Al Queda and Al Queda associates SHOULD be wiretapped. Period.

You're just saying that to throw off suspicions about your own Al Qaeda activities. I'm on to your game.

Greg -
But should YOU be wiretapped, indefinitely, until it can be absolutely proven that you are NOT al Queda?

Gregory - Thats precisely why the FISA court exists, and it overwhelmingly approves government requests for wiretaps. Bush is breaking the law by not seeking FISA approval for the wiretaps. Simple, clear-cut violation of the 1978 law, period.

Why do judges hate America?

Al Queda and Al Queda associates SHOULD be wiretapped. Period.

If we have to give up everything that the Constitution stands for to accomplish that, the terrorists have not only won, they are in the White House.

give me wiretaps or give me death

The virus of the irrational Bush hatred has spread to the judiciary.

The Presiding Judge is the Microsoft judge.

I regret that I have but one wire to offer for tapping, for my country.

tbrosz:
The virus of the irrational Bush hatred has spread to the judiciary.
--

Of course, the fact the Bushies routinely lie and break every and all known laws(Geneva Convention, detainees, torture, etc...) wouldn't have "anything" to do with this?

Bush = Fascism.

If ye love terrorists better than warrantless wiretapping, the tranquility of Islamofascism better than the animating contest of unfettered surveillance, go home from us in peace. We ask not your IP Address or your firewall config file. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your cell phone set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were on our buddy-list.

The responsibility for deciding which laws the executive should break in times of war rests solely with the president.

This story is Exhibit A for all the wankers in all the other threads on the NSA issue and wartime powers of the chief executive that the Bush administration is neither serious about combatting terror nor competent at it.

They are just making shit up as they go along to abrogate power unto themselves.

"It's a proposition I'd like to see Bush try to defend publicly."
Don't be a fool, Kevin. All Bush has to say is "What can I do? The court quits while I'm trying to defend America. I'll have to keep doing what I need to do to protect Americans." Case closed. The conseratives yell Ditto and we Americans continue to be screwed.

Are we trying to sell the idea now that the FISA judges knew nothing about this?

From the first NYT story:

According to those officials and others, reservations about aspects of the program have also been expressed by Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, the West Virginia Democrat who is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and a judge presiding over a secret court that oversees intelligence matters.

The Washington Post story also used the phrase "...most of them [the judges] learned about when it was disclosed last week by the New York Times."

So how does that work? Some FISA judges are cleared more highly than others? Seems odd that any FISA judges would not have the highest security clearances. So some learned about the NSA program only in the newspaper? What kept those judges "in the know" from sharing the information? And how were those judges originally selected to be briefed when the others weren't?

Sorry, but the "we know nothing" bit isn't going to sell any better than when Democrats on the intelligence committees were trying the same gambit.

It will be interesting to see how they respond to the briefing.

Real question: Do the presiding judges have a different clearance from the others? I know that ranking members of the Intelligence Committees seem to have more access than other members.

"Why do we even exist if the Bush administration claims absolute wartime power to do anything it wants without our approval?"

Because, silly FISA judges, by granting him your rubberstamp warrants you give credibility to his actions and this has a positive and measurable PR benefit. Without a FISA warrant, if he wants to justify a search he has to get into this embarrassing discussion of the extent of presidential powers. It makes people think 1984, Big Brother, Orwell and puts him in a politically vulnerable position with grave PR consequences.

Silly FISA judges are also useful when he acquires evidence on American citizens via illegal wiretap. He obviously can't charge the American citizens using that tainted evidence, but the FISA court can give him a clean warrant so he can find it for the first time a second time.

Sorry, but the "we know nothing" bit isn't going to sell any better than when Democrats on the intelligence committees were trying the same gambit.

OMG, this is exactly the fake tbrosz tack I was about to take on another thread.

Spooky.

Yes, whenever someone disagrees with the Bush administration they are by definition the enemy, and their devious plans will never come to fruition. That is tbrosz corollary alpha.

Anonymous:

Seriously, what's the deal with all the judges except one or two supposedly not being told about this? Either the FISA courts are capable of handling secure information or they aren't. Or are there special cases that only the presiding judge gets to see?

Would the judges who knew have gotten in trouble for discussing the NSA program with other FISA judges? Why?

The virus of the irrational Bush hatred has spread to the judiciary.

Posted by: tbrosz on December 22, 2005 at 1:31 AM

Tell me - why shouldn't Free Men hate a would-be tyrant?

Georgge W. Bush has admitted that he is a tyrant. Why do you love tyranny, Throz?

I guess I'll have to wait until morning when the people with brains show up.

I guess I'll have to wait until morning when the people with brains show up.

Good one tbrosz.

Throze, re: msge at 1:59 AM

Only the presiding Judge of the FISA Court was briefed on the alternate procedure that Bush was using, and was not permitted to discuss it with anyone else. Same deal as the ranking members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees.

[Sorry - can't find the reference. But one news report says this is what the woman who is chief judge of the FISA court stated. She was the only one briefed under seal of total silence as was Rockerfeller.]

It really doesn't matter to the legal proceedings of the FISA court, since in American Law no judge can rule on cases not presented to them, and the extra-legal cases by definition were not presented to any court. Unless there is reason to beleive that the evidence presented to the FISA court itself was obtained illegally.

The problem appears to be that if the DoJ took cases to the FISA court that were initiated by illegal wiretaps, the evidence used in the FISA court may have been "Fruit of the Poisonous tree", that is, not evidence a court can legally accept and act on. As long as the FISA judges didn't know that was possible, they didn't look for it. Now they are questioning if they have been handed rotten cases to act on.

You people must have some kind of death-wish! Seriously. You keep talking about this stuff, and sooner or later, the terrorists will catch on, and BAM, our multi-billion dollar whiz-bang technology is no good, cause they're using drums to communicate now like they did in Somalia. From there, it's just a short trip until they're coming over here, cutting off heads, putting women into burhqas, and making us all stick our asses up in the air 5 times a day. So just shut up!

Did you catch that last sentence? "Why do we even exist if the Bush administration claims absolute wartime power to do anything it wants without our approval?"

Good question. It's a proposition I'd like to see Bush try to defend publicly.

—Kevin Drum 1:13 AM Permalink | TrackBack (0) | Comments (5)

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=58400

THE PRESIDENT: I said we use the FISA courts to monitor calls. It's a very important tool, and we do use it. I just want to make sure we've got all tools at our disposal. This is an enemy which is quick and it's lethal. And sometimes we have to move very, very quickly. But if there is a need, based upon evidence, we will take that evidence to a court, in order to be able to monitor calls within the United States.

Q Thank you, Mr. President. Getting back to the domestic spying issue for a moment. According to FISA's own records, it's received nearly 19,000 requests for wiretaps or search warrants since 1979, rejected just five of them. It also operates in secret, so security shouldn't be a concern, and it can be applied retroactively. Given such a powerful tool of law enforcement is at your disposal, sir, why did you see fit to sidetrack that process?

THE PRESIDENT: We used the process to monitor. But also, this is a different -- a different era, a different war, Stretch. So what we're -- people are changing phone numbers and phone calls, and they're moving quick. And we've got to be able to detect and prevent. I keep saying that, but this is a -- it requires quick action.

And without revealing the operating details of our program, I just want to assure the American people that, one, I've got the authority to do this; two, it is a necessary part of my job to protect you; and, three, we're guarding your civil liberties. And we're guarding the civil liberties by monitoring the program on a regular basis, by having the folks at NSA, the legal team, as well as the inspector general, monitor the program, and we're briefing Congress. This is a part of our effort to protect the American people. The American people expect us to protect them and protect their civil liberties. I'm going to do that. That's my job, and I'm going to continue doing my job.

Q Thank you, Mr. President. I wonder if you can tell us today, sir, what, if any, limits you believe there are or should be on the powers of a President during a war, at wartime? And if the global war on terror is going to last for decades, as has been forecast, does that mean that we're going to see, therefore, a more or less permanent expansion of the unchecked power of the executive in American society?

THE PRESIDENT: First of all, I disagree with your assertion of "unchecked power."

Q Well --

THE PRESIDENT: Hold on a second, please. There is the check of people being sworn to uphold the law, for starters. There is oversight. We're talking to Congress all the time, and on this program, to suggest there's unchecked power is not listening to what I'm telling you. I'm telling you, we have briefed the United States Congress on this program a dozen times. This is an awesome responsibility to make decisions on behalf of the American people, and I understand that, Peter. And we'll continue to work with the Congress, as well as people within our own administration, to constantly monitor programs such as the one I described to you, to make sure that we're protecting the civil liberties of the United States. To say "unchecked power" basically is ascribing some kind of dictatorial position to the President, which I strongly reject.

Q What limits do you --

THE PRESIDENT: I just described limits on this particular program, Peter. And that's what's important for the American people to understand. I am doing what you expect me to do, and at the same time, safeguarding the civil liberties of the country.

What's scariest about it all is the in-your -face quality of the Bush response to it. He's saying, yes I broke the law, what are you going to do about it? Will they do that next with Rove and the Plame scandal? Admit Rove exposed her and then lied about it but so what, what are you going to do about it? I guess you could call it the fuck-you defense. Hell, it might work. Then what? The bastards are calling the congress and the press and the courts bluff. If they don't take him down now it's game over.

Typical authoritarian tactic to kill debate and dissent;

It's a secret. Don't discuss this with anybody. We'll take your silence as tacit agreement. And if you disagree, we'll just tell everyone you agreed, and if you tell anyone, well, let's just say that Scooter Libby isn't the best example of what happens to people who leak classified information. Think Paul Wellstone.

no one in the press so far has mentioned a simple point. Bush's imperial aspirations may actually hurt the very cause he claims he was championing. As is the case with overeager cops performing an illegal search, the bypassed FISA warrants may result in dismissed terrorism cases. It may not matter to this bunch, since they would not want to prosecute anyway, preferring instead to either keep the perps indefinitely or rendition them out somewhere where torture is acceptable practice. Under this administration, no one will ever be legally prosecuted for terrorism, only for vague "aiding" terrorists. In their alleged eagerness to combat evil of terrorism, these idiots really ARE bringing down the 1984 curtain on all of us. There is only one way to solve this problem--try them all on treason, find them guilty and make them face the firing squad. No reason to actually shoot them--just the mere sight of them soiling themselves would be sufficient. Except Rove and Cheney--two shots to the back of the head each. Or do it the Boer War style--tie them down in a chair and keep shooting until they shut up. If they love capital punishment so much, why not give it to them? They EARNED it!

The crisis deepens as the Constitution is trampled on. Perhaps the FISA court should ask the Congress specifically if they have authority or the President has authority? Everyone in the Judiciary...and presumeably most people in the Congress...have been working under the assumption that the President abides by the law, right? Or is that a fiction that the Great Leaders men have helped to hide from the people for so long that there is nothing left to defend when it comes to "a scrap of paper".

My understanding of the Framers' intent was for the Congress to be the most powerful branch in the government. Afterall, it is Congress that is tasked with the creation of laws, not the President. If anyone thinks that we are now Corporation America instead of Democratic Republic America, let them come forth now to defend their ideal, rather than slither around behind a wall of hypocrisy.

Yes, I feel that many of those who talk so much about the rights of the Presidency do so much want a king to hand them favors, to give them titles, to ensure their lasting hegemony, that we now face a turning point similar to that of our Civil War. It is treason to seek to subvert the Constitution...and there are citizens that have made oaths to defend this fragile "scrap of paper" against enemies both foreign "and domestic". May they stand firm in their resolution against the Great Leader's usurpation of power.

I hear that many fear another impeachment process. I fear the lack of one. For, if the Congress does not assert its rights under the Constitution to make the laws, and the Judiciary does not assert its rights to adjudicate fairly and with due diligence those same laws and to rightly decide Constitutionality based on the merits of cases, not on the whims of a President greedy for power, then we only have left, legally, that process which the Framers saw fit to give us and which has served us well in the case of Citizen Nixon and may still serve us well in the case of ____ Bush.

THE PRESIDENT: Hold on a second, please.

Well, sir, if you say please. . .

There is the check of people being sworn to uphold the law, for starters.

Well, that's reassuring.

Because I thought Scooter Libby was sworn to uphold the law. And Safavian. And Cunningham. And DeLay. And Frist. And Poindexter.

I'm afraid that doesn't quite cut it, because, you see, I don't trust you, because you tend to lie, and twist, and parse, and misrepresent, and dissemble, and obfuscate, a whole fucking lot, mister President. And when you can get away with it, you usually just say "none of your business, executive privilege, nyah nyah.

So, forgive me for saying so, mister President, but "sworn to uphold the law" though it may be sufficient for most Americans, with you in particular, that's just not good enough. Sir.

There is oversight.

Please be more specific. Because, as I made my point earlier, we don't fucking trust you. Perhaps if you made an effort to come clean once in a while, things would be different. Eh?

We're talking to Congress all the time,

If you're talking about the briefings which are referred to in Sen. Rockefeller's letter, then I'm afraid, once again, that doesn't cut it, and this becomes a perfect example of what we're talking about when we accuse you of not being 100% honest and forthcoming.

and on this program, to suggest there's unchecked power is not listening to what I'm telling you. I'm telling you, we have briefed the United States Congress on this program a dozen times. This is an awesome responsibility to make decisions on behalf of the American people, and I understand that, Peter.

No, mister President, I don't think you do. If you did, you'd understand how concerned Americans are, and you'd understand that, deservedly so or not, the fact of the matter is, you're a major lightning rod for criticism from the Liberal side of the political spectrum, and that means, if you want to builld consensus, you're going to have to take that responsibility seriously and work harder to be a little less "my way or the highway" - I mean, if you're really the best political candidate that the right has to offer up for holding the office of president, you sure seem to lack the verbal skills necessary for even the most basic facets of leadership. I don't know if this is intentional or not - but it's a really serious fucking problem, and it's causing grave harm to the unity and stability of this nation.

And we'll continue to work with the Congress, as well as people within our own administration, to constantly monitor programs such as the one I described to you, to make sure that we're protecting the civil liberties of the United States.

You need to be a little more specific than that. Our civil liberties are very important to Americans sir. We learned from a very young age that our heroes, the Founding Fathers used to say things like "don't trade Liberty for Security" and "Give me Liberty or give me Death." So, as dim witted as you certainly appear to be, you should be able to understand why this is a very grave matter, and your brush-off simply does not cut it.

To say "unchecked power" basically is ascribing some kind of dictatorial position to the President, which I strongly reject.

one would hope so, mister President. Unfortunately, you're on record, on several occasions as having opinions which contradict that. Not to mention the fact that your appointees to the DOJ have written memos to the effect that you indeed, do have dicatatorial powers, which, of course, is not only hogwash, but technically treasonous.

Please mister president. You, or your spokesman, or maybe an NSA representative - SOMEBODY, for God's sake, come clean.

One judge, speaking on the condition of anonymity, also said members could suggest disbanding the court in light of the president's suggestion that he has the power to bypass the court.

Anonymity again? That will never work.

But I look forward to the Congressional hearings. We'll get to learn which, if any, congressfolk are willing to vote to stop the practice. It's an election year, and they will soon enough find out where they stand with the voters. Should be an exciting debate. Perhaps all of the Democrats who protected us against the Schiavo-inspired Republican power grab will act as effectively in this case as they did in that case.

Did the administration claim "absolute" power?

Well I repeat: it's exciting. I expect that all the Democrats who think that the US is losing in Iraq are probably outraged.

I expect that all the Democrats who think that the US is losing in Iraq are probably outraged.
Posted by: papageno on December 22, 2005 at 3:10 AM | PERMALINK

I don't know if the US is losing in Iraq.

But I *do* know that Iran is winning, given the election results so far.

Repeating myself:

What gets people confused about this is the use of the word, "wiretap," which implies listening to a specific conversation or conversations by specifiuc persons.

What is really happening is that the NSA (without warrant, of course) is listening to many, many communications by non specific people, just anybody, using computers. Call that "Stage 1" wiretapping. The computers are listening for specific words, voices, whatever. When they get a hit, then they zero in and "wiretap" (in the more conventional sense) that specific person. Call that "Stage 2" wiretapping. Then human listeners are involved.

A lot of people, especially the right wing, don't feel particularly concerned about the Stage 1, "mass" wiretapping using computers. Why? Because there's no particular target? Because the listener is non-human, so what's the big deal?

I believe (and you should believe) that the mass wiretap is just as egregious as conventional wiretapping, and actually mnuch worse, because it is truly a Bib Brother scenario.

But even putting that aside, what happens if there is a hit and a particular person or persons become targeted? Well that is where it becomes problematic. To get a warrant you have to show probable cause. The evidence of probable cause happens to be the "hit" - which you had gotten without a warrant in the first place (and likewise without probable cause).

The judges on FISA are smart enough to see the problem, and they had even warned Bush not to try to use these "hits" in any warrant requests.

This wasn't an issue for 20 years, because all the mass wiretapping was going on outside our borders, where the Constitution doesn't apply.

The wingnuts focus on the Stage 2, more conventional wiretaps, and gloss over the issue of how it came to be that these people were wiretapped. They would like you to treat the Stage 1 taps as a mere question of technological advancement - not as a fourth amendment problem. We are supposed to say "Gee Whiz, isn't it great that our government has such technology at its disposal," as if we were watching an episode of CSI. That leads rather easily to the conclusion that "the technology has advanced so far that to take best advantage of it, we don't have time or resources to bother with the Stage 2 warrant; therefore FISA must be outdated."

That argument is easily bought into by your average frightened-to-death citizen who watches CSI.

We have to attack (rightfully) the Stage 1, "mass" wiretap, for exactly what it is: Completely and blatantly unconstitutional. We have to avoid the "Gee-Whiz technology" discussion because that is a loser: It says that any technology we have we ought to be able to use in the GWOT; it neatly sidesteps the constitutional question.

Bottom line: Our message is this: Forget the technolgy mumbo-jumbo, folks. What they are in fact doing is monitoring everybody's phone calls 24/7. It's Big Brother, Baby.

Don't get your hopes up. Kotelly is already in Bush and Bill Gate's payroll.

The virus of the irrational Bush hatred has spread to the judiciary.

You need a Libertarian intervention, tbrosz. You need to turn off the computer, kill a hobo, and curl up with a copy of The Fountainhead. Blind loyalty just looks silly on you.

Thirty years after Nixon-era working class rage against bureaucracies was channeled into "Dirty Harry", which first created the paradoxical synthesis of "law-and-order" advocates who despised the law and enjoyed watching police cars get destroyed, we have elected Dirty Harry as President.

"Al Queda and Al Queda associates SHOULD be wiretapped. Period."

Yes, because how else are we going to keep up with all these groups with similar and yet strangely unfamilar names. And to think that I once ate at Al's Quesadilla Hut. Period.

FISA exists as the tipping point for the overall bifurcation that is about to occur in mainstream circles about giving Bush and his maladministration the benefit of the doubt, resulting in an unexpected phase transition of a political system that has been steadily pushed away from equilibrium by the right wing corporate political and media propaganda machine, but against their wishes will actually tip back into a new equilibrium in direct opposition to their intended goals, and all because in the end they were predictably atomized by their own greed and unhealthy pursuit of their own self-interest above any other value, ended up in the most spectacular supernova of corruption and clusterfuck in the modern world, and not one of these judges on FISA, or Jack Abramoff, ever realized their crucial and pivotal roles.

You people must have some kind of death-wish! Seriously. You keep talking about this stuff, and sooner or later, the terrorists will catch on, and BAM, our multi-billion dollar whiz-bang technology is no good, cause they're using drums to communicate now like they did in Somalia. From there, it's just a short trip until they're coming over here, cutting off heads, putting women into burhqas, and making us all stick our asses up in the air 5 times a day. So just shut up!

You god-dammned yellow fear-mongering chicken-shit bastard! We can defeat these men, we will defeat these men. We will fight them with patience, cunning, and determination. And we'll do it without throwing over everything America stands for. They can hurt us, but they can't destroy us. Not unless we change who we are because we're so afraid of getting hurt.

The Republicans love to paint themselves as the party of faith. Looks like their faith doesn't really carry any weight in the real world, does it? The only thing to fear is fear itself.

God Bless America.

And, if you quote the above, if you're similarly insane, please substitute "ending" for "ended".

"The virus of the irrational Bush hatred has spread to the judiciary."

Just remove "irrational" from that sentence, tbrosz, and you've got yourself an honest statement.

papageno - Could you please not spank when you are cutting and pasting the talking points into liberal blogs. I know you are excited but it makes my job more difficult. It distracts me from monitoring the traitorous liberals that post here. By restraining yourself you are aiding the war on Islamofacism and vegans.
ps- nice dress - Are you trying for the Barbara Bush look with those pearls?

What's scariest about it all is the in-your -face quality of the Bush response to it. He's saying, yes I broke the law, what are you going to do about it?

Well, no, that's not what he (Bush) is saying. What he is saying is that his powers as commander-in-chief allow him to direct security agencies to monitor these electronic communications without getting a warrant because we are at war and that such action is not a violation of the law (again, because we are at war).

And, by the way, what ARE you going to do about it?

We will fight them with patience, cunning, and determination. And we'll do it without throwing over everything America stands for.

Oh, please, as if accessing electronic communications in pristine privacy in a time of war belongs in the same sentence as "everything America stands for." As long as you're free to post inane anti-Bush agitpop on blogs like this, we're far far far away from straying from the true values that make up "everything America stands for."

Alright ... this is marginally OT (and already posted on the Revolt of the Professionals thread), but it's late nite (early morning), nobody's posting, and I think this is a pretty fine rebuttal.

It's also the central issue in this whole ball o' whacks: Just how important *is* fighting Islamist terrorism, anyway? Here's my .02:

Steve White:

> Islamist terrorism is one of the larger threats to
> the U.S. It easily has the ability to kill thousands
> of Americans as they've already demonstrated, and they
> don't need especially high-tech weaponry to do so.

After 9/11, the CW was how diabolically ingenious the attack was.
It really wasn't at all; all it took (aside from raw fanaticism) was
a bunch of fake visas and driver's licenses, a modicum of a command
of English, a few vanity commercial jet flying lessons and the
unimaginable brutality to cut up flight attendants with box cutters.

It blindsided us. Arguably Bush was asleep at the switch; I'm not
going to go into all the second-guessing about the August PDB, the
screaming FBI agent, etc.; doubtless you've heard that all before.

What did we do afterwards? Well, airline security drastically
changed. Are our ports secured? Our borders? Not at all.

These are the mundane things we could be doing,
and which we are not, to avoid another attack.

> Should they gain access to WMD (you scoff, but it's
> something to consider), they will kill many more Americans.

I'm not exactly scoffing. It's something to consider, but also
to evaluate in practical terms. Once again, no jihadist I've ever
heard of has mounted an attack with UCW, let alone WMD. Are there
ex-Soviet agents out there willing to sell some leftover goodies
to the highest bidder? Probably. Might North Korea do the same?
Possibly. Do we need to surveill these foreign agents? Absolutely.

But do we let the fear of this keep us awake at night? No. Not
if we're psychologically healthy people and live by our freedom.

And do we need to give the president unlimited powers to address this
threat as he sees fit with no independent oversight? Absolutely not.

> There have been a couple of abortion providers
> murdered (and their killer is in jug).

Don't forget the 250 people blown up in the Murrah Building.

> The Latin Americans may end up making faces at us.

And we might wind up someday going to war over Venezuelan oil.

> Islamofascism (because that's what it is) and
> Islamist terror has the potential to be much
> greater, and that's what we have to react to.

Islamofascism is a term that doesn't parse. The authoritarianism
of conservative Islam is only in the most superficial way equatable
to the authoritarianism of fascism. When Saddam set up a fascist
state, his model was Stalin, his ideology Nasserite pah-Arabism.
He stayed away from Islam because Islam is accountable to a higher
authority. Iranian theocracy has no irredentist ambitions, nor
does Saudi theocracy. The caliphate ideology is a deviant modern
phenomenon; no Islamic country endorsed it since the ouster of
the Taliban. Since this ideology condones the killing of so-
called apostate Muslims, it is considered a grave threat in the
most conservative Muslim regimes. Take Saudi Arabia seriously
when it says that it fears al Qaeda every bit as much as we do.

As for Islamic terrorism, I have yet to see an argument
that persuades me we should treat it any differently
than any other murderous international criminal cult.

> But Osama proved he could hurt us. And he hates
> us. So the threat equation doesn't equal zero
> anymore, at least until al-Qaeda is wiped out.

Well, a lot of threats to America don't equal zero. Do we speak of
wiping out street gangs? Do we even consider it possible anymore
to win the war on drugs? Yet we consider it possible to "wipe out"
al Qaeda. This doesn't parse; despite the most sophisticated military
and surveillance in the world, we simply cannot kill every Islamist
fanatic who has burned with the lust to kill Americans. What exactly
is "membership" in al Qaeda? Do they take a blood oath? Is there an
initiation ceremony? Or does it only entail reading jihadi websites
and becoming divinely inspired? In truth, we honestly don't know.

> Likewise Saddam clearly had intent to get away with
> whatever he could, and the capability part was an open
> question (we now see it was close to zero, but we didn't
> see that in 2002, or in 1998). The threat was non-zero.

I saw it clearly in the fall of '02 and all I had to go by was what
I read in the MSM and on the NYT Iraq forum -- which was full of
raging paranoia in the wake of 9/11. I read the Judith Miller
stories and just shook my head; I *knew* they were bullshit from
the way she handled her sources. I would have voted against the IWR
and I don't know a soul in my social circle who'd have done otherwise.

> Now quibble as you like, assign whatever values you
> want to a given situation, the basic assessment still holds.
> The question is, how much of a threat do you tolerate?

That is precisely the question.

> During the Cold War, we tolerated a threat that was
> substantially greater than zero, because the consequences
> of trying to fix it (we thought, until Reagan came along)

You mean until Gorbachev came along.

> was even greater. Today, we tolerate a non-zero
> threat from China because the consequences of
> trying to fix that directly could be catastrophic.

And we similarly tolerated an at least rhetorical threat
from Saddam because *he* knew that the consequences of
confronting us would be -- as they were -- catastrophic.

> Islamist terrorism is a non-zero threat. The
> threat could be quite large if we allow them to
> have a base of operations (like Afghanistan was),

I certainly never opposed the ouster of one of the most backward,
dysfunctional regimes extant. If they trained the Saudi 9/11
soldiers there, then take out the training camps -- end of story.

What we should have done is poured all of our resources into
making *that* country the model democracy in the region.

Now with Iraq as well, we've bitten off more than we can chew.

> if we allow them to link up to terror-supporting
> states like Iran, Syria or (until recently) Iraq,

There's regional resistance to Israel, and then there's international
jihadist terrorism. The right-wing punditsphere likes to conflate
them, but they aren't the same thing. Hezbollah is Shi'ite, but it
threatens only Israel. No Shi'ite is a member of al Qaeda, because
that Salafist ideology is strictly Sunni and is much more radical
and anti-statist than the repressive statist conservatives in Iran.

By this yardstick, Iraq never supported the kind of terrorism
that threatend the US, even if they did send stipends to
the families of Palestinian suicide bombers or supported
Ansar al Islam in the north to harrass the Kurds.

> if we allow them to work with rogue states like North Korea.
> The threat could be smaller if we conduct certain operations, etc.

North Korea is insular and paranoid, and in fact even a worse basket
case Stalinist regime than was Saddam's Iraq. And -- when we took
our eye off the ball to obsess over Iraq -- they got themselves nukes.

But North Korea has zero connections or affinity to Islamism
and the threat of coordination is probably exaggerated, since
Kim, like Saddam, is most of all interested in surviving.

> After 9/11, how much of a threat are you willing to tolerate from
> Islamist terrorism? Perhaps you're willing to tolerate more than I
> am -- I suspect, given your laundry list in your note, that you are.

Are you more willing than I to tolerate gangland homicide?

I don't consider it a qualitative difference to be killed or
grievously injured by a terrorist explosion vs to be killed
or grievously injured by a gangland drive-by shooting. And
since there was a driveby down the street from me two years
ago (we have Bloods and Crips in my Northeastern city), I can
reasonably calculate that the odds of the latter are much higher.

> I am not, and I'll support a President from either party who
> prosecutes aggressively a war on Islamist terror. Likewise, I'll
> oppose a President from either party who decides to tolerate the
> threat. It's an important issue to me. I'm likely to vote, in
> 2008, based on who is willing to fight terror more effectively.

You're certainly entitled, Steve. You can support a
candidate for whatever single issue you'd like, no matter
how good or bad your rationale is, this being America and all.

But simply telling me you're going to do this does not equate
to a substantive argument for why others should do it as well.

I'd still like to know why Islamist terrorism exists in a
special catetory of threat. You're a medical doctor; I can't
write your motives off to simpleminded xenophobia or racism.

> Now is that real or existential? You're the wordsmith, you decide.

"Existential" here has no fancy philosophical meaning
here, it just means a threat to one's existence.

Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and the USSR threatend our existence.

Al Qaeda does not.

If you think it does -- you're as crazy as a loon.

Bob

But even putting that aside, what happens if there is a hit and a particular person or persons become targeted? Well that is where it becomes problematic. To get a warrant you have to show probable cause. The evidence of probable cause happens to be the "hit" - which you had gotten without a warrant in the first place (and likewise without probable cause).

Who the hell cares about getting a warrant? If the "hit" you're referring to helps us to locate an enemy, we won't need a warrant; we'll simply go after him and either kill or capture him (or have him killed or captured by one of our allies). Do you think the government would have waited for a warrant in 1943 to apprehend a German agent? It seems to me that al Qaeda has plenty of advantages, and used them to their fullest extent. Why shouldn't we use one of our advantages (technology) to its greatest extent? The fact is, the type of mass monitoring (i.e., key word searching, etc) of electronic communications necessary for our security simply isn't conducive to the use of warrants. Why? Because there are millions and millions of such communications taking place every day. I WANT big-ass fancy machines to be exhaustively searching for clues that could lead to the apprehension of America's enemies, and most Americans agree with me. Which is why you people ain't getting anywhere whith this latest "scandal" you're trying to get brewing. Meanwhile, the presiden't numbers are soaring.

It would be interesting to see it the Bushies actually admit that there are ANY legal constraints that they are subject to.

"Meanwhile, the presiden't numbers are soaring."

Yes, like a drunken eagle.

"[. . .]I WANT big-ass fancy machines to be exhaustively searching for clues that could lead to the apprehension of America's enemies, and most Americans agree with me. Which is why you people ain't getting anywhere whith this latest "scandal" you're trying to get brewing. Meanwhile, the presiden't numbers are soaring."

Posted by: sid on December 22, 2005 at 5:35 AM | PERMALINK

Shorter Sid: I'm a coward, and I need a big strong man to protect me. And 40% approval is SOARING BABY!

I think what you actually mean is "souring".

Sid the Id:

> "We will fight them with patience, cunning, and determination. And
> we'll do it without throwing over everything America stands for."

> Oh, please, as if accessing electronic communications
> in pristine privacy in a time of war

Who are we at war with, sid? The boogie man? Is he under your bed?

Ahhh ... al Qaeda, I see. You mean 2000 insane Salafist
ideologues who are shunned in their countries of origin.

If so, then being in a state of war with the most powerful
nation on earth amounts to the largest Affirmative Action
program to aggrandize the egos of misfits ever undertaken :)

> belongs in the same sentence as "everything America stands for."

America stands against ends-justified rationality. Tamper with
that, argue for violating civil liberties in the name of results,
and indeed the whole idea of America does begin to unravel.

Where does it end, sid? How much power is Bush allowed to have?

> As long as you're free to post inane
> anti-Bush agitpop on blogs like this,

How do you know that we're so free to do this, sid?
How do you know that some of these posts haven't already
been keyword-flagged and email addresses indexed?

> we're far far far away from straying from the true
> values that make up "everything America stands for."

You're right. We start straying from our core values every time
you channel Senator Joe McCarthy with another one of your posts :)

Bob

Time to seperate the Good Germans from the Bad, I see. Why do I have this vision of GOPGreg, papageno, and sid all standing blankly in a 1945 German village going "Der Furher would never have abused his powers like that!"

(And if you feel that's too Godwin for you, try, say, 1789 France or 1954 Russia.)

Where does it end, sid?

If and when the Democrats return to power.

How much power is Bush allowed to have?

As much as he needs to stop America's true enemies: The Democrats.

What's scariest about it all is the in-your -face quality of the Bush response to it. He's saying, yes I broke the law, what are you going to do about it?

Posted by: nameless bob

There is only one proper response: a unanimous call for his impeachment immediately. That's exactly what the republican leadership would have done had Clinton ever made such a remark.

Democrats are political cowards; Republicans are political warriors. We will NEVER win until we blow past the Clintons, Bidens and Obamas and demand leaders that go for the jugular at the drop of a hat -- regardless of the consequences for their own political future.

All this wonky dialogue sends the message to assholes like Clinton, Biden and Obama that they can get our support and vote when they ride the fence on fundamental issues like this one and lay low to protect their political future.

We will never win until we run assholes like them out of the fucking party for good.

Why do I have this vision of GOPGreg, papageno, and sid all standing blankly in a 1945 German village going "Der Furher would never have abused his powers like that!"

You're assuming that they wouldn't have already fled by U-Boat to Argentina.

The "need" to circumvent the FISA process has nothing to do with technology, and it has nothing to do with urgency.

It has to do with the identity of the targets.

What the Republicans are doing is implementing the Huston Plan, pure and simple. The targets, when eventually divulged, will prove to be exclusively domestic. Divulging them may have to wait for a Truth Commission after the civil war, which is to say that it may have to wait for a very long time; but it will eventually happen. Jay Rockefeller is not the only person who knows how to cover his ass.

No, The Fascist Trio above would have been shooting anyone who put out a white flag, ala Aachen. They would been the group who came back into town and executed the Mayor for welcoming the Americans. They have more of a Werewolf quality than the average burgher.

econo buzz, nameless bob.

GWB is NOT saying, "I broke the Law. What are you going to do about it". GWB is saying, "I am the law."

In fact, he is quite correct as Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton have already attested. He is also saying, "If you disagree let's take it to the courts for a settlement". What he is not saying but thinking, "Why do you think I apppointed Roberts and Alito? Duh!"

The UK will start recording the movements of all vehicles on the roads, upgrading the already existing network so that they can automatically read license plates numbers as they pass by, and keeping that information for two years.

And with no FISA court authorization.

This gives me an idea: Perhaps Bush should simply say that he's surrendering to critics' demands that we take a "more European" approach to national security.

"The judges could, depending on their level of satisfaction with the answers, demand that the Justice Department produce proof that previous wiretaps were not tainted, according to government officials knowledgeable about the FISA court."
I smell a "conviction thrown out on a technicality," coming. Just lawyer up you silly "accused" terrorist and watch as those who make law from the bench create new laws and drag out your court cases for 15 years. We go to great lengths to protect violent men.
I wonder why Bush doesn't want judges involved in the fight against terrorism?

Oh goody, another Werewolf has crawled out of his hole. Hey, TBrosz, your buddies are here. The swill will rise high today.

Hey, Pale Rider, don't you just love these Telephone guys. We live in the Qwest, former US West area. The former Qwest CEO, Joseph Nacchio was indicted by a federal grand jury on 42 counts of insider trading that allegedly earned him nearly $101 million in illegal profits. Qwest so far has paid out $650 million in settlements relating to the financial fraud. Three assistants have already pled guilty and several more are under indictment.
Qwest has had a running gun battle with the City of Portland over not paying taxes. Probably didn't have the money.
Remember when Ma Bell was considered honest?

There he goes again.

Like clockwork, after refusing to follow up on his previous inane comments, Tbrosz now opines that the radical Dem anti-Republican terrorist-loving hate-America group known as the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court has caught some "irrational anti-Bush virus..."

Given your self-admitted ignorance of how the court works, shouldn't you be more cautious in impugning the judges' integrity? Judge Kollar-Kotelly now has to convene a "secret briefing" in Washington DC next month to outline the classified program to members - shouldn't that give you a hint that your comments about a "'we know nothing' bit" and suggestion the judges are trying the same "gambit" as Democrats are even slightly misplaced?

Libertarian that you profess to be, perhaps you should be even a trifle worried that (according to the Washington Post):

a "government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the administration complained bitterly that the FISA process demanded too much: to name a target and give a reason to spy on it. 'For FISA, they had to put down a written justification for the wiretap,' said the official. 'They couldn't dream one up.'"

Lets get that right: they had to name a target and give a reason to spy on it, and were unable to do so. This is too heavy a burden to put on the administration?

Tbrosz, we'll take your input seriously when you identify which country the US invaded first in World War II and why this is relevant to any contemporary debate.

Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and the USSR threatend our existence.

I'm with you, rmck1, but in fact neither Nazi Germany nor Imperial Japan threatened "our" existence. They threatened the existence of democratic states in Europe and in East Asia, and they threatened to start a lot of wars which would kill a lot of people, as in fact they did. They were an initial test run of a new type of modern governmental system, fascist totalitarianism, which turned out not to be sustainable, basically because it premised political control on a kind of rabid nationalism that inevitably ended in defeat in battle - as subsequent fascists like Nasser and Saddam Hussein have discovered.

Had the Nazis come along twenty years later, when nukes were around, then they would have threatened our existence.

And, obviously, we had to fight the Nazis, whether or not they threatened our existence, because good guys go to war to defend their friends and freedom around the world. And to stop, say, genocide.

Twigless doesn't have anything against judges, per se, he would go with a reincarnation of Judge Roy Bean in a second. So West Texas, you know.

we'll take your input seriously when you identify which country the US invaded first in World War II and why this is relevant to any contemporary debate.

Hey, that's a good one. Which country did the US invade first? Morocco? Tunisia? I'm game, and conveniently deprived of reference material. Lay it on me.

"Not even conservatives will rush to endorse the expansive powers that Bush claims to find in the Constitution to enable the National Security Agency to evade existing law and systematically conduct wiretaps against terrorism suspects on U.S. soil without warrants". Jim Hoagland

Except for the 'conservatives' that post on this blog. I love it.

3rd Paul,

Ma Bell was never considered honest.

It is a shame we lost Bell Labs but Ma Bell had to go.

I wonder why Bush doesn't want judges involved in the fight against terrorism?

Because he's a fascist?

And the Orwell family estate should smack you with a trademark suit for smearing the reputation of your brand; Orwell would have considered you filth.

being in a state of war with the most powerful
nation on earth amounts to the largest Affirmative Action
program to aggrandize the egos of misfits ever undertaken :)

Again, rmck1, I say: what he said.

Why do I have this vision of GOPGreg, papageno, and sid all standing blankly in a 1945 German village going "Der Furher would never have abused his powers like that!"

As a German I have the advantage of knowing both people who were Nazis in WWII and knowing people who were loyal Communists in East Germany, so I'm personally familiar with this brand of blinkered fanaticism. In both cases there were always those who were so brainwashed, so fundamentally committed to the cause, that they never gave up their belief, even after the system they had committed to was lying in rubble around them. Even in the 1980s I knew some older men and women who would say things like "Well, but Hitler got a lot of things right. He was just betrayed by people like Himmler...."

Then, on the other hand, there was the husband of my mom's cousin, a committed Communist in East Berlin. In 1990, after the Wall fell, we flew his family to visit us in the US for the summer. I remember him standing in a supermarket in the Hamptons, absolutely stunned by the abundance of goods, and saying over and over, "they lied to me. They lied to me all my life...." Sometimes the scales do fall.

I smell a "conviction thrown out on a technicality," coming.

I smell an "innocent man kidnapped in Frankfurt and shipped to Jordan where he was tortured by genital electrocution until they realized he had been mistakenly arrested because his name was similar to that of a suspected al-Qaeda member, finally exonerated and reunited with his family", coming.

If you were American, you would understand why we in our country have always believed in the separation of powers. But being a Russian Communist you're ignorant of such things.

Remember when Ma Bell was considered honest?

Actually, the breakup of AT&T led to MCI/Worldcom and Sprint, two companies that have shattered records for screwing investors, gobbling up small companies and smashing unions. Great stuff.

I think people just want a phone that works. How hard is that?

And to stop, say, genocide.

Unless its African genocide, and then the United States just kind of turns and walks away.

Stefan,

I remember him standing in a supermarket in the Hamptons, absolutely stunned by the abundance of goods, and saying over and over, "they lied to me. They lied to me all my life...."

My wife had the same experience. She grew up in Orange County, California and found herself shopping with her mother in a Piggly-Wiggly in Kentucky. I believe disbelief and disdain were the milder effects of outright culture shock that she went through. It's been a few years...she's getting better. Good days, bad days and all that.

One of the most underreported angles of the secret wiretaps case is touched on in the article you linked to today. That is, what happens if, ultimately, the Bush administration's policy is ruled unconstitutional? Given the reaction of the FISA judges, it seems to me this is an entirely possible, if not probable, result. What happens then? Will all the evidence the Bush administration has gathered to prosecute these suspected terrorists be thrown out? Talk about compromising national security. I can understand aggressive wiretaps in the immediate wake of 9/11, but not four years later. Heck, Congress could have called a closed session (as Reid did a few weeks back) to codify these wiretaps in law. If they're that important, and if the links between the U.S. citizens and terrorist networks are that "clear" (as the administration maintains), then why wasn't this done?

Hey, that's a good one. Which country did the US invade first? Morocco? Tunisia? I'm game, and conveniently deprived of reference material. Lay it on me.

Lovely malarial Papua New Guinea, held by the Imperial Japanese Army.

Had the Nazis come along twenty years later, when nukes were around, then they would have threatened our existence.

brooksfoe, largely with you but to be fair, the Germans in 1938 were the first to manage nuclear fission and the Germans did actually have a program to develop the bomb with physicists Werner Heisenberg and Kurt Diebner. Fortunately the progam was never able to produce a critical nuclear reactor. The two Japanese programs prossibly got much further (particularly the navy's) and the Japanese actually had plans to deploy atomic bombs against US troops on Saipan if they could develop them in time.

And watching while the Nazis overran Europe (fortunately the US was never given that option as Germany declared war) would have certainly given rise to something that was an existential threat. In the end, anyway, it was Russia that saved Europe's bacon (at an utterly horrifying cost) when the two great evils of the 20th century faced off.

I guess the point of this rambling is that the threat posed by the National Socialists has to be seen as one that didn't take much foresight to see as becoming existential.

Hey Stefan, I had that experience repeatedly with Russian friends in '89-'91. But I came to realize that it represented something dangerous for the Westerners who saw it happen: too many thought it proved the absolute legitimacy of the Reagan/Thatcherite economically laissez-faire, hard-line militarist "empire of evil" line of the '80s. All it did was prove the absolute superiority of the market economy over the command economy - nothing more. It didn't prove that the military buildup of the '80s made sense (if anything it proved the opposite), it didn't prove that privatizing education or health care were a good idea, it didn't prove that "government is the problem" and business is holy. (As a lot of Eastern Europeans have discovered, to their horror.)

What's awful about the post-9/11 mentality is that people think that the US has carte blanche to do anything it wants, anything at all, because "those guys saw people's heads off!" Rather than opening people's minds to what's going on in the rest of the world, the armed conflicts that have followed 9/11 have pushed many Americans into a stupid, defensive, ignorant assertion of our superiority and of our rightness in blowing away whoever the President and the military have wound up blowing away most recently, and in revoking whatever parts of our system of government they see fit to revoke. I mean, I think those East Europeans who got dropped into the supermarket in the Hamptons had been prepped for the experience: their lives had turned them, through scarcity, into worshippers of material objects and brand names, and, dropped into the West, they saw vast oceans of material objects and brand names, and thought it was heaven. They saw what they had, in a sense, been prepped to see.

On the other hand, Americans have been prepped to see wild-eyed Muslim fanatics who hate freedom and the USA; and, dropped into Iraq, that is what they have seen. They haven't seen people who fight for their country's or their family's honor, combatting foreign invaders. They can't see that. Everything they see reinforces their sense of their own rightness. They're incapable of seeing what's in front of their eyes; their frame of reference shunts it all away.

After two days of thundering by the stampeding lemmings of the MSM/Dem/left, the facts are now starting to dribble out. Former Atty Gen Griffin Bell, Prof. Cass Sunstein, and Clinton Justice Dept #3 John Schmidt have all come forward and said that FISA did not supplant the president's powers for survaillance, and Bush's interpretation of the law is more realistic than the Chicken Littles like you or Robertson.
I also find it interesting that the same people who insist that BUSH LIED about WMD are now exagerating who is getting spied on by these wiretaps. I'm sure 80% of the American people have not heard or seen any caveats in the headlines or coverage that this is only applying to international calls.

Quite a culture shock to go from Alpha Beta to Piggly-Wiggly. And from Carl's Jr to Hardees.

Well said, brooksfoe. Very well said indeed.

I'm sure 80% of the American people have not heard or seen any caveats in the headlines or coverage that this is only applying to international calls.

Those international calls originate from or enter into America, you fuckwit. They're made or received by Americans.

Well said, brooksfoe. Very well said indeed.

and seconded.

I'm sure 80% of the American people have not heard or seen any caveats in the headlines or coverage that this is only applying to international calls.

What a disgusting thing to say. So now making an international call is evidence of disloyalty to America?

I've got an idea, minion of rove: how about we round up the people who have foreign currency. This has been standard practice in every country that's been really successful at wiping out terrorism: the Nazis, the Soviets, Franco's Spain, they all did it. How can we afford to go without this essential technique?

It's interesting to compare Bush's rationale here--I need unlimited power to keep you safe--to his actions during Katrina.

In the Katrina crisis, the President had de facto, if not de jure, authority to do pretty much anything he wanted with the federal government's resources. Furthermore, it looked like everyone went into the crisis expecting to follow FEMA's lead.

But bizarrely, the President didn't seem to have any specific actions in mind that he needed more authority to pursue. I didn't hear him saying, "we would have done thus-and-so, but we could not because we lacked the authority." Instead, all his energy seemed to be fosued on a pissing match over authority with the Louisiana governor. By all appearances, he was more focused on obtaining control in order to manage the spin than in order to manage the substance of the crisis.

Is it just me, or does Katrina pretty much undercut the President's argument that he needs increased authority so he can take action? Because when a crisis itself gave him pretty much unlimited authority, it's not like he used it particularly well.

This leaves us to conclude that the President wants authority simply because he wants control. He doesn't want to have to answer to anyone else or justify his actions. That's not just an undemocratic government, it's bad and ineffective government.

Here's the link for my last assertion:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0512210142dec21,0,3553632.story?coll=chi-newsopinioncommentary-hed

I hope you guys continue with your holier than thou concern for the poor terrorist's privacy rights. You will help us overcome our real issues with Abramoff, spending, K Street, etc. I hope someday we get two legitimate political parties in this country, but not until my side gets to pack the Supreme Court, after that I'll worry about your irrational desire to look down on the great unwashed as not as worthy as you.

Damn straight, theorajones. It's called "authority without responsibility". It's the hallmark of dictatorship.

brooksfoe:"Americans have been prepped to see wild-eyed Muslim fanatics who hate freedom and the USA; and, dropped into Iraq, that is what they have seen. They haven't seen people who fight for their country's or their family's honor, combatting foreign invaders."

insurgents do not equal people fighting for their country. Most of the Iraqi's want it, most of the ideological fanatic muslims don't.

Stephan:"They're made or received by Americans." Wonder why the avg. Joe American would be calling Afganistan? or Syria? Exchanging pie recipes perhaps?

Shoot, we should just all get scanners to listen in like Grand Ma and Grand Pa did with Newt...you tards seemed to be OK with that.

after that I'll worry about your irrational desire to look down on the great unwashed as not as worthy as you.

What are you talking about? Are you, like, ashamed because you've never made an international call?

I'd give you my number and tell you to call me, just to get over your virginity, because it seems to be blocking your ability to think clearly. But I'm afraid you'd turn out to be some weird stalker.

pale rider,

The breakup of AT&T had nothing to do with MCI or Worldcom. They formed to compete in Long Distance after it was deregulated.

Basic phone service is just as reliable as it ever was and is far cheaper.

The problems with phones is the confusing range of choices and the fact no one wants to pay for repair or any employee intensive (expensive) service.

One of the things missed in Verizons decision to convert to fiber from copper is the maintenance savings. They need a bigger pipe but the expense is only justified based on very significant maintenance savings. In this case the Union was wise to allow the company to place the fiber optic cable using non union labor. The lower installation costs and lower maintenance costs will allow Verizon to compete with Comcast and remain profitable.

Eventually the area where I live will be 100% fiber. The number of calls to repair will drop by 90% and more of those calls will be solved from the office. The truck fleet dedicated to repair service will be reduced by at least 90% and the installation fleet by a smaller amount as more can be done from the office.

They will dramatically increase their capacity to handle voice and data traffic at a dramatically reduced cost. Consumers will have a dramatically wider range of services available with better reliability.

It's a shame Bell Labs is gone but the market works.

I've got an idea, minion of rove: how about we round up the people who have foreign currency.

Well passport holders are definitely suspect (I mean they apparently voted for Kerry by more than a 20% margin).

Hey, perhaps this. Tokugawa Japan simply killed anybody trying to enter, trying to return and as far as I know there were absolutely no problems with Islamic terrorism.

Of course they did have to deal with that problem of continual peasant revolts.

insurgents do not equal people fighting for their country. Most of the Iraqi's want it, most of the ideological fanatic muslims don't.

Happy Glimore, I'm having trouble figuring out what you mean. Want "it"? Want what?

Wonder why the avg. Joe American would be calling Afganistan? or Syria?

Maybe his FAMILY lives there, you creep. Do you have any idea how many patriotic true-blue Americans of Iranian ancestry there are in LA, with dozens of relations in Tehran? Do they deserve to have their calls monitored without a warrant? And you know where the 9/11 hijackers were mostly making calls to? Germany. So is calling Germany sufficient evidence of terrorist sympathies for you? You made any calls to Germany lately?

I am probably the only person in this discussion who actually knows for a fact that his phone IS being bugged. I live in a dictatorship, and because of certain perfectly normal things my job involves, which would just be a normal job in the West and is neither exciting nor well paid, well, let's just say that all of us here who do this job get our phones monitored. It's annoying; you never know whether you've done something wrong on your taxes, for instance, that you might mention at the wrong time, and that might serve as an excuse for them to suddenly kick you and your family out. Or whether you might unwittingly endanger someone else by mentioning their name. So to those of you who aren't being monitored, let me just say it's not nice, and that's the reason why the Founders were against unlawful searches and seizures, even of people who were suspicious because their skin was dark or they had funny names or corresponded with foreigners.

Well, the President isn't suggesting that the FISA law no longer exists. He's just saying that the FISA law, and presumably every other law, can be broken by him.

Presumably the FISA court would continue to exist so it could grant warrants to people who aren't authorized by the President.

So how does that work? Some FISA judges are cleared more highly than others? Seems odd that any FISA judges would not have the highest security clearances. So some learned about the NSA program only in the newspaper? What kept those judges "in the know" from sharing the information? And how were those judges originally selected to be briefed when the others weren't?

I see the facts are going to be subject to the usual trenchant tbrosz analysis, spinning webs of fantasy from the simple tr