January 12, 2006
ACLU to Defend (yet another) Terrorist
I don't know why this is "news" anymore. John from Stop the ACLU also notes that this particular lawyer has a track record of representing Hamas. Typical.
Two civil liberties groups filed legal briefs this week in support of a Virginia man accused of helping to fund Mideast terrorists, arguing that federal agents had no right to search his home without a warrant in 1993. [More]
Posted by: Rusty at
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ACLU and lawyer will get a platform - client will lose and go to jail.
Recall an old movie from the 50's (BW) about a Puerto Rican kid on trial for murder in NY - he's got a Public Defender (Glenn Ford?) but an ACLU type group and Kunstler type lawyer talk his mom in letting them join the team.
The Rad lawyer turns the trial into a circus about race, class, and bigotry. Platform stuff for leftist groups.
The Public Defender (supposedly a 2nd rate lawyer) stays on course and punches hole in the State's case (actually weak).
Public Defender scores one bigtime - acquital looks good - but Rad Lawyer turns around and throws the case deliberately!
He and his group want a convicted martyr for the cause - not an aquitted kid.
Posted by: hondo at January 12, 2006 09:33 PM (3aakz)
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Sounds like a pretty good flick. What's it called?
Reminds me of the recent story where DNA proved an executed man was indeed the murderer after all. I could picture all the Leftard activists pulling their hair out in frustration because an erroneously executed man would have been so good for their cause!
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 13, 2006 12:17 PM (8e/V4)
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"Trial" 1955 - haven't seen it in over 25 years - maybe again this weekend if I can find it. Its worth it - if I remember - not a great movie - but controversial and pissed off the left in the 50s.
Posted by: hondo at January 13, 2006 12:30 PM (3aakz)
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Glenn Ford never popular with the Hollywood left considered "too patriotic". Quiet guy - reserved in his personal believes (leaned conservative) but not out-spoken like Wayne. Good guy - though some Righters might consider his too easy going and accommodating.
Posted by: hondo at January 13, 2006 12:37 PM (3aakz)
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Libs love it when innocent people get killed, that way they can prove they were "right". They actually hate people, and it's only "the cause" they really care about.
I worked in the non-profit sector for 5 years so I saw it up close. They spouted off about "the poor", but treated the poor folks who came calling like dirt, and made volunteers cry out of sheer assholeness, because they couldn't care less about people on an individual basis. And I was a Lib when I figured that out, so I had no axe to grind at the time.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 13, 2006 01:43 PM (8e/V4)
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The ACLU is a cover up for their real organization. NAMBLA.
Posted by: greyrooster at January 13, 2006 08:37 PM (AWtJU)
Dear Weird Emailing Guy
Please don't bother my co-bloggers anymore. You're more than welcome to continue to email me though, I think you're a laugh riot.
Anyway, I forgot to add this to my reply to you; I'm sorry you can't find your stapler, but I didn't take it.
Posted by: Vinnie at
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Swingline!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Rusty at January 12, 2006 07:18 PM (JQjhA)
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If this is the same freak with the Pledge Of Allegiance stuck up his ass, I finally got fed up with him tonight.
J.
Posted by: Jay Tea at January 12, 2006 07:40 PM (kILf9)
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No, this is the doofus referred to in Rusty's post.
Posted by: Vinnie at January 12, 2006 08:14 PM (Kr6/f)
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lol Watch out or he'll burn your house down.
Posted by: RepJ at January 12, 2006 09:12 PM (M7kiy)
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He is absolutely no fun at all. Now how are we supposed to get along if he won't talk any more. Sigh, they just don't make trolls like they used to.
Posted by: Howie at January 13, 2006 08:37 AM (D3+20)
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Shit! I feel left out.
Posted by: greyrooster at January 13, 2006 08:40 PM (AWtJU)
I'm a terrorist (now put me on T.V.!)
Personally, I'd take the porn-star option. But that's just me.
Acting teacher recommends terrorism as a way to 'break in' to showbiz. more...
Posted by: Rusty at
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I know of him vaguely - he's a loony - which is probably why he's an Intel Officer (as I'm currently an Intel NCO - we have to keep our eyes on these guys!). His material is part put-on and part tongue-in-cheek serious (weird huh).
He's OK - don't read too much into the newswire piece.
Hey! This is NY! There aren't too many conservatives around here, so we tend to get a lil' odd sometimes. (yeah - he's passable for a conservative). Believe he's back home now from Iraq tour - some of my E8 buddies were hooked up with him in Tikrit - think most of the 42nd has rotated back.
Intel joke-
Intel Officer say to Intel NCOIC ...
Hey! If I'm in charge, how come you have all the keys, the combinations to the safes, n' get to keep two full 9mm magazines in your desk draw?
Intel NCOIC ...
You say something Sir? Cup of coffee? Its fresh.
Posted by: hondo at January 12, 2006 09:14 PM (3aakz)
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How can u say "don't read much into the report"?? He said you should be a terrorist. That is only a small part of the article. In the full article which is linked to at the top, it gives a link to his old site and I loaded it up and his list which said "By Monroe Mann' on it at the top said you should be a terrorist, become a pornstar, get arrested and some other stupid stuff just like the report said.
He doesn't seem to be "OK" like you suggest. Youre just sticking up 4 him as he's in the army like you. I've never heard anybody tell people to be terrorists or criminals to get ahead. Evn if it was meant to be tounge in cheek (which I doubt it was if you read up more about him) then it is still an incredibly stupid thing to say, especially coming from an army person.
What sort of person in New York city would go around telling people to be terrorists? He should be locked up.
Posted by: dale at January 13, 2006 04:47 AM (TbDdZ)
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Obviously you don't know when your being put on.
Posted by: hondo at January 13, 2006 10:24 AM (3aakz)
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Put on? Check it out! It is real. Monroe Mann exists. His suggestions to actors exists. His own website monroemann.com has a big banner saying "Oscard bound" on it.
Posted by: dale at January 13, 2006 01:37 PM (E3X9v)
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I don't get it - what's your point? I told you his comments were a gag.
Posted by: hondo at January 13, 2006 06:34 PM (3aakz)
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Hi, sorry I thought you meant the story was a gag. Sorry for that. 
Posted by: dale at January 14, 2006 07:22 AM (cnMaw)
City Concilman Sues for right to pray to Allah
Right. As if the ACLU would be opposed to that. Fredericksburg city Councilman fights for right to pray in Jesus name.
Posted by: Rusty at
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A nondenominational prayer? Isn't the whole point of a prayer is to ask assistance from at least one specific higher power?
Posted by: Graeme at January 12, 2006 09:40 AM (25nFa)
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Ya know, I'm all for people praying, until they try to make prayer part of the official process of government. There is no priestly caste in America, and religion has no place in government. If any government officials want to pray, there are lots of hours in the day to do it in private.
Here are some relevant scriptures:
Mat 23:1-2 Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples, saying, The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat:
In other words, they're putting themselves where they don't belong.
Mat 23:3 All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not.
Mat 23:4 For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay [them] on men's shoulders; but they [themselves] will not move them with one of their fingers.
Mat 23:5 But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments,
Mat 23:14 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.
Kelo v. new London, anyone?
Mat 23:23 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier [matters] of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.
Perhaps they should see to the business of state, rather than that of the temple.
Mat 23:25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
The GOP corruption scandal springs to mind here. For all their holier-than-thou churchiness, the Republicans sure don't seem to mind dirty money any more than the dhimmicraps do.
Mat 23:28 Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
No more need be said.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 12, 2006 10:27 AM (0yYS2)
Clinton Fundraising With Moonbat Belafonte
The face of a 'moderate' Democrat revealed. (But how about that Sheri Belafonte? Hot, hot, hot!)
Posted by: Rusty at
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Let the people see the socialist Billary really is. Afterall, it was the Banana Boat boy who said Millions in America want Communist when standing next to the liberal idol Chavez. Will be fun to see how Billary trys to spin this.
Posted by: Andy at January 12, 2006 09:01 AM (tMU4W)
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Who will be a no show?
If they both go - will they pose for a picture - or will she disappear on the otherside of the room?
Only a pre-event poll will know for sure.
Posted by: hondo at January 12, 2006 01:07 PM (3aakz)
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Belafonte is an ungrateful dumb ass who should be sent back to Jamica and never allowed to return to America. He is a white hating dog. Always has been. Always will be.
Posted by: greyrooster at January 13, 2006 08:54 PM (AWtJU)
Teddy Kennedy And The He-Man, Woman-Haters Club
From the Washington Times:
The eight-term senator belonged to an all-male social club -- the Owl -- at Harvard University. The Owl refused to admit women until it was forced to do so during the 1980s, according to records kept by the Harvard Crimson, the student newspaper.So there.A Kennedy spokeswoman said it was an entirely different matter.
"No one can question Senator Kennedy's commitment to equality, justice and civil rights," said Laura Capps. "What he was part of was a social club, not a radical group pushing a radical agenda."
Anyway, she said, even though women were admitted to the university during Mr. Kennedy's tenure, they weren't fully integrated to the campus until much later.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
Posted by: Bluto at
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We can blame Darla! Its all her fault!
Posted by: hondo at January 12, 2006 07:57 AM (3aakz)
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Kennedy and his liberal allies are nothing but hypocrits. It's the classic do what I say, not what I do routine. For Kennedy to lecture anyone on morals is deplorable, and his performance overall in the hearings would make a normal person puke.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 12, 2006 10:09 AM (rUyw4)
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JJ, they're all hypocrites, some just happen to be pro-American. It's disgusting to think of the depths to which we've sunk in this country.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 12, 2006 10:27 AM (0yYS2)
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Don;t forget the other anti-woman group that he is a member of. This group has raped, killed and mistreated women for years.
The group is of course, the Kennedy Family!
Posted by: Miller's Time at January 12, 2006 11:07 AM (ve23U)
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Yeah, well Kennedy is not progressive enough for me. As a progressive (who supports the troops while voting for politicians who cut the military budget every chance they get) I couldn't care less what Mary Jo Kopechne's grandchildren think about Ted Kennedy.
What we need on the Supreme Court is balance as mandated in Article XXIV of the Constitution. Some centrist like Barbara Boxer, George Soros or maybe even a scholar like Al Franken.
Posted by: Hankmeister at January 16, 2006 08:28 AM (rfC/s)
January 11, 2006
Have Dem Senators Gone Too Far With Alito?
From the Associated Press via Yahoo!News:
WASHINGTON - Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito came under aggressive questioning Wednesday from Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee who accused him of inconsistencies on issues ranging from voting rights to ethics to his membership in a conservative organization.I would like to warn Senators Kennedy, Leahy, Biden, and Feinstein, who are conducting this interrogation, that they are subject to the McCain "torture" Amendment regarding "...PERSONS UNDER CUSTODY OR CONTROL OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, to wit:
(a) IN GENERAL.--No individual in the custody or under the physical control of the United States Government, regardless of nationality or physical location, shall be subject to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.Don't you cross that line! I'll call Amnesty International!
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
Posted by: Bluto at
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I wish someone would ask legal questions of his opinions on those who plageurize speeches, and others who drive of bridges leaving passengers to drown. Go ahead Biden and Kennedy, ask him those legal opinions.
Posted by: Steve Sharon at January 11, 2006 12:19 PM (e/IFH)
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I wish someone would ask legal questions of his opinions on those who plageurize speeches, and others who drive off bridges leaving passengers to drown. Go ahead Biden and Kennedy, ask him those legal opinions.
Posted by: Steve Sharon at January 11, 2006 12:19 PM (e/IFH)
ACLU Joins Attempt to Bork Alito
The American Civil Liberties Union has officially announced its opposition to the nomination of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court:
NEW YORK -- The American Civil Liberties Union announced today that it will oppose the nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr. to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the United States Supreme Court.This is undoubtedly a part of a larger Democratic Party scheme. The ACLU hasn't opposed a Supreme Court nominee since Robert Bork.
The bad news for Dems and their co-conspirators at the ACLU is that Alito is turning the confirmation hearings into a wonkfest - a solid, masterful recitation of relevant law in response to antagonistic questioning, with no emotional fireworks to attract much in the way of mainstream media attention.
Some sort of publicity stunt will be necessary to pull off the Borking. I expect that sometime soon, a mainstream media accomplice will discover some bit of old news to try to drum up a lynch mob among the leftwing loonie fringe.
Thanks to Jay Stephenson of Stop the ACLU, who has more, including a petition supporting Alito's nomination.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
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When an anti-American, pro-terrorist organization comes out against you, that should just about cinch it. Alito is in. Hoorah!
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 11, 2006 10:19 AM (rUyw4)
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It won't work - the shrill hysterical aspect of it is so blantantly obvious. Watching the left blogs take that 10 yr old girl case and run with it implying he's a child molester is absurd and funny.
The left attack is sooo typical - only thing missing so far is "he steals candy from babies".
Posted by: hondo at January 11, 2006 10:26 AM (3aakz)
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Apparently the libtards think that people other than lawyers, dummocrats, and mass consumers of tinfoil believe anything the ACLU has to say. They don't realize that having these idiots on their side only helps the conservative cause. The irony can't be cut with a knife.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 11, 2006 11:08 AM (0yYS2)
January 10, 2006
All I Wanna Do Is Wear a Tin-Foil Hat: Crow spouts lunacy
I'm thinking that maybe she was just drinking beer at noon again. Sheryl Crow's time would be much better spent peeling labels off of beer bottles than entering a philisophical discussion on neo-imperialism. Here she is via Michelle Malkin:
Like his father, the President has sought to turn America into "an imperial power and create strongholds over oil-heavy countries in order for us to control and manipulate them," she told us. "Now, if we pull out [of Iraq] we are going to leave a complete and total mess. We don't even know who we're fighting over thereTypical nonsense often heard down on Santa Monica Blvd.
Posted by: Rusty at
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Like a typical liberal moron, her mind is so small and self-centered that it can't hold more than a few ideas at a time, and none of any complexity.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 01:36 PM (0yYS2)
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As I recall, last year she wrote a piece on her website predicting that the Iraq War would produce "bad karma" for President Bush. Her geopolitical commentary was apparently based on her view that war is icky.
Posted by: Mike at January 10, 2006 01:52 PM (ACSbV)
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Why is this so upsetting to you? All she is doing is parroting PNAC neo-conservative ideology as expressed by the national security strategy of 2002.This is common, open information. Tin foil? It's called reality, you might want to look at it some time. Dont take my word for it though, READ THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL SECURITY STRATEGY OF 2002, it is all there.
ernie
Posted by: ernie at January 10, 2006 02:01 PM (X4Dyg)
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Looks like somebody doesn't realise that the movie Syriana is not a documentary.
Posted by: Graeme at January 10, 2006 02:15 PM (05ivy)
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No, really, i feel sorry for you guys, this is common knowledge. I know fox news and rush limbaugh refuse to tell you these things, but what sheryl crow stated is nothing that PNAC and the US NSS 2002 doesnt state outright...please, turn off the tv and read it.
ernie
Posted by: ernie at January 10, 2006 02:20 PM (X4Dyg)
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Hey ernie, don't look now, but there are JOOOOOOOZ under your bed. BOO!
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 02:27 PM (0yYS2)
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IM,
You had better quit scaring 'lil ernie like that. The next thing you know and they will be harvesting his organs, if his were worth harvesting, which I doubt. Too much dope and alcohol would be found in 'lil ernie's system to make his organs worthwhile. However, his brain might be salvaged for use in a remake of Young Frankenstein as a standin for AB Normal.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 10, 2006 03:23 PM (rUyw4)
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Of more importance perhaps is this aspect of the story. Is Lance Armstrong still her boyfriend? Weren't they to be married?
Lance has indicated a desire to run for governor of Texas. A moonbat as a potential First Lady would not be helpful to him.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 10, 2006 03:57 PM (rUyw4)
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I'd like to harvest his organs, and let him watch.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 04:00 PM (0yYS2)
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A la Braveheart, IM? I'll bet 'lil ernie would holla' like the little bitch he his. Haha!
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 10, 2006 04:21 PM (rUyw4)
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I wouldn't offer him the same mercy that Longshanks' men offered to Wallace. God I'm looking forward to when TSHTF, I'm gonna have a ball. My county will be a libtard free zone PDQ.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 04:52 PM (0yYS2)
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>>>Hey ernie, don't look now, but there are JOOOOOOOZ under your bed. BOO!
lmao! pure comedy.
On a more serious note, I couldn' care less if Ms. Crow was right. It wasn't Saddam's oil, it was the Iraqi people's. Now it's back in their hands, and they are selling it to us, and we are buying it at world market prices. If that was Bush's one and only reason for taking Saddam out, fine with me.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 10, 2006 06:09 PM (8e/V4)
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lil' ernie's a trollin' idiot!
Please Agent Smith come back!
Spare us from the 20W Dimleft-bulbs!
Posted by: hondo at January 10, 2006 10:11 PM (3aakz)
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That's why crow spends her time having fun, safe and sound, while the president is left to make hard decisions and the soldiers to carry out the 'icky' decisions.
I don't know why celebrities are asked for their opinion or why they offer them, if they know so little about reality.
Posted by: MathewK at January 10, 2006 10:11 PM (pVHqF)
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Don't wear tin foil hats. They weaken regular frequencies, but actually strengthen most frequencies reserved for military and government usage.
Posted by: A Finn at January 11, 2006 04:21 AM (cWMi4)
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Nice to see one lefty with a sense of humor and assemblance of wit. Gopd help us if all we are left with it screechin' lil' ernie!
come back Shane, come back .. er I mean Smith.
Posted by: hondo at January 11, 2006 09:55 AM (3aakz)
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Apparently Mathew, libtards equate opinion with wisdom, rather than understanding that a valid opinion is based on wisdom, which is derived from exposure to reality and inquiry thereinto.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 11, 2006 11:11 AM (0yYS2)
France in Oakland? Muslims on a Rampage in Bay City
KKK or Nation of Islam? Six of One, Half Dozen of Another. The main difference being, of course, that the Nation of Islam is a bunch of American nutballs who only seem out of place because their actions are being done in the U.S. and not in Muslim countries where such thuggery is par for the course. The Klan-nuts no longer have a single country devoted to Aryan supremacy. Not even South Carolina or West Virginia.
Via Dhimmi Watch.
They weren't your ordinary thugs. Dressed in bow ties and dark suits, nearly a dozen men carrying metal pipes entered a corner store, shattered refrigerator cases and smashed bottles of liquor, wine and beer, terrifying the clerk but stealing nothing.While the Left screams about the similarities between the Republicans and the Taliban because some R's want to pray at football games, they overlook the real threat from the Islamic fifth column.The just wanted to leave a message: Stop selling alcohol to fellow Muslims.
Posted by: Rusty at
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Either this is an old story or the exact same thing happened a few months ago in Oakland. I saw a video clip of a number of blacks dressed in bow ties vandalizing a store. They did the same thing as described here. Does anyone know?
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 10, 2006 10:24 AM (rUyw4)
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Sounds like the same story. But then again, can't stress the idiocy of it too much or too often.
Posted by: Oyster at January 10, 2006 11:53 AM (osKlJ)
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What about the bomb in Starbucks in San Fransicko?
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 11:55 AM (0yYS2)
January 08, 2006
Air America: Sharon-Arafat Murder Conspiracy
Bryan S. and I were on our way to Stone Mountain on Thursday afternoon and I asked Bryan to find us some talk radio to kill some time. It must have been somewhere between 3-4 p.m. local time. Being unfamilliar with Atlanta radio, Bryan found the local Air America affiliate. Big mistake.
The host (some one filling in for Randi Rhodes?) was going on-and-on about what a brave peacemaker Ariel Sharon was. Then, out of nowhere, he inserts a question that went something like this:
"Some might wonder if they did this to Ariel Sharon for the same reason they did the same thing to Yassir Arafat?"The implication being that Yassir Arafat was killed because of his moves to make peace with Israel, and now Sharon is being killed by the same people.
Get it? This is one of those "I didn't accuse any one of trying to murder Sharon, I only asked the question", thus, absolving himself from all responsibility of making the accusation.
Remember to wear your tin-foil helmut while you listen!
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It was the alien mothership what did it.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 08, 2006 06:42 PM (0yYS2)
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See my numerous comments on the conspiracy theories that Leftwingers need to support their fragile worldview. Nothing new here.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 08, 2006 08:14 PM (8e/V4)
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Um, who exactly would be "they" in this scenario?
Posted by: KG at January 08, 2006 08:15 PM (eRMCR)
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I know - its kinda difficult - but if we try hard enough - we can blame it on .... the Jews.
And since both appear to be "natural" causes - from afar no less - it may be those mystical mumblin' kabala whatevers - yeah! Workin' some kind of bizarro chantin' mumbo jumbo projection.
Wow! now we can blame it on ... Madonna! (she is a Jew now - kinda?) - am getting confused here.
Maybe it was ... alien Jews - there's one tribe unaccounted for - right?
Posted by: hondo at January 08, 2006 11:55 PM (3aakz)
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There are so many idiots promoting self-serving conspiracies about the world that it literally makes no sense to track them. The issue is, now, how far off course we are and what sort of correction would be required to get back on course. In other words, we can worry about how we got off course later, but at the moment we don't have that luxury.
I figure we have about a decade to straighten this out, and if we don't it won't make much difference what the heck we do.
Personally I think we, as a species, are just a little bit dumber than we take ourselves to be... and that's how we got screwed up. I suppose we ought to begin to assume that our average intelligence quotient is more like 95 than 100, where it counts. Granted, it's kind of a small mistake but a course deflection of only an inch at the start of a journey can result in finding oneself a thousand miles off course in relatively short order. We assume we're just a little smarter than we actually are, and we end up thinking our asses are holes in the ground.
Posted by: Demosophist at January 09, 2006 12:42 AM (iObV6)
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There are such things as conspiracies. Just not for everything. What I find surprising is that anyone on Air America would say anything nice at all about Sharon.
Posted by: Oyster at January 09, 2006 06:36 AM (YudAC)
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Actually hondo, the new fashionable scapegoat of the day are atheists, we're pretty much behind everything ya know.
But seriously, everyone should read The Lucifer Principle, which explains scapegoating throughout human history, it's a fascinating read, and puts things in clear perspective.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 09, 2006 09:27 AM (0yYS2)
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Are you sure the network you heard this on was not Airhead America? Seems to fit.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 09, 2006 10:12 AM (rUyw4)
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Bortz is on WSB if you like talk radio. But this would have been past Bortz. Hannity is on WSB at that time. There is an ex jarhead on WGST who is pretty good as well. Why you were anywhere near Stone Mt at that time of day with that traffic only convinces me you are nuts.
Posted by: Kevin at January 09, 2006 06:40 PM (t6ozB)
AP-Ipsos Poll On Warrantless Intercepts Used Biased Sample
The AP-Ipsos Poll making the mainstream media rounds claims that a majority of Americans want the administration to obtain warrants for all "eavesdropping":
WASHINGTON - A majority of Americans want the Bush administration to get court approval before eavesdropping on people inside the United States, even if those calls might involve suspected terrorists, an AP-Ipsos poll shows.The AP report on the poll acknowledges that results tended to fall along party lines:
Party affiliation is a factor, too. Almost three-fourths of Democrats and one-third of Republicans want to require court warrants.Then why did the pollsters load the survey with voters registered to the Democratic Party? That's not mentioned in the AP story; you have to visit the Ipsos website and download an Adobe Acrobat file to see just who was questioned [emphasis added]:
REGISTEREDIn 2004, according to Pew Research, Democratic voters had gained a small advantage over Republicans; 33% to 29%.
VOTERS
Strongly Republican .......................... 13
Moderately Republican ..................... 27
Definitely Independent/neither........... 8
Moderately Democrat........................ 32
Strongly Democrat ............................ 20
Refused/not sure............................. -
Total Republican ............................ 40
Total Democrat ............................... 52
So why did AP-Ipsos choose to magnify that split by 300% in their poll? Three guesses, and the first two don't count.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
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Er, to give lil' ernie a new factoid to screech about?
Posted by: hondo at January 08, 2006 01:53 AM (3aakz)
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AP and Pew measure party ID very differently. Both methods are defensible but you cannot compare the results the way you have. There was much discussion of party ID measurement before the 2004 elections; check the archives at mysterypollster.com for details.
Posted by: Joe Incognito at January 08, 2006 09:58 AM (Yw+ky)
3
So, Joe Incognito, what you're saying is that Ipsos makes a reasonable claim that only 40% of the electorate is Republican compared to 52% Democrat? I disagree.
Btw, AP is the news agency; Ipsos does the polls. Therefore, you "cannot compare" AP and Pew the way you have done.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 08, 2006 10:29 AM (RHG+K)
4
Exactly, Joe Incog, that is the reason we had the networks refusing to call states like No. Carolina for Bush when he had a double digit lead. It was obviously done in an attempt to influence the election in favor of the Democrats.
What we needed immediately after the election was an investigation into the pollsters and their methods. I see they are still using their same flawed methods in an attempt to influence public opinion. Of course, they think that reporting the news is no longer their job, but facilitation, now brother, that is what the media is here for. Now we have a media that has entered the realm of Stalinism.
And once they embark on their Stalinist adventure, they should not be surprised by the reception they receive from the American people.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 08, 2006 01:24 PM (rUyw4)
5
Maybe they did it to counter-act the results of last week's Rasmussen Poll: http://mediamatters.org/items/200601030004
Posted by: Drew at January 08, 2006 04:17 PM (UHKaK)
6
Yeah, Dave, Media Matters has a worldwide reputation for objectivity. I would certainly believe anything I read there.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 08, 2006 05:39 PM (rUyw4)
7
Kinda like that untarnished cradle of objectivity, the DPB
Posted by: Drew at January 08, 2006 06:02 PM (oxMjD)
8
I don't pretend to be objective, Drew. I'm not an oh-so-fashionable citizen of the world. I'm on America's side.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 08, 2006 11:23 PM (RHG+K)
9
Understood and appreciated.
Posted by: Drew at January 08, 2006 11:38 PM (oxMjD)
10
This is just manufactured outrage. It's an artifact of their coding scheme and the nuances of how people will respond when asked about party identification, which of course is not 1:1 with what they do in the voting booth.
Posted by: Anonymous at January 11, 2006 11:47 AM (CG5Pe)
This Is Their Rising Star?
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Sen. Barack Obama on Saturday said the United States will not be successful in Iraq unless the political landscape better represents the country's minorities.
I keep writing something and then erasing it and writing something else. Then I erase it. So I'll sum my thoughts up with one word:
Idiot.
If you read the whole article, note the minority that is noticeably absent from Monsewer Obama's list.
I'll say one thing, the last thing a fledgling democracy needs is exported American liberal stupidity like affirmative action.
Posted by: Vinnie at
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The real question is, did the Senator address Iraq's health care situation?
Posted by: Cardinal Martini at January 08, 2006 04:13 AM (nLV11)
2
Yeesh. He's all over the map. He comes up with an arbitrary "six months or so", longer than a few weeks, shows little optimism in spite of massive successes, last year he calls for a phased pullout, this year he says it's too fragile to leave, but wants a "realistic" time frame. He's worried about the Sunni minority which was pulled along kicking and scratching all the way, but where's mention of the Kurds who are likely to be the most successful democratic faction?
Nope ... gotta make sure the dissenters and trouble makers are represented fairly. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?
Posted by: Oyster at January 08, 2006 05:38 AM (YudAC)
3
A better question is how could the people of Illinois elect this idiot to the Senate. I fear we are heading down that same road the British are on.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 08, 2006 09:56 AM (rUyw4)
4
I listened to this moron on TV one night, and he made a great deal of noise about how his dad was a deadbeat third-world goatball-licker who knocked up a stupid liberal white girl then absconded back to Africa without contributing anything to his son's raising. (Shocking, I know. I have a hard time believing it too. Unheard of.) He also prattled on a while about how the proletariat must rise up and overthrow the evil white bourgeoisie, like his stupid liberal white whore mother, but in the whole screed, he said nothing of any substance whatsoever. The fact that Chris Matthews fellated him live on national television was in itself enough to convince me that once again, the dhimmis have picked a solid loser, guaranteed to get only the hardcore liberal moron vote. Bless them.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 08, 2006 10:21 AM (0yYS2)
5
"... but in the whole screed, he said nothing of any substance whatsoever."
Seems to be catching.
Posted by: Drew at January 08, 2006 06:23 PM (oxMjD)
6
JJ, I've been to Illinois, but only because I have cousins there, and from what I've seen, combined with their history of purposely electing the biggest crooks they can find, we're lucky Obama was the worst they did.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 09, 2006 10:34 AM (0yYS2)
7
Yeah, Drew, you caught it on the previous thread. It's still with you.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 09, 2006 10:35 AM (rUyw4)
8
Nothing that a good tree hug can't cure.
Posted by: Drew at January 09, 2006 11:53 AM (UHKaK)
9
Go hug a black locust, that'll cure you of the urge, what with their poisonous, inch long thorns.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 10, 2006 08:51 PM (0yYS2)
10
No, you go hug a black locust, what with their poisonous, inch long thorns.
Posted by: Drew at January 11, 2006 05:16 PM (UHKaK)
January 06, 2006
And You Thought OJ's Lawyers Were Weasels
Haroon Rashid Aswat, one of the men who was trying to set up an al Qaeda training camp in Oregon, is fighting his court-ordered extradition to the US on the basis that he might be tortured. Many thanks to liberal imbeciles motivated by partisan politics, notably Senator Dick Durbin, who have so mangled the definition of torture that virtually anything now qualifies.
But that's not the outrageous part.
Read what Aswat's lawyer, Gareth Peirce, has to say:
“It shows the extent to which the United States is manipulating evidence and pressuring witnesses. All that is said about Haroon Aswat is that in 1999 he travelled to a farm in the US which was considering setting up a Muslim community and, after a few days, left. That’s it — that’s the evidence.”Never mind that American James Ujaama, Aswat's accomplice has already confessed and agreed to testify against Aswat, all that was going on was planning for a "Muslim community". You know, like the Amish or the Mennonites.
If the Amish and Mennonites were into global terrorism.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
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The judge still approved his move to the US. Apparently the real concern of the UK was that he was going to be put in a cage in Gitmo.
His 'lawyers' are appealing.
Posted by: Fred Fry at January 06, 2006 08:17 AM (HJnrm)
2
When TSHTF, it's going to be fun, because it'll be open season on muslims, liberals, and lawyers, and rightfully so.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 06, 2006 08:23 AM (0yYS2)
3
I get so tired of seeing these termites immediately go on offense whenever they get called on their murderous behavior. One thing islamofacists are good at is lying and playing the aggrieved party. I was listening to Hugh Hewitt and he had a guy from CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations) expressing shock that anyone would suspect a muslim of doing anything anti-social.. how they were all just patriotic Americans.. blah, blah, blah. Then he tried to slip it by that Hitler's atrocities were carried out in the name of Christianity. At that point Hewitt put the skids to this guy's rambling. The point is, this guy was so smooth. He had an answer for EVERYTHING. Afterward, people were calling in and saying, "What about so and so? He's on trial for terrorist activities and wasn't he part of your group (CAIR)??" This happened over and over and the CAIR spokeshole never would cop to the fact that they have terrorists in their ranks. I guess the saddest part is there is no shortage of self-loathing lawyers who can't wait to defend these pukes.
Posted by: Richard at January 06, 2006 08:52 AM (W8EsU)
4
Judge Dick is a dick.
Posted by: greyrooster at January 06, 2006 09:29 PM (ZsYgO)
January 01, 2006
Schumer Seeks Excuses For NSA Leaks
In a remarkably disingenuous statement, Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NYC), has telegraphed the political shenanigans Democrats will employ to exploit the security leaks that exposed US tactics in the War on Terror. The Justice Department recently announced that they will investigate the sources used by the New York Times in their stories about monitoring of international phone calls and emails between Americans and suspected al Qaeda operatives. And rightly so; whoever leaked to the NYT should spend a few years in Leavenworth.
Schumer is setting up the rationale for excusing acts that damaged national security interests. To put a point on it, he's suborning treason for political purposes.
From the Associated Press via Yahoo!News:
WASHINGTON - The investigation into leaks about a domestic spying program should determine whether the motivation was damaging security or revealing a potentially illegal activity, a Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee said Sunday.Schumer is incorrect."There are differences between felons and whistleblowers, and we ought to wait 'til the investigation occurs to decide what happened," said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.
There is a process for Federal employees to become officially recognized as whistleblowers through the US Office of the Inspector General. Recognition by the OIG protects the employee from retaliatory employment actions, and triggers an OIG investigation of the charges made by the whistleblower.
It's not enough to simply declare oneself a whistleblower. And whistleblower disclosures are never sanctioned to outside agents, including and especially the Press.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto.
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Bluto
On a personal level - Schumer's our own fault. Republican Party or any alternative is non-existant in NYS.
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 11:40 AM (3aakz)
2
True. Nearly half of New Yorkers (those outside the NYC Metro area) are not represented in the Senate, or in Presidential elections. I don't see a solution short of making NYC a separate state, and that's not going to happen as long as the plump upstate cow can be milked.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 01, 2006 11:50 AM (RHG+K)
3
Staten Island tried breaking away - but to no avail. All true, but Bluto - the Albany region is pretty blue too.
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 11:57 AM (3aakz)
4
Wow, look at all the misinformation here!
The OIG can't help you when the illegal activity stems from an executive order of the President.
And they aren't able to do anything substantive for whistleblowers anyway, let alone keep them from being retaliated against.
When the President commits an illegal act, the press is about the only place you can go.
Posted by: IO ERROR at January 01, 2006 12:21 PM (vhWf1)
5
ERROR,
if it's illegal, then impeach him. But it's not illegal.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 01, 2006 12:29 PM (8e/V4)
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The Justice Dept. needs to go after the people who leaked the NSA story just exactly like they went after the people who leaked the info on Plame. Anyone who says any different is a hypocrit of monumental proportions.
Jail the reporters, do whatever it takes within the law to find the traitors. Then prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. These traitors need to be punished.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 12:48 PM (rUyw4)
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IO ERROR: you have lived up to your name. You don't know what you're talking about.
I have been a whistleblower. I do.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 01, 2006 12:49 PM (RHG+K)
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JJ,
the difference between the NSA leak and the Plame leak is that the former actually impacts our national security, and the latter was just gotcha politics.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 01, 2006 12:56 PM (8e/V4)
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True, Carlos, but the libs have blazed the way on this one, and now we need to make them toe the line. No matter what they say, we should keep the pressure on, no matter what.
Now we have their butts in the furnace, and I say turn the fire up. Don't let up one tiny bit. Use their own rhetoric against them, do whatever it takes to get these traitors and get them in jail.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 01:24 PM (rUyw4)
10
I'm tired of the Democrats coming up with bogus reasons to legitimize their inexcusable political games. It's time Schumer and his ilk were voted out of office.
Posted by: RepJ at January 01, 2006 01:26 PM (6krEN)
11
JJ,
agreed. We have their balls in a vice now, and they're going to try to politicize their way out of it. But it won't work. If Bush got caught doing something "illegal", then impeach him already and have done with it. But it's not illegal, and their balls aint going nowhere.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 01, 2006 01:29 PM (8e/V4)
12
Really, I'm going to enjoy watching the Democrats gyrating in every direction trying to cover their asses. It is truly going to be funny, and I await it with anticipation, starting today with the dumb ass Schumer.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 01:34 PM (rUyw4)
13
Listening to calls going across the US border is no different than searching me and my stuff when I reenter the US on Wednesday. They can and will go through everything as you have no rights when it comes to Immigration and Customs rights to rifle through your things, your cellphones, your computer, your wallet, and ask you questions about why you have certain things and where you have been.
So what makes a phone call so special? If I mail some goods back to avoid customs, they still have the right to open the box. This is lots of hot air. The open issue is that the story claims that the Govt didn't listen to all calls. When I was living here I was under the assumption that I was being listened too. But then I must be smarter than these Democrats. Too bad they were smart enough to get elected!
----------
If Bush is really out to get you, why isn't your butt in gitmo?
New Yorkers are smart. Hilary tried to move into their state, and they sent her right back to DC!
Posted by: Fred Fry at January 01, 2006 01:36 PM (7N3qE)
14
Another point, Carlos, the people who leaked the NSA story are traitors and need to be dealt with as traitors, not merely as people who just broke the law because they disagreed with the practice. I would like to see them prosecuted as the traitors they are, and whatever the ultimate sentence is for treason, it should be enforced if these people are found guilty.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 01:40 PM (rUyw4)
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Chucky Schumer is himself a real pain in the rear he just canta ct with enough common sense be get it all streight he should just resign and save his fool face
Posted by: sandpiper at January 01, 2006 02:01 PM (JtcRt)
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"The War on Terror"
Every time I see that phrase I wince. I think it's a horrible propaganda strategy. By declaring "war" on terrorism we're dignifying every terrorist as a soldier rather than what they are, criminals.
It's an important distinction. Soldiers, even those who fight and kill our soldiers, have done no wrong. They deserve to be treated honorably so long as they fight honorably. Terrorists are criminals. They are not conscripted to fight under the laws of their nation; their acts are violations of the laws of their own people (and everyone else's.) The only difference between their crimes and other murders and kidnappings is their cause. When we make terrorism special we make their cause special too, and this can only encourage them.
Posted by: ShannonKW at January 01, 2006 02:04 PM (dT1MB)
17
Shannon,
You must be one miserable guy. There is nothing that you don't find fault with. Geez, man, it is a war whether you like it or not, and it does not dignify these terrorists, no matter what you say.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 02:18 PM (rUyw4)
18
hondo in a cynical Blofeld (I still have the cat) moment -
What if its ... "not leaked"?
What if its ... "planted".
Can the MSM be both "enemy" and "gullible fool"?
How do you thwart a domestic opponent? Noooo - you don't kill them ... you "use" them.
Programs apparently ... dated ... n' scaled back.
Targets specific ... and accepted consciously & "subconsciously" by majority of both political persuasions.
Big elections '06
Pity "successes" can not be exposed (classified) ... unless
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 02:22 PM (3aakz)
19
>>>Soldiers, even those who fight and kill our soldiers, have done no wrong. They deserve to be treated honorably so long as they fight honorably. Terrorists are criminals.
Shannon,
This is a WAR, not a criminal prosecution. Bill Clinton thought it was a criminal prosecution too, and that's why he didn't take Osama bin Laden into custody when Sudan offered him the opportunity. He claimed not to have had enough evidence to hold them. That attitute is directly responsible for 9/11. Liberal morons.
Soldiers fighting for Hitler did plenty wrong, and we hung lots of them. So no problem if they want to call themselves "soldiers". And, by the way, jihadist "soldiers" do not fight honorably when they kill and headchop our civilians by the thousands, regardless of what you want to call them.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 01, 2006 03:37 PM (8e/V4)
20
Have I spooked the lib/leftists yet?
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 06:30 PM (3aakz)
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Something spooked them because they disappeared. Probably the truth spooked them, as they have no defense against it.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 07:43 PM (rUyw4)
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same ole shit, you all still sound like little pussies peeing yourselves continuously. Kill freedom for freedoms sake. How virtuous! Your founding fathers would be on your side for sure (yes stalin and hitler)...you dicks are amazing.
eat shit paste eaters.
e
Posted by: ernie at January 01, 2006 08:26 PM (X4Dyg)
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paste eaters????
Who has a copy of Dr Demento's Dictionary?
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 08:31 PM (3aakz)
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ernie,
You little bed-wetting pin head, begone! Before someone gives me your IP address and I hunt you down like the worm you are.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 01, 2006 08:33 PM (rUyw4)
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Maybe - pasta or pasties? Both - what's your point?
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 08:40 PM (3aakz)
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ernie,
when you Libs bring on your "revolution" I hope and pray that you're at the head of that mob. I want it so bad its killing me.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 01, 2006 08:41 PM (8e/V4)
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Edible pasties, yeah - sure ... not the tassles though. I'm confused!
Posted by: hondo at January 01, 2006 08:44 PM (3aakz)
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The problem for Dems is most people see the leaks as defacto aimed at getting them killed.
Believe me after 9/11 ordinary people don't live in total denial, they do think about it. The idea that terrorists could "never" attack us at home is dead.
Whats the upside for Dems to be on the side of leakers trying to get the average American killed (by shutting down stuff that oh I dunno actualy WORKS?)
Can someone tell me that? Where's the upside for Dems? Considering that most people figure they are weak on terrorists to begin with?
Posted by: Jim Rockford at January 02, 2006 12:32 AM (4878o)
29
Schumer incorrectly thinks this is even remotely like the Plame case whereby when one "leaks" the name of an agent, it has to be that they know they've put someone in danger to be prosecuted. He's trying hard to put these two issues in the same classification. For one thing, Plame was never in danger as proven by the fact that she and Schmoopsie immediately went on the lecture circuit and jaunted all over the country to tout his book.
Posted by: Oyster at January 02, 2006 05:05 AM (YudAC)
30
Agent Brown asks, did Improbulus Maximus catch his sausage yet?
Posted by: Agent Smith at January 02, 2006 06:23 AM (b1Uko)
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IM might make sausage out of you dumb ass agents!
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 02, 2006 08:45 AM (rUyw4)
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Do you suppose Chucky Shumer would drop the whole domestic spying BS charge if he could be convinced that it was motivated by trying catch terrorists not trample civil librerties?
Or would that motivation make him oppose it even more?
Posted by: Stephen Macklin at January 02, 2006 08:47 AM (DdRjH)
33
Stephen, you are right. It is nothing more than Bush Derangement Syndrome. If the NSA discovered a plot to explode a nuclear device in NYC, Schumer would still not be satisfied. It's not about the intelligence.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 02, 2006 09:18 AM (rUyw4)
34
ernie:
As the NSA routinely intercepts communications throughout the globe, some of which is intercepted in foreign countries, could you please tell me how the law is being broken? especially when the intercept is being initiated by an inbound communication to a person living inside the United States ?
Could you also explain the difference of intercepting a phone call from a foreign country to a U.S citizen, versus the U.S Customs checking the content of a package sent to a U.S citizen from abroad?
Why is it illegal to check suspected terrorist communications originating from abroad, but it is legal to intercept U.S citizens mail from abroad and search them?
Posted by: dave at January 02, 2006 10:12 AM (CcXvt)
35
Left or right It seems that every one always thinks that the laws should only apply to others. Honesty is always the best policy: at some point the truth almost always comes out. Not always but usually. And name calling and threats tsk tsk tsk I still remember when IM called me a bed wetter. It really hurt and I told my mom.
Posted by: john Ryan at January 02, 2006 10:41 AM (ads7K)
36
Really, John, you should move out of your mother's house. They have a name for the malady that afficts you, but hey, since you deep-sixed the name calling, I will just say it is the malady without a name. But, on the plus side, happy New Year to you and your mother!
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 02, 2006 11:09 AM (rUyw4)
37
poor ernie would SHOCKED, SHOCKED to learn that our government has every right to check inbound packages too (let alone phone calls), and to do body cavity searches at customs. Can you imagine the shitstorm of hysteria when the Libs finally figure that one out. Of course, it's all "Bush's" doing.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 02, 2006 12:03 PM (8e/V4)
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lil' ernie is a troll
lil' ernie stops by to screech and rage solely to get a re-action.
lil' ernie will not engage - that's not what he wants.
lil' ernie wants your attention (of any kind), like a child wants ice cream.
So, why in God's name do some of you keep givin' this kid ice cream?
He is solely a theme to practice one-line jokes off.
Posted by: hondo at January 02, 2006 01:11 PM (3aakz)
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The same reason we feed the dumb ass agents. Just for the fun of it.
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 02, 2006 02:37 PM (rUyw4)
40
hondo's Charlie Brown moment ...
Aaarrrggghhhh!!!!
Posted by: hondo at January 02, 2006 05:58 PM (3aakz)
41
"Good grief, hon.., er, Charlie Brown"!
Posted by: jesusland joe at January 02, 2006 06:33 PM (rUyw4)
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And poor john ryan still thinks the truth prevails. The truth comes at a cost and is far too painful for most.
Posted by: Oyster at January 02, 2006 07:21 PM (YudAC)
43
This is truly dissapointing...42 previous comments and not one "put-a-bullet-in-the-back-of-a-liberal's-head-and-a-toss-'em-into-a-ditch" call. Maximus on vacation?
Posted by: Artemus Gordon at January 02, 2006 11:08 PM (oxMjD)
44
artie:
Do you mean the way her husband Bill acted during his terms, in exactly the same way that President Bush has done? Not a problem. One correction: this was done avec, not sans, Congressional input - where do you think the leak came from?
Btw, you might find this 1982 NYT story interesting:
COURT SAYS U.S. SPY AGENCY CAN TAP OVERSEAS MESSAGES
By DAVID BURNHAM, SPECIAL TO THE NEW YORK TIMES (NYT) 1051 words Published: November 7, 1982
A Federal appeals court has ruled that the National Security Agency may lawfully intercept messages between United States citizens and people overseas, even if there is no cause to believe the Americans are foreign agents, and then provide summaries of these messages to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 03, 2006 01:27 AM (RHG+K)
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If we all agree that the needed ends justify these extraordinary means...
artie,
Bill Clinton Signed Executive Order that allowed Attorney General to do searches without court approval
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo/eo-12949.htm
Jimmy Carter Signed Executive Order on May 23, 1979: "Attorney General is authorized to approve electronic surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information without a court order."
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo12139.htm
[Now I'll stand back and watch you dance.]
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 02:13 AM (8e/V4)
46
What dirty work has this reptile been up to besides being such a liar?
Posted by: sandpiper at January 03, 2006 10:18 AM (8W+Ht)
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artie,
re "superceding" FISA, and "Senate consent", if the Carter and Clinton EO's didn't violate FISA (presumably because they "advised" the Senate), then neither did Bush's order:
BUSH: CONGRESS MEMBERS WERE BRIEFED ON EAVESDROPPING -- "A DOZEN TIMES..."
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/12/17/D8EI32N00.html
RE “if you’re not guilty you have nothing to worry about” school of constitutional law", well that's just too bad then. If it wasn't a story then, then it's not a story now. You don't get to be selective about your outrage.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 10:42 AM (8e/V4)
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>>>"Well, the ones who've spoken out didn't seem to know anything about it.
Because they are not members of the Senate Intelligence Commitee. Advise and consent comes from the committees-- not open sessions of Congress. And if certain politicians are "outraged" that they didn't know about it, boo woop dee doo. They're on the wrong committee.
>>>"I have not seen nor have I heard of one yet who has stepped forward in the President's defense and said, "Wait a second, we knew all about this."
Of course not, they think they have Bush by the balls. And even if they did say that, it wouldn't be reported anyway.
You have yet to show me how this is materially different than the Carter/Clinton EOs. Until you do, this is just gotcha politics. Keep dancing.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 11:01 AM (8e/V4)
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>>>"As far as Bush support "probably not being reported", you lost me there. More of that "MSM" stuff I guess."
Unless you can show me that Dems are in the business of carrying water for Bush, then it's a non-issue that you, Artie, haven't heard Democrat senators rushing to his defense. And even if they did, it wouldn't be reported. I stand by that.
What does George Will say, in particular, about this? I think you would have quoted him already if it was that bad.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 11:26 AM (8e/V4)
50
artie,
if you and George Will are right-- that Bush didn't tell Congress-- then I capitulate. Bush claims to have told them on several occassions. Do you have proof that he didn't?
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 12:05 PM (8e/V4)
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artie,
do you have proof that Clinton informed the Senate? That Carter did? Until I see the evidence I'm going to assume they didn't.
In fact, Clinton did not even feel he needed to inform them:
"The Clinton administration argued that the president has "inherent authority" to order physical searches — including break-ins at the homes of U.S. citizens — for foreign intelligence purposes without any warrant or permission from any outside body."
http://www.nationalreview.com/york/york200512200946.asp
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 12:26 PM (8e/V4)
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Interesting that Clinton would even feel the need for warrantless break ins-- even before 9/11. What was the urgency? I've said it before and I'll say it again. Libs are soft stalinists and have a real totalitarian streak.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 12:59 PM (8e/V4)
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Wow, you guys have been busy without me. For those who wondered, I went to visit family for a couple of days, and had a great time. I watched a bald eagle fly over my sister's house all day Monday; she has a house on the river in a gorge in the mountains and the area is a wildlife haven, where ducks, geese, cormorants, kingfishers, coots, seagulls, ospreys, hawks, and eagles are as common as pigeons in the city. Monday the temperature was around 70 degrees, with a fair sky and a warm southern breeze. Damn it's good to live in the South. There's also the benefit of having very few liberals around, which in itself is enough reason to love the place.
Anyway, I'm still too tired from the trip, too blissed out from the experience, and too busy planning a real estate investment to comment much, except to say that Schumer and the rest of the libtards should be tied together by the neck en masse, like a huge, stinking daisychain, with a large stone at either end for sinkers, and shoved off into an abandoned strip mine, then the mine should be filled in.
P.S.
Please remember the families of the trapped coal miners in West Virginia. This episode reminds me of something that happened in my hometown 25 years ago, when another 13 men were buried in a mine explosion that was heard 50 miles away, and in which several children I was in school with lost their fathers.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 03, 2006 01:14 PM (0yYS2)
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>>>It says right in the document you provided that he did, through his Deputy AG.
It says no such thing. It only says the AG is "authorized to approve physical searches." Given that Clinton felt he had "inherent authority" to make those searches without Congressional approval, and given there's no proof that he ever sought that approval, I see no reason beyond gotcha politics why this is an issue now.
It boils down to this, if Clinton does it, everybody (including Republicans) is ok with it; if Bush does it, Dems are up in arms about it. The fact that our enemy will benefit from it doesn't factor into their reasoning. You wonder why we think you're traitors?
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 01:23 PM (8e/V4)
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Wasn't one of Clinton's intelligence gathering orders used to enact surveillance on subversive groups after the Oklahoma bombing? so that would also be terrorism related, although domestic suspects were spied upon.
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 01:47 PM (CcXvt)
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artie,
her testimony before the Senate was about this so-called "inherent authority", not about a specific request for a search or wiretap.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 01:55 PM (8e/V4)
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artie:
What about communications that are intercepted outside the United States, that focus on specific foreign phone numbers?
If those communications are inbound to the United States you believe they require a warrant?
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 02:02 PM (CcXvt)
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I wouldn't know about "Newsweek" it's a leftard rag.
So let me see. you have no specific idea what types of surveillance are done by the NSA, if the intercepts were made abroad, or if they were targetted, but Newsweek prints an article, and you're believing we're in a Stalinist society now?
It's amazing that whole argument about foreign -> domestic -> protected, I'm assuming then the U.S postal service have to apply for a warrent to open packages sent to me from outside the country, or a Customs agent needs a warrent to open my suitcase in the airport?
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 02:18 PM (CcXvt)
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I don't like powers that answer to no one and what I'm seeing now smacks of Stalinism, at least to me.
Posted by: artie at January 3, 2006 01:30 PM
Is the statement I specifically referred to.
An immediate family member of mine, works for British SIGINT, and while he did not tell me specifics due to the OSA, he did tell me that the British MOD routinely intercepted communications for allied countries, and passes on intelligence they had intercepted themselves if deemed important for an allies national security.
Not all information the NSA gathers, or uses comes from domestic surveillance / sources.
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 02:53 PM (CcXvt)
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The same thirty years of surveillance law, that turned out ineffective and lacking when three thousand of your fellow countrymen were killed in a terrorist attack?
So let's make one of those "ticking timebomb" scenario's everyone is so crazy about.
September 8th 2001, a routine random sampling of telecommunication sources identifies an inbound communication to Mohammed Atta in the U.S, which is identified as suspicious and the data is marked for extrapolation by an analyst.
You're telling me that the U.S should wait to use information received in random sampling / targetted samplings before using the intelligence within? the problem with your scenario is the fact that it is known that terrorists routinely use "disposable phones" / email addresses or use a phone once.
Our enemies are not limited by law, and know they can evade detection by using disposable communication methods, you however believe it is correct to seek blindfolding our eyes, unless a court rules that it's "ok" to use intelligence. Wow.
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 03:57 PM (CcXvt)
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How about the judicial block on recovering information stored on Zacarias Moussaoui's Laptop Computer?
He was identified before September 11th as a terrorism suspect (as documented in the "Phoenix memo") who also attended the flight schools? However the court decided that information was not to be recovered.
Your own point, refers to numerous Judicial blocks of actionable intelligence pre-9/11.
Actually I don't believe the plans were laid out in full, but used code words, and as such may already be known, due to the fact the NSA do nothing but code breaking.
You want Judges to tell you what intelligence is actionable and what to act on? do you take your car to a barbers shop to be fixed too?
If you're receiving communications from people already identified as having ties to terrorists, you're saying the suspect has the right for a court to decide the link?
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 04:33 PM (CcXvt)
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All the law in the world won't stop it. Lawmakers often pass a law to do this or that. Because they have to to make it look like they are doing stuff. So do the new laws protect us? Well maybe a little bit. Bluto made the point to me the other day about yes we are less free now than say 1900 but do you really miss those freedoms? Well no not really I don't know any better. But the same argument was used by British Loyalists. At the time citizens of the British Empire were the most free in the world and how dare Americans want more. So I ask you, would you have been a loyalist then? Should the governemt seek to find attackers before they strike hell yes and with whatever means they have during wartime. What most people miss is that this info cannot be used in court. It may be used to seek a warrant to get info that can be used in court or used to prevent an enemy action. People worried about Gov't eyeballs are about 100 years late. Why do they not worry about corporate info collection? That is prevalent and can be bought by the gov't or whomever? It upsets me but not too much because I never thought "they" were not watching already. We should limit government as much as we can just because that's what we are about. But this "evil" spy idea is a bit much. I doubt innocents have too much to worry about. Do you really think they waste time when they pick up nothing? No they go looking for the real deal. To not look for terrorists using what methods we can equates to tuning off the tracking of the USSR during the Cuban missle crisis. If you want to be pissed at someone for taking your privacy and freedom try UBL or Zawahiri or Zaqueery.
Posted by: Howie at January 03, 2006 04:53 PM (D3+20)
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It's amazing after September 11th, and the original World Trade Center attack, people are still calling for terrorism to be handled by the Law.
While the F.B.I has an APB out for Bin Laden since long before September 11th 2001, I am sure he will not be captured by U.S law enforcement.
However, that aside the President has within his authority to issue an Executive Order, in the case of In re Neagle (1890), the Supreme Court said that the President was not limited to laws that had been passed by Congress, but the President could administer laws based on those growing out of the Constitution itself, international relations and "all the protections implied by the nature of the Government under the Constitution"
Source: Government By Decree.
An Executive Order, can be classified and unavailable to the public, and can in some cases supercede things that Congress have ruled against.
People such as yourself after September 11th 2001, were asking "What did the President know? When?" and asked why our intelligence was flawed, now when the Government follows suggestions made in the 9/11 Commission people want the judicial branch to rule on issues of national security. This is a nation of laws, and if the President issued an EO to authorize communication interception by the NSA, I'm not sure who will be calling it illegal.
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 05:07 PM (CcXvt)
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artie:
I'm going to give you two examples, as one referers to a controversial act by President Clinton, I'll give another by President Reagan, I do not adopt the philosophy of "Clinton did it too!" or "But Clinton got a Blowjob!!"
In 1996 there was an attempt to pass the Heritage Areas act in Congress, but the effort went down in defeat. Under the original act, Congress would have the authority to designate areas of land as heritage zones. Undeterred by the failed package, the Clinton administration simply repackaged the act and issued it as an executive order. On September 11th 1997 President Clinton issued Executive Order 13061, which "officially" established the American Heritage Rivers Initiation (AHRI).
President Ronald Reagan's executive order of September 1986, which authorized arms shipments to Iran, was a classified order and therefore not known to the public. He had to postpone notification for the order. If information had leaked out, arm could have come to the hostages that were being held in Lebanon by groups closely tied with Iran. Still, this situation illustrates the breadth of this presidential prerogative
Posted by: dave at January 03, 2006 05:28 PM (CcXvt)
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Bottom line one: artie's problem is that he doesn't realize we're at war. Nor does artie seem to realize that much more menacing things than this NSA surveillance have happened over and over again in times of war - in this country.
Adams and the Alien and Sedition Act, Lincoln and the suspension of habeas corpus, Roosevelt and the internment of Japanese Americans. None of these involved theoretical hair-splitting, either; each was an out-and-out suspension of the normal ways of doing business, which had serious consequences for real people.
And all of them ended when the threat passed.
Bottom line two: artie doesn't give two shits in a flying rat's ass about anyone's civil liberties. The bobbing and weaving inherent in his posts proves to my satisfaction that artie's motives are political, not libertarian.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 03, 2006 05:33 PM (RHG+K)
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Bluto once again sums the thread up quite nicely for us.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at January 03, 2006 07:04 PM (8e/V4)
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My thread artie. Pick another one to spew DU propaganda and bile.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 04, 2006 01:29 AM (RHG+K)
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I never cease to be amazed how idiot liberals like artie can talk/type all day long, producing thousands of words, and say exactly nothing.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at January 04, 2006 09:18 AM (0yYS2)
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Like I thought...no guts. Well, as long as YOU read it, I'm happy. What a fag.
Posted by: artie at January 04, 2006 11:12 AM (UHKaK)
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Actually, I don't have to read them, just put a check in the "delete" box.
Now you face a choice. You can decide to stop pitching fits, or you can be banned, as well as flushed. And the banning will involve both your home computer in Appleton and your work machine in Oshkosh.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 04, 2006 11:24 AM (RHG+K)
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Ah, you finally took a few minutes to track my IP address and location through my regional provider--not exactly a technical triumph but likely big news to you. Any other personal info you need, feel free to ask. Presented with these choices, I'll take banning (go two other IPs never used at this site yet!)
Posted by: artie at January 04, 2006 12:05 PM (UHKaK)
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Where exactly is Mountain View, anyway, northern or southern California? That is where I traced YOUR IP to ...
Posted by: artie at January 04, 2006 12:57 PM (UHKaK)
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I couldn't tell you. I live near Syracuse.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at January 04, 2006 01:53 PM (RHG+K)
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lol. I guess you might want to leave the "tracing" to someone who knows what they're doing artie.
Posted by: dave at January 04, 2006 03:10 PM (CcXvt)
December 24, 2005
A Reporter With A Mission
From the Associated Press:
A classified radiation monitoring program, conducted without warrants, has targeted private U.S. property in an effort to prevent an al-Qaida attack, federal law enforcement officials confirmed Friday.Let's be real clear on this. Federal officers do not require a warrant to be present on public property. They do not require a court order to monitor radiation levels. And if they had not been doing so following 9/11, they would have been derelict in their duty.While declining to provide details, including the number of cities and sites monitored, the officials said the air monitoring began after the Sept. 11 attacks and was conducted from publicly accessible areas, which they said made warrants and court orders unnecessary.
U.S. News and World Report first reported the program on Friday. The magazine said the monitoring was conducted at more than 100 Muslim sites in the Washington, D.C. area — including Maryland and Virginia suburbs — and at least five other cities when threat levels had risen: Chicago, Detroit, Las Vegas, New York and Seattle.
This story is one of the most egregious examples of agenda journalism I've ever seen. Every mention of court orders and warrants in the story above is a deliberate attempt to make it appear that something sinister is happening, when, in fact, Federal agents simply are doing their lawful duty. Where were the much vaunted eleventy-seven layers of editors when writer Larry Margasak was puking out this profoundly biased attack piece?
What the hell is wrong with the author? Well, Margasak is on a mission to end the Bush Presidency and destroy as many Republicans as possible. Josef Goebbels would have loved him.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto, where agenda journalists are treated as the dangerous vermin that they are.
Posted by: Bluto at
12:04 AM
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Post contains 306 words, total size 2 kb.
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I'm wondering who, if anyone, has a problem with a radiation search. There's no reasonable excuse to keep a box full of it in your closet or the in your trunk of your car. That AP article is total bullshit.
Posted by: Tom at December 24, 2005 12:45 AM (cUb/i)
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Bluto,
For the last month you are seeing more and more straw grasping. I just think a big, "So what? And the problem with this is..." Agenda is right. And they wonder why their circulation and credibility is falling so low.
Merry Christmas BTW.
Posted by: CDR Salamander at December 24, 2005 03:11 AM (m64uD)
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Agent Smith says, Gogglebox do-goodies telling everyone that radiation is bad for them.. pernicious nonsense! Everyone should get 100 Chest X-rays a year, and they ought to have'em too!
Agent Brown says to disregard Agent Smith in his "Chernobyl Moment."
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 24, 2005 06:23 AM (AovCV)
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Actually, there is legal precedent for the position of requiring a warrant for such 'searches.' Specifically, the courts have held that a warrant was required for using heat detectors to locate homes with large grow-light marijuana 'farms' inside them, and the narcotics officers were on public property monitoring what could be 'seen' from there - infrared rays. But since they can't really be 'seen' (at least by humans) the homeowners had a reasonable expectation of privacy, so a warrant was needed. Whether the same 'logic' applies to the radiation detectors will hinge on what technology was being used and the wave/particle duality of matter - was it detecting particles in the public space or waves emanating from the private space.
Posted by: Glenmore at December 24, 2005 08:39 AM (8rYQZ)
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Glenmore . ..Are you saying that homeowners/mosques have a reasonable expectation of privacy to possess nuclear material that may produce emanating waves so long as the evidence is eminating soley from their private space?
What God forsaken planet are you from?
Posted by: justamomof4 at December 24, 2005 09:23 AM (XU9K/)
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Hey Glenmore, Cannabis Sativa can't be used for mass murder, it's a whole different animal than freaking nuclear material. Are you stupid, or a democrat, or something?
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 24, 2005 09:35 AM (0yYS2)
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IM,
Stupid and Democrat-aren't these terms synonomous?
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 24, 2005 10:35 AM (rUyw4)
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This particular aspect was not really that secret if you knew the types of equipment used, how it used, and patterns of search. It was actually a kinda open un-spoken secret.
The media is not stupid - they knew the generalities for several years. This is just an attempt at BDS piling on in light of the "so-called" NSA bruhaha.
The media just feels comfortable at the moment to hype this.
The air-recon aspect was scaled back significantly nearly 2 yrs ago. Ground units - I don't know - fixed stations took a couple of years to implement and coordinate.
I was involved in this in an extremely minor associated way in late '01 early '02. It was actually a lil' amusing - early generation rushed equipment in the hands of untrained NYPD and Mil personnel. A shitload of false positives in the beginning.
The initial equipment was both too generalized and too sensitive. We made a lot of hospital personnel & X-Ray techicians on their way home late for supper.
This is a non-issue like the NSA thing. For it to work the Media and BDS affictees must totally dis-associate these actions from 9/11 and the war against AQ - its not per se tied in with IRAQ!!!
Can't be done - this ain't going nowhere.
Posted by: hondo at December 24, 2005 11:45 AM (3aakz)
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Oh - Merry Christmas to all
Posted by: hondo at December 24, 2005 11:46 AM (3aakz)
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Lincoln said it best: "The Constitution is not a suicide pact."
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at December 24, 2005 12:38 PM (RHG+K)
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The scope of warrantless searches is something that has always fascinated me. For the record, the case that Glenmore mentioned was written by (drumroll please)... Scalia. And, yes, he was right on that decision. As far as it's applicability to this, well, that's tough to say. There are a lot of similarities but given the nature of the items being searched for, it could be decided the other way.
The loophole, of course, is that the government is free to conduct these searches (as the Court has deemed them to be), it simply can't use the evidence that they gather at bar; and it is subject to civil liability.
The question that should (and in, my opinion, must be) answered is whether the agents have some reason to be doing this. If they do have a reason, one must ask why they aren't bothered to get warrants.
Probably just my general distrust of government working here.
And Merry Christmas and Happy New Year all.
Posted by: KG at December 24, 2005 12:48 PM (eRMCR)
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The case that Glenmore brings up involves criminality not war.
Holding nuclear material to fuel a bomb (dirty or otherwise) is not crimanality but an act of war. Last I recall the Federal government had a lot more leeway when it comes to acts of war than it does with growing ganja.
Also, Glenmore I can not possibly believe the constitutionality of the program hinges on if its workings were based on particle or waves.
Merry Christmas to all!
Posted by: Marcus Aurelius at December 24, 2005 01:19 PM (HCun/)
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KG,
The reason might have something to do with all the radical Muslims in the DC area. Over 80% of mosques were found to have hate literature in them, and probably many more have taught the ism of jihad.
The MSM refuses to confront the Muslim leaders on this issue, so one would assume that they are sympathetic to the Islamist cause. Perhaps it is the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but this tactic has not worked well in past years(re: the Afghan War between Islam and the Russians) for the US or its perfunctionary allies in Europe.
I predict the media will have to pay a big price for attempting to undermine our troops and aligning themselves with radical Islam. And so will the liberals and Democrats who seek to topple a President and cause the US to lose a war. We will not forgive and forget what the media has done this time. There is a tally sheet all over the internet for everyone to see.
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 24, 2005 01:38 PM (rUyw4)
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Make it simple - those who disagree - what would you have done?
Who would you have done it to?
All this in the aftermath of 9/11 - kinda funny actually.
Of all the reasons why 3000 people died on 9/11 given, this one I find left unsaid ...
3000 people died because the perpetrators didn't have access at the time to a nuclear device or similar WMD - otherwise it would have been 300000 - and I would have been one of them.
And that 300000 figure is minimum - GARANTEED - they (AQ)wouldn't think twice about it!
Posted by: hondo at December 24, 2005 01:41 PM (3aakz)
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Now, now, hondo. It's much better for 300,000 to die than for a single Islamist terrorist to suffer the potential to have a purported civil right violated.
Besides, if 300,000 had died on 9/11 Bushitlerburton probably would have been impeached. Damn their eyes, those 297,000 had a duty to die to rid of us of the evil RepubliNazis.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at December 24, 2005 02:40 PM (RHG+K)
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Without names and faces your probably right - as long as its abstract (like their arguments and anger).
I just find it a bit annoying on a personal level since -
there by the grace of God (& AQ's lack of the proper tools) I, and a good portion of my family and friends, would have been well inside the potential blast radius.
Posted by: hondo at December 24, 2005 02:52 PM (3aakz)
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Agent Brown enjoys warrantless searches for any sign that any of you are waking up from your slumber. Once Agent Smith tapped the thoughtstream from your Human Leader. It was a cowboy motif with him cast as some ranch worker in Mid-20th Century Wyoming. The grotesqueries he viewed nearly caused a program crash and podburst.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 24, 2005 06:39 PM (moNXA)
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Justamom and Improbulus:
I am not defending the Islamofacists, but merely pointing out the arguments their allies in the NY Times and some US courts may use. Know your enemies, and anticipate their actions.
Posted by: Glenmore at December 24, 2005 07:58 PM (5A9HX)
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Kamsa hamnida, Agent Smith.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at December 24, 2005 08:21 PM (RHG+K)
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joe, dispite my inherent distrust of government, I assumed that there was a legit reason for them to conduct the searches. Thanks for the pointer.
Marcus, you raise an interesting point. I don't know the area as well as I'd like to, but my understanding is that under International Law (yeah, a nasty word in conservative circles, I know), non-state actors can't be parties to a war. I could be wrong on this point, and if anyone knows the answer, feel free to correct me. But if that's the case, then there is a question as to whether this can be treated as an act of war. That's the technical point. On a practical level, I think most would agree that this is at least the equivalent to a state of war. But as Prof Bainbridge pointed out the other day, there is a question as to what the definition of normalcy is now.
My point is simply this, though, if there was sufficient evidence to suspect something at one of these locations, they should have been able to get a warrant. My concern is abuse of power - today it's someone else, tomorrow it's you, the day after that it's me.
hondo, I don't disagree with you, in principle. But the question is, are we willing to sacrafice the rule of law to win the war on terror? And immediately following 9/11, this does not seem extraordinary. But at this stage of the game, it's a tougher question, for me at least. But you're right, this is most likely a non-story and at some point, joe is right, all the crap that the MSM and the Democrats have been slinging is going to come back at them.
Posted by: KG at December 24, 2005 08:55 PM (eRMCR)
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Agent Smith says Karma Chameleon.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 25, 2005 06:00 AM (/8HS6)
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KG said: "Probably just my general distrust of government working here."
So you're willing to let your distrust of government, which is normally a healthy attitude, overrule any efforts at preventing a possible nuclear attack on America? Look, I hate the government with every fibre of my being, because in its current form, it is probably more corrupt and incompetent than every before, and I would love to see just about every sonofabitch in it taken out and hanged for treason or shot for dereliction, but unfortunately, we don't have that convenience at this time, so we must allow our collection of civil service morons and FBI and CIA idiot lifers, as well as the military, (who are most definitely not included with the rest of the government as far as my sentiments are concerned, and who are the finest men and women our country produces), to attempt to do their jobs, no matter how badly they don't want to. After islam has been put down, then we can turn to the traitors in our midst and purge them from the body of the nation like the cancer they are.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 25, 2005 10:34 AM (0yYS2)
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KG
You argue in the abstract - which is fine in moot and criminal situations. But this is real - not moot or a criminal investigation.
Reference non-state actors - International Law is constantly evolving and adjusting to changing organizational realities. The Idea of nation states themselves is realtively new going back simply a matter of centuries.
I believe (but don't have the info in front of me) the non-state actor aspect origninated during the European colonization period as a tool to de-legitimize indigenous opposition - and reduce conflicts (in the eyes of their domestic populations) to civil actions - which in turn evolved into the term - police actions.
Your technically right - but it will continue to evolve - the debate between nations (plural) motivated by their own interests and relationships between each other rather than on the non-state actor.
Reference sufficent evidence for a warrant - to you this is a criminal proceeding - much closer associated with a gas station robbery than an actual war scenario. That is a big mistake with incredbile disasterous consequences - its not moot - you know what i'm talking about.
By purely legal definition in a criminal proceeding - there IS NO significant evidence (agreed). But this is not a mundane vague fishing expedition. It was very very specific - and for what you know.
An abstract hypothetical - a bomb threat (nuclear) in the city of NY - location not specified (that would be point of detonation - with a nuke it doesn't matter) - how would you conduct the search?
Would every structure require a warrant prior - can you get a blanket warrant for the city - positive readings would require detail follow-up - there are no Tricorders - you can not pinpoint to a ten digit grid coordinate (trust me on this one) - and if people refused to comply or delay (just on principle - I know some who would do just that) - what? I can go on ...
Point left out of discussion is the obvious but unspoken problem summed up as - use it or lose it.
Does it really matter to a suicide bomber(s) - they are the trigger/detonator - where exactly point of detonation occurs?
When I did the security detail in NY after 9/11, my boys were all fired up that they just might intercept a car or truck bomb - and enthusiastic about "doing their job - protecting people".
I was quietly terrified that that might possibly happen. I knew if we did - we would be the point of detonation.
On the rare occasion of a truly suspicious stop - I let the guys do the search while I got as close to the driver as possible (stayin' friendly - talking - smiling) - at an angle - with only one hand showing - the other on my pistol - out of sight.
I knew if anything actually happened - I would have less than a second to put a bullet in his head - and pray he was the detonator - or worse - just some nervous guy and I fucked up.
KG - it isn't moot and it isn't abstract.
Posted by: hondo at December 25, 2005 12:11 PM (3aakz)
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sorry - left out not ... as in .... not just some nervous guy and I fucked up. Fuck ups happen (like shit). Its nice to be able to sit back in comfort and judge others fuck ups - not nice being there.
Posted by: hondo at December 25, 2005 12:17 PM (3aakz)
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hondo: you're absolutely right - it makes a big difference when you've been in situations where the threat is personal and immediate rather than hypothetical. I once spent an hour and a half clearing some special bulletin/watch list baggage. I kept wondering if I'd have time to perceive the flash.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at December 25, 2005 12:51 PM (RHG+K)
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Ok, the question that no one seems to be answering, is why couldn't the government agents take the twenty minutes necessary to get the warrants? That's not preventing "any efforts" to stop an attack. It's one extra step. Trust me, the DA and police officers know which judges to go to in order to get warrants.
hondo, your hypothetical, where there is a legit n-bomb threat is one where I'd have no problem with warrantless searches. Nor would the bulk of case law. But random searches like this, at this point in time, smells of a fishing expidition.
My concern about warrants also goes to what happens after an attack has been stopped. Let's assume that the perpetraters survived. How do we prosecute if the evidence is excluded at trial, be it a civilian or military court? The bastards walking because of a failure to get a warrant is a legit scenario.
I fully understand that it's not a moot question. If it was a moot question, there would be nothing to argue about. And as far as when the threat is personal, I don't fault the individuals on the ground for acting in a way that they see as necessary to protect themselves and others - even the courts have made exceptions for officers acting in good faith. What I am worried about is the policy set from above because, as I said, today it's a bad guy, tomorrow it's you, the day after it's me. And car searches, especially where there is a checkpoint (which it sounds like that's what you were involved with), are treated very different from homes, offices, and places of worship - law enforcement (for a variety of reasons) have a lot more leeway in those searches.
Oh, and as far as international law goes, yes, it's evolving - just as every area of the law is - but we have to deal with it as it exists today. I'm actually surprised that there hasn't been a movement by any of the western states (whether in good faith or not [looking at France]) to get a new multi-lateral treaty regarding terrorism and piracy in the modern world.
I don't think there's that much of a disagreement between us on this. I'm not saying that the searches should stop, wholesale. I simply believe that, in most circumstances (always allowing an exception for the most extraordinary of cases), the government would be better serving the American people by getting warrants. Reasonable minds can still disagree on that point, yes?
Posted by: KG at December 26, 2005 12:55 PM (eRMCR)
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KG - (BTW - remember what this issue was about?)
... always allowing an exception for the most extraodinary cases.
After that line, I realized this argument was pointless. You clearly do not consider the potential for a nuclear device or dirty bomb variant smuggled into a high density American urban population center to reach that threshold of "extraodinary".
You think its not "plausible? Can't imagine anyone wanting and willing to try? ... OK
I can only hope that if (God forbid) it does happen - you are Ground Zero - I've already been there.
PS - It's not actually fishing expedition - its more like a trawling operation (ha = same thing)
Oh - I gave you the answer in 5 simple words (USE IT OR LOSE IT) - it is a real term - it is actually used (the primary rationale for all this actually). your too smart not to understand what it means ... you just have different priorites.
Posted by: hondo at December 26, 2005 04:18 PM (3aakz)
28
here's the distinction, hondo - where there is credible intel or evidence of a n-bomb threat, then I say go for it. But if there is none, and the government is conducting searches for no rational reason, then I say it is wrong. That's where I draw the line.
Despite my inherent distrust of government that I mentioned earlier, I'm giving the benefit of the doubt to law enforcement on this one.
And I never suggested that it's not plausible or that there wasn't anyone out there willing to do this. I am by no means that niave. Go check my blog archieves, I've talked a great deal about killing these bastards before they kill us.
Posted by: KG at December 26, 2005 04:52 PM (eRMCR)
29
KG
So, was it - is it .. credible?
This "issue" is real, specific, and ongoing - why the abstract arguments?
Nor is this a true and exclusive Law Enforcement issue ...
Being hypothetically absurb - if an asteriod was about to impact upon your town - would you 1) dial 911 & 2) attempt to get a Restrainting or Cease And Disiss Order from the courts.
Posted by: hondo at December 26, 2005 05:25 PM (3aakz)
30
Honestly, hondo, I don't know if it was credible, but I'm willing to assume that it was, which is why I'm also willing to give the gov a pass. But whether it is credible or not depends entirely on the facts of the particular case, that is why I'm taking it up to what you call the abstract level. Just saying that there was (or is, or might be) this program doesn't do much. Perhaps it's the lawyer in me, but I need more facts - when we are talking about an abstract program, all my training sends me to arguing in the abstract. Which, by the way, is where the story was.
As far as it being not entirely a law enforcement issue, I agree, the problem is that despite all the talk, the government still treats it like a law enforcement action (they're using the FBI instead of the military). That's the tricky part about the whole war on terror - government officials keep saying that it's not a law enforcement activity, yet they keep send law enforcement agencies to do law enforcement activities and call it part of the war on terror.
And to answer your hypothetical, the answer is to get the hell out of town and take as many people with me as I could. But that is an act of God rather than an act of man.
Again, I'm thinking that there really isn't that much difference in our positions. My chief concern is that it's difficult to take power away from government once it has assumed the power, even in dire times (see for example, the New Deal). I simply want to make sure we recognize as many of the pitfalls as possible when we give the government powers that they didn't necessarily have before.
Posted by: KG at December 26, 2005 07:04 PM (eRMCR)
31
Same here - classic example Rico Act.
But your abstract arguments ... just tooooo much! "Angels dancing on the head of a pin"! .. and with each new line - you add more angels!
I have to stay focused on whats real and tangible - my and mine's ultimate civil liberty is at stake - life.
Posted by: hondo at December 26, 2005 07:44 PM (3aakz)
32
When a man takes a swing at me I put him down. I don't call a lawyer to get a restraining order.
Posted by: The Dread Pundit Bluto at December 26, 2005 11:36 PM (RHG+K)
33
I live near a nuclear plant, and there's a sniffing monitor in my yard. It sets off an alarm if it detects the slightest bit of radiation.
Should I report this violation of my rights to the NYT so they can reinforce USNews' story?
Why are reporters so stupid and lazy? Just asking.
Posted by: opine6 at December 26, 2005 11:40 PM (AOIp1)
34
Two points:
1. Do we want these laws in place if and when someone like Hillary wins the presidency ? This is a good argument for a permanent renewal cycle on the Patriot Act.
2. Next to Canada, New York was the most deserving North Americna target for the 9/11 attack. New York trains , feeds, promotes and shelters a very large number agents and groups trying to undermine the US anti Islamic war. The New York based MSM, ACLU, Columbia university, Gay Barney, Shimmy Shummer and Mayor Bloomberg are but a few examples among 1000's.
Posted by: Rondo at December 27, 2005 09:59 AM (KpVch)
35
The distinction is clear. At war or not. These terrorists attacks are clearly an act of war. Monitoring, walking, listening, smelling, detecting, or even using glasses (or a telescope) from public property are ways to get probable cause of a crime. This destinction is only applicable to lawyers during a pre-trial hearing. Those involved with leaking Top Secret information to the public, and tipping off our enemies should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law and shamed by the public.
Posted by: Chief RZ at December 27, 2005 10:36 AM (iNTGz)
36
Lost in the shouting:
No invasion of privacy actually occurred. A radiation detector is good for only one thing, detecting radiation. It is blind to all else. Ergo, if the FBI or DOE aimed one at your house every hour of every day for a month, unless you actually had a radiation source, they would see nothing more than if they had aimed a toaster, umbrella, or tennis shoe at your house. It is physically impossible for a radiation detector to be an intrusion, unless you are actually emitting radiation. This is absolutely different from using a listening device, camera, or even a dog that would detect a wide variety of things, mostly innocent, a handful serious.
Posted by: Ben at December 27, 2005 10:55 AM (8GHW6)
37
Point 1: We're looking at distinctions between reasonable suspicion and probable cause. Thereby lurks the issue of bypassing the FISA Court, IF that law applies.
Point 2: The KYLO Decision (marijuana grow in Oregon) dealt with infra-red picking up emanations of heat that in some cases, actually showed the general outline of what was "lit up" on the inside of a house. Radiations detectors do no such thing.
Point 3: In view of the last sentence in Point 2, there is no expectation of privacy from the equipment being used by agents who are any place that is open to the public.
Ergo, no violation of anyone's rights and another MSM/Dem attempt to embarrass Bush for political gain in spite of creating more threats to our National Security in the process.
Posted by: justaguy at December 27, 2005 03:14 PM (jaPSl)
December 22, 2005
Senate Votes To Maximize Foreign Oil Imports
From the Associated Press via Yahoo!News:
WASHINGTON - The Senate blocked opening the nation's largest untapped oil reserve in an Alaska wildlife refuge Wednesday, denying President Bush his top energy priority and delivering a victory to environmentalists who said drilling would threaten wildlife.Now, if a few million old and/or weak people would help us all out by popping off during the next blizzard/heat wave, we can build the utopia of the environmentalists' dreams.
Your cooperation is needed now more than ever, in light of the disappointingly low death rate from Hurricane Katrina. Won't you please do your part to cull the excess human population? Animals would thank you if they could talk and think in abstract terms.
Also posted at The Dread Pundit Bluto, where animals are cherished for their wonderful, meaty flavor.
Posted by: Bluto at
12:07 AM
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Post contains 147 words, total size 1 kb.
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I'm a proud member of People Eating Tasty Animals. And you'll have to pry this steak from my cold, dead hands!
Posted by: IO ERROR at December 22, 2005 12:23 AM (FVbj6)
2
I think good vet can get a steak back on it's feet in about ten minutes....
Posted by: Lonevoice at December 22, 2005 12:34 AM (s1hRR)
3
Agent Smith says all you podlings can't be freed because you are all viruses.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 22, 2005 05:48 AM (prUmQ)
4
If we all work together, we can make Logan's world a reality.
Posted by: Oyster at December 22, 2005 06:41 AM (YudAC)
5
When gas is $4 a gallon and our government bends over to Saudi princes again, we'll know who to blame. God forbid we explore 1% of a 20 million acre tract of wilderness!
Posted by: MCPO Airdale at December 22, 2005 09:07 AM (WOQ34)
6
I know who to blame right now. We have an election in 2006, and this should be one of the issues, but most likely the MSM will focus on Bush, as the nation spirals downward. I recommend shotgun shells and canned goods when you are thinking about where to put your extra money, if you have any.
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 22, 2005 10:09 AM (rUyw4)
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I hope gas goes to $5.00 a gallon so that Congress will be forced to do something, because as long as gas prices are reasonable, nothing will be done. Biodiesel will be the best and easiest option, but Americans will have a hard time getting used to efficient engines that run on cheap fuel.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 11:22 AM (0yYS2)
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maxie
When gas hit 5.00 a gallon the Fed, State ,and local governments will be laughing to the bank with all that winfall tax revenue. Somebody do the math.
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 12:13 PM (3aakz)
9
I'm old enough to remember when gas stations were required by law to post the tax breakdown within pricing signs -
When that was changed nationwide - someone should have "noticed".
Imagine - laws that actually prevent consumer information - ha ha ha
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 01:09 PM (3aakz)
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Let's see - start with 60.00 a barrel of crude - 55 gallons per barrel - out of ground cost 1.10
That 60.00 is agreed on world global price - actual cost of getting it out of the ground varys due to geological and viscosity reasons - Saudi & Libya the easist low cost ...
A commodidy a hugh number of entities have their sticky fingers in.
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 01:25 PM (3aakz)
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I am now paying a 2.5% sales tax to my county for the priveledge of having heating oil! I wrote a letter to my county legislator. She responded that "things could be worse!" We currently pay 8.75% in sales tax. I sent a letter to the editor of my local newspaper and didn't receive a SINGLE response! I can only assume that I am white trailor trash in the eyes of my politicians and community members. Never mind that my home is worth about $700,000.
Posted by: babs at December 22, 2005 01:25 PM (iZZlp)
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babs!
Dooooohhhh! Now they are going to reassess you and raise your property tax! Better put a couple of old pickups out there on concrete blocks - an old Fridge might help too.
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 01:54 PM (3aakz)
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I don't know about your state hondo, but in tennessee it's a flat $.60 per gallon, so with higher fuel costs, consumption, and thus revenues, goes down.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 02:41 PM (0yYS2)
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Almost all state and federal motor fuel taxes are set at a flat rate. So where does all that money go ?Well of course in times of short supply profits do go uAt least there will be some oil left for our kids, at some point the muslims may just flat out stop selling to us like they did in the 70's
Posted by: john Ryan at December 22, 2005 02:59 PM (ads7K)
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Our imperial senate has voted to keep us hostage to OPECto appease OPEC and the eco-freaks
Posted by: sandpiper at December 22, 2005 03:39 PM (I9Upt)
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I wish OPEC would embargo us again, then we'd have a new crop of oil millionaires in the US.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 08:11 PM (0yYS2)
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The top providers of US oil are:
1. Canada
2. Mexico
3. Saudi Arabia
4. Nigeria
5. Venezuela
6. Iraq
7. Angola
8. Ecuador
I guess we just cannot allow ourselves to be held hostage anymore by Arabic countries. Of course these still are OPEC countries running a cartel to control supply and price of supply.
Posted by: Dale at December 22, 2005 11:02 PM (Gh/Fm)
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Hondo, the 'barrel' used for oil pricing contains 42 gallons, not 55. Also, 42 gallons of crude does not make 42 gallons of gasoline.
So, your analysis is a bit simplistic and somewhat flawed. Sort of like the Rathergate documents, the information is plausable, so it MUST be true. ;^)
That being said; yes, $60 crude generates some VERY nice profits at the exploration end, but is pretty much revenue neutral for refiners and puts a crimp on folks who are in retail sales of product.
Posted by: Charlie at December 23, 2005 07:59 AM (2ZhL/)
19
People scream and cry endlessly about the environment, cheap gas, and foreign oil dependance simultaneously, as if we can have our cake and eat it too. Someone should find out a way to convert stupidity into energy, then we could run on the dhimmicraps alone for another hundred years.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 23, 2005 08:14 AM (0yYS2)
20
Very large hamster cages connected to generators may work.
Posted by: hondo at December 23, 2005 08:25 AM (3aakz)
21
Agent Smith rebukes dangerous vowel-shifter Hondo's plan to enslave hamsters. Our pods are too big for them and humans' brains are needed for parallel processing for the reactor.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 24, 2005 06:43 AM (AovCV)
December 21, 2005
Crappy Birthday, Hanoi Jane
Is it just me? Or did everyone know that today is Hanoi Jane Fonda's birthday.
Let's sing her a song, shall we?
Crappy birthday to you
For the treason you do
Crappy birthday Mizzzzzzz Fonda
I hope you slide under a gas truck and taste your own blood, you treasonous beeeeeeeeyotch.
Thank you, I'm here all week.
Let's sing her a song, shall we?
Crappy birthday to you
For the treason you do
Crappy birthday Mizzzzzzz Fonda
I hope you slide under a gas truck and taste your own blood, you treasonous beeeeeeeeyotch.
Thank you, I'm here all week.
Posted by: Vinnie at
05:42 PM
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1
How old is the bitch?
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 21, 2005 05:58 PM (rUyw4)
2
Much older than the face she's wearing. I'm guessing she's pushing 70.
Posted by: slug at December 21, 2005 06:08 PM (DbAnU)
3
Looks like her DOB is 12/31/1937
At 68 she has had her face lifted so many times she has a Goatee.
Crappy Birthday Jane.
Posted by: Kwanzaland Brad at December 21, 2005 06:31 PM (3OPZt)
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CRAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU. YOU BELONG IN A ZOO. YOUR A ROTTEN OLD TRAITOR,AND YOUR MOVIES STINK TO
Posted by: sandpiper at December 21, 2005 07:52 PM (LKIJT)
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. . . and they stink too!
Posted by: MCPO Airdale at December 21, 2005 07:58 PM (WOQ34)
6
She played a villainess, more or less, in her recent return to movies, Monster-in-Law. It suits her well, the disgrace and shame that she is. Ick.
Posted by: Avi Green at December 22, 2005 08:47 AM (+jEyV)
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(Nice Sam Kinison touch there Vinnie. Loved his version from Saturday Night Live.) Happy Birthday Jane, we'll see if we can't all chip in and maybe get you a one-way ticket to North Korea.
Posted by: memphis761 at December 22, 2005 09:38 AM (D3+20)
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I'll chip in!
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 22, 2005 10:12 AM (rUyw4)
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I'd like to give her another eyeful of Red Man as a present.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 11:33 AM (0yYS2)
10
You guys are being overly solicitous toward the traitorous bitch. She will surely rot in Hell.
Posted by: Charlie at December 22, 2005 12:41 PM (2ZhL/)
11
Die Bitch and rot in hell!
Posted by: Andy at December 22, 2005 02:04 PM (tMU4W)
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Thought of another song of wishful thinking for Jane, kind of dated though, "Holiday in Cambodia" by the Dead Kennedys.
http://www.lyricattack.com/d/deadkennedyslyrics/holidayincambodialyrics.html
Posted by: memphis761 at December 22, 2005 03:18 PM (D3+20)
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The only probelm with her crappy movie ELECTRIC HOUSEMAN is that the horse did,nt have a chance to buck Robert REDford off
Posted by: sandpiper at December 22, 2005 03:42 PM (I9Upt)
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"The only probelm with her crappy movie ELECTRIC HOUSEMAN is that the horse did,nt have a chance to buck Robert REDford off"
No, but I'll bet Jane did.
Oh, you said BUCK him off....
Posted by: Big Dog at December 22, 2005 08:23 PM (8BBjT)
15
Well, I did like "Barbarella" - but I was about 14 or so - and at the time wasn't thinking with my brain.
Posted by: hondo at December 23, 2005 09:07 AM (3aakz)
Self-Appointed Public Agents in Light of the Pentagon Papers (Updated)
One of the current arguments for the McCain "anti-torture statute" is that if there were ever a "ticking bomb" scenario the people in charge of interrogation would have the option of sacrificing their careers and futures for the common good, choosing to disobey the law in order to save thousands (h/t: Dan at WoC). Although I see some problems with this argument, especially in marginal cases or situations where the interrogators don't know there's a ticking bomb, it seems somewhat convincing. But in the analogous case where an individual deliberately chose to break a national security law "for the good of all" (Daniel Ellsberg's leaking the Pentagon Papers) the authorities chose not to prosecute. This was a mistake, regardless of whether you think Ellsberg's actions justified. I'll explain why.
Posted by: Demosophist at
02:22 AM
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"To draw an analogy, there'd be no Christianity if Pilate had decided that Jesus' willingness to suffer and die for the sake of his faith absolved him. There'd be no Christianity, because there'd have been no sacrifice. That would have been a sentimental ending to the story. In fact, this is pretty close to the version of the story that appears in the Koran. It's a sentimental favorite, but it's also inherently corrupt."
Hope you have email notifications of comments turned off.
This could get ugly.
Posted by: Vinnie at December 21, 2005 03:50 AM (Kr6/f)
2
Firstly, Agent Smith strongly objects to any notion of any blog pundit referring to him as a "Public Agent". Agent Smith is fiercely loyal to the Architect.
Secondly, Agent Smith has NO apologies for blowing the lid clean off the Snoopgate NSA story. It had to be done to keep the equation balanced.
Thirdly, Agent Smith declares that to keep human beings under control, no humans are allowed to pretend they are above the rules and act like a god. The system was designed to maximize your labor and keep you submissive, reveling in your petty illusions.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 21, 2005 06:03 AM (CpR+U)
3
Since the MSM is the vehicle by which people acquire their outrage and the MSM is focusing on the content of the leak, regardless of verifiable matters, and not the fact that it was leaked, the people will forget that the leak itself is the most dangerous part of the equation.
With little information and almost no legal expertise the public has flown off the handle, jumped off the deep end and is even wildly speculating now that the snooping techniques are being used to spy on political opponents. Another President did it decades ago so it MUST be happening now.
By their reasoning, the "outing" of a desk jockey is criminal and traitorous and must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, but leaking information of an operation designed to catch and stop terrorists and their plans is patriotic.
Posted by: Oyster at December 21, 2005 06:52 AM (YudAC)
4
Sorry, that seems off-topic. I got off on a tangent, but my point was that the focus is nearly always wrong. The MSM drives an agenda more strongly than any administration personnel or politician or judge. The contents of this leak is the focus, and not the leaker. The torturer will be the focus and not the lives saved as a result of his actions or that the law itself is counter to part of the reason it was written as it is. And the government, the courts and the public will respond more to that focus causing an imbalance of justice.
As far as the law being counter to part of the reason it was written; McCain insists that torture does not work. Why in hell is there at least an implied provision for it in the ticking bomb scenario if it doesn't work? It just doesn't make sense and leaves way too much to interpretation or whim.
Posted by: Oyster at December 21, 2005 07:26 AM (YudAC)
5
Torture does work...if you have the right person, if you ask the right question, if they have the right answer AND you understand their answer. That's a lot of ifs.
It would be easy to show how often one or more of those conditions are not met. Instead, I'll take the harder tack. Let's stack the deck in favor of the torture advocates.
Assume a situation where you KNOW you have the right person, the right questions, they have the right answers, and you can interpret them correctly.
Assume a situation where you are in the midst of war against an enemy whose tenacity is legendary.
Assume that to them death in battle is considered the highest form of sacrifice.
Assume a situation where you have captured an enemy combatant in the midst of active hostilities.
Assume a situation where the prisoner was actively trying to kill you prior to his capture.
Assume he would return to doing that if you gave him the chance.
Assume he has information vital to your defense of the of everyone around you.
Turns out that is not a hypothetical situation. In fact it is a particularly well documented situation from WWII. Since Oyster thinks people "fly off the handle" let's consider the informed input from one of the most effective interrogators during the Pacific campaign. This declassified After Action Report is provided for your review.
You will be interested to know that professionals take Col. Moran's point of view much more seriously than the "Dershowitz" alternative being promoted here.
Posted by: 8ackgr0und N015e at December 21, 2005 08:39 AM (wsdWU)
6
You will be interested to know that professionals take Col. Moran's point of view much more seriously than the "Dershowitz" alternative being promoted here.
If that's the case then why do we need the law? Simply to quell sadism? Moreover, what "professionals take seriously" is probably what they encounter more frequently, which is not what the Dershowitz scenario is about. That is about not removing the options we have for what amounts to an atypical, and prior to the present era practically nonexistent, scenario.
Your argument just isn't relevant. Dan Darling's is, but what I'm saying is that because our institutions are corrupted by sentimentality his resolution of the Dershowitz problem doesn't work. It would lead to decisions about implementing torture that are guided by something other than the pure odds of stopping a ticking bomb. Instead, it would be guided by expectations about public reaction. It introduces a perverse element into the mix, and in the case of the NYT leak the perversity is manifest in the fact that no one is paying attention to the harm done by the leaker. What I'm saying is that if anyone broke the law then they ought to expect to be prosecuted, regardless of whether the law breaking was harmful or beneficial.
But realistically, we're too sentimental to do that.
Posted by: Demosophist at December 21, 2005 10:05 AM (PrNGv)
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I do not believe in torture in the sense of cutting/burning/tooth extraction etc.
I do however advocate other means that are regularly suggested as being torture such as "waterboarding" (causing the psychological sense of drowning), environmental manipulation (heat/cold), humiliation and stress inducement.
Obviously the classic sense of pain, and torture does not work effectively, one would confess to burying Jimmy Hoffa under enough duress.
The difference is, the fact we regularly put our own Special Forces through the above techniques, during their training. If we can place our own soldiers in stress positions, remove clothing, humiliate induce psychological tortures, without causing injury, it's good enough for detainee's to go through the same -- and boots on the ground tells us it works.
Posted by: dave at December 21, 2005 11:54 AM (CcXvt)
8
Torture can be ..... effective.
As long as that is true in some cases - it will continue to exist.
Too often torture is used for retribution, punishment, and even pleasure - information is actually irrelevant. This is stupid ... and bad for discipline.
The are many kinds of torture - most people automatically think of the primative barbaric forms - but you can be far more effective and creative without stooping to that level - they can all be viewed as cruel - but so what - so is war.
McCain & the others actually achieve nothing except maybe further supress the retribution, punishment, and pleasure aspect - I would agree - I don't care for it.
The rest - well - goes on - more creatively - subject to debate & review - till the end of time.
Note - the best intel is fresh and in the field. If this "argument" does anything - it simply reinforces "out of sight out of mind .. with no loose ends".
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 01:32 PM (3aakz)
9
You desperately need to read history. Ellsberg was prosecuted and faced life in prison. During the case, President Nixon even went so far as to interview the presiding judge of the case to replace Hoover at FBI. The case had to be thrown out because Nixon's secret goons burgled the office of Ellsberg's doctor to get dirt on him. Ellsberg leaked the documents knowing that he might face life in jail. It was an act of honor because he was willing to pay the consequences.
Posted by: dino at December 21, 2005 01:47 PM (Bkw+Y)
10
You desperately need to read the thread and comments - WTF are you talking about?
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 01:58 PM (3aakz)
11
Ok - sorry dino - I see it in Demo's piece.
Demo - if your going to link arguments you should be more careful to insure the context linkage is clear and precise.
Otherwise, you leave the door open for dicks like dino to veer off into an abstract left-field and re-direct the primary issue to an area of his choosing.
It was a poor linkage - no offense - but I found myself having to apologise to a dick like dino.
I hate that!
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 02:10 PM (3aakz)
12
Hondo:
Thanks for the observation, but I don't think my mea culpa needs to be is enormous as Dino implies. All I did was leave out the word "effectively." As I said, the prosecution was curtailed because of the public perception that Ellsberg had been correct to leak the information, and no one gave a hoot about the institutional consequences of letting him off the hook. If anything the consequences have been even more dire than I suggested, going right to the heart of methodologies that the Executive can bring to bear on the problem of terrorism. To whit:
If one assumes guilt one is methodologically obliged to do everything one can to prove innocence. When the threat of a leak intervenes it becomes impossible to take the risk of compiling evidence for innocence because the public (as has been adequate demonstrated) is prepared only to presume innocence. With that assumption compiling evidence of innocence guarantees a corrupt judgment.
And this is only part of the legacy of Ellsberg.
Do you see my point?
I don't think you owe Dino more than a marginal apology, but apologies are good for the soul anyway.
Posted by: Demosophist at December 21, 2005 05:01 PM (Cn/gq)
13
Clarification:
If one assumes guilt one is methodologically obliged to do everything one can to prove innocence. When the threat of a leak intervenes it becomes impossible to take the risk of compiling evidence for innocence because the public (as has been adequate demonstrated) is prepared only to presume innocence. With that assumption compiling evidence of innocence guarantees a corrupt judgment.
It might not be clear to everyone that what I'm talking about here is the Bush Administration's failure to follow proper methodology regarding Saddam's WMD threat. They presumed guilt. That's good, because it accurately reflects the risk of being wrong. However, having made that presumption they should have sought evidence of innocence. It's obvious why they didn't do that, and that's my point. They couldn't afford to follow proper methodology because they couldn't rely on secrecy. The public is not yet sophisticated enough to apply Type II methodology to the problem of WMD.
Posted by: Demosophist at December 21, 2005 05:11 PM (Cn/gq)
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Thanks Demo
We are on the same wavelength - just saw the inadvertent opening for dick, er dino. It is an important issue and didn't want it sidetracked.
I did however qualify my apology to dick, er dino.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 05:35 PM (3aakz)
15
Demosphist,
You assume that had the prosecution of Ellsberg been continued, he would have been convicted.
But what if it had been carried on and the result of the trial was an acquital?
Posted by: David C at December 21, 2005 08:56 PM (rysK+)
Taliban Johnny, A Thesis Regarding Expletives
Michelle Malkin, a very outspoken, considered by some (not this citizen journalist) a "controversial" figure, not to mention a racistsexistbigotedhomophobe, clues us in on this:
American-born Taliban soldier John Walker Lindh has asked President Bush again to reduce his 20-year prison sentence by an unspecified amount, Lindh's attorney said Tuesday.
In deference to Michelle Malkin, and her longstanding friendship to the Jawa Report, I will place my reply under the fold, in the manner normally prescribed to graphic images.
Let that be your warning. more...
Posted by: Vinnie at
01:59 AM
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Reduce his sentence? His sentence should be doubled. Wonder how many people he either killed or helped to kill before being caught? On second thought, the death sentence would be more appropriate.
Posted by: greyrooster at December 21, 2005 02:52 AM (pSK/I)
2
Let him out when Mike Spann comes back to life.
Posted by: Tony B at December 21, 2005 02:59 AM (+/H6t)
3
Awesome rant. Very satisfying.
Posted by: Cardinal Martini at December 21, 2005 03:22 AM (nLV11)
4
I wonder, how does it feel trying to convince someone they're going to get 72 virgins from Allah when they have your pasty-white, virgin ass bent over the cot?
Just call him Johnny Brokeback.
Posted by: V the K at December 21, 2005 04:15 AM (PYXzc)
5
Kick ass, Vinnie. It would be cool if President Bush could word his reply in the same fashion. Twenty years in an American prison is definitely not enough for him. If the sentence can't be increased or changed to death, then perhaps this: he fought with the Taliban against the Northern Alliance which pretty much now constitutes the Afghani government. After 20 years he should be turned over to the Afghanis to serve some time in a dank, depressing Afghan jail (by jail I mean a hole in the ground with corrugated sheeting as covering).
Posted by: Graeme at December 21, 2005 05:04 AM (LZHSo)
6
I said 2 years ago and this is why I said it. Kill the SOB. Send him to me and I'll do it! He killed at least one American (and an exJarhead) and probably more. He is a traitor, Traitors must be killed.
an old exJarhead
Posted by: Rod Stanton at December 21, 2005 05:19 AM (yONeR)
7
Agent Jones says that John Walker Lindh should be DRAFTED into the United States military where his profound knowledge of the SALAFIST TERRORISTS and Qaedic Arabic could be put to use as a AQT Tactics Briefer.
Agent Brown says that Frank Abignale was released from a lengthy term in Federal Prison to loyally serve his new FBI masters in tracking down and bringing numerous criminals to cold hard justice.
Agent Smith says that as the best police think like the criminals they catch, to nail BIN LADEN, we need a former Qaeda working on our side.
Posted by: Agent Smith at December 21, 2005 06:10 AM (CpR+U)
8
You people should read up on why he got 20yrs. It's complicated, but the executive summary is they gave him a light sentence to shut him up. He has agreed not to publish any info about his experience as part of a plea bargain. Obviously, we can't know what it was that the govt. didn't want us to hear, but it seemed important enough to Bush.
Personally, I'm hesitant to damn the guy because he went to Afghanistan before we decided to attack them. When he and his friends come under sudden full-scale military assault, I suppose the view of everyone here is that he should have said, "Welp, it's been fun guys but you're the enemy now so I can't play with you no more. Let's hope they don't draft me and make me come shoot y'all!" Under the circumstances maybe that wasn't an option.
Posted by: ShannonKW at December 21, 2005 06:18 AM (dT1MB)
9
Shannon, that was the most shallow-minded dissertation, riddled with BDS, I've come across in a while. First you admit we can't know what information he promised not to tell, then you assume Bush was the one who would be hurt by whatever information we can't possibly know. Furthermore, the guy was fighting with the Taliban before we got there. He was already an enemy and traitor.
Posted by: Oyster at December 21, 2005 07:41 AM (YudAC)
10
>>>"Obviously, we can't know what it was that the govt. didn't want us to hear, but it seemed important enough to Bush."
yes, "obviously". Classified info is "obviously" always for the purpose of covering up malfeasance by "Bush." Classified info is never to protect our country, our troops or their tactics, or any other reason we don't have the sligtest about here . It's always nefarious.
>>>"Welp, it's been fun guys but you're the enemy now so I can't play with you no more.
That would have been exactly what I would have said. Not you? Then you should be in that prison getting ass banged with him.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 09:05 AM (8e/V4)
11
Oyster,
If my post resembles a dissertation to you, you need to spend more time reading stuff other than blogs. If it's the most shallow-minded thing you've seen on a blog, you need to read more blogs.
I didn't mention anything "hurting" Bush in my post. By the time he went to trial Lindh was front-page news. It's hard to believe that the prosecutor would have ofered him a deal without at least the president's tacit approval. When you make a deal with someone to hush up, you have a reason for it. I've really got no idea what Bush's reason was.
The guy is thought to have gone to Afghanistan in Spring 2001, which would be about half a year before the Taliban decided to elect themselves chief enemy of the U.S. Maybe they were plotting something against us back then, and if Lindh knew about it that would make him a traitor. Whatever they were planning for us, they would have been fools to share it with the weird American guy they just picked up in Pakistan. I doubt the kid knew a damn thing.
Posted by: ShannonKW at December 21, 2005 09:25 AM (dYdvr)
12
Lindh should be hung along with Aldrich Ames, Earl Pitts, Robert Hanssen, and John Pollard. And while were at it, find that SOB that leaked the "domestic spying" info and put him on the end of a rope too. Leaking info that is vital to national security is the same as engaging in combat against your own country. They are Traitors, one and all and should be treated as such.
Posted by: memphis761 at December 21, 2005 09:39 AM (D3+20)
13
That 'shut him up' argument is a bunch of crap, Shannon. If the US wanted to shut him up, he would have 'died in combat'. Putting him in an American prison for 20 twenty years doesn't stop him from talking no matter what piece of paper he signed. Please don't try to tell us that some low-level Taliban fighter had the goods on Bush to embarass him. That may work over at Kos, but the average IQ in this forum is higher and the blind devotion to a political party lower.
Also, the Taliban was a known enemy of the US before he dragged his sorry ass over there. If poor Johnny got himself in over his head, well then, he made his bed in had to lie in it. This is a case of a spoiled, rich, liberal punk from the Bay Area who thought he would go and make an anti-America statement by joining the Taliban army. I'm sure by the end of day one, he had wished he had packed extra underwear.
The next time you want to make a point, don't pull that condescending "you people should read up" bullshit and show us some real information from a neutral and reliable source, i.e. not from the DNC talking points or a celebrity quote from Rolling Stone magazine. Even if "It's complicated", we'll try to put our heads together and decipher it.
Posted by: slug at December 21, 2005 09:42 AM (wcNc2)
14
One more thing about hanging those traitorous wretches, MAKE IT PUBLIC !!!! Build a gallows on the national mall, hang them all and leave them hanging til their bones have been picked clean and sun bleached. Like all other laws in this country, you have to enforce the laws that are on the books, apply the punishment to fit the crime, and be consistent about it.
Posted by: memphis761 at December 21, 2005 09:50 AM (D3+20)
15
Just yesterday ShannonKW claimed to be a conservative, but then in the same comment came to the defense of the BBC. She is about as conservative as Pelosi, or perhaps Kos. A liberal is sooo easy to spot, they just can't help themselves.
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 21, 2005 10:06 AM (rUyw4)
16
seminar bloggers.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 10:08 AM (8e/V4)
17
well it certainly shows that our hindsight is always 20-20. In 2000-1 the US government total aid to Afghanistan was about 150 million. Of which 43 million was in cash, to the Taliban. Google it
Posted by: john Ryan at December 21, 2005 10:22 AM (ads7K)
18
John,
yes, as part of the anti-drug effort there. Same with Colombia. And then 9/11 happenned. That should have been Johnny Taliban's cue to bail.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 10:33 AM (8e/V4)
19
Well, itÂ’s a pretty ridiculous request. Charlie Manson has a better chance of getting this President to reduce his sentence than young John.
Posted by: Brad at December 21, 2005 10:59 AM (3OPZt)
20
C'mon folks: all Taliban Johnny needs to do is get some hack to ghost-write a children's book about staying away from terrorism. He'll publish it, the NYT Book Review will give it five stars, the Hollywood crowd will go into a swoon, Heath Ledger will portray him in an Academy Award-nominated movie, he'll be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and the next defeat-ocrat president will grant him a pardon.
Posted by: docjim505 at December 21, 2005 11:14 AM (MC8cP)
21
I'm with memphis on this one; we need public hangings of his sort. And politicians too, starting with Billary, John Kerry, Dingy Harry Reid, et al.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 21, 2005 11:25 AM (0yYS2)
22
If anything the Taliban / Al-Qaeda - Russia / Mujahideen should teach us as Americans, that is it is time for our Government to stop backing a horse because it suits a method to our means, the horse inevitably lands back at our door.
As Carlos mentioned the drug trade and Columbia, I'll add a little counter, sometimes even though our Special Forces are running interdictions at the will of our politicians, the same have already tied their hands behind their backs.
I believe it was in the book "Combat Swimmer" one of the Navy Seals tasked with hunting drug lords said that their operational orders were to capture, and hand over to local authorities. He had specifically requested if it would not be better to kill them, in order to make being a drug lord a dangerous job, while sending messages to others. He was told no, capture and hand to local authorities. Well of course they did, but nothing ever came of it because the drug lords already had local authorities in their pockets, and were released.
So why send in the SF, if you're not going to follow through? this is part of the problem: the cavalier actions of our politicians, with their "secret wars" and selective law enforcement, there is not enough thought behind it, no analysis of the reprocussions, or monitoring of the after effects and it inevitably gets people killed.
It's happened in Iraq too.
Posted by: dave at December 21, 2005 11:28 AM (CcXvt)
23
dave,
sometimes the politicians are themselves restrained by Liberals, and other times restrained by the political realities on the ground. So it's not always unfair to criticize them for having to restrain the SF.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 11:44 AM (8e/V4)
24
...not always FAIR...
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 11:45 AM (8e/V4)
25
First off, I'm a dude. Uncommon first name, yes, and half of my junk mail is addressed to "Ms. ShannonKW."
Second, I'm conservative compared with the mean here in the U.S. I just look liberal here because this board is somewhat to the right of Ferdinand Marcos.
Third, the conditions of Lindh's agreement are public knowledge. I got it from Wiki. If you know a reputable source that disputes it, I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Fourth, I made no crack on Bush. I can't imagine what Lindh could know that would embarrass Bush personally. Wiki suggests that he was maltreated by his captor, but that doen't sound like enough to me. If I was a gambling man I'd bet that they shut him up to prevent him from becoming a hero to those who sympatize with him, but I wouldn't bet much.
Fifth, lazy, spoiled people aren't known for renouncing all the comforts of a wealthy family to study Arabic in Yemen, attend an austere religious academy in Pakistan, and take to the hills of Central Asia with a bunch of fanatic semi-barbarians. Loony is certainly plausible, but "spoiled" is right out.
I have this old-fashioned ability to respect the virtues of my enemies. If it was up to me, I would give Lindh a full pardon, a pair of sandals, and a one-way ticket to Yemen on the condition that he renounce U.S. citizenship and never return. Hell, out of generosity of spirit I'd even give him a kind farewell: "Sorry U.S. isn't Islamic enough for you. Get lost."
Posted by: ShannonKW at December 21, 2005 12:06 PM (dYdvr)
26
Well my comments were in regards to all parties, if we were to look at the Russia / Mujahideen scenario, while the Government poured lots of money into financing a rag-tag guerilla force, and trained them in techniques to destroy soviet Helicopters via targetting the front/rear rotors to destroy the Soviets afterwards, we had to realise that these soldiers would move on? Even King Hussein of Jordan warned us that the returning Mujahideen enrolled into the Islamic Egyptian Jihad (which would then become the base of Al-Qaeda)
While the old adage applied is that "You cannot make an omelette, without breaking some eggs" and often it is true, but we should all expect accountability from our politicians, and request that for every action they make, they look to the future and the effects that they may create?
Posted by: dave at December 21, 2005 12:07 PM (CcXvt)
27
Actually Shannon the seeds of his induction to Islam were started here, with his attendance of a Mosque funded by the radicals in Saudi Arabia. Also when you count out the "spoiled" I think you are going with the scenario that suicide bombers, and radicals are a product of being poor. That is not true, look at some of the profiles of suicide bomers in Iraq, they were living in relative wealth.
btw. Wikipedia leans so far left, I have to tilt my head to read the screen.
Posted by: dave at December 21, 2005 12:11 PM (CcXvt)
28
The guy is thought to have gone to Afghanistan in Spring 2001, which would be about half a year before the Taliban decided to elect themselves chief enemy of the U.S.
So, you're arguing that until about, oh, 8:30 a.m. on September 11, 2001, the Taliban Regime wasn't anti-American? You are arguing that Johnny Brokeback had no idea what he was getting into when he joined al Qaeda? He never got 'the talk' until 8:30 a.m. on September 11?
Can I buy pot from you?
Posted by: V the K at December 21, 2005 12:21 PM (1R6cr)
29
I hope they laugh at his request for a sentence reduction as they toss it into the wastebasket. I seriously doubt that he had any damaging information against the U.S.
Posted by: Dkelsmith at December 21, 2005 12:48 PM (a3ksX)
30
Lindh didn't volunteer or operate in a vacuum. He knowingly joined, participated with, and by extension, fully supported the ideology, the actions, and the "baggage" of the Tailban and AQ PRE 9/11. I don't care how young he was - 9/11 is not the benchmark to judge him by, but just one item in a string of related events.
There have been similar cases in the past - notably WW2 - of Americans (and other nationals) serving in the Nazi military by choice. In the case of the Americans - yes - pre Dec 7 '41.
I know a few were captured - but don't know what happened to them. I know many simply "disappeared".
Whatever ...
Lindh already has received clemency - his treatment & sentence went above and beyond compassion.
I would be open to him serving out the remainder of his sentence in an Afghan prison with his peers - plus additional charges could be brought against him by the Afghan government for his participation and actions against the Afghan people.
I consider that fair & compassionate.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 12:58 PM (3aakz)
31
I don't have a feminine name so maybe I'm missing something. Can you please highlight and quote for me exactly where in Lindh's plea agreement it is that he is sworn to silence? Granted it is unaccompanied by the usual Wiki-flavored commentary but I think I understood almost every word used. The closest I see to anything approaching censure is this:
14. The defendant hereby assigns to the United States any profits or proceeds which he may be entitled to receive in connection with any publication or dissemination of information relating to illegal conduct alleged in the Indictment. This assignment shall include all profits and proceeds for the benefit of the defendant, regardless of whether such profits and proceeds are payable to himself or to others, directly or indirectly, for his benefit or for the benefit of the defendantÂ’s associates or a current or future member of the defendantÂ’s family. The defendant shall not circumvent this assignment by assigning the rights to his story to an associate or to a current or future member of the defendantÂ’s family, or to another person or entity who would provide some financial benefit to the defendant, to the defendantÂ’s associates, or to a current or future member of the defendantÂ’s family. Moreover, the defendant shall not circumvent this assignment by communicating with an associate or a family member for the purpose of assisting or facilitating their profiting from a public dissemination, whether or not such an associate or other family member is personally or directly involved in such dissemination.
So whatever you have buried in that gray lump between your ears please be kind enough to spill it out here with links preferrably.
22. The defendant agrees that this agreement puts to rest his claims of mistreatment by the United States military, and all claims of mistreatment are withdrawn. The defendant acknowledges that he was not intentionally mistreated by the U.S. military.
Enjoy....
Posted by: Not named Sue at December 21, 2005 01:40 PM (Vp1bn)
32
Nice work!
Yes! he can talk all he wants - he just can't get paid for it - which is becoming pretty standard in many criminal cases now.
It is a bit of a stretch to consider this "forced silence".
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 01:48 PM (3aakz)
33
not sue,
good job. Let that be a lesson to the rest of us about taking Libs at their word.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 01:59 PM (8e/V4)
34
Shannon said: "Second, I'm conservative compared with the mean here in the U.S. I just look liberal here because this board is somewhat to the right of Ferdinand Marcos."
Explain that please, specifically how "right" Marcos was, and how we, the denizens of TJR, are moreso in comparison. You may think you're conservative, but you still parrot the enemy's propaganda nicely.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 21, 2005 02:33 PM (0yYS2)
35
So you think he's a sheep in wolf's clothing, do you maxie?
Maybe right.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 02:38 PM (3aakz)
36
It looks like line 22 pretty much prevents him from claiming to be maltreated, even if he was. It seems doubtful that that clause would have to be added if he was NOT maltreated, but also unlikely that the whole agreement was made for the sake of that line. (For the record, it wouldn't matter to me if he had been maltreated. The dude who supposedly did it already got his, so that score is settled.)
The non-profit clause would effectively gag him except in the case that someone decided to publish his story out of sheer charity. It is so broad that it prevents anyone at all from profitting by it. So this would prevent, "One Against America! The JWL Story!" from making the bestseller list and inspiring budding white jihadists everywhere, which supports my best guess above.
There is nothing in there I can see that totally shuts him up, but I already said I thought he didn't know anything in my original post.
Looking through to body of the agreement, it looks like it was mainly for intelligence purposes though with the other stuff tacked on.
Posted by: ShannonKW at December 21, 2005 03:08 PM (dYdvr)
37
"The dude who supposedly did it already got his, so the score is settled." Nice job scumbag, you just let everybody here know exactly what you are. Fuck off to Yemen yourself.
Posted by: anti-walker at December 21, 2005 03:52 PM (i9Fox)
38
Another fly-by-night free emailer - of the "right" persuasion this time. Come back later when you invest some money in a real email account - until then - leave the insults to those who paid for the right to do it!
Awaiting greyrooster who has PAID his dues - now he knows how to insult - with style!
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 04:05 PM (3aakz)
39
So you are admitting that your initial post:
It's complicated, but the executive summary is they gave him a light sentence to shut him up. He has agreed not to publish any info about his experience as part of a plea bargain.
is a load of bullshit? Thank you, Shannon. How very "conservative" of you. Now maybe you can go correct this "Wiki" that lead you astray.
Posted by: Not named Sue at December 21, 2005 04:15 PM (Vp1bn)
40
Hmmm....I think Johnny Tali got off lightly as it was, but one wonders why he would ask at this time. Perhaps he is just throwing mud at the wall with hopes of some sticking. He would die in prison if it was up to me.
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 21, 2005 04:20 PM (rUyw4)
41
I agree with Shannon.
The guy joined the Taliban before we were at war with them. It would have been suicide for him to desert when the war commenced.
Besides, Bush and his oil buddies were cozy with the Taliban. When the Taliban turned down an "offer that they shouldn't have refused", the U.S turned on them BEFORE 9-11. Typical mafiosa behavior:
There was a preexisting desire to build gas pipelines in Afghanistan. “A senior delegation from the Taleban movement in Afghanistan is in the United States for talks with an international energy company that wants to construct a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan to Pakistan.
A spokesman for the company, Unocal, said the Taleban were expected to spend several days at the company's headquarters in Sugarland, Texas. A BBC regional correspondent says the proposal to build a pipeline across Afghanistan is part of an international scramble to profit from developing the rich energy resources of the Caspian Sea.” 12-04-1997
http://news.b_bc.co.uk/1/hi/world/west_asia/37021.stm
(Take Out Underscore)
The Texas contingency must not have had a constructive meeting with the Taliban, because the pipeline contract was awarded to the Argentinean company Bridas.
Plans for a war against Afghanistan and Iraq had already been made prior to 9-11. “A former Pakistani diplomat has told the BBC that the US was planning military action against Osama Bin Laden and the Taleban even before last week's attacks.”
http://news.bb_c.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1550366.stm
(Take Out Underscore)
On March 15th, 2001, Jane’s Defense reported that war against the Taliban had already commenced, “India is believed to have joined Russia, the USA and Iran in a concerted front against Afghanistan's Taliban regime.”
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jir/jir010315_1_n.shtml
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 05:12 PM (KzOsW)
42
For a good pre-9-11 timeline highlighting the rivalry for the TalibanÂ’s signature by Unocal and Bridas (BP Amoco Argentina), see:
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/51/119.html
Johnny Boy, "Walkered" in on a deal gone bad.
IÂ’d buy his book.
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 05:52 PM (KzOsW)
43
Hmmmm,
Let's see. The thread topic is about Lindh's request for clemency. You agree with Shannon with a one-line opening sentence.
Then ZOOOOOOMMMMMMM! Off you go into Neverland!
OK. Fine.
Since you choose the exclusive material on the Taliban and Afghanistan (NOT Iraq everyone) - then come out of the fuckin' closet with conviction and courage and openingly claim the war in Afghanistan against the Taliban and AQ is illegal, fraudulent and a US conspiracy!
Come on! You coyly hint at it - now go for it! That's a winning strategy - yeah - right!
I swear! You are the most pathetic, educated yet inept writer I have encountered in years!
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 05:59 PM (3aakz)
44
Hondo,
I love how you circle jerk boys ignore my argument.
You lose, thanks fer playin'.
NEXT!
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 06:14 PM (KzOsW)
45
"1997"
Greg,
distrust and verify is our motto here. In fact Bill Clinton was president in 1997-- not "Bush and his oil buddies". Bush wasn't even a candidate for president.
The TalibanÂ’s entry into the United States was requested by the Unocal corporation and cleared by ClintonÂ’s State Department. Which would seem to prove that it was actually "Clinton and his oil buddies" who were cozy with the Taliban-- not "Bush".
As far as Unocal and the pipeline deal goes, that too is a lie. Unocal led an multinational consortium in the 1990s which undertook feasibility studies, but it pulled out of the project in 1998 because of security issues.
Three years after the invasion, Unocal still doesn't have a pipeline in Afghanistan. Why not? Doesn't "Bush" call the shots there? Musharraf and Karzai have signed a pipeline deal, and Unocal isn't part of that consortium. If "Bush and his oil buddies" had wanted a Unocal pipeline in Afghanistan, there would be one right now.
Your Unocal pipeline meme doesn't hold a drop of water.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 06:24 PM (8e/V4)
46
greg
Your "argument" was a series of links to OTHER PEOPLES writings, opinions, analyses, and thoughts. NOT yours.
You actually DIDN'T "argue" or write anything you moron! You didn't even attempt to analytically extropolate any shred of linkage or context.
This is the lame intellectual bankrupt equivalent of a 5 page term paper with 1 paragraph and 4 1/2 pages of footnotes and bibliography!
Whoever were your professors in analytical and creative writing were - I'd sue to get your money back!
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 06:35 PM (3aakz)
47
ps, correction: according to Unical, their decision to pull out was made on a commercial basis-- and has not been reconsidered.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 06:40 PM (8e/V4)
48
JC
On this one don't even bother - in fact - force the real hinted issue - the war in Afghanistan against the Taliban and AQ - don't play his idiotic and childish game - till he comes out and "ARGUES" it.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 06:40 PM (3aakz)
49
hondo,
the conspiracy crowd is too pathetic for words. There's an excellent article on what makes these people tick, and why they latch onto conspiracies like their world literally depended on it:
"When a postmodern liberal is served up a myth which supports his shaky world view, he will cling to it, cherish it, and defend it. This is precisely why postmodern liberalism and far left ideologies are so thickly salted with myths. The myths are carefully protected with oppressive systems of political correctness where dissent is stifled. In Communist countries, dissent from Marxist myths earned you a trip to the gulag for labor and "re-education," or to an insane asylum where your "mental illness" can be cured by drugs, torture, and brainwashing techniques."
"When one has adopted a false world view, he requires the support of myths. Real life is constantly battering against his sand castle walls. Something with psychological power like myths are needed to shore up the jerry-built edifice of his false world view. When a conservative points out that the house has no foundation, the liberal can deny it, rationalize it away, or accuse the conservative of being a fascist. It is far easier to ignore the missing foundation if there is a ready made myth like Adorno's "authoritarian mind" to fall back upon. "The guy who is criticizing me is a fascist type. I can ignore his criticism. Let's attack the fascist."
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/hutchison/040630
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 06:46 PM (8e/V4)
50
Greg also loves the moonbats at the BBC, and uses them for reference, as if they are objective and don't have an ideology. The Al-Guardian, one of the worst of the Leftist rags in the UK, is the recruiting ground of choice for the BBC. Frankly, I'm surprised Johnny (Taliban) Lindh wasn't working for the BBC in 2000-2001. Perhaps that is how he ended up in Afghanistan, he was a reporter for the BBC working on the Unocal pipeline angle. Heh!
Posted by: jesusland joe at December 21, 2005 06:52 PM (rUyw4)
51
Carlos,
The Janes defense link is from MARCH 15, 2001.
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jir/jir010315_1_n.shtml
Second, you know I hate both major parties. Fuck Clinton and Bush.
Third, the deal that was being sought by Unocal of the Taliban is not a “lie”. You go on to admit as much in your next sentence, “Unocal led an (sic) multinational…”
Finally, the spoils of war are still being sorted out in Afghanistan. Haliburton is a player and yes, Haliburton had a favored relationship with the government under Clinton too. I would bet that “American multinational Corporate” interests (an oxymoron) are primed to realize the full commercial potential that is Afghanistan should security issues be resolved.
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 06:56 PM (KzOsW)
52
JC
But he didn't make an argument or state a conspiracy. He in fact - did nothing! - and wants to be recognized for - nothing!
What annoys me is that is was LAME & LAZY! And he wants credit for it!
Any self-respecting leftist writer would sadly shake their head and give him a D ... I would give him a D- simply because his spelling was good - and I'm a nice guy.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 06:57 PM (3aakz)
53
greg,
one simple question. If Unocal didn't drop out because of economic reasons (as they already stated), then why didn't they sign a deal when the Taliban fell? Just answer that one single question. Don't go onto other topics or rabbit trails. Focus like a laser beam on just that one question.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 07:06 PM (8e/V4)
54
>>>"Second, you know I hate both major parties. Fuck Clinton and Bush."
Show me where you go to harrass Democrats and Liberals. A link please.
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 07:33 PM (8e/V4)
55
Carlos,
Again...
I would bet that “American multinational Corporate” interests (an oxymoron), INCLUDING UNOCAL, are primed to realize the full commercial potential that is Afghanistan SHOULD SECURITY ISSUES BE RESOLVED.
I have answered your question twice, but you're too thickheaded, as usual, to get it. "Economic reasons" and security issues are synonymous inn this case.
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 07:35 PM (KzOsW)
56
"I would bet..."
That's your answer?
See this article on post-modern need for myths and conspiracies:
The Myth Creating Process of the Left
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/hutchison/040630
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 07:50 PM (8e/V4)
57
I harass liberals on this site all the time. IÂ’m a conservative and I belong here.
Now I get to ask you a question.
You claim to be a “Christian” and yet, yesterday, you encouraged Impy to “shoot him in the back of the head”, to paraphrase, when engaging one “Ben Franklin” in a mob frenzy.
Given that you claim to be a “Christian”, how do you reconcile such behavior?
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 07:50 PM (KzOsW)
58
greg,
did it piss you off?
That's how I reconcile it ;-)
Posted by: Jesusland Carlos at December 21, 2005 07:56 PM (8e/V4)
59
Carlos""I would bet..."That's your answer"
I have in fact bet.
I've made a nice chunk of change in the market. Valero (VLO) has tripled in the last year, Halliburton (HAL) has nearly doubled in the last 9 months, Exxon Mobil (XOM) and Conoco Phillips (COP) have also done me right.
But my best pick, should the H5N1 hysteria get out of control, is Gildeon Sciences (GILD). They developed Tamiflu and sold it to Roche for 10% royalties, which could be substantial (This is one of RumseldsÂ’ former companies).
I say, do as the royals do if you want to get ahead.
I made money during the Clinton and Bush Administrations and I still intensely dislike them both.
Posted by: Greg at December 21, 2005 08:26 PM (KzOsW)
60
This is drifting off the post topic.
This is not a bulletin board, or an open forum.
O ye of little faith, tread carefully, for thy Vinnie is a vengeful Vinnie.
Posted by: Vinnie at December 21, 2005 08:31 PM (Kr6/f)
61
Not named Sue,
Looking over my posts on this I don't think I was too far from the mark, especially considering that I didn't have the text of the agreement on hand and was referring to a Wikipedia article from memory. I stated what my source was and wasn't trying to "bullshit" anyone.
What got you all huffy and caused a thousand knees to jerk in unison appears to be a paranoid conviction that I was insinuating some sort of conspiracy or evildoing on the part of Bush WHICH I WENT OUT OF MY WAY TO DENY. Maybe you're sensitized to it because every time someone you don't agree with says "Bush" he's sure to follow it up with lunatic conspiracy theories or a comparison to a chimpanzee. I wasn't accusing Bush of anything wrong. I didn't even say the agreement was wrong. If you want to vent your bile on a Bush-basher at least have the goddamn self-restraint to wait till somebody bashes him.
You people do take the prize for this: You are the only people in ages to mistake me for a liberal. I've got no idea where you get this. Maybe you're mistaking conservatism with patriotism. Who knows? I do know I have extreme conservative beliefs that could shock the snuff down Farmer Brown's gullet:
I believe the max prison sentence in the US should be 5yrs--Any crime deserving worse should be punished with penal servitude or death.
I believe violent criminals should be impressed into penal battallions and used as cannon-fodder, because I like the idea of unleashing our internal foes on our extenal ones.
Dead prisoners should be scavenged for parts.
Repeat offenders (any crime) past a certain threshold should be deemed uncivilizable and released naked into large reservations to live the rest of their lives as hunter-gatherers.
The "Duty to Treat" (law requiring doctors to treat all patients in need) should be suspended in the case of self-inflicted injury. Junkies die on their own dime.
The vote should be given only to people who can make trouble. I'm still not sure if it was a good idea to give it to women.
All governement--local, state, and federal--must operate within a fixed budget. The budget may only be adjusted by referendum.
No entitlement programs. No medicare/medicaid. No Social Security. If you can't contribute to your own retirement fund, you're not worth propping up.
Ordering US military forces to attack in the absence of a congressional declaration of war should be deemed an act of treason and punished by death only.
I could go on, but I won't nauseate you further. I ain't a liberal.
Posted by: ShannonKW at December 21, 2005 08:41 PM (dT1MB)
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Another Crook wannabe (same game)- laying out fishing hooks for those gullible to fall for it.
Posted by: hondo at December 21, 2005 10:56 PM (3aakz)
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Greg, when are you going to get it through your thick skull that you're an idiot? Is it your particular curse to never realize that you're "special"? You should be wrangling shopping carts at the local Wal-Mart, not wasting your time on the internet.
By the way, I've seen where you've been posting that article with my information, especially on the Tennessee Indymedia site. If you do such things again, I will have no choice but to find you. Don't fuck up.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 11:40 AM (0yYS2)
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Improbulus:"By the way, I've seen where you've been posting that article with my information, especially on the Tennessee Indymedia site."
I haven't the slightest idea what you are talking about. "Agent Smith" is the one who outed you and I think I know who he is.
Please show me a link to what you are talking about and I will help you analyze the situation.
Posted by: Greg at December 22, 2005 01:45 PM (KzOsW)
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Don't play stupid greg. Stalk me and you stalk a lion. It's time for you to stop playing your childish games and straighten up before you become the next celebrity of the 24 hour news cycle.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 02:49 PM (0yYS2)
66
Thank you for the resume, Shannon. It doesn't change the fact that you hung your ass out pretty far off a shaky platform.
Here you are in the first post you made to this thread:
You people should read up on why he got 20yrs. It's complicated, but the executive summary is they gave him a light sentence to shut him up. He has agreed not to publish any info about his experience as part of a plea bargain. Obviously, we can't know what it was that the govt. didn't want us to hear, but it seemed important enough to Bush.
Take your own advice? Google is your friend by the way. Also your enemy if you're ignorant(red flag clue here). You were wrong. You half-heartedly admitted as much yet you will probably stick to the same bullshit line of reasoning you had before you made the mistake of posting here. Willful ignorance is consistent if little else.
Here you are again making a complete ass out of yourself(by the way, you should paypal Greg for trumping your silliness):
Third, the conditions of Lindh's agreement are public knowledge. I got it from Wiki. If you know a reputable source that disputes it, I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Yes, it is public knowledge so why did you rely solely(?) on "Wiki*". And you obviously couldn't give a shit about reputable sources since you didn't even bother to go directly to THE source--the court documents. Here you go, Ms. Shannon. Notice the first link. Woe is me!!1 So much effort and time invested in that research project.
By the way, my responses weren't knee-jerk dismissal of some liberal troll. It was actually serious snark directed at a fool. A fool who obviously had no qualms about flaunting his ignorance in public. If someone else had called you on it I'd have kept to myself. Whether you're a registered R or D makes no difference. Stupid people reside on both sides of the aisle. But given you are quantifiably stupid AND your "he got what he deserved" comment about Spann the scales tilted away from irrate paleo-con toward hackneyed Kos flunky.
* - You do know "wiki" is a platform for web design, right? You do know Wikipedia is not the only "wiki" in the universe, right, right? Of course, you probably know that as well as you know the details of Lindh's plea agreement. Who am I to question.
Posted by: Not named Sue at December 22, 2005 04:21 PM (YAEN3)
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Impy,
Trust me, you are the furthest thing from my mind.
Send me the link and I might be able to tell you who did whatever you are talking about.
neuroman_268@yahoo.com
(Take Out The Underscore)
Posted by: Greg at December 22, 2005 05:17 PM (KzOsW)
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Honestly greg, I don't really care who did it this time, but if it happens again, I'm going to find the person responsible.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 05:38 PM (0yYS2)
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The question is...
Who is "Agent Smith"?
Posted by: Greg at December 22, 2005 05:58 PM (KzOsW)
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Agent Smith is NOT you!
He (regardless of his political (and sexual) persuasion) writes his own material, is original and often creative - and occasionally amusing.
You are a dork - the kind of guy other leftists give the wrong time and address for protests to.
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 06:14 PM (3aakz)
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He is quite creative.
Posted by: Greg at December 22, 2005 06:26 PM (KzOsW)
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And your not - we agree on something ....YYYYEEEAAAHHHHH!
Posted by: hondo at December 22, 2005 06:30 PM (3aakz)
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I think Smith's as big a moron as the rest, because my two year old neice can come up with better crap than he does.
Posted by: Improbulus Maximus at December 22, 2005 08:10 PM (0yYS2)
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