Originally Posted By woody Post 911, I would rather we avoid another attack. The blame is almost incidental to the matter. Nonetheless, I can see you would want to prevent any intelligence investigations even if they are effective and TOP SECRET.
Originally Posted By gadzuux Do you really think that al qaeda operatives are worried about their constitutional rights? Or that they've been making calls under the impression that they were enjoying some right of privacy? There's a lot of things within the bush white house that are 'top secret'. The secrets are from US, the public - because they don't want any accountability for their actions.
Originally Posted By woody Al Qaeda should not get any constitutional rights whether they are in a foreign country or in the US. If they are in the US, they get the same constitutional protections. The warrantless wiretapping is about calls coming from foreign countries to the US. The intercepts are happening outside the US. Congress was notified of the top secret activities. Congress is supposed to provide the accountability. They have provided accountability. Since the TOP SECRET was blown, we can see how the public reacted. The majority of the public believes Bush did the right thing.
Originally Posted By woody "Or that they've been making calls under the impression that they were enjoying some right of privacy?" Privacy should only be expected if you're in the US, but then again, this is war. If you're tagged as a terrorist operative, you shouldn't expect constitutional protection, but this will be tested in the courts eventually especially if we catch the operatives. See Jose Padilla case.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <He says this because it's generally understood that circumventing the judges and courts that are specifically in place for the white house to gain authority for wire taps and intel gathering on US citizens is "illegal".> What's generally understood is that using soliciting campaign contributions from a public office is "illegal", but that didn't stop Mr. Gore from claiming there was "no controlling legal authority" to prevent him from doing it. It's also generally understood that the President has far reaching powers over national security matters. In fact, an assistant attorney general for Mr. Gore's running mate asserted that a President had authority to perform warrentless searches for national security. <These rules are in place to protect you, me and every other american.> And, according to some, those who interact with our enemies.
Originally Posted By patrickegan Maybe for you but speaking for myself I’m doing better now then six years ago. Still working seven days a week since 1994. My wage isn’t stagnant but then again I have to produce. Yes health care costs have increased but some of the increased healthcare cost can be attributed to the millions sneaking into to this crappy country. My pension depends upon my own decisions and only some of it is affected by the board. I hear those same complaints all the time from the sneak out early socialist that are my clients. I say BS get another job. The daydream that you are going to suckle at the teat for 20 or 25 years for 40 hours a week or less and get the golden handshake is over. You have a situation where too many social services are eating up all of the extra money for raises and benefits. If you work for a big company and think your pension is safe you ain’t seen nothing yet and the same goes for anyone under 40 and SS.
Originally Posted By inlandemporer "Warrants are hard to get. That's the basic fact." Hasn't the FISA court turned down something like 4 requests for warrants in the past 20 years and granted 20,000? Something like that. So what makes anyone think that the FISA court would turn down a request for a warrant against an Al Qaeda member or associate? That's nuts. Of course they wouldn't. All the NSA would have to say is that we want to tap Mr. X, an Al Qaeda associate, and bingo: warrant. They can even tap him without a warrant and get it from the court LATER. Which raises the question: why would they not want to get a warrant, then? Maybe not all of those wiretaps were directed at Al Qaeda. Maybe some of them were directed at people the administration just doesn't like and wants to keep tabs on. We can't know, because they won't tell us. But we do know groups like the Quakers have been investigated because they held peace rallies. Would Bush also wiretap Quakers, trying to find something on them? Frankly, I wouldn't put it past him. But with the secrecy in this administration, justifying everything in the name of "national security," how can we know? And they sure are fighting to KEEP it secret, even from Congress, which I can't imagine them doing if all the targets were legitimate.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer >>All the NSA would have to say is that we want to tap Mr. X, an Al Qaeda associate<< That explains why we never see his face...
Originally Posted By woody "Hasn't the FISA court turned down something like 4 requests for warrants in the past 20 years and granted 20,000? Something like that." Actually, it was a lot more under the Bush Administration. The court impeded the warrants. They also altered many warrants. It was a bad situation. The Clinton Administration was also concerned about the process, the delay, and the turndowns so they didn't pursue the warrants in any more significance. I think warrants are fine when you want to investigate a crime, but this is about intelligence about war plans. Is it wrong to intercept and decrypt messages from Germany and Japan during WWII without warrants? The line of reasoning would imply this would be wrong.
Originally Posted By StillThePassHolder "Actually, it was a lot more under the Bush Administration. The court impeded the warrants. They also altered many warrants. It was a bad situation." Source?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 You beat me to it, STPH. Sounds like one of woody's "I just know it happened this way" things.
Originally Posted By cmpaley >>"Actually, it was a lot more under the Bush Administration. The court impeded the warrants. They also altered many warrants. It was a bad situation." Source?<< Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Hannity, Savage Pick one of the above.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer >>I think warrants are fine when you want to investigate a crime, but this is about intelligence about war plans.<< But Congress hasn't declared war, have they? The nation, legally, is not in a state of war right now.
Originally Posted By cmpaley >>>>I think warrants are fine when you want to investigate a crime, but this is about intelligence about war plans.<< But Congress hasn't declared war, have they? The nation, legally, is not in a state of war right now.<< It's the whole unitary executive thing. The executive can do whatever he damn well pleases without Congress even knowing about it. The concept of a unitary executive is that the man in the position is basically a king, emperor and dictator and is not bound by any laws whatsoever, even the laws that establish the office he holds.
Originally Posted By woody It is the way it is. <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/york/york200512191334.asp" target="_blank">http://www.nationalreview.com/ york/york200512191334.asp</a> People familiar with the process say the problem is not so much with the court itself as with the process required to bring a case before the court. "It takes days, sometimes weeks, to get the application for FISA together," says one source. "It's not so much that the court doesn't grant them quickly, it's that it takes a long time to get to the court. Even after the Patriot Act, it's still a very cumbersome process. It is not built for speed, it is not built to be efficient. It is built with an eye to keeping [investigators] in check." And even though the attorney general has the authority in some cases to undertake surveillance immediately, and then seek an emergency warrant, that process is just as cumbersome as the normal way of doing things. "Many agents in the field told us that although there is now less hesitancy in seeking approval for electronic surveillance under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, the application process nonetheless continues to be long and slow," the commission said. "Requests for such approvals are overwhelming the ability of the system to process them and to conduct the surveillance. The Department of Justice and FBI are attempting to address bottlenecks in the process."
Originally Posted By cmpaley You mean walking a piece of paper down the hall takes that long? They need to get faster wheelchairs or something.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Even if that's the case, the obvious answer is to streamline the process; not pretend it doesn't exist and make up the law as you go.
Originally Posted By woody It helps to be informed. <a href="http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20051226-122526-7310r" target="_blank">http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/v iew.php?StoryID=20051226-122526-7310r</a> Bush was denied wiretaps, bypassed them WASHINGTON, Dec. 26 (UPI) -- U.S. President George Bush decided to skip seeking warrants for international wiretaps because the court was challenging him at an unprecedented rate. A review of Justice Department reports to Congress by Hearst newspapers shows the 26-year-old Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court modified more wiretap requests from the Bush administration than the four previous presidential administrations combined. The 11-judge court that authorizes FISA wiretaps modified only two search warrant orders out of the 13,102 applications approved over the first 22 years of the court's operation. But since 2001, the judges have modified 179 of the 5,645 requests for surveillance by the Bush administration, the report said. A total of 173 of those court-ordered "substantive modifications" took place in 2003 and 2004. And, the judges also rejected or deferred at least six requests for warrants during those two years -- the first outright rejection of a wiretap request in the court's history. ---------- Think of all the warrants that are not even processed. -------- <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/16/terror/main612305.shtml" target="_blank">http://www.cbsnews.com/stories /2004/04/16/terror/main612305.shtml</a> (AP) The number of secret surveillance warrants sought by the FBI has increased 85 percent in the past three years, a pace that has outstripped the Justice Department's ability to quickly process them. Even after warrants are approved, the FBI often does not have enough agents or other personnel with the expertise to conduct the surveillance. The FBI still is trying to build a cadre of translators who can understand conversations that are intercepted in such languages as Arabic, Pashto and Farsi.
Originally Posted By woody "Even if that's the case, the obvious answer is to streamline the process; not pretend it doesn't exist and make up the law as you go." LOL!!! Fix the bureaucracy. Yes, I've heard it all before.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <The 11-judge court that authorizes FISA wiretaps modified only two search warrant orders out of the 13,102 applications approved over the first 22 years of the court's operation. But since 2001, the judges have modified 179 of the 5,645 requests for surveillance by the Bush administration, the report said. A total of 173 of those court-ordered "substantive modifications" took place in 2003 and 2004. And, the judges also rejected or deferred at least six requests for warrants during those two years -- the first outright rejection of a wiretap request in the court's history. > What that says to me - if FISA didn't do that sort of thing before but DID do it with Bush even after everyone in the country was security-minded after 9/11 - is that Bush and co. were overreaching, and asking for questionable wiretaps. I just can't imagine them turning down a request on a bona fide Al Qaeda target. (And notice they still granted without alteration 97% of the requests). So it seems likely to me that they were casting their net too wide, on to targets that were not legitimate, and the court balked. So Bush and co. decided to do an end run around the law. Lovely.
