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We haven't had a good new thread - especailly on the internal spying - recently...

 

 

 

SOOOOOOO, they used the idea that they felt the law allowed them to urinate directly on the principles of our government...but now, as we all already knew (except the three people here who say they are strict constitutionalists I predict) the law has been broken.......

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10741787/

 

Analysts: Bush spying rationale legally shaky

Memo questions use of presidential power in wiretapping without approval

 

 

WASHINGTON - A report by Congress's research arm concluded yesterday that the administration's justification for the warrantless eavesdropping authorized by President Bush conflicts with existing law and hinges on weak legal arguments.

 

The Congressional Research Service's report rebuts the central assertions made recently by Bush and Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales about the president's authority to order secret intercepts of telephone and e-mail exchanges between people inside the United States and their contacts abroad.

 

The findings, the first nonpartisan assessment of the program's legality to date, prompted Democratic lawmakers and civil liberties advocates to repeat calls yesterday for Congress to conduct hearings on the monitoring program and attempt to halt it.

 

44-page report said that Bush probably cannot claim the broad presidential powers he has relied upon as authority to order the secret monitoring of calls made by U.S. citizens since the fall of 2001. Congress expressly intended for the government to seek warrants from a special Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court before engaging in such surveillance when it passed legislation creating the court in 1978, the CRS report said.

 

The report also concluded that Bush's assertion that Congress authorized such eavesdropping to detect and fight terrorists does not appear to be supported by the special resolution that Congress approved after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which focused on authorizing the president to use military force.

 

"It appears unlikely that a court would hold that Congress has expressly or impliedly authorized the NSA electronic surveillance operations here," the authors of the CRS report wrote. The administration's legal justification "does not seem to be . . . well-grounded," they said.

 

Lawmakers lash out at spy program

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has pledged to hold hearings on the program, which was first revealed in news accounts last month, and the judges of the FISA court have demanded a classified briefing about the program, which is scheduled for Monday.

 

"This report contradicts the president's claim that his spying on Americans was legal," said Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), one of the lawmakers who asked the CRS to research the issue. "It looks like the president's wiretapping was not only illegal, but also ensnared innocent Americans who did nothing more than place a phone call."

 

Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said the president and the administration believe the program is on firm legal footing. "The national security activities described by the president were conducted in accord with the law and provide a critical tool in the war on terror that saves lives and protects civil liberties at the same time," he said. A spokesman for the National Security Agency was not available for a comment yesterday.

 

Other administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the CRS reached some erroneous legal conclusions, erring on the side of a narrow interpretation of what constitutes military force and when the president can exercise his war powers.

 

A global, indefinite war?

Bush has said that he has broad powers in times of war and must exercise them to target not only "enemies across the world" but also "terrorists here at home." The administration has argued, starting in 2002 briefs to the FISA court, that the "war on terror" is global and indefinite, effectively removing the limits of wartime authority -- traditionally the times and places of imminent or actual battle.

 

Some law professors have been skeptical of the president's assertions, and several said yesterday that the report's conclusions were expected. "Ultimately, the administration's position is not persuasive," said Carl W. Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor and an expert on constitutional law. "Congress has made it pretty clear it has legislated pretty comprehensively on this issue with FISA," he said, referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. "And there begins to be a pattern of unilateral executive decision making. Time and again, there's the executive acting alone without consulting the courts or Congress."

 

Balance of power

Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the report makes it clear that Congress has exerted power over domestic surveillance. He urged Congress to address what he called the president's abuse of citizens' privacy rights and the larger issue of presidential power.

 

"These are absolutely central questions in American government: What exactly are the authorities vested in the president, and is he complying with the law?" Rotenberg said.

 

The report includes 1970s-era quotations from congressional committees that were then uncovering years of domestic spying abuses by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI against those suspected of communist sympathies, American Indians, Black Panthers and other activists. Lawmakers were very disturbed at how routinely FBI agents had listened in on U.S. citizens' phone calls without following any formal procedures. As they drafted FISA and created its court, the lawmakers warned then that only strong legislation, debated in public, could stop future administrations from eavesdropping.

 

"This evidence alone should demonstrate the inappropriateness of relying solely on executive branch discretion to safeguard civil liberties," they wrote. The lawmakers noted that Congress's intelligence committees could provide some checks and balances to protect privacy rights but that their power was limited in the face of an administration arguing that intelligence decisions must remain top secret.

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related angle:

http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_arti...8930f269e2bde50

 

Cheney-Rumsfeld Surveillance Plans Date Back to 1980s

 

Commentary/Analysis, Peter Dale Scott,

New America Media, Jan 03, 2006

Editor's Note: Illegal eavesdropping and illegal detentions of U.S. citizens marks a revival of presidential powers curtailed since Watergate, and likely grew out of a secret Reagan-era program that planned to suspend the U.S. Constitution in the event of a national emergency.

 

Revelations that the National Security Agency (NSA) has engaged in warrantless eavesdropping in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act prompted President Bush to admit last month that in 2002 he directly authorized the activity in the wake of 9/11.

 

But there are reasons to suspect that the illegal eavesdropping, and the related program of illegal detentions of U.S. citizens as well as foreign nationals, began earlier. Both may be part of what Vice President Dick Cheney has called the Bush administration's restoration of "the legitimate authority of the presidency" -- practices exercised by Nixon that were outlawed after Watergate.

 

In the 1980s Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld discussed just such emergency surveillance and detention powers in a super-secret program that planned for what was euphemistically called "Continuity of Government" (COG) in the event of a nuclear disaster.

 

At the time, Cheney was a Wyoming congressman, while Rumsfeld, who had been defense secretary under President Ford, was a businessman and CEO of the drug company G.D. Searle. Overall responsibility for the program had been assigned to Vice President George H.W. Bush, "with Lt. Col. Oliver North...as the National Security Council action officer," according to James Bamford in his book, "A Pretext for War."

 

These men planned for suspension of the Constitution, not just after nuclear attack, but for any "national security emergency," which they defined in Executive Order 12656 of 1988 as: "Any occurrence, including natural disaster, military attack, technological or other emergency, that seriously degrades or seriously threatens the national security of the United States." Clearly 9/11 would meet this definition.

 

As developed in the mid-1980s by Oliver North in the White House, the plans called for not just the surveillance but the potential detention of large numbers of American citizens. During the Iran-Contra hearings, North was asked about his work on "a contingency plan in the event of emergency, that would suspend the American constitution." The chairman, Democratic Senator Inouye, ruled that this was a "highly sensitive and classified" matter, not to be dealt with in an open hearing.

 

The supporting agency for the planning and implementation was the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). FEMA was headed for much of the 1980s by Louis Giuffrida, whose COG plans for massive detention became so extreme that even President Reagan's then Attorney General, William French Smith, raised objections.

 

Smith eventually left Washington, while COG continued to evolve. And in May 2001 Cheney and FEMA were reunited: President George W. Bush appointed Cheney to head a terrorism task force and created a new office within FEMA to assist him. In effect, Bush was authorizing a resumption of the kind of planning that Cheney and FEMA had conducted under the heading of COG.

 

Press accounts at the time claimed that the Cheney terrorism task force accomplished little and that Cheney himself spent the entire month of August in a remote location in Wyoming. But this may have just been the appearance of withdrawal; as author James Mann points out in "The Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet," Cheney had regularly gone off to undisclosed locations in the 1980s as part of his secret COG planning.

 

As to the actual role of Bush, Cheney and FEMA on 9/11 itself, much remains unclear. But all sources agree that a central order at 10 a.m. from Bush to Cheney contained three provisions, of which the most important was, according to the 9/11 Commission Report, "the implementation of continuity of government measures."

 

The measures called for the immediate evacuation of key personnel from Washington. Both Cheney and Rumsfeld refused to leave, but Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was helicoptered to a bunker headquarters inside a mountain. Cheney also ordered key congressional personnel, including House Speaker Dennis Hastert, to be flown out of Washington, along with several cabinet members.

 

During Cheney's later disappearance from public view for a long period after the attack, he too was working from a COG base -- "Site R," the so-called "Underground Pentagon" on the Maryland-Pennsylvania border, according to Bamford.

 

Many actions of the Bush presidency resemble not only what Nixon did in the 1970s, but what Cheney and Rumsfeld had planned to restore under COG in the 1980s in the case of an attack. Prominent among these have been the detention of so-called "enemy combatants," including U.S. citizens, and placing them in special camps. Now as before, a policy of detentions outside the Constitution has been accompanied by a program of extra-constitutional surveillance to determine who will be detained.

 

As Cheney told reporters on his return last month from Pakistan, "Watergate and a lot of things around Watergate and Vietnam, both during the '70s served, I think, to erode the authority" of the president. But he defended as necessary for national security the aggressive program he helped shape under President Bush, which includes warrantless surveillance and extrajudicial imprisonment -- in effect, a new Imperial Presidency.

 

At least two Democrats in Congress have suggested that Bush could be impeached for his illegal surveillance activities. The chances of impeachment may depend on whether Congress can prove that planning for this, like planning for the Iraq War, began well before 9/11.

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duh... president is just a term...I don't want to get into semantics...I'm saying both started as republics and then delegated power further and further to what can be called in modern terminolgy and usage "the president" until one day this elected president or whatever term suits you became what can be called a dictator or emperor or czar or ceasar or king ...

 

 

 

 

*anyway for the record, stay on topic PLEASE and don't argue semantics. I assume everyone here is learned and intelligent enough to know what I'm talking about without wasting our time nit-picking terminology. If it makes you feel superior, start a new thread on being a nit-picking semantics bugger, and who's best at it.

 

 

This is a graf forum discussing politics. I don't need to waste my time spell-checking and explaining terminology on every statement I make...I write as precisely as I need to without wasting my time...

 

 

back to our thread...sorry for the rant...

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Originally posted by John Birch@Jan 8 2006, 08:23 PM

duh... president is just a term...I don't want to get into semantics...I'm saying both started as republics and then delegated power further and further to what can be called in modern terminolgy and usage "the president" until one day this elected president or whatever term suits you became what can be called a dictator or emperor or czar or ceasar or king ...

 

 

 

 

*anyway for the record, stay on topic PLEASE and don't argue semantics. I assume everyone here is learned and intelligent enough to know what I'm talking about without wasting our time nit-picking terminology. If it makes you feel superior, start a new thread on being a nit-picking semantics bugger, and who's best at it.

 

 

This is a graf forum discussing politics. I don't need to waste my time spell-checking and explaining terminology on every statement I make...I write as precisely as I need to without wasting my time...

 

 

back to our thread...sorry for the rant...

Its more than semantics or terminology. No need to worry about spell checking or terminology. You said they both started as democracies or republics. Hitler started as a Socialist government (communism). And the Roman empire was always a monarchy, not a democracy. That is a totalitarian government. They are night and day different from a democracy or a republic.

 

A President is the executive branch of a democratic government. One of three branches, so the power is not all in one person's hands. In a Socialist based government or Monarchy, all the power is in one person's hands.

 

So no, its not semantics, your "point" is completely invalid. The only thing off topic is you complaining. Again, if the mods don't like it they can always delete the posts, but this is on topic.

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And as far as domestic spying is concerned, I'll say the same thing I wrote in the other thread about it. Right after 9-11 everyone was furious that the government hadn't done enough to prevent it. If they had done something, it would have been technically considered domestic spying since the hi-jackers were here legally.

 

The fact that the press is allowed to write critical stories of the government, and break this type of news, is a pretty good indicator that we aren't breaking down into a "dictatorship".

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Originally posted by Stereotype V.001+Jan 9 2006, 01:19 AM--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Stereotype V.001 - Jan 9 2006, 01:19 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteBegin-John Birch@Jan 8 2006, 08:23 PM

duh... president is just a term...I don't want to get into semantics...I'm saying both started as republics and then delegated power further and further to what can be called in modern terminolgy and usage "the president" until one day this elected president or whatever term suits you became what can be called a dictator or emperor or czar or ceasar or king ...

 

 

 

 

*anyway for the record, stay on topic PLEASE and don't argue semantics. I assume everyone here is learned and intelligent enough to know what I'm talking about without wasting our time nit-picking terminology. If it makes you feel superior, start a new thread on being a nit-picking semantics bugger, and who's best at it.

 

 

This is a graf forum discussing politics. I don't need to waste my time spell-checking and explaining terminology on every statement I make...I write as precisely as I need to without wasting my time...

 

 

back to our thread...sorry for the rant...

Its more than semantics or terminology. No need to worry about spell checking or terminology. You said they both started as democracies or republics. Hitler started as a Socialist government (communism). And the Roman empire was always a monarchy, not a democracy. That is a totalitarian government. They are night and day different from a democracy or a republic.

 

A President is the executive branch of a democratic government. One of three branches, so the power is not all in one person's hands. In a Socialist based government or Monarchy, all the power is in one person's hands.

 

So no, its not semantics, your "point" is completely invalid. The only thing off topic is you complaining. Again, if the mods don't like it they can always delete the posts, but this is on topic.

[/b]

 

 

oi, know your history:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Republic

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazy_Germany

 

 

 

I think you didn't understand my point...all republics, irregardless of your definition, eventually (d)evolve into dictatorships usually through the guise of "emergencies." It happened in Rome and it happened in Germany. It happened in Pakistan a few years ago and is happening in the US now...

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"And as far as domestic spying is concerned, I'll say the same thing I wrote in the other thread about it. Right after 9-11 everyone was furious that the government hadn't done enough to prevent it. If they had done something, it would have been technically considered domestic spying since the hi-jackers were here legally."

 

well put.

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Originally posted by Stereotype V.001@Jan 8 2006, 09:24 PM

And as far as domestic spying is concerned, I'll say the same thing I wrote in the other thread about it. Right after 9-11 everyone was furious that the government hadn't done enough to prevent it. If they had done something, it would have been technically considered domestic spying since the hi-jackers were here legally.

 

The fact that the press is allowed to write critical stories of the government, and break this type of news, is a pretty good indicator that we aren't breaking down into a "dictatorship".

 

 

haha i think it's more that the government did not USE the info they HAD

because they were too busy infighting at the agancies about who's info had to be shared with who.

there are plenty of sources stating that the goverment had the info to prevent it.

 

no, it would not have had to have been spying, after all, they may have been here legally.. some of these guys were already on the watch list ..but they WERE NOT AMERICAN CITIZENS. little bit of a difference there.

and it ain't semantics.

 

 

 

would you not also agree that the constant attack on the media as "liberal"...

(what i consider a laughable allegation that most people have swallowed whole)

...has been a blatant attempt to supress dissention????!?!

 

FOX news is nothing but a propaganda machine for our government

I've heard enough straight BULLSHIT reported as fact in the past few months to know

our media is hardly allowed to say what it wants.

even the NYtimes sat on the domestic spying issue for awhile

because the white house asked it to shelve the story.

 

 

and, for the argument with john birch

it is a bit nit picky

we all know, power corrupts

and there has been a brazen attempt by the executive branch of government to consolidate power since they got it.

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John Birch- I understand your point fully, but the examples you provided were not democracies or anything close to our current government. Read the links you posted. Sorry if it sounded overly nit-pickingnesslyington, but I have heard the "our government is corrupted, it happens every time, look at history" line over and over but I have yet to hear anyone provide an example of a fully democratic nation.

 

Symbols- Actually none of the 9-11 hi-jackers were on the major watchlist that is handed out to airlines and the like. An army intel group "able danger" had Atta on one of their watchlists, and had wind of something big being planned and Atta was considered to be involved. Why did they not alert the FBI and Law Enforcement agencies immediately? Domestic spying laws that were in place made the fact that they had Atta's name on a list illegal, and impossible to pass on the information. If they tried, chances are any agencies would have wanted nothing to do with it. Its even more touchy because it was a military group. All of the "infighting" at the agencies your talking about was caused by laws preventing domestic spying.

 

As far as them being legal citizens, this also came up in the previous thread. Some of the hi jackers WERE American citizens. You don't have to be born in America in order to become a citizen, you can take a test and apply for citizenship. The rest had visas, and although temporary the time they are allowed here on a visa they are granted the full rights of any other citizen. So, if we had acted on intelligence it would have been illegal, and exactly what Bush is getting his balls nailed to the wall for right now.

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Missed the media part of your post. It is funny that anyone who thinks the news you agree with is "liberal" and must be trying to supress dissension, while anyone who likes FOX is falling for "straight propaganda" because you disagree with it. I personally think FOX is overly biased towards the right, for obvious reasons. I also think other news outlets are biased towards the left, reporting "desecration of the Koran" without checking their sources and reporting the Iraq death toll reaching 2,000 like they were counting down on new year's eve. Zawahiri and others actually use this type of information for the videos they release as little pep talks for all the "holy warriors" watching Al Jazeera in between wiring IEDs and lobbing mortars. But that is all a matter of opinion, and has nothing to do with the point I was trying to make.

 

All personal views and politics aside, stories like the Abu Ghraib scandal, this scandal about domesticy spying, ect ect is harmful to the Bush administration's image. If we were truly living in a dictatorship/police state or whatever you want to call it, that type of harmful news would be censored and people attempting to publish it would not be allowed to live. And the NYT sitting on the domestic spying story might not be the best example, I'm pretty sure it wasn't a coinky dink they broke this story after sitting on it for a year right before the patriot act came up for renewal.

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Man...

 

...fox news doesn't lean a little too far to the right. Fox news is not a news agency. They don't "lean" either way. Fox news only exists to benefit the republican agenda. End of story.

 

Most other major news agencies don't report liberal news, especially tv news agencies. I wish I could drill that through peoples heads. Liberal news might really discuss what happened in the 2000 and 2004 elections. They might discuss the Bush family history. They might discuss what the tax cuts are doing to lower and middle class america. They might investigate the official story of 911 and why so many things don't add up. Or maybe why corporations these days have more rights than humans do. Or look into which social programs are being cut in order to pay for an illegal war based on (lies) bad intelligence, in which a lot of the contracts have been awarded to our vice presidents company. Or bush's dui in texas, or cocaine habit in college, or the fact he was a fucking cheerleader. Why don't they do some reports about how walmart is putting so many small business' under and the gov't hasn't stepped in to stop it. Or the fact that a few mega-corporations own 90% of the media and control what most americans are exposed to. ..blah blah blah. I know a few of these stories have been glossed over during a 3 minute segment on 20/20...but a lot of this should be headline news night after night with real investigating going on.

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"...fox news doesn't lean a little too far to the right. Fox news is not a news agency. They don't "lean" either way. Fox news only exists to benefit the republican agenda. End of story. "

 

in keeping with the other part of your post.. i could also say that fox news doesnt have any conservative or goldwater republican content. otherwise they would have larry pratt, pat buchanan and those dudes on there all the time. they would be talking shit on big government. they would be talking about overturning gun laws. real shit .

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the other day, i saw PAT BUCHANAN on NBC providing "polotical analysis"

 

hahahaaa

talkin real shit.

 

Published on Monday, April 5, 2004 by the New York Times

Leaders of 9/11 Panel Say Attacks Were Probably Preventable

 

Mr. Kean also cited the "lack of coordination within the F.B.I." and the bureau's failures to grapple with the implications of the August 2001 arrest of Zacarias Moussaoui, a French citizen who was arrested while in flight school and was later linked to the terrorist cell that carried out the attacks. ....

 

Mr. Hamilton, a former chairman of the House Intelligence and International Relations committees, said, "There are a lot of ifs; you can string together a whole bunch of ifs, and if things had broken right in all kinds of different ways, as the governor has identified, and frankly if you'd had a little luck, it probably could have been prevented." He said the panel would "make a final judgment on that, I believe, when the commission reports."

 

 

 

Clarke: Rice should have done job before 9/11

Thursday, March 25, 2004 Posted: 1448 GMT (2248 HKT)

Former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke criticized the Bush and Clinton administrations' responses to al Qaeda before September 11, 2001.

 

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke said that key information about the September 11 hijackers may have come out before the attacks if national security adviser Condoleezza Rice "had done her job" -- suggesting the plot may have been uncovered in time to prevent it.

 

In an interview Wednesday on CNN's "Larry King Live," Clarke said that "we'll never know" if the 9/11 terrorist attacks were preventable.

 

But he said the Clinton administration's approach to a similar threat before the turn of the millennium -- in which top officials held daily interagency meetings and actively sought out information from within their agencies -- shows that a similar approach might have worked.

 

He said that people within the FBI knew that two of the 19 hijackers were in the country before September 11, but that information never made its way up the chain of command.

 

...NOTE THAT IT SAYS NOTHING ABOUT LAWS PREVENTING INFO SHARING.

 

 

http://www.crisispapers.org/topics/9-11.htm

"The U.S. government warned Saudi Arabia more than three years before the Sept. 11 attacks that Osama bin Laden might use civilian airplanes in terror attacks, according to a memo released Friday by the National Security Archive, NBC News reported. The June 1998 note says bin Laden 'might take the course of least resistance and turn to a civilian [aircraft] target'. The Sept. 11 Commission, a panel appointed by Congress in 2002 to investigate U.S. security, made no mention of the memo in any of its reports, Windrem said. It is unknown why the report did not address the warning." (12/13)

 

 

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/aug2005/atta-a10.shtml

 

US military intelligence identified four 9/11 hijackers in 2000

By Patrick Martin

10 August 2005

 

Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author

 

A top-secret military intelligence unit identified four of the 9/11 suicide hijackers as Al Qaeda operatives, including two of the pilots, more than a year before the September 11 terrorist attacks, a front-page report in the New York Times revealed Tuesday.

 

The article by reporter Douglas Jehl, cites Republican Congressman Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania and an unnamed former military intelligence officer as its sources.

 

Jehl’s report confirms what has been widely reported overseas but long covered up by the Bush administration and the American media: Mohammed Atta, believed to be the operational leader of the 9/11 attacks, was under US intelligence surveillance even before he came to the United States in 2000. How Atta was able to enter and re-enter the country on multiple occasions over the next year, enroll in flight school, and use credit cards and bank accounts in his real name, despite being a known Al Qaeda operative, has never been explained.

 

 

 

aww there's more but fuck it.

keep living the dream.

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Guest KING BLING
Originally posted by Stereotype V.001@Jan 8 2006, 05:19 PM

Its more than semantics or terminology. No need to worry about spell checking or terminology. You said they both started as democracies or republics. Hitler started as a Socialist government (communism). And the Roman empire was always a monarchy, not a democracy. That is a totalitarian government. They are night and day different from a democracy or a republic.

 

 

 

 

 

Actually you're incorrect on many points...

 

 

GERMANY

 

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/GERhitler.htm

 

Communism is not Socialism - they share a common motivation, but are not the same. But Hitler was not actually a Socialist, as with many parties throughout the world with Parlimentary governments, parties can be titles "Socialists" without having philisophical links to the Russian communist model ...

 

"The next few weeks saw open warfare on the streets between the Nazis and the Communists during which 86 people were killed."

 

 

Likewise Hitler was assigned through legal political mechanisms as Chancelour - this was in a DEMOCRATIC parliment setting called the Reichstag. He was crazy leading up to this but he was given his power, he did not take it by force...

 

"a group of prominent industrialists who feared such a revolution [The Nazis camapigning agaisnt the Communists] sent a petition to Paul von Hindenburg asking for Hitler to become Chancellor. Hindenberg reluctantly agreed to their request and at the age of forty-three, Hitler became the new Chancellor of Germany.

 

*****************************************************

 

ROME

 

Rome, for the majority of what its known for was in fact a primitive but very clearly functional democracy. This democracy lasted from (as listed below) 509 BC to about 44 BC when Caesers semi-dictatorship went into effect...

 

http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/rome/p/blromerepgovt.htm

 

From the Founding of Rome in 753 to 509 B.C. Rome was a monarchy, ruled by kings. In 509 B.C., the Romans expelled the Etruscan kings and established the Republic. Having witnessed the problems of monarchy on their own land, and aristocracy and democracy among the Greeks, they opted for a mixed form of government, with three branches:

 

CONSULS - Monarchical Branch of Roman Government:

SENATE - Aristocratic Branch of Roman Government

ASSEMBLY - Democratic Branch of Roman Government

 

 

 

...So no, its not semantics, you're <correction made> "point" is completely invalid.

 

Indeed both of these societies transitioned into dictatorships on a platform of freedom and democracy corrupted...

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Out of everything from all of those articles and excerpts you posted in bold, I did not see anything even remotely implying that 9-11 occured in no way because of domestic spying restrictions. Most of the articles actually help to prove my point.

 

Simply put, all of the hijackers had either full citizenship or visas. They lived in America, had steady jobs, college degrees, homes, girlfriends. They were all legally American citizens. If the FBI, able danger, or any intelligence agency had investigated further it would be DOMESTIC SPYING. Exactly what Bush is doing now. Domestic spying is spying on citizens. They were temporary or in some cases permanent citizens. Its not complicated. You constantly make comments like "someone is living in a movie, dream" ect but you seem to be the only one who keeps blocking out common sense in favor of living in a fantasy. And since we are posting links to support our points... http://http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004...ain622710.shtml

One example of the FBI's troubles was seen in the case of Sept. 11 hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, who were linked by the CIA to al Qaeda and were found to have entered the United States in summer 2001. FBI agents involved in the criminal probe couldn't track the men down because intelligence officials weren't allowed to share information on the case.

 

Among the ideas under consideration is a domestic intelligence agency modeled after Britain's MI5.

 

Democratic commissioner Timothy Roemer said FBI Director Robert Mueller's recent proposal to improve domestic surveillance by creating an intelligence service within the bureau is another option under review by the panel but might not be enough.

Domestic Surveillance.....saaaay, thats not anything like domestic spying, right? I mean, if the 9-11 panel recommended that it would lead one to believe that the lack of domestic spying in part caused 911...nah couldn't be.

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I think the problem is, is that the FBI was spending too much time tracking the mafia, pot growers, and doing background checks on anybody who applied for low level gov't jobs.

 

For example:

I was going to apply to do some humanitarian work for post-katrina stuff down in nola last week, but found out the FBI does 10 year background checks for all applicants and the e-mail said not to even bother applying if you have anything on your record. Well I'm a drunk and a graf writer. Of course I have a record. I'm also well educated and love my country. To me that seems bullshit. Yet they're (FBI/ NSA/CIA/DHS etc) complaining about not getting good people to work for gov't, but who wants to work for that and for $15 an hour? Fuck that...

 

 

Thats just an example how of their priorities are fucked up. I'm a white guy with an Irish name. Does that mean I'm gonna infiltrate NOLA for Saddam to fuck up their planning? lol

 

and yet they still can't catch the real terrorists. To me it seems the terrorism thing is more a ploy to consolidate gov't in the hands of the elite and their YES-men than really getting anybody to make America safer and freer...

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Guest imported_Tesseract
Originally posted by John Birch@Jan 9 2006, 08:43 PM

To me it seems the terrorism thing is more a ploy to consolidate gov't in the hands of the elite and their YES-men than really getting anybody to make America safer and freer...

 

word, you just noticed?!

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no...but something I saw on Jon Stewart last week reminded me..a guest he had wrote a book about how the iraq re-building effort was staffed by 24 and 25 year-old young republicans from conservative think tanks...who had no expereince in planning or infrastructure etc... and kept asking "are you iraqis free yet?'

 

 

well the people who are truly qulaified to do that work won't get those jobs because they are "too liberal" or ask the right questions... or don't kiss the right asses...so pathetic

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on the media thing above..

i think the whole press thing is pretty hard to definitively say it's

either detrimental or not detrimental to the white house.

the culture of american politics is and has been

scandalous for so long that people are just so used to, it's business

as usual. there are alot of things that don't get reported that should,

or they are severely under-reported, but if they were sprawled across

the ny times, would anything really change?

politicians know full well that they can manage scandal with an

apathetic population that's come to expect scandals.

add a bunch of fear into the mix and you get the impressive scandal

sheet of this administration.

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Guest KING BLING

The botttom line is there is no legit reason for Bush to go around existing mechanisms to complete the ends he is persuing. FISA even allows government agents to perfrom surveillance and then go to the court and have it cleared...

 

 

Simply put, justifying Bushes action is justifying rogue and unprecedented behavior...

 

http://www.eff.org/Censorship/Terrorism_mi...s/fisa_faq.html

 

 

How does FISA fit with regulation of electronic surveillance?

Given the "tendency of those who execute the criminal laws . . . to obtain conviction by means of unlawful seizures," the Supreme Court has viewed commumications interception as an especially grave intrusion on rights of privacy and speech. Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41, 50 (1967) (quotation and citation omitted). "By its very nature eavesdropping involves an intrusion on privacy that is broad in scope," and its "indiscriminate use . . . in law enforcement raises grave constitutional questions." Id. at 56 (quotation and citation omitted). "Few threats to liberty exist which are greater than those posed by the use of eavesdropping devices." Id. at 63.

 

Thus, the Court outlined seven constitutional requirements: (1) a showing of probable cause that a particular offense has been or is about to be committed; (2) the applicant must describe with particularity the conversations to be intercepted; (3) the surveillance must be for a specific, limited period of time in order to minimize the invasion of privacy (the N.Y. law authorized two months of surveillance at a time); (4) there must be continuing probable cause showings for the surveillance to continue beyond the original termination date; (5) the surveillance must end once the conversation sought is seized; (6) notice must be given unless there is an adequate showing of exigency; and (7) a return on the warrant is required so that the court may oversee and limit the use of the intercepted conversations.

 

Indeed, the Court said that if "neither a warrant nor a statute authorizing eavesdropping can be drawn so as to meet the Fourth Amendment's requirements . . . then the Ôfruits' of eavesdropping devices are barred under the Amendment." Id., at 63.

 

Where intelligence operations are concerned, however, the bounds of the Fourth Amendment are less clear than they are for ordinary criminal investigations. FISA creates a special court and legal regime for counterintelligence surveillance orders.

 

Executive Order 12,333 (1981) provides the general framework for U.S. intelligence activities, and it also addresses electronic surveillance. "[A]gencies are not authorized to use such techniques as electronic surveillance, unconsented physical searches, mail surveillance, physical surveillance, or monitoring devices unless they are in accordance with procedures established by the head of the agency concerned and approved by the Attorney General." EO 12,333, para. 2.4. Dep't. of Defense (DOD) Directive 5240.1-R implements FISA and EO 12,333 within DOD. These authorities govern the collection of intelligence by the U.S. government against United States persons, whether they are located within the United States or outside the United States.

 

FISA does not regulate the use of electronic surveillance outside of the United States. For instance, electronic surveillance of electronic communications like e-mail is only governed by §1801(f)(4) if the surveillance device is installed "in the United States." When e-mail sent by a U.S. person to a foreign person is intercepted outside the United States, that interception does not meet this definition.

 

Is there really a secret FISA court?

Yes. FISA established a special court, composed of seven federal district court judges appointed by the Chief Justice for staggered terms and are from different circuits. See 50 U.S.C.A. § 1803. Individual judges of the FISC review the Attorney General's applications for authorization of electronic surveillance aimed at obtaining foreign intelligence information. The proceedings are nonadversarial and are based solely on the DOJ's presentations through its Office of Intelligence Policy and Review.

 

The records and files of the cases are sealed and may not be revealed even to persons whose prosecutions are based on evidence obtained under FISA warrants, except to a limited degree set by district judges' rulings on motions to suppress. 50 U.S.C. §1803©. There is no provision for the return of each executed warrant to the FISC, much less with an inventory of items taken, nor for certification that the surveillance was conducted according to the warrant and its "minimization" requirements.

 

The FISC meets two days monthly, and two of the judges are routinely available in the Washington, D.C. area on other days. Statement of Mary C. Lawton, Counsel for Intelligence Policy, Before the House Subcommittee on Courts, Civil Liberties, and the Administration of Justice, June 8, 1983, at 8.

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Originally posted by Stereotype V.001@Jan 9 2006, 07:29 PM

Out of everything from all of those articles and excerpts you posted in bold, I did not see anything even remotely implying that 9-11 occured in no way because of domestic spying restrictions. Most of the articles actually help to prove my point.

 

 

If we were tracking Zacharious Moussaui years before 911 and we knew he was linked to al-queda...I'm sure once he entered and re-entered the country (EVEN IF HE WAS HERE LEGALLY) a court would have granted a warrant to keep him under surviellance. I think it was still legal even way back in 2001 to spy on americans IF they recieved a warrant. And I'm sure they could have gotten a warrant issued to watch an al-queda operative. So, your wrong. The CIA could have been watching the terrorist cells legally...and even if they were watching illegaly, I assure you someone, anyone, could have bent the rules and swept it under the rug just to keep an eye on al-queda(sp?).

 

But, no, of course your attitude seems to be it's not Bush, or our gov'ts fault. It's the goddamn liberals fault 911 happened. Use some common sense.

 

EDIT:

after reading my post I'll take back my statement that you're wrong...you are most likely wrong. ha. But seriously...though.

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Originally posted by John Birch@Jan 9 2006, 09:43 PM

For example:

I was going to apply to do some humanitarian work for post-katrina stuff down in nola last week, but found out the FBI does 10 year background checks for all applicants and the e-mail said not to even bother applying if you have anything on your record. Well I'm a drunk and a graf writer. Of course I have a record. I'm also well educated and love my country. To me that seems bullshit. Yet they're (FBI/ NSA/CIA/DHS etc) complaining about not getting good people to work for gov't, but who wants to work for that and for $15 an hour? Fuck that...

 

 

fyi

 

i was in NOLA doing volunteer work for three weeks

i'm fairly certain that if you went there, you would be able to find a job helping to rebuild without much effort. there's been a huge influx of illegals, some of them doing subcontracting work for govt agencies.

 

if you decide to do it, be careful to make sure you will be getting paid though, i did hear of some construction workers (they were illegals) not getting paid.

 

if you are really interested, just don't go through the govt

i was offered positions during my tenure as a volunteer, and met literally hundreds of people.

the red cross took me, and my record.

 

 

 

stereotype

 

if you do not accept anti-terrorism EXPERT richard clarke's own statements that 9/11 was fully preventable, then i guess you really are living a dream. FOUR presidents in a row picked this guy to head up antiterrorism

but what does he know? he's probably some liberal.

it's like i said in my above post, there is more evidence, but if your position is simply "anything you say bolsters my point" then why the fuck even take part in a discussion?

you already have your mind made up.

 

my mind has changed, and learned, since 9/11 occured. i'm not so blindly attached to political views that i would continue to cling to them, no matter how high the evidence stacks against me.

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Hobo knife- It has been established that several intelligence agencies were on to some of these guys, but you can't run and get a court order because of something as minor dang ole towel head left the country a few times. The fact that no one was willing to break the law is what this thread is about and the point I am attempting to make, domestic spying laws that inhibit our country's abilities to protect us.

 

symbols - I didn't say "your position is simply "anything you say bolsters my point" then why the fuck even take part in a discussion?". I said most of those articles you posted help prove my point. 911 WAS preventable. Thats the whole point. I agree with EXPERT Clarke, you only selected one small excerpt of his to prove your point. And its pathetic you have to try and discredit me with this type of post "but what does he know? he's probably some liberal." When have I said someone is wrong simply because of a political affiliation? Your argument must be losing steam if your already on the personal attack stage. BTW, is your mind not set on this issue? Are you saying its possible I'm right, or is the "your mind is already made up, dont take part of the conversation" rule only applicable to me?

 

"my mind has changed, and learned, since 9/11 occured. i'm not so blindly attached to political views that i would continue to cling to them, no matter how high the evidence stacks against me."

 

You sure? Because you seem to be "clinging" to your stance on domestic spying, when it is blatantly obvious that spying on the 9-11 hijackers would be the same illegal action you are decrying, since they were citizens. But you have managed to side step directly talking about that so far. It doesn't make spying on quakers and that sort of thing right, but pretending it couldn't have been used to prevent 9-11 makes me wonder how blindly attached to political views you really are.

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Originally posted by Stereotype V.001@Jan 10 2006, 06:38 PM

Hobo knife- It has been established that several intelligence agencies were on to some of these guys, but you can't run and get a court order because of something as minor dang ole towel head left the country a few times. The fact that no one was willing to break the law is what this thread is about and the point I am attempting to make, domestic spying laws that inhibit our country's abilities to protect us.

 

 

You're simplifying what I said to support your argument. We're not talking about just any "dang ole towel head" (although that is a very clever slur)....we're talking about someone who was suspected of having direct ties to al-queda...and was being watched years before 911 even happened. So this guy was in new york city(which alqueda had attacked once already) he was leaving the country and returning frequently, and you're saying that a judge wouldn't have issued a warrant to keep an eye on an al-queda foot soldier?

 

I'm not really that opposed to what Bush has actualy done here...It doesn't surprise me that they want to monitor int'l calls, especially calls to middle eastern countries. It's the principle though, that they are breaking the law behind our back, and tightening the noose around the public's privacy. If you're so opposed to big gov't you should be concerned that they granting themselves the power to monitor your every move. And it's all being done in the name of patriotism. You want to be protected by the gov't? Then tell them to stop conquering other countries and creating massive amounts of future terrorists in the process. Or maybe you want more war and violence because you get off on it...lets go kill some towel heads. yeah.

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Originally posted by Stereotype V.001@Jan 10 2006, 07:38 PM

symbols - I didn't say "your position is simply "anything you say bolsters my point" then why the fuck even take part in a discussion?". I said most of those articles you posted help prove my point. 911 WAS preventable. Thats the whole point. I agree with EXPERT Clarke, you only selected one small excerpt of his to prove your point. And its pathetic you have to try and discredit me with this type of post "but what does he know? he's probably some liberal." When have I said someone is wrong simply because of a political affiliation? Your argument must be losing steam if your already on the personal attack stage. BTW, is your mind not set on this issue? Are you saying its possible I'm right, or is the "your mind is already made up, dont take part of the conversation" rule only applicable to me?

 

"my mind has changed, and learned, since 9/11 occured. i'm not so blindly attached to political views that i would continue to cling to them, no matter how high the evidence stacks against me."

 

You sure? Because you seem to be "clinging" to your stance on domestic spying, when it is blatantly obvious that spying on the 9-11 hijackers would be the same illegal action you are decrying, since they were citizens. But you have managed to side step directly talking about that so far. It doesn't make spying on quakers and that sort of thing right, but pretending it couldn't have been used to prevent 9-11 makes me wonder how blindly attached to political views you really are.

 

the 9/11 hijackers were not citizens of the united states.

"....came from Saudi Arabia. The remaining four came from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon."

are you that uninformed?!

 

how am i engaging in personal attacks?

these are some of the attitudes you are conveying.

is it hard for you to believe?

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