Cal Thomas’ column in today’s Eagle is dishonest and incoherent. He seems to argue that those trying to question the president’s possibly illegal spying on American citizens will have to take the blame for the next national security disaster. But he conveniently ignores the fact that the bipartisan critics aren’t against spying — they’re against illegal spying, undertaken against American citizens in violation of U.S. law. Don’t like the law? Then change it.
Cal also bemoans the restrictions against torture. To him, security is more important than civil liberties, echoing Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas: “None of your civil liberties matter much after you’re dead.” But I liked the apt retort by Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis.: “Give me liberty or give me death.”
Posted by Randy Scholfield
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45 Comments
Nothing is illegal – if “W” doest it! He is our devine leader from heaven! He can anything he wants!
another vote for support for “W”!
Cal Thomas. Has there ever been a columnist so willing to shill for the Neocon cult of the Repbulican party as he has done? the only time he criticises Bush is when Bush compromises in some small way with the opposition.
Here’s some truth you won’t read in Thomas’s column–
President Bush’s own words, verbatim from the White House website from a talk he gave in Buffalo, NY, April 20, 2004.
“When the President speaks, he better mean it. . . . Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires — a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so. It’s important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.”
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/04/20040420-2.html
Oops, chalk that one up as another LIIIIE from the Liar-in-Chief. He doesn’t get court orders and he apparently DOESN’T value the constitution.
I encourage everyone on the WE Blog to instead go to the kansas city star blog.At the Kansas City Star Blog the editorial writers and posters (sic) actually engage in a conversation with those of us who care about these issues. liberal or conservative, you can appreciate a paper whose writers actually have to defend their posts and opinions.free market of ideas this blog is not.
Thanks, Cap’n. Got a link? (Too lazy to google it . . .)
just go to:
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/
there are a few blogs. one of them is unfettered letters, which is kinda a free-for-all
and another is a crime blog. all kinds of good stuff.
I might check it out, too, but since I live in Wichita, I’m a tad more interested in engaging the local populace.
And, having had 2 posts edited and another outright deleted, I know that somebody’s at least reading these. :)
understood.my irritation comes from the writers dropping opinions then running away not having to defend.I feel that if you really want a real discussion they should engage.we’re great, but it would add a whole lot if they didn’t post and run
Randy, you and Russ “Give me liberty or give me death” Feingold are willing to put your concerns over the electronic monitoring of overseas phone calls over the security of the country. That is a dangerous attitude.
Outlander and all the rest of you right-wingers, when are you going to get it? Outlander, did you not read what Randy? Have you not read the Constitution? Are you not familiar with the different agencies whose job it is to make sure that laws are not broken and the rights of citizens under that Constitution are not infringe upon or completely done away with?
Spying is legal with a court order. Even George W. Bush knows this. You need proof? Check out Galahad’s link, unless you think the official White House website is phony. So if Georgie can do it within the law, why did he need to circumvent it?
Good question RD. Why, if the same exact thing could be accomplished by getting a court order, would Bush issue an executive authorization? Maybe it couldn’t?
Out,Well, obviously, he wanted to do something the court, and/or the constitution (which he swore to uphold) wouldn’t allow. No time? Bullshit!
Thanks for your insight, Galahad. I had never thought things through like that. What a difference this will make for me.
Jed: George Bush was elected president. He has presidential authority to issue the order. His job is to protect the security of the country. If critics don’t like it, work to take the power away.
Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter also made use of the power. Funny how there was no uproar then. Let’s see, were they Democrats?
Personally, to paraphrase an earlier post, I would be disappointed if we didn’t have this monitoring program as a part of doing everything we could to protect our nation.
Sorry to be redundant.It is legal to do monitoring of communications from KNOWN terrorist phone numbers. If they call someone over here Bush, Clinton, etc. authorized the NSA to continue to monitor both sides and keep a record of what phones are being called by the enemies of US.Nobody authorized them to spy on Americans, unless, of course, they are regularily chatting with the enemy.
If I knew Clinton was doing it I might have worried a bit as I recalled the hundreds of FBI files that were found in his white house. But the NYT would not have printed that.So I understand the Democrat noise.
Randy, on the other hand, should get up to speed before he posts such crap.
Galahad, I think your enduring admirer is quite literally not human.**********************************Procedure Stevebot (void):
Case (Random_Phrase) OF:
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Print “Thanks for your insight,” Insert_Name “. I had never thought things through like that. What a difference this will make for me./n”
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Everybody likes Bush. Just not one that lies around till it stinks. If this mobster is not impeached NOW, we will NEVER have an America left!
“Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter also made use of the power. Funny how there was no uproar then.”
Well, it’s probably because this isn’t a true statement. And why is the first justification out of a conservative’s mouth “well Clinton did it”? Is it because conservatives respect Clinton so much that they feel a need to emulate him? It would seem so.I’m glad to see that republicans are finally developing the respect and admiration the man deserves.
And if you enjoyed Mr Clinton, you’re going to love the Missus in ‘08.
The “it’s OK for Bush to do it because _________ (fill in the blank) did it before him” is no justification at all and a worthless defense. It ranks up there with “liar, liar, pants on fire”.
Two wrongs don’t make a right. If Bush violated the provisions of FISA then some type of reprimand or prosecution is in order. And the same is true for Clinton, Bush Sr., Reagan, and/or Carter if they too violated FISA.
Brian,
Indeed. The second-grade mentality of Repubes like codie and Outlander can’t get beyond ‘if Clinton did it Bush also should be able to.’
What liars you are, Outlander and codie, when you ignore the fact that when Clinton asserted the FISA didn’t cover physical searches, he was right. As a matter of law, at the point when Clinton asserted Presidential perogative, physical searches weren’t covered by FISA. Once the law was amended, he stopped. In other words, he obeyed the law, and acknowleged the Constitutional limits of Presidential power.
This is different, absolutely different, from Bush’s absolutist claim that the President has the power to suspend existing law. The framers, Madison in particualr, disagree. That isn’t one of his ‘inherent powers,’ and the only other two examples of this in American history (Lincoln’s suspension of Habeus Corpus and Truman’s attempt to nationalize the steel industry) remain isolated anomalies. If Clinton had attempted to make the Presidency into an absolulte office the way Bush is, you better believe I would have been happy to jumped down his throat. But he never did try to destroy the rule of law by exempting the President from it. Nixon did, and we all know where THAT went.
And guess what, Outlander: the President’s job is not to protect the ’security of the country.’ Get your facts straight: he swears to uphold the Constitution, not to keep scared little girl Outlander from wetting his knickers over evil Osama. When did you Wingnut fascists turn into such girly men that only King Jesus George Bush could save you from the Ay-rad boogeymen under the bed?
I just think it’s funny to watch you Wingnuts on the one hand support a fascist like Alito as a ’strict constructionist’ of the Constitution, who will ‘interpret law rather than make law,’ while on the other hand y’all make up a whole new theory of executive perogative that hasn’t occured to anybody for the first 225 years of Constitutional interpretation. It offers strong evidence for your lack of principles and desire for power at any price.
You yell and lie and hope we’ll get tired and go away. Well, when you LIE, Outlander, and when you LIE, codie, we’re staying right here dishing it back on your lying, spinning assess as quickly as you puke it out.
So, having demolished your spin, here are the facts:
-Bush is arguing that the Constitution doesn’t matter.-He is the first President to make this argument in this fashion for these reasons.-He has broken the law and should be impeached.
CF
As with most folks on the left you are mischaracterising what Bush is doing. If he were doing warantless phone tapping as part of a domestic law enforcement operation it would be illegal.
What he is doing is gathering intelligence on a foreign enemy based upon information captured from those enemies. The information captured in this manner may not be admissable as evidence in a US court against a US citizen, so what. The primary purpose of the operation is to gather intel to prevent attacks in this country and learn more about the enemy.
It’s not just a matter of intelligence gathering. If the program involved ‘gathering’ on American citizens, even if they were conversing on the other end of the connection with foreign terrorists the information gathered against the citizens would be gathered illegally.
There is no exception, as far as I’m aware, of expediency trumping fundamental rights. At what point does intelligence gathering against US citizens become expedient. Would the ‘war on drugs’ qualify? If there were no reason to suspect me except for information gathered from a wiretap of my phone (without a warrant), would that also be acceptable? How about my ordering materials that would qualify as ‘porn’ in my neighborhood? Would that qualify?
While I might agree that information gathering against foreign nationals might be OK in some circumstances (obviously not OK to tap diplomats or diplomatic embassies on US soil), any implication of US citizens would surely be illegal and inadmissable against them (although it might be admissable against the foreign national with whom they were conversing).
Brian
I’m certainly no lawyer, just reading some things written by lawyers. It sounds to me that as long as the person in the US is talking to “the enemy” in another country that they are by association an agent of that enemy. Therefore gathering intel. from them is legal. That doesnt make it admissible in a US court, but the act of gathering the intel is not illegal.
Wrong CF, you have demolished nothing other than your credibility.
As the Commander in Chief, the number one job of the president is to protect the security of the country. Show me your national security crendentials and I might give a damn about your opinion of what is and what is not necessary to protect the country.
But protecting his family is a man’s job. How could I expect you to know about that?
Gathering intelligence is the right thing to do.
Being an idiot by circumventing congress, the constitution and the courts is, well, just being an idiot.
Gee, what if the president is a woman?
Heckler,
Contrary to your objection, I have done no such thing.
I understand perfectly well that the wiretapping of foreign communcations by U.S. citizens is illegal, and that it has been illegally authorized by the President.
The fact is that a court exists to approve such wiretaps, and a law passed in 1978 stipulates that the President has to apply to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for permission to wiretap the foreign communications of U.S. citizens. Bush claims he does not have to follow this law, or submit warrants to this court. In asserting this, he flouts the law, and has drawn the ire of the members of the court, including Head Judge Colleen Kellar-Kotelly. None of them affirm Bush’s claim that executive perogative exempts the President from having to secure warrants through established judicial procedure, and all of them challenge the legality of the NSC’s wiretapping. One judge resigned yesterday.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/21/AR2005122102326.html
Those are the facts, Heckler. Everything beyond that is spin and the attempt to reframe the issue in a broader way that tries to justify the President’s claim of executive authority to override current law and judicial practice.
In making these claims, Bush is absolutely beyond the scope of his Constitutional powers, and is attempting to fabricate a whole new set of Presidential powers out of whole cloth. This poses a MAJOR Constitutional crisis that not even the complicity of the GOP will be able to contain. It is not ‘business as usual,’ for this President or any other, Heckler.
Outlander,
The President’s oath of office says nothing of the kind. Here it is:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.
Article II, Section 1, of the Constitution:
If you can’t understand and affirm that, it makes you something other than an American.
As far as your wish to play ‘you show me yours and I’ll show you mine’ on the basis of security credentials, I have none. But my opinions seem to matter very much to you nonetheless.
Finally, when an intellectually bankrupt, political coward like you tries to impugn my masculinity, who cares? I’m not the one surrendering my freedom on the pretext of security.
Republicans like you are little girls.
Sorry, that should have been ‘Repubicans’ like you. My bad.
“One 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.”
Holy friggin’ shit!! It just keeps getting better and better.
Thanks for the link, CF. . . and for not tiring out. . .
Y’know, their objection sounded a little familiar. It reminded me of this:******************************The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
[Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution]*********************************
It doesn’t get much more basic than that.
CF
I appoligize for the length of this. It’s from John Hinderacker of Powerline to Eric Lichtblau of the times. He explains this better than I can.
Mr. Lichtblau, in your reporting in the Times you appear to have tried to create the impression that the NSA’s overseas intercept program is, or may be, illegal. I believe that position is foreclosed by all applicable federal court precedents. I assume, for example, that you are aware of the November 2002 decision of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review, in Sealed Case No. 02-001, where the court said:”The Truong court [United States v. Truong Dinh Hung, 4th Cir. 1980], as did all the other courts to have decided the issue, held that the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information. *** We take for granted that the President does have that authority and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the President’s constitutional power.”
Based on what I read from multiple sources that I deam credible, your certainty that Bush has broken the law is at best misplaced and and worst flat wrong.
But then I’m not a lawyer.
This from Findlaw.com…
In Katz v. United States,151 Justice White sought to preserve for a future case the possibility that in ”national security cases” electronic surveillance upon the authorization of the President or the Attorney General could be permissible without prior judicial approval. The Executive Branch then asserted the power to wiretap and to ”bug” in two types of national security situations, against domestic subversion and against foreign intelligence operations, first basing its authority on a theory of ”inherent” presidential power and then in the Supreme Court withdrawing to the argument that such surveillance was a ”reasonable” search and seizure and therefore valid under the Fourth Amendment. Unanimously, the Court held that at least in cases of domestic subversive investigations, compliance with the warrant provisions of the Fourth Amendment was required.152 Whether or not a search was reasonable, wrote Justice Powell for the Court, was a question which derived much of its answer from the warrant clause; except in a few narrowly circumscribed classes of situations, only those searches conducted pursuant to warrants were reasonable. The Government’s duty to preserve the national security did not override the gurarantee that before government could invade the privacy of its citizens it must present to a neutral magistrate evidence sufficient to support issuance of a warrant authorizing that invasion of privacy.153 This protection was even more needed in ”national security cases” than in cases of ”ordinary” crime, the Justice continued, inasmuch as the tendency of government so often is to regard opponents of its policies as a threat and hence to tread in areas protected by the First Amendment as well as by the Fourth.154 Rejected also was the argument that courts could not appreciate the intricacies of investigations in the area of national security nor preserve the secrecy which is required.155
The question of the scope of the President’s constitutional powers, if any, remains judicially unsettled.156 Congress has acted, however, providing for a special court to hear requests for warrants for electronic surveillance in foreign intelligence situations, and permitting the President to authorize warrantless surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information provided that the communications to be monitored are exclusively between or among foreign powers and there is no substantial likelihood any ”United States person” will be overheard.157
With regard to the Truong case:
The origin of what the government refers to as the false dichotomy between foreign intelligence information that is evidence of foreign intelligence crimes and that which is not appears to have been a Fourth Circuit case decided in 1980. United States v. Truong Dinh Hung, 629 F.2d 908 (4th Cir. 1980). That case, however, involved an electronic surveillance carried out prior to the passage of FISA and predicated on the President’s executive power. In approving the district court’s exclusion of evidence obtained through a warrantless surveillance subsequent to the point in time when the government’s investigation became “primarily” driven by law enforcement objectives, the court held that the Executive Branch should be excused from securing a warrant only when “the object of the search or the surveillance is a foreign power, its agents or collaborators,” and “the surveillance is conducted ‘primarily’ for foreign intelligence reasons.” Id. at 915. Targets must “receive the protection of the warrant requirement if the government is primarily attempting to put together a criminal prosecution.” Id. at 916. Although the Truong court acknowledged that “almost all foreign intelligence investigations are in part criminal” ones, it rejected the government’s assertion that “if surveillance is to any degree directed at gathering foreign intelligence, the executive may ignore the warrant requirement of the Fourth Amendment.” Id. at 915.
Brian
That’s a good explanation. What’s the source for that?
Brian,
Thanks for the legalese. Most helpful, if turgid.
Heckler,
I’m not a lawyer either. For that matter, Constitutional Law isn’t an area of expertise for John Hinderaker or anyone else on Powerline blog, so I’m not deferring to their opinions either. But everything I’VE read seems obviously and flagrantly to overstep the boundaries of Executive power, and to go into territory that the Framers intended to keep off limits.
Watching Gonzales try to twist the resolution authorizing the use of force into a justification of the Bush Administration’s illegal surveillance activity was a good sign of their grasping at legal straws to find SOME justification. I find their theory of Executive privilege to be bankrupt and scary as hell. Their abuse of power thus far has been breaktaking, and if Congress rolls over and surrenders their perogatives, we’re done for.
OT, it’s notable that the Judiciary seems to be pushing back against the Administration’s power grab in a big way. Witness the Fourth Circuit Court’s refusal to agree to the Justice Department’s request to transfer Jose Padilla to face new criminal charges. This is the Fourth Circuit we’re talking about: a conservative court. But even THEY seem fed up with the Executive’s power-grab.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/12/22/appeals_court_refuses_to_transfer_terror_suspect/
What can I say, Heckler. It seems obvious to me that they’ve gone way, way, way outside of what’s plausible, much less Constitutional. Regardless of the apologetics to the contrary, they’ve obviously broken the law. Obviously. And if the question, Heckler, is ‘who are you gonna believe–me or your lyin’ eyes?’, it’s pretty clear that I see what’s going on just fine.
Heckler,
http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/constitution/amendment04/05.html
CF
I don’t understand how you can say that it’s obvious that they broke the law. If they are in fact gathering intel the courts have said that is reasonable. I would say that if they tap a number and find no evidence of collusion with any al Qaeda operatives within a short period of time then they need to either drop it or get a warrant.
Have a merry Christmas.
Rage–Nice find, dude. I’ve been bot-stalked!
I always knew those right-wingers weren’t even bothering to read the posts before they respond to them.
Hey, Steve, if you’re out there mouth-breathing somewhere, as the wise old Yiddish say, “hak mir nisht ken tshaynik.”
Quit banging your teakettle.
The problem with unlimited spying is that it is so open to abuse. Former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover kept extensive files of bugged and wiretapped intelligence and uncorroborated or trumped up accusations against many thousands of prominent individuals, and used them as blackmail to get anything he wanted.We really don’t want to go back to those bad old days!
Heckler, you dork, that’s the exact same passage I quoted earlier! It’s from the FISA decision In Re: Sealed Case.
By the way, Hecker, if what the Post’s anonymous source says is true: i.e. that they didn’t even want to NAME PEOPLE or GIVE REASONS, and that Gonzalez was wanting to spy on massive groups of people, would you still defend them?
If fact, are they are any imaginable circumstances where you wouldn’t defend them?
Thank you, Insert_Name,[Run time error in PROCEDURE Stevebot, line 127. Program aborted.]
Rage.
That passage allowed for warrantless searches and evesdropping if we are after “foreign inteligence”. If it is a “law enforcement” operation they can’t do it. The legality of it all hinges on two thing. Did the Congress grant Bush “war powers” and are they gathering “foreign intelligence”
John Hinderacker at Powerline has an exhaustive analysis of the precedents and applicable court cases.
If they’re breaking the law I don’t support them. I about crapped when I first heard about this, but then I quit listening the BS from the networks, including FOX and started listening to people who where actually analysing the laws and precedents and came away with a completely different view. There’s a lot we don’t know but it will all shake out in the end.
I think you guys are all wrong with youre interpretation of this thing.
Heckler,
I don’t watch mainstream media. I do what you do: read blogs, read analysis. And to my ears, this is clearly unconstitutional and part of a larger effort to argue for a WAY larger measure of Presidential power than that intended by the framers. I don’t think one needs to be a legal expert to understand that this is unprecedented and dangerous. I’ll continue to think so until it is demonstrated to be otherwise.
Heckler,I’m leery of trusting anonymous sources (think: Scooter Libby), but everything about this, including the ridiculous rationale given by Gonzalez publicly, suggests that something far more ominous that “foreign intelligence survellience” is going on, and the Post’s source was probably speaking the truth.
The FISA court certainly didn’t like it, now did they?
Whatever your interpretion of Truong, Katz remains good law. Ask any lawyer. Give it another read (thanks, Brian).
And have a good holiday.