WAR: Daschle Wades in on Wiretap Debate

Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, has come forward to say that Congress "explicitly denied" a White House request to expand powers within the United States, and that the Bush Administration's argument that it has legal justification under a resolution adopted by Congress, is false.




So there it is in a nutshell. The administration proposed an alteration to the bill that would have permitted warrantless wiretapping of US citizens, as they were clearly aware the unaltered bill did not allow it.

Are you getting worried about your government now?

[edit on 12/23/2005 by mythatsabigprobe]

[edit on 12/26/05 by FredT]

Well I am one of the few that stands by the truth of our government behind the sugar coated disguise.

What the president did was abuse of power and that what is call for.

Anybody can say anything they want but he abused his power and did it because he though that he can do it and get away with it.

Shame on the President.

lets see, i democrat that got voted out of office (the majority leader at that)after a very very bitter campaign takes a bat at the republican leadership.

nooooo. say it aint soooo.

sorry, dont see anything he has to say as being reliable info. just MHO.

Wasn't Tom Daschle, along with Tom Brokaw, the target of one of the Anthrax Letters sent in the wake of 9/11?

He went on to become the target of the GOP in the '02 elections.

Coincidence? There is no such thing.

Its good to see him back in the mix.

If we had listened to more of what he had to say then, we might not be in the precarious situation we are in now.

Tom Daschle found out the hard way that Eastern Liberal Democratic principles & values don't sell so well out West. It's to bad he ever let himself be captured by that group to begin with because he was a very capable senator.

Unlike Icarus Rising, I personally find the U.S. situation in the world to be fairly stable and not precarious.

We are all entitled to our opinions, and to disagree amicably with those of others. Time will reveal the truth to us all.

I didn't say we are in imminent danger of some major catastrophy, just in a precarious position on the world stage. It is interesting to see the effort at democracy in Iraq unfold along the same lines in their recent election as they have here in the US's recent elections, sans, of course, the IEDs and homicide bombers. So far, that is.

If this is true it would have been all over the media years ago. Every president since carter (Mr. peanut) has used this law. This is covered in another thread.....
Bush Allowed NSA to Spy on U.S. International Calls

The law, exactly as it reads now, was passed in 1978.

The DOD has strict guidelines, adopted in December 1982, that limit the extent to which they can collect and retain information on U.S. citizens.

DoD regulations set forth procedures government the activities of DoD intelligence components that affect United States person. It implements DoD directive 5240.1 and replaces the November 30, 1979 version of DoD regulation 5240-1R. It is applicable to all DoD intelligent components.

The purpose of these procedures is to enable DoD intelligence components to carry out effectively their authorized functions while ensuring their activities that Affect U.S. persons are carried out in a manner that protects the constitutional rights and privacy of such persons.

This has not been amended yet. Bush can be impeach using many ways of the law that he has broken when it comes to Americans constitutional rights and privacy.


msnbc.msn.com...


A 1985 ruling by the Supreme Court that the attorney general and other high-level executive officials could be sued for violating people's rights, in the name of national security, with such actions as domestic wiretaps.










[edit on 25-12-2005 by marg6043]

Daschle. Tom Daschle. Wait. I'm starting to remember. Yeah. Now I got it. He's that LOSER from, uh, wait, I got it now, South Dakota, right?

Shut up loser! No one wants to hear your crap!

CJCS General Pace was asked about this very issue on the Fox Sunday Interview today. His first response was, a uniform doesn't make policy in the US. Bravo!

The interviewer rephrased the question and General Pace said again it was his job to act on the intelligence collected in the most appropriate way, not to source it, and it should be collected in a way that respected the constitutional rights of American citizens. Bravo, again!

Man, I really like General Pace, he's a straight shooter, and boy am I glad he is CJCS. It gives me hope that our military will work its way out of the mess our politicians have put them in.

Merry Christmas and Godspeed to you, General Pace. Semper Fi! Uh-Rah!

[edit on 25-12-2005 by Icarus Rising]

marg6043: Research, research, research. Check out the ATS thread:
WAR: Bush Allowed NSA to Spy on U.S. International Calls, and read the entire thing. The US law is there that allows what Bush did, and it's been in effect since 1978. Check the facts before you rant.

[edit on 26-12-2005 by zappafan1]

Originally posted by zappafan1
The US law is there that allows what Bush did, and it's been in effect since 1978. Check the facts before you rant.

[edit on 26-12-2005 by zappafan1]

This is not Rant but research, even if Bush did what he did illegally he is hiding under the patriot act to justified it.

Still is not amendments to any of the laws listed above so it will be a matter of what law he broke and he can be prosecuted for it.

Occurs it will all come down to what the congress will so with the evidence.

No Rant here but facts, so the propaganda of what he did or not do under his power as president can still be scrutinized when it comes to abuse of power and over steeping the constitutional rights of the American people.

Don't tell me you forgot the constitution . . . Did you?

No wonder Bush wants Alito for supreme court judge, he was one of the people during the 80's that wanted to made possible for officials in the government to be immune to decisions that affect the constitutional rights of Americans in the name of national security.

The supreme court halted that in1985.

Tell me how many people under Bush surveillance were prosecuted and arrested?

None.

It was an abuse of power and a rat chase.

This might shed a little more light on the reason for sidestepping the FISA court...

www.upi.com...
Bush was denied wiretaps, bypassed them

WASHINGTON, Dec. 26 (UPI) -- U.S. President George Bush decided to skip seeking warrants for international wiretaps because the court was challenging him at an unprecedented rate.

A review of Justice Department reports to Congress by Hearst newspapers shows the 26-year-old Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court modified more wiretap requests from the Bush administration than the four previous presidential administrations combined.

The 11-judge court that authorizes FISA wiretaps modified only two search warrant orders out of the 13,102 applications approved over the first 22 years of the court's operation.

But since 2001, the judges have modified 179 of the 5,645 requests for surveillance by the Bush administration, the report said. A total of 173 of those court-ordered "substantive modifications" took place in 2003 and 2004. And, the judges also rejected or deferred at least six requests for warrants during those two years -- the first outright rejection of a wiretap request in the court's history.

And that in turn, may shed more light on the reason for FISA Judge James Roberston's recent resignation.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

A federal judge has resigned from a special court set up to oversee government surveillance, apparently in protest of President Bush's secret authorization of a domestic spying program on people with suspected terrorist ties.

U.S. District Judge James Robertson would not comment Wednesday on his resignation, but The Washington Post reported that it stemmed from deep concern that the surveillance program Bush authorized was legally questionable and may have tainted the work of the court. The Post quoted two associates of the judge.

An aide to Robertson said the resignation letter submitted to Chief Justice John Roberts was not being released. Robertson did not step down from his district judgeship in Washington.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan would not comment on Robertson's reported resignation or the reasons cited for his departure. "Judge Robertson did not comment on the matter and I don't see any reason why we need to," McClellan said. [/quote

[edit on 12/27/2005 by mythatsabigprobe]

Is odd, isn't it...the court that no qualms the majority of the time for many previous presidents, suddenly becoming so uncooperative with Bush?? Did they have a massive change in justices on the court, inserting a bunch of those horrible, liberal, "activist judges"? or did these justices see a problem with the kind of servelience that Bush wanted to do? was this servelience so far out of line with what all the other presidents were doing that it deserved this type of reaction from the court?

ya know, some of nixon's wrongdoing was tapping into the phone lines of journalists and media.....which would explain why ALOT of these stories that occasionally pop up aren't covered whatssoever by the mainstream media.....don't know if this is the case or not. But, well, Bush decided to bypass the laws that would have provided oversight...so, can anyone prove that he didn't? just what in the world was he listening into and well, how can you prove that it wasn't more...or are you just taking his (and his pals) word for it?

he broke our laws, they weren't working for him, so he chose to just ignore them....

the laws don't work sometimes for me either, sometimes they actually hurt me, or the ones I care about and who are relying on me for things.....so, well, I guess what's good for the goose should also be good for the gander...don't ya think?

Originally posted by dawnstar

the laws don't work sometimes for me either, sometimes they actually hurt me, or the ones I care about and who are relying on me for things.....so, well, I guess what's good for the goose should also be good for the gander...don't ya think?

Well as you know is a different we are the populace the ones that should not be complaining because after all everything that the government do even if is stepping on our constitutional rights is all for the good of the nation and for our own safety.

But when you or I brake the law we are arrested with not problem.

So what makes our elected leaders invincible?

Nothing, just the fact that we the public has stop caring what is happening to us and are allowing the elected officials decided for us.

What I find to be intensly interesting about this entire issue is the fact taht if anyone in the proper circle...i.e. intelligence/military/government.....wanted to wiretap or in some way breach the privacy of any given individual, they could. Without anyone being the wiser....especially the violated in question (or not in question, however the case may be).

I'm sure the knowledge would come up if the information recieved illegally were actually used as evidence in a public forum, but that isn't necassarily why intelligence is gathered in the first place. Sometimes it is merely gathered in order to confirm or refute speculation, so future priorities can be set and resources allocated accordingly.

I'm sure it's not that simple, however, I also don't accept that if this capacity is currently held by the government along with technology that hasn't been advertised, much less sold to the population, then it would go unused because people 'don't like it.' I mean, when you consider that these people are apt at hiding their tracks from people who are aware, then it isn't a feat to hide from the population....who for the most part only know what they told.....

MAybe, now that the damage is done....they need a scapegoat to blame the mess on.....and well, Bush and his neocon friends are elected.

Exactly........which makes this, in my opinion, more of a public relations issue than anything. People are concerned and sometimes the quickest way to assuage concern is by stating to the contrary and creating a scapegoat........which makes me wonder what exactly teh point is, in many cases.....

ummm....our national debt is now unmanageable, there's a good chance that our country could be up on war crimes...ya know, sactions, blockades and all that....and well, we, the people can't be blamed can we....it was a runaway government, elected into office by faulty voting machines!!! have mercy, please????

we kicked the culprits out of office!!!

I think you misunderstood me....when I stated that sometimes I wonder what the point was, I was referring to listening to the media and elected officials. It can be assumed that they are are going to tell the people what they want to hear because that is what perpetuates them.....media=ratings and advertising revenue; elected officials=modicum of power attention/salaries......

That's what I see here.....a wiretap debate that is essentially irrelevant to the day to day of most americans. But buy hearing about this debate for the amount of time taht it's been in the news is going to get them thinking about it as if it really did apply to their lives...which is interesting because most people wouldn't know what to do on the off chance that they actually did discover someone invading their privacy in the given capacity....

Originally posted by dawnstar
and well, we, the people can't be blamed can we....

That says it right there.....we don't want to blamed....so we have illusory failsafes.....yet the bumbling (intentional or not) still sends a message to the world and we are still affected in many international endeavors..personal/professional....individual/collectively. What difference does it make if we can say we didn't do it if we get lumped together as a generality/stereotype in the world press?

Which leads me to think that the onflict /resolution aspect of this story is merely there to give the illusion that someone is on the side of he common person.....to give comfort, or something to that nature....

Originally posted by dawnstar
.....we kicked the culprits out of office!!!

Kind of really doesn't matter if the career of most politicians is give or take the span of a decade.....they all make way in the end.....