President George W. Bush said that he had authorized the use of wiretaps on US and foreign citizens in the United States, calling the practice crucial to the “war on terror.”
The admission came in an unusual live televised broadcast of his weekly radio address, in which Bush confirmed a report that he had authorized eavesdropping on overseas communications by people living in the United States who are suspected of terrorist activities.
Bush…noted that he had personally reauthorized the program more than 30 times since September 11…
Is it time to start reminding folks of that great quote from Huey Long? “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the American flag.”
The division among conservatives between those who support a constitutional republican democracy — and those who are secure being “good Germans” — grows deeper every week. Let them fight it out amongst themselves. My personal contempt is reserved for management of the NY TIMES who prate about what news is fit to print — and spent a year kissing Bush’s butt before the stink got bad enough to force them to print the story.
1. As far as we know, we haven’t been attacked since 9/11. (I am suspicious of a couple of train derailments)
Whatever it takes to keep idiots from flying airplanes into our buildings or other forms of destruction is ok by me. I am former card carrying member of the Libertarian Party before they adopted a policy of sending Barney Fife to arrest OBL
Idealism is wonderful if you aren’t dealing with insane people who have avowed to kill us all.
Is it time to start reminding folks of that great quote from Huey Long?
“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the American flag.”
From what I have seen here the above statement is very true.
“Least we forget, it was FOREIGN citizens that killed 3,000 of OUR citizens. Focusing our investigations upon FOREIGN citizens just might prevent another 9/11. Confiscating knitting needles from 80-year old ladies from Cleveland will not.”
I’m not sure which crack induced hallucination caused you to believe that this sort of spying was only conducted on foreigners. Organizations such as the American Friends Service Committee were spied on also. Are right wing fascists so paranoid now that even Quakers scare you?
The best way to not have another 9/11 is to not start shit in every corner of the world, especially not the very vengeful corners such as Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc, not to mention the majority of Central America. Countries that don’t fund terrorism in other parts of the world don’t seem to have as much of a problem keeping it out of their own lands.
There is no School of the Americas in the Netherlands. Finland didn’t fund the mudjahadeen. New Zealand never gave weapons to Saddam to settle a pointless grudge with Iran. It is not by chance that these countries don’t have the enemies the US does.
If I may slip into scifi mode for a minute, it seems all but certain that in the next century or two (or ten) even a 5 year old child will eventually have the technology to destroy all life on earth. Long before that point we can either find a way to ban free will, or a way to grown the hell up, and evolve beyond this domestic/foreign, them/us, right/left crapola. The only other alternative is extinction.
I applaud Bush for this move- and I do so not because I approve, but because his actions, and his admission of the existence of this program, were exactly what was needed to bring about the defeat of the Patriot Act provisions the other day. That defeat was based on the revelations in a single newspaper article; now with this official acknowledgment by Bush that he broke the law and conntinued to do so for years, it is very unlikely that he will gain enough support in congress to renew his precious Patriot Act. So in this case- thank you Mr. President!
AB CD
“since it’s not spying on Americans calling Americans.”
And how do you know that?
“It’s soubtful that this is illegal,”
It’s doubtful that it’s illegal for a government agency to do what it shouldn’t?
Okay, here’s another interesting tidbit coming out: at the time Chairmain of the Senate Intelligence Committee Bob Graham says he was never told of the program.
>There is no School of the Americas in the Netherlands. Finland didn’t fund the mudjahadeen. New Zealand never gave weapons to Saddam to settle a pointless grudge with Iran. It is not by chance that these countries don’t have the enemies the US does.
I don’t know about Finland, but New Zealand has had terrorist attacks, and the Dutch have their own Muslim terrorism problem. Have you heard of Theo Van Gogh and Pim Fortuyn?
>“since it’s not spying on Americans calling Americans.”
>And how do you know that?
That’s what the article said-people calling overseas.
It’s probably not illegal given the number oif people who were informed about it.
Ignorance and absurdity. Is this supposed to have “shock” value?
#19 Greg,
Excellent find! Throws good light on the subject.
I would also point out this part of 1802:
“1802 (B) there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party; …”
Any bets on whether or not US persons have been wiretapped without a warrant?
“Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged sword. It both emboldens the blood, just as it narrows the mind. And when the drums of war have reached a fever pitch and the blood boils with hate and the mind has closed, the leader will have no need in seizing the rights of the citizenry. Rather, the citizenry, infused with fear and blinded by patriotism, will offer up all of their rights unto the leader and gladly so. How do I know? For this is what I have done. And I am Caesar.”
Greg,
Thanks for the link to “Unclaimed Territory”.
I apologize for misreading the article; it was not 30 wiretaps. The amount of initial wiretaps is unknown, but somewhere between 10 and 30 of them were of sufficient interest that he reauthorized the wiretaps for another year. (The lower number is based upon reauthorizing the same wiretap 3 times.) Of course I’m still not sure if my interpretation is correct since “he had personally reauthorized the program more than 30 times since September 11″ is vague as to what “program” the article is referencing.
As to the legality of these wiretaps — United States Code Title 50 Chapter 32 Subchapter I Section 1802 Paragraph (a)(1) says:
“Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General certifies in writing under oath that—”
What is wrong with you people? The US Government has never hid the fact that NSA listens in on foreign phone conversations. They have been reporting “chatter” for years as the rationale for posting “Orange Alerts”. Why are you suddenly shocked? Don’t think for a minute that no other country, including France, doesn’t do the same. It’s called gathering INTELLIGENCE.
Mike, care to provide a source for that? Hint, it’s not Shakespeare.
Smith: Read the post I linked to in #19 and RonD in #31.
1802(a)(1) has three requirements that must be met, (A) through (C). Both of (A)’s subheadings say that it must apply to foreign powers as defined in 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3). Being as terrorism is explicitly defined as 1801(a)(4), it does not meet that requirement.
(B) requires, as RonD noted, that “there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party.” This requirement is also not met.
All of this can be conveniently read here, a link ironically provided by Joe with a snarky comment about us needing to “look past [our] own echo chambers for [our] news.” Hmm…
What’s wrong with us? Don’t quote law that clearly doesn’t apply if you just read down to the next few headings. It’s illegal. The spying itself could have been legal if they actually followed the law and got a warrant from the FISA court.
Ask Babs… I think she may know.
Paul: You are correct, I misspoke. I had read that article earlier and when I dug it up again for here I just went by the title of the blog post, which is admittedly misleading. He was notified of the program, but he was under the assumption that it would be performed with warrants obtained. Being as that’s the law, that should have been a safe assumption. Being as the issue here is not the existence of the program itself but the way in which it was performed, that’s the pertinent detail. So notifying him of the existence of the program and him not stopping it is not implicit permission for the way in which it was executed unless he was notified of that as well.
Then Clinton was wrong. If he broke the law as well he should be held accountable. Just because someone on the other side did it too doesn’t make it right. For example, gerrymandering is a completely bipartisan sin. That doesn’t make it any less evil. I wish the ballot measure passed in California as much as I wish it passed in Ohio.
Chris M
As I understand, the NSA is tasked with monitoring all electronic communication entering or exiting the country. This is done by computer, searching for certain words. The monitoring is not done by human listening unless there appears something of interest. Then the NSA is supposed to obtain a FISA warrant within 72 hours. To claim Clinton did the same as what Bush has done is, again, misleading. There is a difference between monitoring a communication for key words and outright wiretapping.
And I don’t like the idea of any of my communication with anyone outside the country being monitored.
Is Joe Lieberman a “good German”? No, but he hasn’t justified his fascist leanings lately. At the rate Lieberman is going, I fully expect him to jump ship and join the Republicans. Look for him to make a run for Vice-President under Frist, or possibly McCain.
Greg,
Thanks for the link to Unclaimed Territory. A good piece and recommended read.
Paul T.
It doesn’t matter who was told. If it is illegal then it is illegal. Only a Judges signature on the warrant would have made it legal.
To all those who think this is proper.
I seem to remember just three or four years ago a lot of huffing from the right wing-nut conservatives about if you don’t like the way Bush is fighting the war on terror, then move to Cuba or any other non-democratic country. It seems there never was a need to move.
Actually, under Clinton there was monitoring of pretty much all e-mails, and as far as I know project Echelon is still happening. So the same Congressman who are complaining about this wiretapping haven’t been complaining for 5 years about a much larger eavesdropping.
If a computer is searching for keywords, then it means it is monitoring the entire conversation. It’s only a lack of sufficient database capacity that keeps them from storing all e-mails(GoogleNSA?)