Obama Continues Bush's Illegal Drone Surveillance

[General_Failure]

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[LBIggle]

odd, i really think secretary of state should be above secretary of the treasury.


this spying on its own citizens really rejuvenates my confidence that were doing a good job keeping the terrorists out of this country.  but i guess that's why were in iraq.. or wait..  umm..  hmm, yah screw it.

[MURP]

Uh-oh.  Sorry to pee on the "impeachment" parade.  Looks like Clinton and Carter did the same thing. 

Or not

[MadMarchHare]

HA!

[fansince61]

Don't get pissed at peolpe who are trying to keep people in major cities alive

[Butchers Bill]

Uh-oh.  Sorry to pee on the "impeachment" parade.  Looks like Clinton and Carter did the same thing. 

Or not

Stop it MURP!  I'm gonna run out of urine!

Cute sixty second sound bite.  Unfortunatly it doesn't tell the full story.  Sure the semantics (thanks rjs) are different between the executive orders, but lets look at the actual law being used here shall we?

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, allows the gov't, under certain circumstances to eavesdrop on Americans (without warrant or court order) when

1.) the purpose of the eavesdropping is to gather foreign intelligence
- AND -
2.) the communication in question is between known foreign agents overseas and the American (like if UBL contacts the likes of Jose Padilla).
-AND-
3.) the American in question is acting in his role a part of an association or corporation that is "not substantially composed of United States persons."
- AND-
4.) The eavesdropping is done incompliance with a list of specified "minimization procedures", which include making regular reports to
4a.) the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence AND
4b.) the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence AND
4c.) the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court

It is now known as US Code Title 50 Secs. 1801 et seq.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/script...le=50&sec=1801
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/script...le=50&sec=1802

The whole reason behind 4 and 4abc is so that there is oversight...meaning if any abuses are suspected the practice can be stopped at any time.

I am not for domestic surveillance of US citizens at all, and was surprised to hear about this law.  However, it does not appear that any laws have been broken here.
 

[Rome]

I still don't see how Carter and Clinton have anything to do with Bush breaking the law.

If they feel the need to prosecute Carter & Clinton, then be my guest.  Drag their tired asses out into the street and beat them with billy clubs for all I care.

Bush broke the law but then again, breaking the law for this administration is the rule rather than the exception.

[Butchers Bill]

Bush broke the law but then again, breaking the law for this administration is the rule rather than the exception.

What law did he break?

[rjs246]

Bush broke the law but then again, breaking the law for this administration is the rule rather than the exception.

What law did he break?

None! He broke no laws! Hooray! Our president rules! He's the smartestest mostest bestest president ever! Yay!

[Butchers Bill]

None! He broke no laws! Hooray! Our president rules! He's the smartestest mostest bestest president ever! Yay!

See, thats one of the problems in the US today...total lack of communication.  Instead of responding to a legitimate question, you make an ass out of yourself.  You would rather believe as truth the sound bites from Jon Stewart or the opinions of people on an Eagles message board than actual facts.  The same goes for both sides of the political spectrum...for every Rush Limbaugh there is an Al Franken.

Look...no one is claiming that Bush is a great President, possibly not even a "good" one.  The blind hatred people have for him is foolish and uneducated (just as it was for the Clinton haters).

[rjs246]

Look...no one is claiming that Bush is a great President, possibly not even a "good" one.  The blind hatred people have for him is foolish and uneducated (just as it was for the Clinton haters).

I finally agree with something you say... sort of. My dislike for Bush has a whole lot more to do with his lack of qualifications for the job. I don't have any idea about laws he's broken and I'd be hypocritical if I judged someone on that since I've broken a few myself. I do have a good idea about rights he's infringed upon, but he's a republican President, it comes with the territory.

(And before you get your thong in a bunch about his qualifications I'll tell you why I don't think he's qualified. His track record of failed business decisions, questionable (at best) governance of the state of Texas and inability to even maintain decent grades at an Ivy League school, and as a person who has MANY friends who went to Ivy League schools let me tell you, there is nothing more difficult than getting a C at one of those schools. Ask anyone who went to harvard/yale/brown/etc. If you work hard you get an A, if you show up you get a B, if you make absolutely no effort to even pretend that you are in school, you get a C.)

In other words, he may not be an idiot, but he's done a damn good job of trying to convince everyone that he is. And stupidity and I don't get along.

[MURP]

Daschle: Congress Denied Bush War Powers in U.S.

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 23, 2005; Page A04

The Bush administration requested, and Congress rejected, war-making authority "in the United States" in negotiations over the joint resolution passed days after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to an opinion article by former Senate majority leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) in today's Washington Post.

Daschle's disclosure challenges a central legal argument offered by the White House in defense of the National Security Agency's warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens and permanent residents. It suggests that Congress refused explicitly to grant authority that the Bush administration now asserts is implicit in the resolution.


The Justice Department acknowledged yesterday, in a letter to Congress, that the president's October 2001 eavesdropping order did not comply with "the 'procedures' of" the law that has regulated domestic espionage since 1978. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, established a secret intelligence court and made it a criminal offense to conduct electronic surveillance without a warrant from that court, "except as authorized by statute."

There is one other statutory authority for wiretapping, which covers conventional criminal cases. That law describes itself, along with FISA, as "the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance . . . may be conducted."

Yesterday's letter, signed by Assistant Attorney General William Moschella, asserted that Congress implicitly created an exception to FISA's warrant requirement by authorizing President Bush to use military force in response to the destruction of the World Trade Center and a wing of the Pentagon. The congressional resolution of Sept. 18, 2001, formally titled "Authorization for the Use of Military Force," made no reference to surveillance or to the president's intelligence-gathering powers, and the Bush administration made no public claim of new authority until news accounts disclosed the secret NSA operation.

But Moschella argued yesterday that espionage is "a fundamental incident to the use of military force" and that its absence from the resolution "cannot be read to exclude this long-recognized and essential authority to conduct communications intelligence targeted at the enemy." Such eavesdropping, he wrote, necessarily included conversations in which one party is in the United States.

Daschle's article reveals an important new episode in the resolution's legislative history.

As drafted, and as finally passed, the resolution authorized the president "to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons" who "planned, authorized, committed or aided" the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Literally minutes before the Senate cast its vote, the administration sought to add the words 'in the United States and' after 'appropriate force' in the agreed-upon text," Daschle wrote. "This last-minute change would have given the president broad authority to exercise expansive powers not just overseas -- where we all understood he wanted authority to act -- but right here in the United States, potentially against American citizens. I could see no justification for Congress to accede to this extraordinary request for additional authority. I refused."

Daschle wrote that Congress also rejected draft language from the White House that would have authorized the use of force to "deter and pre-empt any future acts of terrorism or aggression against the United States," not only against those responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks.

Republican legislators involved in the negotiations could not be reached for comment last night.

[MadMarchHare]

JFC - this dude really scares me....

[MURP]

NY Times: Domestic spying widespread

NEW YORK (AP) -- The National Security Agency has conducted much broader surveillance of e-mails and phone calls -- without court orders -- than the Bush administration has acknowledged, The New York Times reported.

The NSA, with help from American telecommunications companies, obtained access to streams of domestic and international communications, said the Times, citing unidentified current and former government officials.

The story did not name the companies.

Since the Times disclosed the domestic spying program last week, President Bush has stressed that his executive order allowing the eavesdropping was limited to people with known links to al Qaeda.

But the Times said that NSA technicians have combed through large volumes of phone and Internet traffic in search of patterns that might lead to terrorists.

The volume of information harvested from telecommunications data and voice networks, without court-approved warrants, is much larger than the White House has acknowledged, the paper said, quoting an unnamed official.

The story quoted a former technology manager at a major telecommunications firm as saying that companies have been storing information on calling patterns since the September 11 attacks, and giving it to the federal government. Neither the manager nor the company he worked for was identified.

[MURP]

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.

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