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Unbelievable: Bush's Illegal Spying Could Free the Very Terror Suspects It's Jailed and Hopes to Convict

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As reported in the NY Times Wednesday, several captured terror suspects with ties to Al Qaeda are planning to challenge their cases and sue the government claiming the Bush administration used illegal wiretapping in criminal prosecutions that resulted in conviction. The challenges are being mounted in Ohio, Virginia, Florida and Oregon, and including cases involving Iyman Faris, who plotted to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge.

At issue is the Busheviks' skirting of the courts and Congress in its post-911 power-grab under the guise of protecting America from the terrorist threat. Since 911, Bush, through the National Security Agency, has authorized some three dozen instances of illegal surveillance of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of U.S. and foreign citizens, both abroad and here at home. In order to have pursued his extreme terrorism and espionage spying, Bush was and is required by law to obtain warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which was established by Congress in 1978 to uphold and protect civil liberties. But Bush has defiantly thumbed his nose at FISC, declaring that his aggressive spying tactics are "fully consistent with my constitutional responsibilities and authorities."

"The activities I have authorized make it more likely that killers like these 9/11 hijackers will be identified and located in time," Bush said. "And the activities conducted under this authorization have helped detect and prevent possible terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad."

But here's the rub: the very terrorists that sit in U.S. jails right now could be freed if their legal challenges are successful in claiming they've been denied due process and have been victims of illegal wiretapping. Incredulously, the Bushies' flagrant circumvention of the law could result in people like Faris back on the street to plot another NYC catastrophe. All because Bush refused to seek the warrants every legal scholar in America agrees he could've easily, and quickly, obtained.

So what we have is an administration run amok. There have been more requests for FISC warrants under Bush than in the last four presidential administrations before him. And most of them have been either amended or denied. So what do the Bushies do as a result? They say, 'screw you, courts, we'll just do whatever we want without you.'

One has to seriously question the ultimate motivations and intent of Bush, who willfully circumvented the legal process which he knew would not support his imperialistic pursuits. This is a very serious matter if the president intentionally broke the laws designed to protect U.S. citizens from undue search and seizure, invasion of privacy, and illegal government intrusion. We live in a society based on the rule of law; of checks and balances. In their quest to achieve supreme, unlimited power and create the first totalitarian regime in American history, the Busheviks blatantly disregard these sacred governing principles, and in the process, have actually made our nation less safe and secure, not more.
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Andy Ostroy, a NYC-based 45-year-old entrepreneur and political commentator, is an aggressive counter to the Bush administration, the Republican Party and the powerful right wing media machine. Our mission is to do whatever possible to help Democrats take back the House and Senate in 2006 and win (more...)
 
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