Punishing the Guilty
 

The Constitution is "involved," although the application of the Fourth Amendment here is less clear than the questions of statutory interpretation. If you want to understand more -- not necessary given your posting style, I'll concede -- I'd be happy to point you to a lengthy legal analysis by a law professor, former DOJ prosecutor and Kennedy clerk, and -- yes -- blogger.

I missed all that, alas.

Punishing the Guilty
 

I have a job and a family, so i admit i read less than some of you- but if the taps, absent warrents, would violate the 4th amendment, why is the statute necessary?

Punishing the Guilty
 

Because Congress can decide to keep the NSA out of domestic surveillance for reasons other than the concern that the NSA is violating Fourth Amendment rights.

Punishing the Guilty
 

here's my problem with this- if the actions that the act proscribes violate the Constitution anyway, the act was ill-advised. Statutes can be repealed a whole lot easier than the Constitution can be amended. Once the statute has been reversed, isn't the reversal support that the previously proscribed acts are not unconstitutional?

You say "concern" but ain't no "concern" here. If the acts are unconstitutional, then they were/are, and no statute is necessary.

Ty- you're arguing the Carter Dem congress fucked up by passing the act- it was over inclusive and sought to prevent things that were unconstitutional already- does your mom and Dad know you're attacking the late 70s Congress?

Punishing the Guilty
 

The constitutional argument is less clear than the statutory argument, and perhaps there's no reason to reach it. The fundamental problem here is that Bush sees himself as above the law, and has surrounded himself with people who affirm this.

Punishing the Guilty
 

According to my constitutional law pprofessor in law school, judges will, if possihle, generally attempt to resolve an issue as a matter of statutory interpretation rather than constituional interpretation if such is possible.

Perhaps a Venn diagram would help?

Punishing the Guilty
 

It's not clear to me how this gets in front of a court. I think it ends up as a political question. Or does Congress stop appropriating money for the program?

Punishing the Guilty
 

Ole "no borders" Jones? Seems to me your school owes you a refund from that class.

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/page.asp?RelNum=6664

• Media Bias Is Real, Finds UCLA Political Scientist
  
  
  While the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal is conservative, the newspaper's news pages are liberal, even more liberal than The New York Times. The Drudge Report may have a right-wing reputation, but it leans left. Coverage by public television and radio is conservative compared to the rest of the mainstream media. Meanwhile, almost all major media outlets tilt to the left.
  ................ the average ADA score in Congress (50.1) was assumed to represent the political position of the average U.S. voter.
  ..................Of the 20 major media outlets studied, 18 scored left of center, with CBS' "Evening News," The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times ranking second, third and fourth most liberal behind the news pages of The Wall Street Journal.
  
  Only Fox News' "Special Report With Brit Hume" and The Washington Times scored right of the average U.S. voter.
  
  The most centrist outlet proved to be the "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer." CNN's "NewsNight With Aaron Brown" and ABC's "Good Morning America" were a close second and third................The fourth most centrist outlet was "Special Report With Brit Hume" on Fox News, which often is cited by liberals as an egregious example of a right-wing outlet. ..............With scores in the mid-70s, CBS' "Evening News" and The New York Times looked similar to Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., who has an ADA score of 74.
  
  ...................."By our estimate, NPR hardly differs from the average mainstream news outlet," Groseclose said. "Its score is approximately equal to those of Time, Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report and its score is slightly more conservative than The Washington Post's. If anything, government‑funded outlets in our sample have a slightly lower average ADA score (61), than the private outlets in our sample (62.8)."

Hank Chinaski

201-12

Their methodology makes very little sense to me, and the bit in there about Drudge being left of center -- because they basically ignored what he writes, paying more attention to other things he cites -- seems to reflect the problem.

Boy, I must say I admire this work. Those Yanqui Communists at the Drudge Report ought to have their phones tapped.

Good job, son. You are one smart fellow.

Assuming 2 minutes for you to notice the post, and 2 minutes to draft your response, leaves 5 minutes for your in-depth consideration of this work of 3 years. Bravo. I hope your clients appreciate your ability to so quickly get to the heart of a matter.

Punishing the Guilty
 

Congress holds hearings and amends the statute.

What Bush has yet satisfactorily to explain is why the statute was insufficient--the application is ex parte, and they can do it retroactively. Basically what he's saying is that rather than amend the statute to make it useful in the circumstances it was better to ignore it and use his constitutional authority (which he presumes overrides the statute) to seek these taps.

And he wonders why the Patriot act wasn't reauthorized. (which, by the way, is another story--why did hte times sit on this story for a year, publishing it on teh day the patriot act was up for a vote?)

Punishing the Guilty
 

Boy, they had to run it, because if they didn't, that Drudge fellow was going to scoop them. And we all know Drudge would have been releasing it solely to defeat the Patriot Act and embarass the Republicans.

Punishing the Guilty
 

The only thing I could think of is that maybe the NSA launched a sophisticated data mining surveillance system, and ALL conversations and e-mails are under some sort of low-level monitoring. The system picks out conversations with certain key words or phrases, and then someone analyzes the conversation to see if it's something the NSA may be interested in following up on. Wasn't Total Information Awareness, run by John Poindexter, a similar system?

Maybe the NSA picked up that ball when Congress decided that the Pentagon shouldn't be playing with such things without much more supervision.

But even if a system like that was in place, the 72 hour retroactive rule would still work, I think. Though maybe the NSA was concerned that judges wouldn't approve warrants on the basis of phrases alone without further probable cause.

Punishing the Guilty
 

Nope. The issues are completrely unrelated. (Except perhaps to the extent that you might argue in a 4th A case that the reversal changed a person's "reasonable expectation of privacy" -- but that doesn't hold much weight.)


Statutes -- especially nice clear ones like FISA -- are much easier and quicker to interpret and enforce that the Constitution. They also have penalties for violations. You don't get sent back for remedial classes for violations of the Constitution.

S_A_M-

Ummmm. i didn't write it, I quoted it.

note to Fringey: you should mention in GGG's file (unless you closed it- optomist!) that while he lives in Boston, he apparently didn't go to school there.

I know there's more than one school there- but there's not.

Hank Chinaski
'88 '91 Law

I saw an article on the study on Monday. I suspect Ty was familiar with the study before you posted it.

Punishing the Guilty
 

This article (linked on the liberal Drudge Report) suggests that the reporter had a book coming out talking about the wiretaps. If they didn't run the story, they'd be scooped by their own reporter.

http://www.observer.com/pageone_offtherec.asp

Yeah, I guess you're right. Once he's a lame duck, then why should he bother obeying the law?

You ought to consider actually reading this stuff before you post it.

Punishing the Guilty
 

There is another, minor, gloss on the Constitutional aspect of this. Bush took an oath of office wherein he swore to obey and uphold the laws of the United States. He violated that oath. He did so knowingly, apparently with full intent to do so, and he now shows no indication that he even acknowledges the possibility that his conduct was wrong.

Bush Lied!
 

Liar liar liar.

• Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/relea...0040420-2.html

The War on Christmas
 

Hitchens's take:

• But there are millions of well-appointed buildings all across the United States, most of them tax-exempt and some of them receiving state subventions, where anyone can go at any time and celebrate miraculous births and pregnant virgins all day and all night if they so desire. These places are known as "churches," and they can also force passersby to look at the displays and billboards they erect and to give ear to the bells that they ring. In addition, they can count on numberless radio and TV stations to beam their stuff all through the ether. If this is not sufficient, then god damn them. God damn them everyone.

http://www.slate.com/id/2132806/

Punishing the Guilty
 

My God, man, you are not actually suggesting that this is as bad as lying about sex, are you?

Punishing the Guilty
 

On the scale of things how does this stack up to stealing the election in 2000, disenfranchising millions of black voters in 2004, lying us into a war to protect his dad and wrecking the economy to get tax breaks for his rich friends? It just seems minor in comparision.

Punishing the Guilty
 

Well, of course not. Shrub wasn't under oath, strictly speaking.

I'm torn
 

On the one hand slimy bastard Abramoff should do some time; on the other hand, if he squeals, there's no telling how many Republican congresspeople he could take down with him. Right in time for the mid-term elections.


Hmmm.

Punishing the Guilty
 

Welcome back.

Punishing the Guilty
 

Took you long enough to come around.

I'm torn
 

I'm hoping for as many as possible, but I'll settle for Tom Delay and Don Nickles.

Punishing the Guilty
 

If by "this law" you mean FISA, that's not my reading of it. If you're targeting a US Person, and if that US Person has a REP and a warrant would be required for law enforcement purposes, then regardless of where the interception occurs, it's "Electronic Surveilance" (1801(f)(1)), and you need can't go warrantless under 1802 if a US Person's communications are going to be intercepted.

I'm torn
 

But is the deal in exchange for ratting out the upper echelons of the Republican party, or for keeping his trap shut?

ETA: and is he crying in that picture? I suppose he could just be squinting against some glare. I hope so. Because if you're going to shake down half the industries in America for political favors, you really shouldn't be a pussy about it when they finally throw you in jail.

I'm torn
 

Probably depends on whether he's talking to the career DoJ guys or the political appointees.

I'm Confused.........
 

Here are some things I don't understand.

1) Why would congress pass an Act (FISA) that limited government surveillance beyond the bounds of the constitution. Especially when it comes to foreign nationals and calls outside the United States? The answer is probably that Congress did a lot of stupid things in response to Watergate.

2) If FISA or some other act did such a thing, why didn't the Patriot Act reverse those parts of FISA? Who dropped the ball on that one? Seems to me pretty obvious who dropped the ball on that one.

3) If the NSA computerized system sometimes picks up domestic calls between US citizens, then why don't they say that those were a mistake and they were working on the problem.

4) How can anyone argue that non-warranted listening to phone calls between US citizens in the United States is not a problem? How can anyone defend that? National Security? Following that logic why have any civil liberties at all? They just get in the way of National Security.

I'm torn
 

The Rolling Stone article about this guy was awesome. I liked the bit from a high school classmate about how his nickname was Abraham Jackoff.

I'm Confused.........
 

I'm not sure if this makes you a Commie or a terrorist. Maybe both.

I'm torn
 

The three Congressmen I am targeting in the primay are Doolittle, Delay and Pombo. They all have had dealings with Abrahamoff. I hope this guy sings like a Canary and he included these three in his swan song.

What a Christmas that would be. Although I have to admit, I have not been a very good boy this year, so Santa probably won't deliver all three on a silver platter.

I'm Confused.........
 

Why would be ban torture overseas? Why would we ban assassinations of foreign leaders? There are things the constitution does not bar, but it might nonetheless be good policy not to permit.

I'm Confused.........
 

I think I would like to be called a neo-terrorist. In domestic policy I am a neo-liberal, in foreign policy I am a neo-conservative, in social policy I have been accused of being a neo-progressive, and when it comes to the enviroment, since I don't think the government should subsidize waste disposal (thereby distorting makets) that makes me a neo-conservationist. So that pretty much just makes me a neo at everything.

I'm Confused.........
 

I hope you take the red pill.