Cato Institute says the expiration of FISA will have little effect...
By John Amato Saturday Feb 16, 2008 9:38amBush keeps ramping up the fear, but even the CATO institute isn't buying his usual brand of fear-mongering.
The Bush administration can initiate new terrorist monitoring activities after the PAA expires. It just has to get a FISA warrant, the same way it did in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006. Indeed, Bush himself praised the changes Congress made to FISA in the wake of the September 11 attacks, noting that they “will allow surveillance of all communications used by terrorists, including e-mails, the Internet, and cell phones” and makes the intelligences community “able to better meet the technological challenges posed by this proliferation of communications technology.” If we were able to get by with those provisions for nearly six years, surely we’ll be OK living under them again for a couple of week.
And I' like to ask the HOUSE---how does it feel to actually stand up to Bush and his sycophants? Pelosi and Reid respond:
“The Protect America Act will expire only because the President and congressional Republicans refused to approve an extension of that law. Their true concern here is not national security. Rather, they want to protect the financial interests of telecommunications companies and avoid judicial scrutiny of their warrantless wiretapping program...read on
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Maybe not, but you can count on the whinny-assed republicans to continue to say that the "Libruls" are endangerin muricah by not giving bush what he want.
Bush will act indignant, Boener will Cry, McCain will grimace and the Neocons will continue with their "Libs are un-patriotic" rant.
Bangkok Bob @ 1:
Hmmm, I forgot, it's Sunday over there and you are probably just getting up.
Funny, because McConnel on FnS just said we are now in greater danger, and the threat grows worse with each passing day because of the failure to renew the bill.
Get a warrant and listen to whoever you need to. don't get a warrant, well to bad, but don't blame the democrats for protecting the Contitution. big brother isn't welcome here.
Mugsy @ 3:
He's lying of course. Same old SOP. keep the Sheeple afraid.
Medical Diagnosis by Video @ 5:
I get the same impression, especially from McCain. He could snap at any minute.
RHM's blog
Isn't the focus of the illegality of this the fact that Bush hasn't gotten warrants through the FISA court?
FISA has no expiration date, John.
Bush Co does what it wants. If it isn't obvious after 7 years.
May, 2006
Intelligence Czar Can Waive SEC Rules
“President George W. Bush has bestowed on his intelligence czar, John Negroponte, broad authority, in the name of national security, to excuse publicly traded companies from their usual accounting and securities-disclosure obligations. Notice of the development came in a brief entry in the Federal Register, dated May 5, 2006, that was opaque to the untrained eye.”
I hope the House finds standing up to Bush's criminal regime to be an addicting experience.
He didn't need FISA to spy on us before, so what's the big deal?
"Congress does what it's told, it rubs the lotion on its skin"
from Silence of the Sheep (a new docudrama about Congress's ineptitude to stand up to Bush).
What bothers me is that the Dems are still not getting the message out. Fine, make a statement through the Gavel, which no one but the choir reads. They should have scheduled a presser to send this message to the world. But no, they let the whining Repubs beat the the punch once again. Why can't they learn to grab the headlines and frame the message?
Answer me this, why do they actively go out of their way to listen to our conversations? They have been campaigning for this from word go. The same can be said about torture. This is not a situation where one agent ended up listening in on someone's call without a warrant and they are trying to justify it after the fact, they set out to be able to do this because they want to.
They want to torture people and listen in any conversation they feel like. This feels good to them.
I wish the democratic party would do more to explain to the general public why this is bull shit. This retroactive immunity seems like a small deal, but theres a law suit about a bulk collection.
i think this is the problem.. They cave in, trying to use civil discourse. If they said the republicans are lying, they would look bad if they can't prove it... but they are lying, and having basic understanding of the bill would prove it
WRT #14:
This republican-owned media problem is tougher to solve than at first blush. Second and third blush, too.
via @ 14:
I agree. Calling a presser makes sure it is covered by the msm. They let them frame it. No matter what the bill they say the same thing. Bush won or the Dems lose again. This one couldn't have been framed that way with a presser.
I've been so mad at Reid and Pelosi that I am surprised if they do anything that is actually For the People. They seem to be having a contest to see who can cave into Repug pressure fastest. but I will say if they have to do one thing right, this is the thing they should be doing.
OF COURSE the expiration of FISA won't have any effect -- think Bush & Cheney CARE?
Janet @ 18:
I think the Democrats passed this one for themselves. I guess their cave-in humiliation quota about oversight has been filled. At the rate they were going, there would soon be no need for Congress anyway.
WHOOO ARE THE BRAIN POLICE?
This is nothing but a delay. Lets not forget that the Senate bill is still sitting in the hopper.
If Reid feels this way then why did he let a bill WITH immunity get through the senate?
Make that *retroactive* immunity.
anney @ 20:
Of course not. If you have an Attorney General and Department of Justice who refuse to pursue any case against the administration why should they care? They consider themselves to be a law unto themselves.
"Badges? Badges!?! We don't need no steenking badges."
Pelosi won't Impeach simply because she has no balls.
Literally
lucid fiction @ 26:
Congress doesn't have time to Impeach. they have more important things to do, like go after the NFL spying case. You know they can't chew gum and walk at the same time.
McConnel carrying George Bush's water and lying through his teeth on FNS is nothing new. Too bad for him FNS audience continues to shrink. It's just not the effective medium it once was for scaring the country.
diamondmc @ 22:
Bingo. And this is why every thread, post, and M$M story claiming that "FISA has expired" is unhelpful. What needs to be repeated again and again is that FISA cannot expire. There is virtually no difference between what the spies can do now compared with what they could do last week. The only real difference is that they have to get permission from a court that says "yes" about 99.2% of the time. Ergo, there is no need for the Senate's bill.
Going further, the best thing right now is delay. Every day that goes by without an attack can be presented as (short-sighted) evidence that the PAA is not needed. This will reduce pressure to pass the Senate's bill (or anything like it), which is good. Sure, it would be nice to have some of the additional safeguards that Holt (House) and Feingold (Senate) wanted to include, but better nothing than the crap that Bond and Rockefeller (both Senate) wanted to include.
Plus, the longer you wait, the more the implications of Donna Edwards might have on the Blue Dogs.
But regardless of the length of the wait, please, I beg you, stop saying that FISA has expired. It makes you sound like a lying right-wing fear-monger and hurts the cause.
This may be somewhat off topic, but what actions could be taken if someone believed they were one of the innocent suspects being waterboarded? ACLU, lawyers, etc. ? My nerves are shot and I am grasping at straws trying to figure out any way to get out from under this and let the truth be known.
And yes I am 100% serious about this.
Thank You,
Chris
JTM @ 29:
No matter how you slice it, they've been spying on you for decades. What a shocker. I just can't figure out why the telecomms need immunity. Uncle Sam goes to a Repub judge and he says ok. Done. What the hell does it have to do with telecomms again? They don't refuse anyone and why should they? Privacy? There is no privacy.
HELP! @ 30:
None. Nothing. Zilch. Nada. IF there was, people at Gitmo for all these years, would have at least attempted to use it.
The whole argument that FISA needed to be changed again - aside from the Telecom immunity aspect - is that there was a backload of FISA applications last summer and that the approvals for (legal) eavesdropping didn't come fast enough, thereby endangering our security. That's my understanding anyway. But the solution is and should not be to by pass applying for warrants: it should be to get more bodies to process these applications faster! I don't understand why Congress, especially the Democrats in the Senate do not realize this (unless I have it all wrong). Is it indeed a judicial vacancy problem? Then Congress and President Bush better get their act together and fill those vacancies so those warrants can be processed faster. Not having enough judges (in a "secret court") to process warrant applications is no excuse for legislating this PAA. .
Hey, that's what they say. But in my neighborhood alone terrorist communications have increased 24.763% (unnamed source)! Why, if you extrapolate that to all the neighborhoods in America that's an increase of 34.891% million percent!
Time to be afraid folks....very, very afraid.
"It just has to get a FISA warrant, the same way it did in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006."
I think the point of the retroactive immunity is because they weren't complying with the FISA law.
Now, if the Congress has the time to investigate steroids in baseball, and the New England Patriots videotaping, then surely Congress has the time to investigate whether immunity is appropriate for the telecoms. Things like whether the telecoms were acting altruistically or for pecuniary gain should be determined. The representations and assurances that the government gave the telecoms should be disclosed.
Senator Claire McCaskill was on Real Time Friday, and indicated she voted for the retroactive immunity because "those companies did act in good faith and this narrow exception I think is appropriate because the heavy hand of government was around their neck".
I don't know how this determination was reached, but there should be an accounting available to the American people for the government role in inducing the telecoms into assisting the Bush administration in nullifying the 4th amendment.
I couldn't believe it!
I woke up this morning!
Whew!
The media is complicit in this. A Fox news producer said, "If no one hears it, is it news?" The media won't give the democratic members the face time on this.
Google Orwell rolls in his grave.
NoBuddy @ 35:
It really doe not matter what their motives were. They knew they were not supposed to break the law even at the request of the President of the US.
Now the Administration is saying that most of the spying is done by the Private Sector.
So, are they trying to say that because they give this spying to "Contraitors" that they then have not as much responsibility? What about oversight? Which seemed to be non-existent during the 6 year republican rape of the House and Senate?
You do realize that Bush was using warrantless wiretapping since 2003, right? It's just been legal for the last 6 months when the democrats caved and passed it.
Back then I held firm to the truth that they would sort it out in February and not let it pass again.
Thankfully they held true to that.
charlie @ 33:
That was one of the arguments in August. The reason you don't hear it any more is that the backlog has been cleared and is unlikely to occur again. So now they are saying that they have to have other things.
In short: you're correct that the goalposts/justifications have moved on this one. But there's no evidence that we need more judges on the FISC. Reminding people of moving goalposts and altered justifications is useful, but doesn't seem to make it into the M$M as it is "complicated."
HELP! @ 30: This may be somewhat off topic, but what actions could be taken if someone believed they were one of the innocent suspects being waterboarded? ACLU, lawyers, etc. ? My nerves are shot and I am grasping at straws trying to figure out any way to get out from under this and let the truth be known. And yes I am 100% serious about this. Thank You
=================
All detainees are stripped of their rights to habeas corpus. So like the other dude said, you have ZERO options.
They never have to put you trial, you can't request a trial. They can detain you for any reason as long as they see fit.
Yes, it really it that disturbing.
jake3988 @ 40:
From what I understand, he may have started as early as January, 2001.
"It really doe not matter what their motives were. They knew they were not supposed to break the law even at the request of the President of the US."
It may not matter to you (or me), but for the public to have any confidence in the Congress's determination, there needs to be disclosure about the circumstances that leads Congress to their findings, of which presently, I've heard none.
Assuming the government did have a "heavy hand around (the companies) neck", we can assume that the government took a carrot and stick approach. We need disclosure of what any carrots were, and what constituted the stick.
For example, were any FCC or justice dept rulings on unrelated matters influenced by whether the telecoms cooperated, and so forth.
I don't think this matter should be buried. They want to decide it, then decide it, out in the open.
Also in the Washington Times.
Once the dam breaks, the water gushes.
Vote in the C-span poll on the effect of the PPA expiration:
http://www.capitalnews.org/ .
It's morning in America.
And Cato Institute isn't the only right-ward media calling Bush out on the PAA: Cato just linked to a WASHINGTON TIMES piece that basically did the same. Here's the link:
If it was all that important, why didn't the FBI pay their telecom bills?
NoBuddy @ 44:
Ok, i see your point.
bob @ 45:
The links are a little messed up, but you get the idea.
I hope we get attacked and then the Republicans try to explain to America that it was the fault of the Democrats because of the 'Protect America Act' expiring. Then Americans will truly realize the assclowns we have in office.
jake3988 @ 42:
No, it's way more disturbing than that. It's quite logical to believe that someone who is tortured and subsequently proven innocent is more likely to be murdered than someone who is guilty. Here's the cruel but inescapable reasoning behind this:
The guilty person at least justifies the fact of their being tortured, and can be a political asset in a show trial.
The innocent torture victim is a witness to a capital crime and puts the torturer and his superiors (what an unjust use of that word) in jeopardy. His further survival is nothing but a liability, threatening the torturer, the agency, the program and the government. I'm sure anyone who could justify torture to begin with could easily justify the 'elimination' of an innocent victim.
I don't like it, but it is what it is. Sad, but true.
bob @ 49:
Here they are repaired:
Also in the Washington Times
Once the dam breaks, the water gushes.
Vote in the C-span poll on the effect of the PPA expiration:
It's morning in America
xoites defends Constitution @ 36:
Message for you at the Sunday Morning Bobblehead Thread No. 2
Jay Severin Has a Small Pen1s @ 50:
Sorry, but i hope we are never attacked again and i don't care who it does not embarrass.
Saint Augustine @ 53:
Sorry number 42, keyboard malfunction!!
Saint Augustine @ 55:
Thank you very much. :)
The Libertarian Cato Institute as well as the Libertarian Party, of which I am a member were opposed to the war in Iraq as well as Bush's warrantless wiretaps and mail and email snoops. A number of Democratic legislators supported Bush.
I understand about the detainees being held in Gitmo and their lack of rights, but what about a citizen living "free" in the US in his hometown who has not been talked to about the situation by anybody whatsoever (aside from what I have learned from the media). And what about the friends and family members who are involved that have superficial ties, or in most cases no official ties, to the government that are involved in a case like mine?
Jay Severin Has a Small Pen1s @ 50:
Ummm.I'm assuming You'd be fine with an attack on You.Then we'd have killed two birds with one stone-so to speak.
Let boygeorge get a warrant if he wants to listen to my phone calls, your phone calls, or anyone elses for that matter. The only terrorists around here are Cheney and Bush. The rest is pretty much bullshit designed to scare the over 70 crowd. My father and mother-in-law are scared shitless. According to them, either a Mexican, or a middle eastern terrorist will sneak into their home in the middle of the night and slit their throats. I am not kidding here. They are quite scared about this actualy happening. Is it Puss Limbaugh, Wrong Hannity or Bill O'dumbass that put the fear of Mexicans in them?
This post gets a great big gigantic
Duhoh and Let's all be vewy.vewy.vewy.vewy. afwaid, 'cuz Elmer Fuddstick says so.911911911911911fearfearfearterrorterror.......................seven years of this on the hit parade, come on guys let's get a new song.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndS0cEIIiXw
and because this is my anthem and not yours george you goddamn fucktarded twit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_nO0F4ugss&feature=related
Party on Hosers
HELP! @ 58:
I'd start by studying the case of Jose Padilla. example linky
Small point, but it feeds the bed-wetter meme - FISA's not expiring. The PAA is expiring.
What does the Green Hornet say about the expiration of FISA?
Bangkok Bob @ 2:
I always seem to be getting up.
Try this link thing one more time.
Thanks for the link. I'm not sure what you mean by "even the Cato Institute," though. Cato scholars have been criticizing the president's war-mongering and encroachments on civil liberties for years.
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