In at least one area, President Bush is on the run.
Congress should run him to ground.
The issue, which should be of concern to Democrats, Republicans and independents alike, is illegal spying on Americans by the National Security Agency.
Back in 2005, the New York Times (after unconscionably holding the story for a full year) exposed the fact that Bush, in late 2001, had authorized the NSA to illegally begin a wide-ranging program of monitoring the phone calls and internet communications of Americans in direct and blatant violation of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). That act had been passed by Congress in 1978 precisely because of a similar spying program authorized by President Richard Nixon. It had turned out Nixon was using the NSA illegally to spy on political opponents both outside and inside his own administration.
Last year, a federal judge determined, in a case brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, that Bush's actions had been illegal, violating both FISA (a felony), and the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Civil Libertarians both among the public at large and in Congress, have been up in arms ever since disclosure of the Bush spying, both because of its clear affront to the rule of law, and because no explanations for it put forward by the administration made any sense. Bush and his legal advisers at the White House and in the Justice Department have been claiming for nearly two years that they "had to" violate FISA because of a supposed need to monitor suspected terrorists, but critics rightly point out that the FISA law was designed to make such monitoring easy. Under FISA, there is a special secret court of 12 senior federal judges whose only responsibility is to hear government requests for secret wiretaps. Its top-security-clearance rated members stand ready to act even in the middle of the night, and in fact have only rejected such requests for warrants four times since 1978.
Furthermore, critics note, the FISA law gives law enforcement and NSA wiretappers three days to seek a warrant after they start wiretapping! In other words, there is no issue of timeliness. Under FISA, the administration can start spying, and seek permission retroactively.
This has many people suspecting that what the administration has been doing was not spying on terrorists at all--but rather spying on people it should not have been spying on--people that even the most accommodating FISA judges would not have granted warrants for. Who might these people be? Well, given the administration's many comments about how critics of the president are "aiding the terrorists," they could well be legitimate critics of administration policies like torture or the Iraq War. Given the administration's paranoid obsession about leaks, they could also be people within the Bush administration. Both such groups were targets of Nixon's illegal NSA spying, and it seems likely they have also been targets of Bush's mysterious spying campaign.
In any case, while past efforts to get answers from the administration foundered in a Republican Congress, with the Democrats in control of both houses, it was becoming clear that Bush would be facing hard questioning, possibly including subpoenas of documents and people, by the new Congress.
That prospect has led the administration to chaznge course and announce that it is ceasing the warrantless spying, and will now be adhering to FISA and seeking warrants when it wants to monitor someone's communications.
Clearly Bush is hoping that the problem will now go away; that the Congress will drop plans to seriously investigate the five-year illegal NSA spying campaign he illegally ordered up. Indeed, the Justice Department has reportedly already gone to the Court of Appeals to request that the federal case finding the spying to be illegal, currently on appeal by the government, be "mooted," or ruled no longer at issue because of their new decision to operate within the law. No doubt similar arguments will be made to the House and Senate intelligence and justice committees.
Such efforts should be slapped down.
The fact remains that for more than five years, this president willfully violated a federal law. Both the courts and the Congress, as well as the American people, have a right and a duty to know, in clear detail, both what he did and why he did it.
Only a few months ago, the president and his attorney general were insisting that Bush's illegal spying campaign was absolutely essential in the so-called "War on Terror," and that the procedures of the FISA law were "too slow and too cumbersome" to do the job. Now, faced with the likelihood of real congressional inquiry, the president and his attorney general are claiming that they can do just fine staying within the law, and getting warrants from the FISA judges. What do they take us for, idiots?
If, as seems almost certain, the president abused his power and sicced the NSA on American citizens who were not violating the law or involved in terrorism, he should be impeached for the most grave of Constitutional violations.
http://www.thiscantbehappening.net
Dave Lindorff, a columnist for Counterpunch, is author of several recent books ("This Can't Be Happening! Resisting the Disintegration of American Democracy" and "Killing Time: An Investigation into the Death Penalty Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal"). His latest book, coauthored with Barbara Olshanshky, is "The Case for Impeachment: The Legal Argument for Removing President George W. Bush from Office (St. Martin's Press, May 2006). His writing is available at http://www.thiscantbehappening.net
I've written several articles on the subject including one just days before this recent reversal in policy.
While I AM glad the policy isnt being continued, should that the be the end of it? I dont think so. The policy was a gross assault on our Constitutional Protections and those who engaged in it need to suffer the consequences.
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Steven Leser (186 articles, 34 quicklinks, 31 diaries, 1251 comments)
on Thursday, January 18, 2007 at 3:43:14 PM
Just because you stop robbing banks doesn't mean you aren't a bank robber. Just because you stop murdering young women doesn't mean you are no longer a serial killer. And just because you stop feloniously breaking a surveillance law and stop violating the Constitution's Fourth Amendment (if in fact Bush has really stopped...) doesn't mean you are not an abuser of power and subject to impeachment.
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Dave Lindorff (293 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 141 comments)
on Thursday, January 18, 2007 at 4:09:21 PM
Yes, the Bush cabal take you and everybody else as impotent idiots we have become. There's no downside. No chance for imprisonment. A slight chance for impeachment in the House and virtually no chance for conviction in the Senate. Until there is equal application of our laws, integrity, honesty and decency will continue to dwindle in our nation and government.
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Dusty Nathan (16 articles, 0 quicklinks, 6 diaries, 49 comments)
on Thursday, January 18, 2007 at 5:59:07 PM
You guy's go!!! Drive the steak through Chenney's and Bush's hearts, then put some nails in there coffin's. Truly these last few day's have been like music to my ear's. Stopping Bush is a must, if not it will end as the Vietnam war era with temporary relief. If we could just find someone high enough up in the CIA to vent out there injustices, and have Congress and Senate put limits on CIA nonsense. They have also became a rouge enterprise, separate from government control. This is where power like that of the Bush's with a driving all out evil attention form to start out. But a victory against G.W.Bush would put them in check for now. One will definitely wonder where the mighty war machine will surface next. As dangerous as the CIA people are, curiosity could end up killing the cat digging out information into there crime spree's.
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Fred F (1 articles, 1 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 363 comments)
on Thursday, January 18, 2007 at 8:27:35 PM
I enjoyed reading your article on Gonzales and his trying to defend Bush attempting to do away with Hapas Corpus. In my opinion Bush and Cheney both need to be impeached out of office for his abuse of power and for his and Cheneys lying to get support for his illegal invasion of Iraq. We as American citizens need to force congress to investigate Bushs first and second term in his stolen elections. Thank you for your very infromative article
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bored65622 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 6 comments)
on Friday, January 19, 2007 at 1:22:08 AM
I'm asking everyone in the movement to refer to the gop as "the george bush party"--for example, if you refer to Liddy Dole [R-NC], please call her Liddy Dole, George Bush Party-North Carolina.
Even republicans have come to say that the bushistas have turned their party away from its historic goals. Using this expression will help to divide these "real" republicans from the rambling wreck george bush has wrought.
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gabby hayes (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 14 comments)
on Friday, January 19, 2007 at 9:19:53 AM
it's very difficult for a person of limited intelligence to understand that other people are smarter. Instead they think smarter people are affected or pretending or gay. And when you outsmart them (as anyone of ordinary intelligence or better can do easily) they accuse you of cheating and develope their own cheating skills to even the playing field. They don't understand decency, they don't understand thought, and they don't understand intelligence. They don't want to use diplomacy because they know they will be beat easily by virtually anyone. They can't follow the constitution because it is designed to maintain the highest principles of fairness and decency--principles that inevitably result in the shunting aside of people like George, condi, gonzo, ashcroft and the rest.
PS
I'm asking everyone in the movement to refer to the gop as "the george bush party"--for example, if you refer to Liddy Dole [R-NC], please call her Liddy Dole, George Bush Party-North Carolina.
Even republicans have come to say that the bushistas have turned their party away from its historic goals. Using this expression will help to divide these "real" republicans from the rambling wreck george bush has wrought.
by
gabby hayes (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 14 comments)
on Friday, January 19, 2007 at 9:24:10 AM
FISA judge Dee Vance Benson ruled in fraudulently removed to federal court New Mexico 12 person paid-for jury trial lawsuits guaranteed inviolate under New Mexico constitution and 7th Amendment to US Constitution
Rule 38. Jury Trial of Right
(a) Right Preserved.
The right of trial by jury as declared by the Seventh Amendment to the Constitution or as given by a statute of the United States shall be preserved to the parties inviolate.
Case Title: Morales, et al. v. Zavitz, et al.
Case Number: 01cv01198
Judge(s): Presiding: District Judge Dee V. Benson
Office: Albuquerque
and
Case Title: Payne v. Dow, et al.
Case Number: 01cv01132
Judge(s): Presiding: District Judge Dee V. Benson
Office: Santa Fe
If we don't get these matters settled by Monday January 22, 2007, then we start the process of voiding crooked judge Dee Vance Benson's rulings for lack of jursdiction.
Criminal complaint aganist Gosler and Folley for high tech terrorism filed with DC judge Harry Edwards is one of the more interesting aspects of this 15 calendar year, so far, legal battle.
Criminal complaint was mailed certified return receipt requested July 16, 1996 and arrived in WDC on July 18, 1996.
If they did, they never would have hidden the programs, NSA spying and others, in the first place.
What they take us for is, powerless to investigate/stop them. As long as they had a firm wall of enablers in Congress, they were right.
The voters acted last November to 'tear down that wall.' Now we will see if voting was enough. We see it was enough to cause Little Alberto to announce to the Judiciary Committee that the program has been put under FISA. At least the NSA spying program has been put under FISA.
As a voter and an activist independent, I want to know on whom they were spying, while the program was not under judicial review: Reporters, political opposition (from either party) and/or their wives or husbands, political activists of all kinds?
Whatever else this program was, it was a big abuse of power. Let's find out how big.
The Democrats haad better not let this go!
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wintefire6 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 86 comments)
on Saturday, January 20, 2007 at 4:56:50 AM
I'm thinking it's about time for a "false-flag" operation, say an attack on one of the ships bush put in the Persian Gulf.
bush's criminal family is crumbling. They can't stand the light of day. They need to do something. Iran is it. And when they spew tens-of-thousands of radio active sand into the atmosphere with their bunker-busters we can look for China and Russia to jump in and then it's kiss the baby good-bye time.
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Mr M (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1003 comments)
on Sunday, January 21, 2007 at 10:10:26 PM
