to us.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Tablizer]

It's a sticky balancing act between protecting national security and protecting freedom of the press. Should we try to find secret leakers even if the investigation goes through journalist?

Re: What did Fox News do?

[roman_mir]

Yes but Gouvernments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?".

- yeah, and then they multiply it by about 1000 and do that instead.

Has Nixon actually bombed a bunch of Americans around the world? I hate the guy, by the way, but I don't think he has done anything even close to what the modern day politicians are doing daily.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

You left out the part where Holder swore to a judge that he was a co-conspirator and that he may be charged with a felony. It is not ok to go after leaks via the press. They will all have to start using burner phones

Re: What did Fox News do?

[gallondr00nk]

Yes but Governments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?"

Quick, get someone over to the Watergate!

Re:What did Fox News do?

[ebno-10db]

They investigate what they choose to investigate for their own ends. No network has given that up. Fox News just tends to be investigating a lot more now, with a left leaning president, while during W they mostly just pandered. Now MSNBC is in pander mode, having done the "investigating" thing during W.

So between the two of them at least somebody is doing some investigation regardless of who is president. Ideally news outfits would be less biased and more willing to hang any president, but the way this works now is pretty much how the press has worked for most of our history. It's a lot better than having no one investigating.

BTW, when did Obama become a "left leaning president" as you put it? He's a Democrat, which means CNN loves him and Fox hates him, but on most issues he doesn't lean left at all. You must be imagining some opposition party that no longer exists.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[ATMAvatar]

Very good point, no news source has ever been in existence that didn't have an ulterior motive. Weather it was for profit, pander or ideals. The news has always been spoon fed to us.

Well, the bias has manifested itself in different ways and severity. I'm sure that there have been some egregious cases of bias in the past. In past decades though, many news stations took their job seriously and strove for objective news, with biases creeping in mostly as a result of subconscious slips when putting together stories.

Today, because echo chamber news has shown to be more profitable than real news, the bias is mostly mandated by company policy. Fox started first by pandering to the right, MSNBC came next by pandering to the left, and CNN... well, I think CNN just has a gas leak somewhere in their office.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[gl4ss]

Yes but Gouvernments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?".

- yeah, and then they multiply it by about 1000 and do that instead.

Has Nixon actually bombed a bunch of Americans around the world? I hate the guy, by the way, but I don't think he has done anything even close to what the modern day politicians are doing daily.

Everything Nixon did is legal in current day USA.

Think about that.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Totenglocke]

Except Nixon was a saint compared to Obama.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

They investigate what they choose to investigate for their own ends. No network has given that up. Fox News just tends to be investigating a lot more now, with a left leaning president, while during W they mostly just pandered. Now MSNBC is in pander mode, having done the "investigating" thing during W.

Pretending anything else is just exposing your personal bias. The crime here is our news outlets have such blatant bias, and very little dedication to journalism and conveying the facts to the masses. Worst, people actually think that what these organizations are doing is truth.

No, MSNBC and all the other networks but Fox are in pander mode. Once you get past idiot partisan biases, you realize a simple fact:

If you vote in a Democrat, one shitty network, Fox, and a handful of conservative rags will investigate the administration.

If you vote for a Republican, all the good networks (and the ridiculously shitty MSNBC) and the vast majority of the press will investigate the administration.

Vote Republican just so the fourth estate will do their fucking job.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[daknapp]

The crime here is our news outlets have such blatant bias, and very little dedication to journalism and conveying the facts to the masses.

That has always been the case, the various news outlets' claims to the contrary notwithstanding. It doesn't bother me as much as the obvious willingness of people to abandon the First Amendment protections for a news source they don't agree with.

You'd think Slashdotters would be intelligent enough to separate the principle from the actors. Oh, wait. This is Slashdot. My bad.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Dcnjoe60]

The crime here is our news outlets have such blatant bias, and very little dedication to journalism and conveying the facts to the masses.

That has always been the case, the various news outlets' claims to the contrary notwithstanding. It doesn't bother me as much as the obvious willingness of people to abandon the First Amendment protections for a news source they don't agree with.

You'd think Slashdotters would be intelligent enough to separate the principle from the actors. Oh, wait. This is Slashdot. My bad.

That has not always been the case. Early on, network news was a public service and paid for by the profits from other programming. Then some bright MBA got the idea that if they made it controversial and sensational then more people would tune in and they could charge more for commercials, just like regular programming. Thus was born the modern news outlet and journalism, where it is no longer about presenting the news, but attracting viewers for advertising revenue. Sex sells, so we had weeks of the Jodi Arias trial. Politics, abortion, gay rights are all hot button issues, so instead of news we have op-ed pieces masquerading as news to inflame the public, but to get them to tune in. Why? Because people respond to that shit and in doing so, the news outlets make a fortune in advertising revenues.

The BBC reports the news because they are government funded. They just report the news good or bad. In the US, however, if profits don't exceed last year, then shareholders are angry which means the board of directors is angry which means CEOs are in trouble, so the "news" has to get viewers to watch however they can. That is why there is a bias in the news. It is basic Marketing 101. Controversy gets viewers ==>Viewers gets advertisers ==> advertisers improve the bottom line ==> improved bottom line make shareholders happy ==>happy shareholders leads to happy Boards ==> happy Boards leads to bonuses for execs and the pattern repeats over and over.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Mashiki]

Can you point to us where the other networks were investigating things...unless fox was investigating it first? You know, sometimes a month or more beforehand. Besides, it wasn't just MSNBC in pander mode, but NBC, CBS, CNN, and NPR. So, really now we've got a 5:1 ratio. Then again, Fox was hardly silent during the days of W, and broke several stories that the other part of news media then caught onto. And really the media hasn't only done this with the current administration, but other important news stories...like the Gosnell trial. And the only reason why they refused to do any news on that is because they were carrying even more water.

Even though I'm up in Canada, Fox was the only one that carried pundits on both sides of the issue on that one. The other 5 did nothing on it, for nearly a month. In fact the reserved press section in the courtroom was uniformly empty of them, AP, Reuters, AFP among others and only Fox and bloggers were the ones covering it.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW, when did Obama become a "left leaning president" as you put it? He's a Democrat ... but on most issues he doesn't lean left as far as I want him to.

FTFY. Obama is solidly liberal on health care, immigration, environment, gay rights (well, now at least), abortion, race, political speech (e.g. Citizen's United decision), spending, taxes, macroeconomics (stimulus, son of stimulus, QE 2 and 3, etc.), scope of government, gun rights, and most foreign affairs (his views on Israel and UN, and his entire "foreign policy reset" was based on liberal conventional wisdom).

You're probably an anti-war liberal, but the anti-war movement exists on both the left and right. (The libertarian movement is strongly anti-war, and Pat Buchanan was a conservative famous for being opposed even to US involvement in WWII.) Obama is simply an interventionist liberal, in much the same way Clinton was.

And you might be opposed to Obama's continuing the war on drugs, but prohibition is hardly foreign to the left, seeing as how it came out of the early feminist movement and (via groups like MADD) is still being pushed by feminists. Obama is a "save the children" liberal much like Tipper Gore.

So, he may not be your kind of liberal, but his liberalism is just as valid as yours, just as I might not agree with social conservatives, but they have just as much claim to call themselves conservative as I do.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes but Gouvernments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?".

Or what would FDR or Kennedy or LBJ do? Since all of them also used the IRS to target political enemies.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now MSNBC, CNN, AP, NBC, ABC, PBS are in pander mode, having done the "investigating" thing during W.

Now CBS is in pander mode, having done the actual "faux news" thing during W.

FTFY

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Culture20]

No, MSNBC and all the other networks but Fox are in pander mode. Once you get past idiot partisan biases, you realize a simple fact:

If you vote in a Democrat, one shitty network, Fox, and a handful of conservative rags will investigate the administration.

If you vote for a Republican, all the good networks (and the ridiculously shitty MSNBC) and the vast majority of the press will investigate the administration.

Vote Republican just so the fourth estate will do their fucking job.

That might actually convince some of my friends. If they actually believed that the big news players were playing softball. They think they're playing hardball, and that Fox is making up fake documents Dan Rather style.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[kermidge]

"The news has always been spoon fed to us."

Never heard of Edward Murrow, I guess. There have always been some papers that played along, and always some papers that never did; most of the good ones - and damn few are left - did what they always did, dug into stuff, looking for dirt to write about to gain subscribers and advertisers. Along the way some very good reporting got done.

It takes some effort today to find those papers, those which can afford to pay reporters to do their jobs, rather than re-phrasing press handouts and blogs, but they are there, you simply have to spend some time casting about and doing some reading.

And seriously, "weather"?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Bartles]

Sure, just crap on Fox news. That's a great way to avoid having to defend the administration.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Bartles]

FTFY. Obama is solidly liberal on health care, immigration, environment, gay rights (well, now at least), abortion, race, political speech (e.g. Citizen's United decision), spending, taxes, macroeconomics (stimulus, son of stimulus, QE 2 and 3, etc.), scope of government, gun rights, and most foreign affairs (his views on Israel and UN, and his entire "foreign policy reset" was based on liberal conventional wisdom).

Obama is solidly leftish-authoritarian on these issues. Or perhaps you could say Liberal. But he is almost exactly the opposite of liberal on these issues.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Bartles]

The warrant application also said Rosen was a co-conspirator in, "the bombings". I think this was a recycled application that was not actually read by Holder, or the Judge. Both should be disbarred for malpractice.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[mysidia]

Nixon resigned though :)

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

...Fox started first by pandering to the right, MSNBC came next by pandering to the left, and CNN... well, I think CNN just has a gas leak somewhere in their office.

I think CNN started it by pandering to whatever random hot air got them ratings, even if it did mean nonstop coverage of a toddler that fell into a well or the slow white Bronco "pursuit"

[posting anon due to moderation]

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes but Gouvernments these days asks themselves the important question of "What Would Nixon Do?".

- yeah, and then they multiply it by about 1000 and do that instead.

Has Nixon actually bombed a bunch of Americans around the world? I hate the guy, by the way, but I don't think he has done anything even close to what the modern day politicians are doing daily.

Nixon ended Vietnam, ended the draft, started the EPA, modernized our currency, integrated the officer corps, and a few other things. Nixon was on a path to being a great President before he abused the power of his office.

That's why the parallel is so eery. Obama started off very well, except his foreign policy promises didn't survive meeting with the Joint Chiefs, but his domestic policies all basically went through. But since the Republicans took the house, he hasn't been able to negotiate with them (unlike Clinton who was adept at finding a compromise), and he has been trying to destroy his enemies using essentially the same tactics as Nixon did.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Media bias predates the TV by a few hundred years. The Federalist papers weren't exactly fair and balanced

Re:What did Fox News do?

[I'm New Around Here]

Essentially, the reporter in question wrote an article just to say that we had a high-level asset inside the North Korean government. There was no new factual information in the article otherwise - just the need to out a spy in an article about North Korea responding to sanctions.

So, what is the spy's name?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[stenvar]

Fox News just tends to be investigating a lot more now, with a left leaning president, while during W they mostly just pandered. Now MSNBC is in pander mode, having done the "investigating" thing during W.

Yup, that's the way it's supposed to work.

The crime here is our news outlets have such blatant bias,

Heaven forbid that reasonable people can actually reach different conclusions.

and very little dedication to journalism and conveying the facts to the masses.

And whose "the facts" would that be exactly? Yours? Obama's? The Pope's? Do tell!

Re:What did Fox News do?

[phantomfive]

an undercover operative inside Al Qaida who delivered them a sample bomb for analysis.

Wow, it must have been tremendously difficult to get that bomb out......

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Uberbah]

with a left leaning president

How is a president to the right of Reagan "left leaning", exactly?

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nixon didn't end a damn thing, numnuts. Congress defunded the war after the Pentagon Papers were published.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you my Canadian brother for having at least that much of an open mind that you are willing to see what is in front of you. I am a conservative, not a Republican but usually I vote Republican. FNC is better that the other outlets - not by a large margin, but better nonetheless.

I stand for the rights we citizens have as outlined in the Constitution and that applies to *all* citizens regardless of political party, race, religion, color, shoe size or anything else. Sadly however it is all too often you see the Democrat and Republican alike ignoring constitutional limits on the state at their every opportunity. This is what spells doom for our republic; if we are not a nation of laws then we are a nation of men. Men as we all know can be pretty damn mean and nasty, laws (the Constitution that is) was put in place to provide a set of limitations on the power of these men that make up the government as to what they can do to the citizens; when these men ignore these laws and act against any man you can bet that before too long these same men will be using these same arbitrary powers against every single one of us, and worse.

The Constitution is the antidote to tyranny, this is a protection of our civil society and by now it is barely an afterthought in the mind of today politician. This is not to blame Obama personally, or Schumer or Pelosi or any single one of them. Republican administrations are not without guilt either.

It is the IRS targeting of political opponents that worries me the most; this is wrong and it would be wrong for the state to use the IRS in a political manner against any organization no matter what their political aims are. But you look at there are very few who really understand this. We even see Schumer, Franken and a host of other Senators openly sending mail to IRS officials approximately a year back demanding IRS action against political enemies. If that doesn't chill any constitution loving citizen I don't know how much more blatant it can be.

It is a badness for all of our society, a very very dark thing, and even in the face of it all you see here 'Faux News Evil; Democrat Party good!' Now give me my free government cheese NOW!". Please people open up your eyes and forget the D vs R bickering and bashing. Learn the Constitution and what it means and where it applies; support politicians that support these ideals and demand of them all that they do so now. The Constitution is there to protect the citizens - all citizens! - and to limit the powers of the state, be it a Republican or Democrat is of no relevance whatsoever. No temporary politician is allowed to ignore the Constitution and I do not care it you are a Republican or Democrat or anything else, if you deprive any man of his natural rights and constitutional protections you are a tyrant and if these rights are not preserved for any one man then the rights of all of us will become worthless before too long.

Bot are we fucked.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Cederic]

Sorry, but how does mocking a news organisation renowned for its quality gaps in any way relate to peoples views on the government that's doing bad stuff?

It's possible to hate Fox News and condemn the way they've been treated. It's possible to want to drown George W Bush in liquid shit and still hate Obama. It's possible to hold multiple conflicting views at once, let alone multiple views that aren't even fucking related like "fox sucks" and "reading journalists' emails is bad".

I am yet again fucking bewildered by the utter inability of so many Americans to be anything other than hopelessly slavishly partisan in their thinking.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh good grief. Nixon improperly gained information from the IRS for his own political aims, audits were mentioned but none ever occurred; in fact Nixon himself was audited. I am not here to defend Nixon but you have to understand the scope and abuse in the two cases have gone totally beyond the "evils' perpetrated by the Nixon administration.

Fast and Furious has resulted in the deaths of many people, how many we frankly do not even know.

Benghazi; Stephens and members of his security murdered,

IRS harassing; law abiding citizens and depriving them of their right to conduct themselves as they see fit in a law abiding way.

State monitoring of journlists for political reasons.

And this is just the surface issues, doubtless three are more and all of these items deserve much more analysis.

The Obama administration is Watergate *squared*. And I'll bet there are huge numbers of US Slashdot socialists reading here now with happy smiles on their faces wishing the IRS would do more to harass and stifle the free speech of all conservatives, all the while screaming 'Nixon Nixon Nixon!.

Here is the difference, the conservatives believes that the state is limited in what they can do to the citizens based on the Constitution and would completely reject the idea of state using its powers against the natural rights of any of the citizens, Democrat, Republican, ANYONE.

And yet the sicalist liberals write letters to the IRS demanding political persecution of conservatives. Well hold on to your hats socialists, you may support those who violate the Constitution when it is against your political enemies. If you really want that door opened then you are a fool, it's just a matter if time before it is you who the state will set eyes on next,

But of yea it's just so hipster-doofus cool to hate on Republicans. This is tyranny and unmistakably so.

Have a look douchebag, learn some history and learn that you do have the power to reason. Prove me wrong, nothing would make me happier. But of course, I am not wrong.

  "It covers the surface of society with a network of small complicated rules, minute and uniform, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate, to rise above the crowd. The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd."

                - Alexis de Tocqueville

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh huh. And to take this a step further Obama didn't kill Bin Laden, policies, intelligence and actions started by the Bush administration, and retained by the Obama administration did.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Bartles]

I agree with all of what you said. But the poster I replied to, did none of that, hence, my comment.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Cederic]

Sorry, you kind of got the flak from the accumulation of multiple "stop taunting Fox instead of attacking Obama" posts.

It probably doesn't help that I have no allegiance to Bush, Obama or any other American politician, and in my own country I call out politicians on what they say and do, not on which party they represent.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are calling Obama a leftist, you are also calling Bush a leftist, as their policy difference simply is not existent.

If you had been exposed to politics outside of the US (most any country will do), you would correctly realize that Obama is solidly an authoritarian conservative. He might be "left" of Bush, but he is still FAR to the right on the entire political spectrum, much like all US politicians are.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[IndieVoter]

Step back a second. Where does it say that the News Media has an obligation to the 'truth'? Their only concern is simple.... sell ads. Everything else is in a distraction. NPR? They 'sell' for contributions, lobby for taxpayer money. Fox? MSNBC? Two sides of the same coin. OK, the news media is simply entertainment. At least Fox had decent looking entertainers. MSNBC is so depression, looking at all those old, burnt out 60s liberals spitting and sputtering at the camera.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are absolutely correct in your views. What makes it worse is there are now so few news outlets as they have been and continue to be scooped up by just a very few agenda creating people. We are getting only the news that someone else wants us to get and the slant on that news is pervasive.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the Fox News that is banned up here in Canada because it is too biased and inaccurate for it to be allowed to be called a news program?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Mashiki]

You mean the Fox News that is banned up here in Canada because it is too biased and inaccurate for it to be allowed to be called a news program?

You know, if you're going to lie. Make it believable, it's available in Canada as a specialty channel. I should know, I was one of the key people who got it carried here, being an ardent charter believer that S2 of the Charter means what it says.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[demonlapin]

There were lots of newspapers that were called the XYZ Republican or the ABC Democrat. The entire concept of "unbiased journalism" was started by the agencies like AP because... they wanted to get both sides to subscribe to their wire feeds. We're just returning to an older pattern as people are once again able to select information sources that match their ideology.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[demonlapin]

He's on the left in the US. American politics are not like other countries' politics. The US does not really have a history of nobles and peasants, so it's hardly surprising that Communism has never really had much appeal here. We have no Left because there is no real Right for it to form as a reaction to.

(Possible exception: the plantation aristocracy of the South is really the only population that could be a conservative in the European fashion, but they were mostly smashed 150 years ago.)

Re:What did Fox News do?

[demonlapin]

The Beeb has its biases too. They're not exactly the same as corporate news' biases, of course, but they are still there.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[14erCleaner]

other important news stories...like the Gosnell trial.

The Gosnell trial wasn't an important news story, unless you spin it as a referendum on abortion. Got anything else?

Re:What did Fox News do?

[CptNerd]

Exactly right. I prefer someone tell me where they stand when they report something, rather than falsely make some high-handed claims to "objectivity."

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW, when did Obama become a "left leaning president" as you put it? He's a Democrat, which means CNN loves him and Fox hates him, but on most issues he doesn't lean left at all. You must be imagining some opposition party that no longer exists.

There was NEVER an opposition party, and there never will be. It's all part of the grand circus of fake politics which 'Murkans accepted long LONG ago as something like normal. 'Murkans also have absolutely no conception remaining as to what it even is to be "left". Here's what passes for a "left" argument anymore:

A new law states: Persons who have been convicted of using Drug X will, upon conviction (or thereabouts), be chopped into 5-pound cubes and transported as fuel to The Pit Of Eternal Stench for rendering as part of the new "Freeing And Securing Citizens In Scary Times" (FASCIST) law. "Labor activists" (leftists, all) will then complain that 5-pound cubes are too taxing for workers to heave into the pit all day long. They will mandate a more humane 2.7 pound cube of fuel flesh for a stronger and more free 'Murka.

Re:What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

The courts have consistently put people in jail for not revealing their sources in contempt cases. The sources anonymity has never been protected under the first amendment. Just repeating a lie doesn't make it true.

If they had a warrant, then it was legal, and I don't have a problem with the actions of the administration.

If they shouldn't have had a warrant, then we have to look at the judicial branch, not the administrative branch.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nixon rigged the election, using the FBI/CREEP. Obama just kills people. Nixon deserved to be hanged for treason, Obama should probably be impeached and tried for murder. Perhaps also for war crimes (continuing the Iraq War). Completely different things, yanno.

Re: What did Fox News do?

[jwhitener]

Except Nixon was a saint compared to Obama.

Can you please elaborate?

I see some of this sentiment on the conservative side of my family, and honestly, I don't see how he's much different than any other president. And in terms of comparing him to Nixon, everything Obama is doing is currently legal. Nixon intentionally used the office of the president to commit crimes. The most I can say about Obama, is that some of his foreign policy tactics are untested fully in a court of law (and are largely carried over from his predecessor anyway).

There you have it

[tsotha]

They told me if I voted for Romney the government would engage in unconstitutional wiretapping.

Nothing is more amusing to me that watching leftists trying to pretend this is all okay because it's Fox and not what they consider real news organizations. I hope you remember this moment when the next Republican president takes office.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Leftist here. It's not OK because its Fox and it's not OK because Obama did it. And FYI I'm sure the government would have also engaged in unconstitutional wire tapping were Romney (or Paul, or [Insert your favorite controlled opposition candidate here]).
Your problem might be that you have mistaken Democrats for actual leftists.

Re:There you have it

[Le Marteau]

Now that the administration actually has scandals worth reporting on, it's like the boy crying wolf over at Fox. What are they going to do, use 45-pt headlines instead of 38-pt they were using for Solyndra?

They don't have to. I did not read about this on Fox news, and I doubt you did either. Other news agencies have taken the story and run with it.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

Fast & Furious is a major scandal. It's perfectly reasonable for Fox to treat it as such.

Re:There you have it

[houghi]

The countries that failed where not leftist. The only said they were.
Countries that are actually leftist are doing pretty well. Sweden, among others.

Re: There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny you should mention sweden, heard anything about stockholm and some riots lately?

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Countries that are actually leftist are doing pretty well. Sweden, among others.

last i checked, sweden isn't doing too well.

Re:There you have it

[Tablizer]

Obama is a centrist, not a leftist, especially with regard to civil liberties.

Re:There you have it

[felrom]

You really think it's not a scandal when the US government gives 2500+ guns to Mexican drug cartels, which are then used to murder hundreds of Mexican citizens (so far) and at least one US border patrol agent? Let's not even bring the issue of responsibility into it; no questions about how much Holder and Obama knew, or when they knew it, or why they never released the subpena'd documents congress demanded, or the illegal use of executive privilege to just make it all go away. Simply keep the question in terms of ,"the US government did it." Was it a scandal?

Please tell me what you would consider a scandal.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

ROFL.
Low information much?

Re:There you have it

[Kohath]

It's just hundreds of innocent Mexicans murdered by guns the administration supplied to drug cartels. How is that a scandal?

Meanwhile, Mitt Romney made his dog ride on top of the family car once. Sorry widows and orphans of murdered Mexicans, you lose.

Re:There you have it

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

> Fast & Furious is a major scandal. It's perfectly reasonable for Fox to treat it as such.

It is absolutely a major scandal. But Fox trivializes the scandal by politicizing it. Instead of making it about government run amok, they keep trying to make it about the "other team" running amok. That is a major disservice because it makes people like the OP tune out. They are the little network that cried Fox.

Re:There you have it

[BlueStrat]

Fast & Furious is a major scandal. It's perfectly reasonable for Fox to treat it as such.

Not if you believe that private, individual gun ownership should be highly restricted/regulated and/or outright prohibited at almost any cost, and that the ends justify the means, so that running guns to Mexican drug cartels resulting in innocent Mexican civilian and US law enforcement deaths, all as a propaganda scheme to attack the 2nd Amendment, is OK as long as nobody finds out.

Sort of like the Benghazi, AP, and IRS scandals. Those in power view the whistle-blowers as the problem, not their own illegal actions. That's the reason for the recent big push to ferret-out whistle blowers (or "national security threats", as the DoJ calls those exposing their corruption).

PROTIP: If you're a government official planning something that includes calculations of the risk of being caught by watchdog groups, exposed by journalists, and/or prosecuted by (the remaining small non-corrupt parts of) law enforcement or Congress, it's probably a very bad idea.

Particularly when it involves innocent people being brutally murdered as collateral damage or (in the case of Benghazi) being left to die to eliminate "loose ends" who could expose and/or testify against those in power

Strat

Re: There you have it

[amiga3D]

Leave the facts out of this. You'll destroy the fantasy with facts.

Re:There you have it

[amiga3D]

It can't be a major scandal. CBS, ABC and NBC are pretty much treating it as minor news.

Re:There you have it

[amiga3D]

Nobody gave the cartels anything. They sold them to the cartels. We're running out of money and we've got to get some revenue somehow.

Re:There you have it

[Kohath]

Please tell me what you would consider a scandal.

Mitt Romney said 47% of people don't pay income taxes and so his tax cut message might not appeal to them. Scandal-palooza!

(Sorry dead Mexicans and grieving widows and orphans and parents of murdered children. You lose.)

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Please tell me what you would consider a scandal.

How about Operation Wide Receiver?

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Please tell me what you would consider a scandal.

Obviously, all that under a Republican administration.

Re:There you have it

[fredgiblet]

On an objective scale yes. But most of us here in America think that America's scale is complete, instead of starting in the middle and going right.

Re:There you have it

[amiga3D]

President Obama is a firm supporter of civil liberties. At least for people that agree with him.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

No, he's not a centrist. He's just a really poor leader for his leftist ideals. A leftist who can't get things done is not a centrist.

Read his books. It gets a lot clearer afterwards.

--
By the way, I say this with no problem that he is a leftist. Everyone has the right to their own beliefs. I just want them to be accurate and honest.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

the US government gives 2500+ guns to Mexican drug cartels

Your source?

They allowed known straw purchasers to buy weapons who's serial numbers were recorded.
They did not drive a dumptruck full of guns to Mexico and shout "come git yer guns bad guys!"

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

More sugar in their Kool-Aid

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW I never heard about Operation Wide Receiver in 2008 or 2012 (didn't even recognize the term), and I followed the elections pretty closely.

Republican or Democratic administrations doing this ill-advised stuff, voters didn't care either way. Maybe they should have. But they didn't.

Re:There you have it

[the eric conspiracy]

Howcum it wasn't a major scandal when Bush was doing the same thing?

Could it be the House and was Republican for 6 out of his 8 years in office?

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Fox needed to pin a scandal on Obama, and in Obama's first term it was slim pickings for them. So the same shit that happened under Bush, that everybody at Fox knew damn well happened under Bush's DOJ, suddenly became DAY AFTER DAY FRONT PAGE news for Fox.

Fucking Roger Ailes hypocrit POS's.

Re:There you have it

[ebno-10db]

Nothing is more amusing to me that watching leftists trying to pretend this is all okay

Please cite some specific examples "leftists" trying to pretend this is ok.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Since you ask. When Bush did it they put trackers on the guns, and attempted to track the guns, and told the Mexican president about what they were doing. The SECOND they found out one of the criminals removed the tracker from the gun they ended the program with a "never do this again" printed on the folder.

When Holder did it... He didn't put trackers in the guns, didn't attempt to follow or track the guns, didn't tell the Mexican government that they were doing it, and when caught he lied to Congress three times, withheld information from an investigation, and was found in Contempt of Congress.

Just in case you actually thought both presidents did the exact same thing.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

The SECOND they found out one of the criminals removed the tracker from the gun they ended the program with a "never do this again" printed on the folder.

Wishful thinking from a talk radio addict. Here's what really happened.

BTW Rep. Issa went on the attack, claiming that the Obama administration's defense amounted to "The Bush administration did it too" and that that "reeked of desperation". A thoughtful man, is that Darrell Issa, wouldn't you say? Not just a partisan schmuck on the lookup for something/anything he can turn to his party's advantage.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

MSNBC specifically Rachel Maddow's blog seems to think the IRS thing is ok, the four Americans killed in Bengazi and the lies and cover up for it are ok, spying on reporters perfectly legal.

Ask and you shall receive. I don't think Bill Maher has run this week yet, or I would send you video clips of him saying the same thing.

Re:There you have it

[Rockoon]

Idiot. You picked just about the worst example of socialism going right in this modern age... besides ourselves.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Just in case someone thinks the above is true, read THIS.

It appears the DOJ is working with Media Matters in leaking information, that may or may not be true, to make talking points to go out. Congress is considering investigating these "leaks" to find out who in the DOJ is releasing ready made talking points to protect the current administration against scandals.

Thought it was weird I hadn't heard your spin, didn't trust your source but instead of doing the normal /. thing and complaining, I thought I'd actually look it up myself.

Re:There you have it

[darkmeridian]

LOL, no, if you voted for Romney the government would have engaged in unconstitutional wiretapping anyway. Everyone wants to expand government powers when they're in charge then rein them back when they aren't.

My problem with Fox News and their supporters is their embarrassing inconsistencies on this issue. Roger Ailes said in 1988 that leakers should be tortured and executed, and Fox News personalities have consistently declared war against Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and Wikileaks because they weren't real news organizations. It's the leftists who defended Bradley Manning and also Fox News. Just read everyone who supports Fox News. Even the New York Times got Fox News' back: "With the decision to label a Fox News television reporter a possible ''co-conspirator'' in a criminal investigation of a news leak, the Obama administration has moved beyond protecting government secrets to threatening fundamental freedoms of the press to gather news." So not only are you wrong about the right, you're also wrong about the left. I guess you must be a GOP.

And about the IRS scandal. Remember when four Republican congressmen asked (and received) a three year IRS probe into the NAACP for saying bad things about President Bush? LOL.

Seriously, the GOP and its supporters should adopt a worldview that's at least internally consistent. The leftists do a better job of it than the right. The GOP argues that we should preserve the Constitution then argues that we should strip American citizens of their Constitutional rights because they were accused of being a bomber. PLEASE THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK!

Re:There you have it

[Bartles]

Seriously, about 2 minutes on wikipedia will destroy both of those myths.

Re:There you have it

[Bartles]

Just scroll up. There's at least half a dozen up there.

Re:There you have it

[Tablizer]

The admin did NOT supply the guns. It only logged them.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Bush wasn't doing the same thing. Operation Wide Receiver placed trackers on the weapons, FF didn't. WR tracked the weapons with drones, FF didn't. WR was done with involvement from Mexican authorities, FF was kept secret from Mexico. WR sent hundreds of weapons before it was scrubbed. FF sent thousands of weapons, and wasn't scrubbed until casualties started piling up and Mexican authorities became alarmed at the sudden influx of American weapons. WR was the first, and it didn't work. FF was done with full knowledge that a prior had not worked, and was done with *no* safeguards.

So, basically, under Bush WR was a stupid operation, arguably a scandalous waste of taxpayer dollars. Under Obama, FF was a fucking bloodbath and major international incident.

Re:There you have it

[Kohath]

Knowingly allowed the guns to be supplied. Told gun dealers, who raised suspicion about the buyers, to sell the guns to the buyers for the drug cartels.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

It's just hundreds of innocent Mexicans murdered by guns the administration supplied to drug cartels. How is that a scandal?

Meanwhile, Mitt Romney made his dog ride on top of the family car once. Sorry widows and orphans of murdered Mexicans, you lose.

It wasn't the administration, it was the Phoenix branch of the ATF.

And they didn't supply the guys to the cartels, they allowed individual smugglers to cross the border with the hopes they could shut down the entire network.

Look at it for what it was, a very high risk Arizona ATF operation that failed badly, and left the Mexicans carrying the bag. Similar operations also occurred under Bush with the difference that they were smaller and the Mexicans were involved. But the Bush or Obama administrations didn't have anything to do with it.

Is it a scandal? Sure, a major law enforcement operation failed spectacularly and let a lot of guns into Mexico.

But the actions of a Phoenix ATF director over multiple administrations doesn't have a damn thing to do with Obama.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

It wasn't Holder, it was the Phoenix ATF.

If the guy who's been delivering your mail for 20 years drops one of your letters in the mud is it Obama's fault via the Postmaster General?

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

They told me if I voted for Romney the government would engage in unconstitutional wiretapping.

Nothing is more amusing to me that watching leftists trying to pretend this is all okay because it's Fox and not what they consider real news organizations. I hope you remember this moment when the next Republican president takes office.

Nothing more amusing than watching conservatives complaining about "leftists trying to pretend this is all okay" when virtually none are.

Sure those people exist, but in my experience that level of hypocrisy is a confined to a marginalized fringe on the left.

Hell, just out of curiosity I checked out what Daily Kos had to say. It's mostly schadenfreude and laughing at the hypocrisy but no where do I see them pretending it's ok.

Re:There you have it

[Kohath]

But the actions of a Phoenix ATF director over multiple administrations doesn't have a damn thing to do with Obama.

He just heard about it on the news, I guess -- like a lot of other things his administration has done lately.

Why stonewall the congressional investigation then? Why withhold documents? Why should people believe the Administration's story when they're hiding evidence from congressional investigators?

Re:There you have it

[Izuzan]

you need to read up on it then.

the govt told gun stores to sell to known straw purchasers saying "they were tracking them", and later told said gun store owners they would shut them down if they went to the press about it.

they couldn't have "tracked" the guns without them in their possession.

in my views ordering gun stores to sell to known straw purchasers that have ties to Mexican drug gangs, then threatening the gun stores when the govt realized they couldn't track said guns IS supplying the gangs with guns. plain and simple.

Re:There you have it

[Izuzan]

sure. the higher ups had nothing to do with it that's why Obama pulled strings to get holder off the hook.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

But the actions of a Phoenix ATF director over multiple administrations doesn't have a damn thing to do with Obama.

He just heard about it on the news, I guess -- like a lot of other things his administration has done lately.

Why stonewall the congressional investigation then? Why withhold documents? Why should people believe the Administration's story when they're hiding evidence from congressional investigators?

Does the Obama administration withhold documents they shouldn't? Yes, so do all other administrations whenever a scandal pops up, but the Obama administration is just as bad if not worse in a lot of cases and deserves a ton of blame and criticism for not being more transparent.

But you didn't say they were withholding info or obstructing the investigation, you said "hundreds of innocent Mexicans murdered by guns the administration supplied to drug cartels", a claim that is false.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

Howcum it wasn't a major scandal when Bush was doing the same thing?

The Bush administration actually followed the guns and made arrests instead of letting them disappear like Obama's people did.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

Why all the stonewalling then?

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

Oh, yeah, I guess when you put it that way. It's only Mexicans.

Re:There you have it

[stenvar]

That's like Christians who try to say that anybody who does anything bad isn't "really" a Christian. The countries that failed were what leftist politics leads to, just like Christianity leads to its own set of disasters. Sweden isn't "leftist", it's a constitutional monarchy governed by a center-right party; the progressives and leftist are not in power in Sweden. Sweden does seem to have lavish social benefits and high taxes, but that's not a unique trait of leftist politics.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

If the guy who runs the division of the Post Office in my area decides it makes sense to smuggle drugs as an attempt at catching drug smugglers, I would assume someone working in a position directly under the Postmaster General would have been queried if the plan was sensible. That person would have then brought it up to the Postmaster General at a staff meeting. Since that is the whole point of having a hierarchy in an organization.

I don't for one second believe it was a department chief in Phoenix that decided to dust off the folder from Bush's administration, decided the failure of the previous operation was caused by having control of the situation, and so removed the control and came up with Fast and Furious, with no notice going up the chain of responsibility.

Re:There you have it

[stenvar]

"Most of us" here in America have delusions and fantasies about the politics in other nations. In fact, our progressives are about as left wing, and sometimes more so, than social democrats and left wing parties in Europe.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

If the guy who runs the division of the Post Office in my area decides it makes sense to smuggle drugs as an attempt at catching drug smugglers, I would assume someone working in a position directly under the Postmaster General would have been queried if the plan was sensible. That person would have then brought it up to the Postmaster General at a staff meeting. Since that is the whole point of having a hierarchy in an organization.

I would have used a mail metaphor. Either way hierarchies sometimes mean information doesn't travel as high as it should, particularly in law enforcement where telling more people can jeopardize the operation.

I don't for one second believe it was a department chief in Phoenix that decided to dust off the folder from Bush's administration, decided the failure of the previous operation was caused by having control of the situation, and so removed the control and came up with Fast and Furious, with no notice going up the chain of responsibility.

Here's another story, they tried the operation a couple times before (not giving a damn about what administration it was), they tried to do it one more time cutting out the Mexicans this time because they thought there might have been a leak there. And they didn't report up the chain of responsibility because they weren't required to and they can do things themselves without Washington bureaucrats double checking everything they do.

Sure you can assume everyone is lying and there's some big conspiracy. Or you can accept that it was screwup in the Phoenix office and Washington had nothing to do with it.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

If the guy who runs the division of the Post Office in my area decides it makes sense to smuggle drugs as an attempt at catching drug smugglers, I would assume someone working in a position directly under the Postmaster General would have been queried if the plan was sensible. That person would have then brought it up to the Postmaster General at a staff meeting. Since that is the whole point of having a hierarchy in an organization.

I would have used a mail metaphor. Either way hierarchies sometimes mean information doesn't travel as high as it should, particularly in law enforcement where telling more people can jeopardize the operation.

Sorry, I thought that was implied. The "guy who runs the division of the Post Office" would be using official mail and postal planes/semi-trailers in his sting operation. Did you think I meant that the "guy who runs the division of the Post Office" buys a ticket on Delta to personally smuggle drugs as an attempt at a drug sting operation?

Re:There you have it

[Tablizer]

If they couldn't track, then how did they determine a person was shot by a targeted gun?

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

If the guy who runs the division of the Post Office in my area decides it makes sense to smuggle drugs as an attempt at catching drug smugglers, I would assume someone working in a position directly under the Postmaster General would have been queried if the plan was sensible. That person would have then brought it up to the Postmaster General at a staff meeting. Since that is the whole point of having a hierarchy in an organization.

I would have used a mail metaphor. Either way hierarchies sometimes mean information doesn't travel as high as it should, particularly in law enforcement where telling more people can jeopardize the operation.

Sorry, I thought that was implied. The "guy who runs the division of the Post Office" would be using official mail and postal planes/semi-trailers in his sting operation. Did you think I meant that the "guy who runs the division of the Post Office" buys a ticket on Delta to personally smuggle drugs as an attempt at a drug sting operation?

I assume the guy who runs the division of the Post Office would be mainly concerned with delivering mail, a sting operation (even for people smuggling through the mail) would be far enough outside his regular duties it would go up a couple rungs. The primary job of the ATF to catch firearm smugglers, therefore it's reasonable to think that an ATF office wouldn't bother to ask Washington, that's why I was complaining about the metaphor.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be because the Bush administration actually wanted to shutdown the drug cartels and the Obama administration wants to undermine the second amendment. .

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, I'll never understand how they persuaded Vin Diesel to appear in such a crappy film. It's not like he needs the money.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

The primary job of the ATF is not to smuggle guns to drug cartels in foreign countries, which is in effect what took place. Therefor it's reasonable to believe an ATF office wouldn't violate international law on their own.

Re:There you have it

[CodeBuster]

Leftist here. It's not OK because its Fox and it's not OK because Obama did it.

Rightist here. Why is nobody in the Obama Administration ever punished for their mistakes or misconduct, criminal and otherwise? Have you noticed that whenever there is a scandal nobody seems to know anything, including the President himself? WTF is going on up there in the White House, the State Department, the DOJ and the IRS? How is it that nobody is ever found to be responsible for anything and punished? Instead they stonewall and delay and cover up while spinning like crazy and the journalists, with the exception of Fox news and few others, let them off the hook? I didn't vote for Obama and I've never had a high opinion of the man or his policies, but this sort of corrupt behavior only confirms for many of us on the right what we've suspected all along, that behind the flowery rhetoric and flawed liberal policies lies a deeply corrupt and duplicitous administration, the likes of which hasn't been seen since 1974.

Re:There you have it

[CodeBuster]

Nothing more amusing than watching conservatives complaining about "leftists trying to pretend this is all okay" when virtually none are.

There aren't many apologists on this issue, it's true. However, the criticism of the Obama Administration from the left, at least on this issue, also seems to be half-hearted. It's more interesting to see who isn't talking, neither defending nor criticizing President Obama, so as to curry favor with the administration and ensure priority access to the President for future interviews and White House briefings.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

The primary job of the ATF is not to smuggle guns to drug cartels in foreign countries, which is in effect what took place.

One of their primary jobs is to stop gun smugglers, they tried to do this job by letting through a few shipments so they could shut down the network, letting small fish go to catch the big fish, a very common investigative tactic. They failed badly.

Therefor it's reasonable to believe an ATF office wouldn't violate international law on their own.

So not stopping smugglers becomes, smuggling, which then becomes violating international law, I suppose next you'll say that by violating international law they were trying to start a war which obviously was decided by the executive branch?

Your sig says you hate hypocrisy, yet you're doing mental gymnastics to avoid the obvious fact that an ATF office could decide on and execute a big operation without telling Washington.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, it was a bad movie, wasn't it?

Re:There you have it

[Uberbah]

That's like Christians who try to say that anybody who does anything bad isn't "really" a Christian.

You'd like to think so.

The countries that failed

Who's banking system blew up the worldwide economy? Who's demand for cheap goods is driving climate change? It's not the "leftist" countries, who are enjoying better health care for less money while not forcing their young to gamble their future on 5 figure student loans.

Re:There you have it

[Uberbah]

He just heard about it on the news, I guess -- like a lot of other things his administration has done lately.

Translation: "oh shit, somebody noticed the gaping hole in my storyline". Like when you go back to pulling your hair out over the IRS without mentioning the fact that the scrutiny towards political groups began under a Bush appointee...

Re:There you have it

[jkflying]

The exact same questions can be asked of the Bush Administration. How did they get away with the illegal wiretapping? Why was nobody punished for the bad intel on the WMDs in Iraq?

Seriously, it goes on both sides. Both administrations have been worse than Nixon.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

Your description of the operation is false. I guess that is where your interpretation differs from mine. They let a lot more than "a few shipments" go, and they made no effort to catch the small fish or the big fish.

And, NO, stopping smuggling does not become smuggling. Smuggling is smuggling in itself. As there was no attempt to stop said smuggling, I'm not even sure what your argument really is. And I still have seen no reason to believe a field office would try such a half assed scheme without someone in Washington knowing about it. Since Holder and Obama have claimed documents about it are covered by Executive Privilege, I think my argument is stronger than yours.

And my sig is very relevant here. You are the gymnast, hoping to play down scandals of your political side. You have stated no "obvious fact" about the ATF office in Phoenix and what they don't tell Washington. Unless you work for the ATF, you know no more than I do about their inner workings. At least I'm basing my reasoning on their actions and testimony before Congress. You are basing yours on political affiliation.

Re:There you have it

[jkflying]

BS. From somebody living in another country.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Who's banking system blew up the worldwide economy?

I wasn't aware it had "blown up". Have you actually looked at data on the world economy? Furthermore, Europe's large unemployment and stagnation are the fault of European policies, not American, and it's only going to get worse for Europe. But just like in the 1920s and 1930s, European left wing and right wing politicians are trying to blame the US for their own mistakes.

Who's demand for cheap goods is driving climate change?

So you are saying that if only the US actually wrecked its economy to be as poor as that of Europe, then China would export less, and it wouldn't matter as much that China flat out refuses to reduce its carbon emissions and that Europeans emitted carbon like there was no tomorrow for two centuries. Uh huh, you have found your scapegoat it looks like.

It's not the "leftist" countries, who are enjoying better health care for less money

Actually, they are enjoying worse health care. They do live a smidgen longer, mostly because of lifestyle choices.

while not forcing their young to gamble their future on 5 figure student loans.

An excellent public university education in the US is about $8000/year in tuition, which is about a small car for four years of education. If you can't afford to pay that off, you shouldn't to go to university in the first place.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

In my long years of living abroad myself and my experience with US expatriates, I've found they usually know very little about how the countries they live in actually work. So I call BS on your BS.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

PLEASE THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK!

Welcome to the internet, you must be new around here.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

Countries that are actually leftist are doing pretty well. Sweden, among others.

You can tell Sweden is doing well by the multi-day riots and streets full of burning vehicles. Yay for Sweden! They've really got it all figured out.

Re:There you have it

[Straif]

They had the serial numbers of the sold weapons. So more accurately, they had no plan for any type of 'real-time' tracking, they just wanted to see what crime scenes the weapons would show up on to see how they there used and by who; not the greatest plan.

Re:There you have it

[otterpop81]

On an objective scale yes. But most of us here in America think that America's scale is complete, instead of starting in the middle and going right.

Says who? We have two parties who refuse to do anything but increase the size of government. I say we start in the middle and go left.

Who gets to define what "the middle" is anyway? In my experience, there's a basic human tendency to try to find equal and opposite in everything. For some it makes them feel like they're above (ie: superior to) the fray. Just read the comments here. The theme of "it's the same on both sides" is pervasive. Someone above suggests that Fox News and MSNBC are the same but opposite. Think objectively for a second. Can that possibly be true? Equal? Or is it more reasonable to think that one of them (whichever one) is _more_ biased than the other. It almost _has_ to be that way.

Fox news supporters say "right of the left is not the same thing as right of center." It's tautology. You can't dispute it. Everyone thinks they're in the middle and balanced and everyone else is nuts.

It's easier to hate everyone (in this case both sides) because if you don't support anything, you never have to defend anything; you can just throw rocks.

By the way, I'm a right-wing nutjob. I can admit it.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

Your description of the operation is false. I guess that is where your interpretation differs from mine. They let a lot more than "a few shipments" go, and they made no effort to catch the small fish or the big fish.

If they made no effort to catch anyone than what's your theory on what they were doing?

And, NO, stopping smuggling does not become smuggling. Smuggling is smuggling in itself. As there was no attempt to stop said smuggling, I'm not even sure what your argument really is.

I agree that not stopping smuggling doesn't become smuggling, which makes me really confused at to how you changing your tune agreeing with that point makes you wonder what my argument is.

And I still have seen no reason to believe a field office would try such a half assed scheme without someone in Washington knowing about it. Since Holder and Obama have claimed documents about it are covered by Executive Privilege, I think my argument is stronger than yours.

They claim EVERYTHING is covered by Executive Privilege, as did Bush, and would Clinton if he were in office now. They claim executive privilege with or without a real scandal because
a) So claiming Executive Privilege doesn't become evidence of a scandal the next time when there's a real scandal they're trying to keep hidden
b) It's safer because someone in the DOJ may have known something they didn't know about, or some other scandal might exist buried in the docs
c) Even if the docs are clean it's not that hard to twist something out of context (re climategate)
d) Even if the DOJ is completely innocent, a news cycle consisting of "the DOJ has released documents in the investigation into the Fast & Furious scandal and investigators are looking through them" is super damaging to the ears of the uninformed voter.

Just consider, if a rival group with no other objective than to get you in as much trouble as possible asked to look through all your work emails for evidence that you did something wrong would you agree to it?

And my sig is very relevant here. You are the gymnast, hoping to play down scandals of your political side. You have stated no "obvious fact" about the ATF office in Phoenix and what they don't tell Washington. Unless you work for the ATF, you know no more than I do about their inner workings. At least I'm basing my reasoning on their actions and testimony before Congress. You are basing yours on political affiliation.

I'm basing mine on the most likely scenario based on the available evidence. Snooping on Fox News' email or the AP's email, that's a scandal. Claiming states secrets in every terror related court case against the government, that's a scandal. A really bad police op executed by the ATF branch in Arizona over multiple Presidential administrations, that's a scandal, but one for the Phoenix ATF, not Washington.

Re:There you have it

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. It is almost on scale with the Reagan administration selling arms to Iran.

Re:There you have it

[I'm New Around Here]

Your description of the operation is false. I guess that is where your interpretation differs from mine. They let a lot more than "a few shipments" go, and they made no effort to catch the small fish or the big fish.

If they made no effort to catch anyone than what's your theory on what they were doing?

So, rather than admit they made no effort to catch the criminals, you want to sidetrack the conversation to what my theory is. As if you care what my theory is.

And, NO, stopping smuggling does not become smuggling. Smuggling is smuggling in itself. As there was no attempt to stop said smuggling, I'm not even sure what your argument really is.

I agree that not stopping smuggling doesn't become smuggling, which makes me really confused at to how you changing your tune agreeing with that point makes you wonder what my argument is.

I didn't change my tune. I specified there is a difference between "stopping smuggling" and "smuggling". I guess that is too complicated of a theory.

And I still have seen no reason to believe a field office would try such a half assed scheme without someone in Washington knowing about it. Since Holder and Obama have claimed documents about it are covered by Executive Privilege, I think my argument is stronger than yours.

They claim EVERYTHING is covered by Executive Privilege, as did Bush, and would Clinton if he were in office now.

That's because these operations are coordinated in conjunction with the national headquarters, and if not necessarily authorized by the head of the department, in this case the Attorney General, they are at least known by someone under him. At the least, lawyers are consulted for clarification of what is legal and what isn't. You don't seem to understand that international law isn't something to be ignored by a regional leader in Arizona.

They claim executive privilege with or without a real scandal because
a) So claiming Executive Privilege doesn't become evidence of a scandal the next time when there's a real scandal they're trying to keep hidden
b) It's safer because someone in the DOJ may have known something they didn't know about, or some other scandal might exist buried in the docs
c) Even if the docs are clean it's not that hard to twist something out of context (re climategate)
d) Even if the DOJ is completely innocent, a news cycle consisting of "the DOJ has released documents in the investigation into the Fast & Furious scandal and investigators are looking through them" is super damaging to the ears of the uninformed voter.

Just consider, if a rival group with no other objective than to get you in as much trouble as possible asked to look through all your work emails for evidence that you did something wrong would you agree to it?

As a private citizen, no.

If I were the head of the Executive branch of federal government of the USA, and a leader in the Legislative branch requested this information, I would be hard pressed to justify keeping it from him or her. Maybe I would make it available only to the top leaders in that branch, but I would not ignore their legitimate inquiries that are in line with their role as spelled out in the document that created their office as well as my own.

But, then again, I would never have people who thought the Fast and Furious operation was sensible and correct actually working in my administration. I would make it clear that any idiocy like that would be grounds for immediate dismissal. But, hey, that's just my way of being the head of an organization. Following the rules that are in place, and stuff like that.

And my sig is very relevant here. You are the gymnast, hoping to play down scandals of your political side. You have stated no "obvious fact" about the ATF office in Pho

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

Your description of the operation is false. I guess that is where your interpretation differs from mine. They let a lot more than "a few shipments" go, and they made no effort to catch the small fish or the big fish.

If they made no effort to catch anyone than what's your theory on what they were doing?

So, rather than admit they made no effort to catch the criminals, you want to sidetrack the conversation to what my theory is. As if you care what my theory is.

My theory is they wanted to track the guns across the entire supply chain so they could nab everyone, but the effed up badly, lost track of the guns, and got no one. My theory fits the evidence.

Your theory is they let smugglers smuggle the guns because....

I don't want to sidetrack the conversation, but I'm not even sure what you're arguing. What was the motive of the ATF or whoever you think authorized this operation?

And, NO, stopping smuggling does not become smuggling. Smuggling is smuggling in itself. As there was no attempt to stop said smuggling, I'm not even sure what your argument really is.

I agree that not stopping smuggling doesn't become smuggling, which makes me really confused at to how you changing your tune agreeing with that point makes you wonder what my argument is.

I didn't change my tune. I specified there is a difference between "stopping smuggling" and "smuggling". I guess that is too complicated of a theory.

Ok, when you wrote "And, NO, stopping smuggling does not become smuggling." I assumed you made a typo and meant to write "And, NO, [not] stopping smuggling does not become smuggling."

So in response to that the ATF did not smuggle, they did not let guns by smuggled across the border. They saw a bunch of straw buyers, instead of arresting the straw buyers and grabbing the guns they investigated so they could get the top level guys hiring the straw buyers and the running the whole network.

They failed, they lost track of the guns, and the guns got across the border.

By your logic any cop who lets a street dealer go in order to catch their boss is now a drug dealer themselves.

And I still have seen no reason to believe a field office would try such a half assed scheme without someone in Washington knowing about it. Since Holder and Obama have claimed documents about it are covered by Executive Privilege, I think my argument is stronger than yours.

They claim EVERYTHING is covered by Executive Privilege, as did Bush, and would Clinton if he were in office now.

That's because these operations are coordinated in conjunction with the national headquarters, and if not necessarily authorized by the head of the department, in this case the Attorney General, they are at least known by someone under him. At the least, lawyers are consulted for clarification of what is legal and what isn't. You don't seem to understand that international law isn't something to be ignored by a regional leader in Arizona.

So I don't know ATF regs to know how much of that is accurate. But lets assume that's true and some random attorney in the DOJ was consulted about it. Does that make it an administration scandal? What if that random attorney was working there when Bush was in office and so was their boss, is it still an administration scandal?

Besides, I'm not sure if international law comes into play since they didn't involve the Mexicans.

They claim executive privilege with or without a real scandal because
a) So claiming Executive Privilege doesn't become evidence of a scandal the next time when there's a real scandal they're trying to keep hidden
b) It's safer because someone in the DOJ may have known something they didn't know about, or some other scandal might exist buried i

Re:There you have it

[Tablizer]

That's not the same as selling them. They just logged the existing pipeline. I see nothing really wrong with that by itself.

Re:There you have it

[Straif]

They also threatened the sellers with revocation of their licenses if they refused to sell to know cartel buyers. There are several reports of gun stores complaining about having to sell weapons they knew were being purchased for this purpose and being told by the DoJ to keep selling.

Essentially, the DoJ instructed, and then threatened, legal gun sellers to violate federal and state laws in order to facilitate the sales of guns to know traffickers with no plan on doing any real tracking of the movement or use of those weapons.

Re:There you have it

[Uberbah]

I wasn't aware it had "blown up".

Of course you're aware that tens of millions of people are out of work, just here in the United States, in the worst economic times since the Great Depression. But since the conversation isn't about the standard red herrings of the CRA or Barney Frank, you're planing dumb.

So you are saying that if only the US actually wrecked its economy to be as poor as that of Europe

So you're saying you like trying to change the subject when it's inconvenient for you?

Actually, they are enjoying worse health care.

Actually, now you're just ignoring facts that contradict your Randian sociopathy. Also known as lying. Socialized medicine provides better care for less money, and that's just a fact you'll have to deal with.

while not forcing their young to gamble their future on 5 figure student loans.

An excellent public university education in the US is about $8000/year in tuition

Which becomes a five figure student loan in less than 1.5 semesters. I didn't know Teabaggers were now trying to have their own set of maths to go with with their own economics and history.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

One of their primary jobs is to stop gun smugglers, they tried to do this job by letting through a few shipments so they could shut down the network, letting small fish go to catch the big fish, a very common investigative tactic. They failed badly.

Failed? No, not really. It wouldn't be a big scandal if they were trying something legitimate and failed. They forced retailers to break the law and then they closed the operation. They didn't even try to follow the guns, and nobody seems to know what the point of the operation was supposed to be or what the plan was. Nobody seems to know anything at all.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

One of their primary jobs is to stop gun smugglers, they tried to do this job by letting through a few shipments so they could shut down the network, letting small fish go to catch the big fish, a very common investigative tactic. They failed badly.

Failed? No, not really. It wouldn't be a big scandal if they were trying something legitimate and failed. They forced retailers to break the law and then they closed the operation. They didn't even try to follow the guns, and nobody seems to know what the point of the operation was supposed to be or what the plan was. Nobody seems to know anything at all.

The point was to shut down the gun smuggling ring, the DOJ has long said they preferred to shut down smuggling networks instead of gun buyers, the Phoenix ATF tried to do this and failed badly.

Were they woefully incompetent and disorganized? Sure. But to claim they didn't have the basic intent of stopping gun smuggling is absurd. You're making it sound like they had some other nefarious motive (which you can't even identify) instead of the obvious explanation of incompetency.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

This goes far beyond incompetence. Incompetence is when you try and fail because you weren't as good as you should have been. In this case they just rolled up the operation halfway through for no reason anyone can explain.

The president and his political allies were making a big deal about American guns reaching cartels at the time (dishonestly, of course). Would I put it past Obama to deliberately send guns to Mexico in order to generate political support for his gun control policies? No. No I wouldn't.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

The president and his political allies were making a big deal about American guns reaching cartels at the time (dishonestly, of course). Would I put it past Obama to deliberately send guns to Mexico in order to generate political support for his gun control policies? No. No I wouldn't.

I'm sorry, but you just placed yourself somewhere between "Bush caused/allowed 9/11" and "Obama is a Muslim". That's a conspiracy theory, and not even a good one.

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

Yeah, whatever. I would have said the same six months ago, but this guy has lost the last bit of trust I have in his integrity. This IRS scandal just gets worse and worse. He's making Nixon look honest.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

How is the IRS scandal getting worse? I haven't seen a single bit of evidence that says this was anything more than a couple employees at a particular IRS office (and it was stopped by the higher ups as soon as they found out).

Re:There you have it

[tsotha]

"A couple"? You mean 80? And it doesn't just involve the IRS, either. People are coming forward now that have had multiple government agencies (like IRS, OSHA, and EPA) sicced on them in a very short time period. It's hard to imaging how that doesn't involve coordination at a higher level.

These are going to be fun hearings. Obama's not dumb enough to put anything on paper, but at this point it's pretty clear the direction came from the top or very close to it.

Re:There you have it

[quantaman]

I haven't tracked the IRS scandal but it looks like it definitely goes beyond the Cincinnati office. That still doesn't mean it will reach anywhere close to Obama though they need to investigate and figure out where it does reach.

Not OK No Matter What.

[kms_one]

Don't let the Red/Blue Faux News debate cloud this issue. It doesn't matter who did it or to whom it is not okay and this policy should be banned.

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[PolygamousRanchKid]

The DOJ loves that this has become a Red/Blue slug fest. It diverts the public's attention from the real issue.

Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if the DOJ is throwing fuel on that fire. If the Reds and Blues hung up their gloves for a minute, and really thought about it . . . they would both direct their guns at the DOJ instead of each other.

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[I'm New Around Here]

Wow. Great way to be above the partisan ship. You can't even restrain yourself from the "Faux" talking point.

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Faux News debate" could well have been facetious which is how I took it, but even if not the poster clearly comes to the correct conclusion.

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[quacking duck]

Wow. Great way to be above the partisan ship. You can't even restrain yourself from the "Faux" talking point.

He immediately acknowledged his inherent bias, and then says what's being done is not right even if it's against something he despises.

I say he got his point across perfectly.

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[Anonymous Coward]

'Faux' is not a talking point. That would be something political that is being used to attack a political opponent, like Obama's birth certificate or suchlike.

'Faux' is a joking insult, which unlike many joking insults has significant grounding in truth.

For 'Faux' to be a talking point, Fox News would have to be a political opponent; they aren't a political organisation, are they?

Re:Not OK No Matter What.

[Anonymous Coward]

Great way to sieze that thin stalk of grass as you dangle over the cliff and utterly miss the point...

Blame game

[psherman2001]

Doesn't matter who's fault it is...
who started privacy abuses,
what party is/was in power.


There is something going terribly wrong here.

We, as Americans,
have obviously slid quite a little way down the slippery slope,
toward something quite different than the bastion of freedom we like to think of ourselves as...

We should be doing something more about it than pointing fingers and playing politics.

Re:Blame game

[icebike]

Exactly.

Everyone is so worried about whose ox was gored and whose ox did the goring that they are totally willing
to overlook that we are all bleeding. And its not JUST this issue or JUST wiretaps.

The constitution is in tatters, our freedoms are an illusion, and everybody thinks that as long as
they can drive to a ball game and have a beer everything is just fine.

Re:Blame game

[russotto]

The constitution is in tatters, our freedoms are an illusion, and everybody thinks that as long as they can drive to a ball game and have a beer everything is just fine.

And one side is working to get rid of the driving. The other side would be working on getting rid of the beer if they didn't need redneck support.

Re:Blame game

[kermidge]

You two make sense (along with a few others), but it's easier for most to play 'he said, she said', while floating along in the shitstream that's left of our heritage on the way to the holding tank.

Re:Blame game

[Bodero]

everybody thinks that as long as
they can drive to a ball game and have a beer everything is just fine.

And soon they won't even be able to do that.

Reminder

[Arancaytar]

An infringement on the freedom of the press, or the confidentiality of sources, is a threat to democracy regardless of whether it targets an actual news agency or a mockery thereof.

Re:Reminder

[amiga3D]

Did NBC get their e-mails snagged too?

Re:Reminder

[the eric conspiracy]

While I think anything run by Murdoch is a corrupt mockery it appears to me that this reporter was engaged in real investigative journalism.

As such his treatment is a serious scandal.

Re:Reminder

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought Fox News had spent considerable time and money to avoid being labelled "the press" but rather an entertainment distributor to avoid some of the regulation... regulating the press.

If they don't want to pay the piper, why should they get to play?

Re:Reminder

[tyrione]

An infringement on the freedom of the press, or the confidentiality of sources, is a threat to democracy regardless of whether it targets an actual news agency or a mockery thereof.

There is no Free Press in the US, unless it is publicly financed Free Press. Corporate Free Press is Press directed by leadership to maximize profits for its consortium of shareholders and board of directors. Stop whining about attacks on the Free Press when the Press is not immune to violating the laws any more than you or I. The day the Free Press embedded themselves with Commercial Profiteers is the day they opened the door to the limitations of Commercial Free Speech.

Democrats can do whatever they want

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why there are no protests for President drone-strikes's killing spree.
That's why the press runs a coverup after the administration gets our ambassador to Libya killed and then lies for two weeks about it being related to a YouTube video.
That's why their fund raiser Corzine can steal $1 billion dollars and escape indictment.
That's why they can send thousands of guns to Mexican drug cartels, resulting in the murder of hundreds of innocent Mexicans.
That's why they can use the IRS and other agencies to infringe the freedom of speech and freedom of association of their opponents.
That's why they can spy on reporters whenever they want.
That's why the unemployment rate and the deficit don't make news.
That's why they can funnel billions to their political contributors in "green" loan guarantees as company after company goes under.
That's why they can receive record amounts of campaign cash from Wall Street and still pretend they're not on Wall Street's side.
That's why they can be against gay marriage and it doesn't matter because everyone knows they don't mean it.
That's why they can take massive cash from Hollywood to make Copyrights permanent and no one calls them on it.
That's why they can force colleges to adopt unconstitutional speech codes in the name of harassment.
That's why they can slur Clarence Thomas and Mia Love and Ted Cruz and Nikki Haley.

The rules aren't for them. They get a pass. On everything.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[amiga3D]

I'm not going through the whole silly list. Let me just take the first line. The drone strikes are being criticized all over the place. In fact, one of the few places that isn't critical of them is Fox News. I'm pretty sure they feel it's one of the few things the Obama administration is doing right.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[Anonymous Coward]

"They are being criticized" is not a "protest". Where are the anti-war protestors? Clearly the protestors were always just phony partisan hacks putting on a show for rubes like you.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[AK Marc]

So your issue isn't that all of those done were done by the Republicans as well, but that the complaints are all by impotent radio talk show hosts if the Democrats are in power, and protesters if the Republicans are in power? You've missed the issue.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[Anonymous Coward]

The press covers up for Democrat lawlessness. They get a pass. Do you think that will lead to more lawlessness or less? How much more lawlessness do you think the country can take?

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[ATMAvatar]

It's not wrong because someone is doing it. It's wrong because they are doing it.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[amiga3D]

I know you're an idiot but try to think anyway. Anti-war protestors are still around and by definition they are anti drone strikes. Just because the protesters aren't front page news like they were during the Bush administration they still exist whether or not they make the lead story on the news or not. As far as putting on a show for "rubes" like me I think not. I'm not terribly impressed by people carrying signs and yelling for the cameras. Don't think the left isn't upset by the drone strikes just because you don't hear them talking about it much. I think the fact that President Obama isn't the guy they thought he was is still sinking in.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[Anonymous Coward]

Anti-war protestors are still around, but now they have nothing much to say. President drone-strike can kill anyone he wants. If you ask he anti-war protestors, they'll say they don't (entirely) approve -- but they'd rather you didn't ask them now, rather wait until their position advances their much more important partisan goals.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[AK Marc]

The press covers up for Repulbiacan lawlessness as well. Now that the presidency is on the other foot, it's funny to see all the Republicans suddenly want the press involved, when they wanted the press to stay our of it when Bush was doing the same thing.

And no, the press isn't staying out of it. I hear about all sorts of things in the mainstream press. So not only is your conclusion wrong, but your premise as well.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[AK Marc]

"They" are always doing it. "They" just change the pin on the lapel from elephant for an ass every few years to give the impression of a choice.

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[Anonymous Coward]

The press covers up for Repulbiacan lawlessness as well.

Except you can't come up with a single example from the last 50 years.

And even if you could, what's your point? Covering up for lawlessness is ok? Lawlessness is ok if the right people do it? Lawlessness is ok if the cover-up fails? Lawlessness is ok because they did it too?

Re:Democrats can do whatever they want

[AK Marc]

You didn't ask for an example. And there are hundreds. They aren't any better, but it's good irony that those who defended the Republicans and helped cover up to have their unethical practices be used by the other side. Go ahead. When the next Republican gets elected, push for more authoritarianism like under Reagan and the Bushes. Then, when the Democrat gets elected, keep whining for the problem you caused.

Just pass a fucking new law

[Tablizer]

Congress should pass an adjusted law and move on rather than making it a witch hunt. Trying to milk it as a "dirty conspiracy" will just pull BOTH parties (deeper) into the mud.

Computerized gerrymandering is part of the problem: politicians redraw their own districts to be slanted politically so that all they have to do is kiss up to extremists to get re-elected rather than do real work.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[ebno-10db]

Computerized gerrymandering is part of the problem: politicians redraw their own districts to be slanted politically so that all they have to do is kiss up to extremists to get re-elected rather than do real work.

They don't have to kiss up to extremists, or do anything. With a well enough gerrymandered district the Democrats or Republicans could run a dead slug and he'd get elected. The 2012 redistricting did this where I live. Instead of adjusting the congressional districts, they completely redrew them. At least it was bipartisan - we now have a guaranteed Democratic district and a guaranteed Republican district.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[Tablizer]

It's a fucking shame and a fucking sham.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[Anonymous Coward]

They don't have to kiss up to extremists, or do anything.

It's quite possible for politicians to lose in gerrymandered districts favoring their own parties. Example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Holden

They should end gerrymandering by moving to single transferable voting. Currently, swing districts have the least stable results. They shift parties in every wave (2006 and 2010 are great examples). This means that most of the moderates have less influence than their more partisan peers (for example, both Boehner and Pelosi are in safe districts where they only have to win their primaries to be assured of winning the general election). With single transferable voting, moderates would have broader appeal. And it would also allow for more representation for fringe groups. Right now, fringe groups only matter if they care about an issue that is not important to most people. With single transferable voting, a group that has a small following will get a small representation. In plurality voting, a group that consistently gets 10% of the vote in every district would still get no representation.

Abortion is a classic example. Most Americans think that abortion is wrong but should be legal. However, the parties take extreme positions. The Democrats argue that abortion is right and should be protected under all circumstances. The Republicans argue that abortion should be illegal. Both of these are minority positions. With single transferable voting, there is less need to pander to extremists like this. They will be voting for their extremist candidate. Most candidates are then free to express their actual preferences.

Another advantage of single transferable voting is that it would end the current absurdity of everything bad for Democrats being good for Republicans (and vice versa). In multiple party systems, bad for Democrats might mean good for Greens. Remember that negative ads hurt both the accuser and the accused. They are effective in a two party system because they hurt the accused more. A multiple party system would mean that both the Democrats and the Republicans could do worse if one pursued an investigation of the behavior of the other. This would put less emphasis on scandals and push politicians to be more positive.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[drinkypoo]

At least it was bipartisan - we now have a guaranteed Democratic district and a guaranteed Republican district.

False. There's nothing bi-partisan about it. You now have two republicrat districts. Or as I like to call them, corporate whores.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[Anonymous Coward]

Congress should pass an adjusted law and move on rather than making it a witch hunt.

Be honest: would you be saying that if George W. Bush were still President when this happened?

I'm totally fucking tired of this administration getting a pass on all the shenanigans. They knew or should have known about the IRS stepping on political groups due to their names. They knew or should have known about Fast and Furious. They hit reporters with the full force of the law, harder than any previous administration, yet they did nothing about serious leaks related to how black ops are done (probably because they themselves were the source of the leaks). Now Eric Holder said he knows nothing about this, yet his signature was on the paperwork.

Eric Holder should be fired at least. I wouldn't rule out jail time... to get this search warrant he had to sign off on the idea that this reporter was a dangerous criminal. (Normally a person is notified when the government gets a search warrant like this. To make it secret, the paperwork has to claim that the target is a criminal and that the investigation would be compromised.)

So no, I don't want to move on. I want the full blinding light of the news media beamed on this and every person involved.

What I really want is for the news media to just report the news, rather than spinning it for the best benefit of the Obama administration. I can't have that, but maybe at least the news media will report on scandals involving the news media.

Re:Just pass a fucking new law

[Tablizer]

They knew or should have known about the IRS stepping on political groups due to their names.

There's probably roughly tens of thousands of different "activities" done by the federal government. The head people cannot be on top of every last one (A.K.A. "micromanaging"). You have to hope people do their jobs well, and being human, some will occasionally screw up.

It's kind of like plane crashes: The vast majority of flights go perfectly normal and nobody hears about them. But the rare crashes get all the attention and taint the reputation of planes despite being comparatively safe.

Now Eric Holder said he knows nothing about this, yet his signature was on the paperwork.

Link?

The REAL Reason They Didn't Need This

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they were breaking the fucking law in the first place. Who gives a shit about warrants? It's called the Constitution. Something Holder and Obama give exactly zero shits about.

BUT HEY GUYS, keep supporting them for your pet social issues because that fucking matters so much compared to freedom of the press and the right to bare arms.

Re:The REAL Reason They Didn't Need This

[fredgiblet]

To the best of my knowledge no one is trying to restrict the right to bare arms. In fact IIRC the law in New York (?) is being adjusted so that women can even bare torsos (including nipples!). I haven't heard any talk about requires people to wear sleeves.

Re:The REAL Reason They Didn't Need This

[Anonymous Coward]

BUT HEY GUYS, keep supporting them for your pet social issues

Sounds like people who voted for Bush because he was against abortion and gay marriage. How's the tea party doing now that the social nutters have taken over? Any actual hope of change in either party on the horizon?

TFA looks familiar

[Anonymous Coward]

A visual compare of TFA with this Cnet article suggests that copy-pasta was involved.

You're the one who needs to wakeup

[Anonymous Coward]

First, Team Obama have had an effort underway since the start of their campaign in late 2007 to push the theme that Fox news is evil/bad/untrustworthy because it is the ONLY network in the US with no financial ties, employment ties, or family ties (by blood or marriage) to the Obama campaign and PR people (look it up... it's shocking how many at the other news outlets have either worked for the Obama admin, fund raised for them, or are married or biologically related to them). No other president in U.S. History has had the media in his pocket to this degree. PBS is financially dependent on him. The NBC network (via GE and including MSNBC) had its CEO in the Obama team, partly funded Obama, and GE itself was untaxed under Obama (but of course this has NOTHING to do with the relentless pro-Obama NBC and MSNBC coverage...). If you watch any news outlet other than Fox, ask yourself how often you have seen a reporter shouting tough questions at Obama and how many times you have seen stories about Obama policies or actions that did not presume he was right. This used to be the norm with ALL news outlets and all previous presidents... not with Obama... with Obama, the press is friendly to him and always assumes as the baseline of any story that he is a good guy doing good things... it's like 1936 Germany... a progressive press spoon-feeding good news about a progressive leader to a public which therefore, seeing nearly nothing negative about him approves of him getting more and more power over their lives... it's bizarre and unsettling to see AMERICANS interviewed about Obama talking about him in such messianic terms as some now do (we've seen this play before and it rarely ends well).

The Obama campaign to de-legitimize Fox has included the effort to flood You-Tube with anti-Fox bits. Obama's human drone supporters flood message boards with anti-Fox stuff all the time in an effort to keep people from getting any news that might be critical of Obama.

Second, it's the Daily Show (which, DUH, is a COMEDY show) that doctors the news clips (to help set-up comedy and satire bits). Fox has repeatedly shown entire news clips then showed Jon Stewart's take on the matters (using hacked bits of the Fox video) and debunked this stuff... Jon Stewart and his supporters either ignore it or say "so what? he's a COMEDIAN...nobody takes this SERIOUSLY!".

People who think that ANYTHING they get on a COMEDY channel from two Democrat SATIRISTS (Stewart and Colbert) is actual NEWS are fools... exactly the sort that Obama NEEDS to vote for him and support him and NEVER watch anything like Fox that might debunk anything he says/does.

You, sir, have been manipulated by the nation's court jester on behalf of his king... and you do not even know it. Very sad indeed

Re:You're the one who needs to wakeup

[Anonymous Coward]

it's bizarre and unsettling to see AMERICANS interviewed about Obama talking about him in such messianic terms as some now do

Why do you hate our dear leader? We should hail Obama for overcoming his adversities. Just because he hates Israel is no reason to think he hates all Jews. The blatant racism of the Democratic Party was left behind twelve years ago.

Re:You're the one who needs to wakeup

[narcc]

People who think that ANYTHING they get on a COMEDY channel from two Democrat SATIRISTS (Stewart and Colbert) is actual NEWS are fools.

Probably. I should point out, however, that those fools are still far better informed that Fox News viewers. Sad, isn't it?

Study Finds Fox News Viewers Least Informed Of All Viewers

Re:You're the one who needs to wakeup

[Pseudonym Authority]

Wow, you're such a victim. It's amazing that you actually think that the President of the United States has made it his personal mission to crush you and your clowns at Fox News. Do yourself a favor and go get tested for paranoid schizophrenia or something, and maybe once your treated, you'll stop blindly believing all the crap that randomly pops up in Bill O'Reilly's head to justify the right wing's politician's failures to do absolutely anything to benefit the country in the last thirty years. Or wait, maybe you should, because after all, I could be an agent of the BIAS LIBERAL MEDIA out to steal your guns, abort your children, and make you gay marry a pothead.

Everything is peachy...NOT

[Anonymous Coward]

We should just keep handing our liberties, rights, money, and lives to any corporation that says they are going to fix all of our problems. In our case we have the good old American Government which if you didn't know is indeed very much a corporation. We just need to keep giving them power so they can have the resources they need to fix everything in the world. I mean look at our deficit. They're really killing it in that department. We can't be too hard on them tho because working with negative numbers can be tricky. Its a good thing we put government in control of educating the masses. If I didn't know any better I would think that someone or something is trying to devalue the economy of the entire world so they can strategically acquire key assets for pennies on the dollar when everything goes to shit. Well its already happening. Did you forget about the government bailouts or the scores of the countries we are currently/have previously aided to overthrow dictators/leaders. The Libyans might have pulled Kadafi out of a hole and stabbed him in the ass with a box cutter to death. However it was French/US drone strikes that decimated his 50 vehicle armored forcing to hide like a little bitch under an overpass. Without millions of weaponized dollars in the air they might not have ever got kadafi exposed. We literally sponsor Call of Duty IRL. The rebels probably got a high enough kill streak and were awarded a drone strike just like in COD. I bet they got UAVs, care packages, and weapon upgrades too. I wonder what game type they play in Libia. Looks like capture the flag mixed with team death match(two of my favs). Things can and will only get worse. How is it possible that damn near every government in the entire world cannot figure out how to produce more than they consume?

Easily...

[Anonymous Coward]

The studies you cite, done by a democrat professor from a less-than-stellar university over-sampled Fox news viewers and then asked them a bunch of "current events" questions which ALL Americans generally do poorly at.

Want the TRUTH? try this page which is not a Fox-related site.

Try getting some news from a place not tied to the Democrats or to Progressives (i.e. stop soaking your head in the MSNBC/HuffPo/Kos KoolAid). Some lefty academics have done studies specifically designed to trash non-lefties and then pushed them through the progressive-run media (all of whom hyped those studies and in a circular fashion passed them around) and because most of their target audience never seems to come up to the surface for air, this scheme works fairly well.... it just does not convince anybody whose not already in the tank.

Progressivism is toxic and Dangerous and always leads to bad things... Progressives count on the public being dumb enough to confuse "Progressivism" with "progress"... the two are only related if you are a hard-core evolutionist who wants to give mother nature a bit of a hand... The last time Progressivism rose in America (Early 1900's) it lead to extreme evil and it spread some nasty ideas (like genetic purity/superiority/cleanliness, supermen, euthenasia, the individual as only a cog in the great machine of society, assigning a dollar value to a human being, etc) around the world... so much so that the left abandoned the "progressive" title they'd previously been proud of and they hid behind the moniker: "liberal". Now, having soiled the term "liberal" they are hoping that everybody forgot about the bad side of progressivism and, like cattle, they are all following Hillary Clinton's call to go back to that term. There's a very good reason why nearly all the Progressive webites and think tanks have been partly funded by the world's richest and most famous NAZI collaborator.... young people need to WAKE UP and study some of that history stuff your progressive/unionized teachers did not teach you... you are being setup for a VERY DARK future just as a previous generation of young people were similarly setup.... only now the world has far better technology to oppress and kill...

Re:Easily...

[jkflying]

This is fucking hilarious... Hillary Clinton is a Nazi? How did this get modded informative?

Re:Easily...

[silentcoder]

You remind me of a debate between Bill O'Reily and Bill Maher, where O'Reily said: "People don't want progressivism, they don't want the country to change, they like the country".

My answer to him is: yes, a lot of people like America, a lot more than 50 years ago actually, much more than 70 years ago and way more (all percentage-wise to population at the time) than a hundred and fifty years ago. The reason each generation has more people who like America is because each generation has fewer groups of people who are not being disenfranchised and having their rights denied by government and the beneficiaries of unequal rights. That philosophy which, with each generation, has recognized and extended basic rights to more and more of those groups who are denied it, that is progressivism. That is what gave the vote to black people, to women, and as recently as 1992 only to people of Romani descent (aka gypsies). We still need to be progressive because, today, there are still many people in the USA whose rights are not truly recognized and who are not truly equal before the law. The gay community for one, the children of illegal immigrants for another (recently a republican congressman suggested denying foodstamps to illegal immigrants, since any child born in the US is automatically a citizen, this would mean - literally - starving American babies because their PARENTS broke the law).
We can stop being progressive, when we have nobody left who desperately needs progress to happen."

Bias disclosure: I am not an American, nor do I ever want to be one, but I do follow your news and events (since they directly impact my life - you choose a bad president and I get poorer even though I got no vote, seems rather undemocratic in my view, that's about the only thing I actually AGREE with Ron Paul on - stay the hell out of other people's countries, you do not get to mess with OUR democratic choices to serve YOUR interests).

Re:Easily...

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent troll my anonymous brother. I almost thought you were a right winger until the end of that tirade where I realized you HAD to be trolling.

Ha Ha,... um... NO

[Anonymous Coward]

Bush had PLENTY of reasons to do this (like when the New York Times leaked that the Bush admin was tracing cell phones to try to get BinLaden...and then Bin Laden stopped using cell phones.... and then the NYT wrote repeatedly about Bush's inability to get BinLaden...) and Yet the supremely evil (in the eyes of left-wingers) George W Bush did not do this to the New York Times

There, You have been PROVEN wrong... and it was EASY.

The really foul and toxic thing here is that the Reporter has been listed in court documents signed by Eric Holder (Obama's Atty Gen) as a co-conspiritor.... in other words (for those of you who depend on comedy shows for your news) in the eyes of Obama, doing the most basic job of journalism (asking questions of government employees) is a criminal act. Even Nixon knew that it was the job of reporters to ask questions and the job of government people to know which ones not to answer (and to not answer THOSE questions). In a "leak" it has always been the leaker who was violating the law (the guy who has the info is the one who knows whether it is classified and who has taken an oath to keep it secret). Sometimes, when a leak was a very big national security measure, the govt went to the receiver of the leak and asked him not to publish (and Nixon went to court to try to keep the leak from being published...a fight he lost when the courts refused to support "prior restraint" on the free speech of journalists...) It's a big leap, however, for Obama to go to court and say it's a crime for journalists to ask questions of his employees...

Just remember this, you progressives:

Every single thing Obama gets away with doing to Fox sets a precedent.... some future Republican president will be justified in doing it to all the non-Fox news outlets... Everybody at the NYT is a criminal just for asking questions.... (oh, and using the IRS to go after conservative groups? ha, ha, ha.... audits in the future of "enemies" at HuffPo, Kos, MoveOn, MSNBC, etc are now completely justified... move along... nothing to see here....) By going so far in the tank for Obama and not attacking this behavior, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, NYT, WaPo, etc have done themselves and their viewer/readers a huge long-term disservice

Ha, standard left-wing reply

[Anonymous Coward]

Every time a leftist utopian experiment fails, the answer from the left is "but, the wrong people were doing it" or "but, it wasn't done right..." The NYT held-up the Soviet Union as a shining example of a successful left-wing system early-on and even helped cover-up Stalin's massacre of millions (because it's a basic tenet of progressivism that the ends justify the means) ...... but then after it all collapsed? Oh, the wrong people ran it... and it was done the wrong way and eventually we even started to see stories about the Soviet Empire having been "conservative"... Only a fool would trust the NYT for honest reporting...

Left wing economics are simply unworkable where human beings are involved because they run contrary to human nature.

It's nice to say "everybody should produce as much as they can while consuming as little as they need", BUT too many people will say "I'm just not capable of producing... and I need LOTS of stuff" and the few who are over-producing will eventually say "to hell with this! I'm not working my butt off anymore just so those other guys can take it easy!" Just ask the Germans how much longer they'll be willing to work hard so the Greeks can have their long vacations and early retirements...

Re:Ha, standard left-wing reply

[Tablizer]

There is a big difference between a democratic leftist country and a dictator leftist.

Re:Ha, standard left-wing reply

[Anonymous Coward]

Only about 2 election cycles.

What If !

[Anonymous Coward]

The so-called 'super search warrant' actually does not exist.

Then a plausible scenario as the following could have evolved within the DoJ.

DoJ Sec Eric Holder marches into a cubicle to a 'staff' member of DoJ.

[Holder] I want a WARRANT !

[Staff] Well Sir. There are guidelines and prerequisites that need to be fulfilled prior to the issue of a warrant.

[Holder] Kicks down the cubicle walls and picks up a chair and throws it across the other cubicles while shouting racial obscenities. Then Mr. Holder urinates on the 'Staff' person.

[Staff] Yes Sir [using a towel]. Just a moment ! Ah there we have it ! A Warrant ! And I am printing it now ... please excuse ... I must retrieve the Warrant from the printer ... Ah yes ... here it is . Will there be any other requests Mr. Holder [?].

Mr. Holder marches out of the cubicle floor of the DoJ to the delight of the 'prisoners.'

Such is becoming a typical day at the DoJ.

Because Bush never stooped so low

[Anonymous Coward]

President Obama is the first one to have his Atty Gen go into court with papers saying that a journalist is a criminal co-conspiritor simply for asking questions of an employee of the government. That's what Atty Gen Eric Holder did in order to get a judge to sign-on to a warrant that would go after they guy's phones and e-mail without giving him and Fox News the usual warnings and notifications. Oh, and the really good part is that Eric Holder later went before congress and, under oath, said he was unaware of any such activity and had no involvement... This admin is getting really toxic and if Holder does not take a dive for his boss, this administration is going to fall apart. I remember Watergate... it boiled-away with really only one news outlet doggedly pursuing it for nearly two years before it all blew up... Obama has had a bunch of his people go up to capitol hill and lie under oath, and on live video... this is really bad for the country

War Powers

[Anonymous Coward]

People are hashing it out about warrants but I suspect that the various powers of the executive in war exclude normal legal processes. If someone at Fox was consorting with someone inside government and effectively helping in espionage I think that the privacy issue is not relevant at all. People who are caught dirty usually do cry fowl. I do not include Bradley Manning in this sort of thing because the information he released was not strategic or martial in nature. Manning pointed to lout like behavior of officials and double talk and the like. But Fox really does associate with and encourage dangerous groups. What channel do you think Tim McVeigh listened to?

Nice try

[Anonymous Coward]

I see you got your HuffPo/DailyKos memo... (all the George-Soros funded "Progressive" sites flailed-about grasping for any excuses they could find and they were all told to use this one)

The stupid "Wide Receiver" program [a] attempted to track the weapons [b] notified the Mexican govt and [c] ended before Obama's team of idiots decided to try again, only in the worst ways possible... Team Obama never tried to track their weapons, did not tell Mexico, Forced American gun dealers to sell the weapons even when they objected, and attempted to blame all American gun owners and the 2nd Amendment for all the resulting bloodshed.

You lefties always depend on people not looking at the details...

Fascist, not centrist

[Mr. Underbridge]

Obama is a centrist, not a leftist, especially with regard to civil liberties.

Sorry buddy, where civil liberties are concerned he's practically a fascist. This shit - IRS, AP, Fox News, drone kills, etc, etc, etc - is so far over the line that Bush II established, it isn't even funny. In either the sardonic or the ha-ha sense. Obama, on the topic of openness and liberty, is worse than Bush II in every way.

And if the media were as motivated to take Obama down as they were to take Nixon down, I expect this would be a lot bigger than it is now. As it is, he gets the kid gloves treatment, and somehow his excuses about not knowing about this shit get swallowed.

The more I see from this president, the more disgusted I become. Mostly because he has become exactly the sort of person he claimed to be against during his first "hopey changey" campaign. Every politician becomes a hypocrite upon gaining office, but this one wins the prize.

Re:Fascist, not centrist

[Anonymous Coward]

You used the words 'hopey changey'.

Enjoy your jello salad in Alaska.

Original Article.

[Anonymous Coward]

The original article on CNET has links, the real pictures, and doesn't feed a link building content farm. Not to mention it was written by Declan McCullagh, a great guy (bring back politech!)

Remember kids, only you can avoid feeding the trolls.

This is fight against investigative journalism

[boorack]

Your lovely government is trying ot crack down on investigative journalism as we know it. They want you to see only government sanctioned news in the media. It will make them easier to lie you into yet another war (Iran, anyone?) or pursue whatever dirty deal they want with impunity. I don't care who is the victim: Fox News, Wikileaks, AP, CNN or some lefty outlet - this is BAD, period. In all such cases your government uses easy to vilify targets first to set precedent and then extend opressions to everyone - this so called "war on terror" is prime example on this. You should stand up against it, whoever their target is because it is guaranteed you'll be next. It happened in almost every case of free country descending into oppresive regime and I don't see things to come out in a different way in USofA unless citizery stands up and stops this process in its tracks.

From the mirror winger universe?

[Uberbah]

Obama is solidly liberal on health care

By passing the Heritage Foundation health care plan?

immigration

By deporting far more people than his Republican predecessor?

environment

He's continued Dick Cheney's energy policy, only with more drilling.

race

How. I'll stop there because your bullshit little list is entirely based around Obama's party affiliation and not his actual polices. Which are to the right of Reagan on many, many fronts, from Social Security to torture to prosecuting bankers to declaring amnesty to even the right of unions to bargain collectively.

You know what's better than reading comments?

[pecosdave]

Clicking on all the scores on the comments. The moderator fights on this thread are epic.

That T word again

[dbIII]

Treason isn't on the list of charges now (if it ever was).
Since it isn't even treason for a serving US officer to sell US made weapons to a listed terrorist group that had killed over a hundred US Marines a year previously then I don't see how a leak of information that was available to over a million people could be.

Bush "wouldn't" do it? Bush DID do it.

[MickLinux]

http://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/21/chilling-one-reporters-sources/

Of course, you won't have been aware that Bush DID do this, because it won't have been on FOX FARE'N'BALANSED(TM) news.

Fox has no honesty. They are not news. They are simply a fascist propaganda outlet.

Patriot Act

[Anonymous Coward]

How you like me now?

I'm an American

[Kilo Kilo]

and this is why I read BBC. All the "news" media does here is attack their opponents. This country is becoming so divided (in the media anyway) that it's disgusting. Everyone's goal is to outdo the guy before them and make sure their party keeps control.

And yes, this is "news for nerds" because /. is one of the few places left that values privacy for private citizens.

Incredible

[MooseMiester]

It is astounding to me that anyone in their right mind would:

Defend any of this under any circumstances

Blame it on the victim - Fox News and the A/P

Pretend this happened as an isolated incident. Pretend that the DHS never went after political enemies, the EPA didn't grant waivers to friends and aggressively prosecute political enemies, the IRS didn't grant 501(c)(4) to thousands and thousands of liberal groups, and deny thousands and thousands of conservative groups the same treatment, the DOJ didn't selectively enforce all kinds of laws based on politics.

Invoke the "Well the other guy committed a crime that maybe was kind of sort of the same as this, so that justifies all the crimes my guy committed" defense.

The plain truth is that we have an administration that wants to persecute people for incorrect thoughts and speech. This should fill any intelligent thinking person with sheer terror. Especially those who talk about "fairness" and the need to defend "individual liberties"

Cloud Email

[Anonymous Coward]

Mail left on a server should be considered private if it's a cloud based/active mail account. It should not be subject to the six month rule, because it is being used to store mail on an active server. It is not abandoned mail in that sense. The six month rule was written for mail left at a post office. A mail account is not a post office, but a private, personal storage facility, based in the cloud. Just because it is provided for free makes no difference. That is the prerogative of the service.

Operation Vigilant Eagle

[SplashMyBandit]

Snooping on Fox News, Associated Press, conservative and Jewish groups are only one part of what the Obama regime is going (yes, I can provide citations, or you could just head over to Breitbart to get the facts yourself). The Feds also are running "Operation Vigilant Eagle" which is snooping on veterans returning from serving overseas. You might think such a programme would look to see whether such veterans were influenced by the jihadist enemy and pose a danger to US society - but this is not the purpose of the programme. The purpose is to look for disgruntled vets that oppose the current Obama regime. In fact, a Marine was thrown in jail for comments and poems pasted on Facebook (no First Amendment rights for Marines under the Obama Administration). Fortunately a circuit court judge found out about it and freed him.

Stop listening to what the Obama regime is saying (because it is clear they continually lie), and actually what the facts of what they do. The Obama Administration is prepared to snoop illegally on the press, jail returned servicemen for poems, abandon allies all over the world, promise to give Russia the performance characteristics of the US anti-ballistic missile defenses, run Fast n Furious giving guns to Mexican drug cartels, refuse to secure the southern border, invite the Muslim Brotherhood into positions of policy decision making in the Administration, abandon their own Ambassador in Benghazi when the State Department gave Stinger missiles to Al Qaeda in Libya (despite the CIA telling them not to - which is why Petraeus' affair was used against him), etc etc.

If Obama, Clinton and their Administration were prepared to do all these things to important people they should be defending, just how much effort will they spend to defend a US or foreign citizen? [Answer: less than none - they'll sell you out and then lie their face off about it]

Start reading folks:

• http://www.breitbart.com/
• http://frontpagemag.com/
• http://newsmax.com

The US Government and most of the mainstream media are lying to you (Fox is targeted because it tells the truth more often than the others - and the Obama Administration cannot have the truth known - the free people would revolt if they became aware of what is going on).

Re:Operation Vigilant Eagle

[Anonymous Coward]

In February 2003, a Florida Court of Appeals unanimously agreed with an assertion by FOX News that there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States.

Yeah, Fox News actually went to court to fight for the legal right to distort and falsify news. If Fox really does tell the truth more than other US news organizations, the US is screwed. As for the judicial system actually supporting Fox ... I might expect China or North Korea to legalize deliberately lying in "news" stories, but the US? The US is SO screwed ...

I have no problem with anonymous sources

[ToddInSF]

being used as the basis of a "news" article.

What I have a problem with is the assumption that just because a "source" is "anonymous", it's assumed credible. We should be more concerned with proper disclosure, not with treating the continued circumvention of disclosure as some sort of worthy goal...

Stay Out of Politics

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want to read political stuff from technical people.......This is how you lose readership.

Re:Stay Out of Politics

[DirtyLiar]

I don't want to read political stuff from technical people.......This is how you lose readership.

You are not the target audience for /then, because almost ALL /.ers are techies of one stripe or another. Did you miss the motto? "News for Nerds"? If you want political experts, go to some political website, not slashdot. The denisens of /. are not going to stop posting their opinions just because you can't seem to NOT click on stories you are NOT interested in reading.

So I've got a better idea for you, Troll, how about YOU stop reading the political postings on a TECH FOCUSED website? Political postings make up between 80 to 95% of /. anyway since most everything nowadays is somehow connected to or affected by politics.

But then you'd have nothing to complain and troll about, would you?

From the strange bedfellows department

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe Fox should seek help from the ACLU.

they are the police and can do what ever they want

[wilfredsatan]

The police every were belive they are above the law and therfor don't have to worry wether their actions are legal who cares and who can do any thing about it .the police have commited numerouse crimes against me and all I could potentialy do is ask the police to investigate .well that would be volunteering for more punishment .I can prove these crimes with thelir records but to whom.

Ever since 9/11...

[DirtyLiar]

... it's been legal to tap anyone's phone, read their email, or seize and hold them for an unlimited amount of time, all without warrents, and with no obligation to inform ANYONE of what you are doing. You just have to say the magic word, "Terrorism", and all rights dissappear.

But the media hasn't even wispered any outrage. Not until it was used against them.

And in this situation the terrorism isn't immaginary, it dealt with a documented terrorist attack, and details that the Pentigon felt could assist future terrorist attacks.

I value MY privicy AND yours, but why should a corporation or business have MORE rights than a citizen and human-being?

Don't get on the wrong side of this, it's just another fight to give fictional entities more rights than real-people. And I don't care what Romney says, I say, "Corporations are NOT people, my friend."

AT&T

[Anonymous Coward]

Duh, because AT&T exists, search warrants aren't needed.