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Latest Articles: Dead Constitution
The Constitutional Record of George W. Bush
Post Date: 2006-05-25 02:27:09 by Pandora
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The Cato Institute has published a report on the Constitutional record of George W. Bush. The report is available here: Power Surge: The Constitutional Record of George W. Bush. Here are the conclusions the Cato Institute arrive at: .... far from defending the Constitution, President Bush has repeatedly sought to strip out the limits the document places on federal power. In its official legal briefs and public actions, the Bush administration has advanced a view of federal power that is astonishingly broad, a view that includes a federal government empowered to regulate core political speech--and restrict it greatly when it counts the most: in the days before a federal election; a ...
ACLU Launches Nationwide Action Against NSA Snooping on Americans’ Phone Calls
Post Date: 2006-05-25 00:38:09 by Brian S
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NEW YORK, NY -- ACLU affiliates in 18 states today followed the lead of a group of Mainers and filed complaints with Public Utility Commissions or sent letters to state Attorneys General and other officials demanding investigations into whether local telecommunications companies allowed the NSA to spy on their customers. Two weeks ago, the Maine Civil Liberties Union filed a petition to intervene in a similar complaint filed by James Cowie and 20 other Mainers; the MCLU has since made the materials from that complaint available to other affiliates. “It’s time for this illegal invasion of privacy, that could affect everyone in this country, to be unveiled,” said Shenna ...
Negroponte can now make companies immune from reporting income
Post Date: 2006-05-24 23:43:39 by Mekons4
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NPR interview with a Newsweek reporter says that Smirky the Wonder Chimp has turned over authority to Negroponte to shield any company he wants from reporting income or lack thereof concerning any matter of national security to their shareholders or anybody else. As of May 8 (my birthday, btw) they can hide any info they want from even their own officers. It's pretty obvious what is going on. Some telcos are threatening to sue the press because of reports they turned over our phone records to NSA. So now you can't sue THEM, but they can SUE YOU and deny they ever did anything wrong. When it is proven they did, after the Dems take over, they can say, we were given immunity, but we still want ...
Leaked report: Drug traffickers obtained classified DEA documents from U.S. Embassy in Bogotá “at will”
Post Date: 2006-05-24 22:48:44 by robin
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Leaked report: Drug traffickers obtained classified DEA documents from U.S. Embassy in Bogotá “at will”By Bill ConroyOnline Journal Contributing Writer May 24, 2006, 01:07 Narco News has obtained yet more evidence supporting the maze of charges in a leaked Justice Department memo that links DEA agents in Colombia to narco-traffickers.The memo, authored in late January 2004 by Justice Department attorney Thomas Kent, alleges that Drug Enforcement Administration agents on the front lines of the drug war in Colombia are on drug traffickers’ payrolls, engaged in money laundering and complicit in the murders of informants who knew too much about their nefarious ...
Gonzales's Rationale on Phone Data Disputed
Post Date: 2006-05-24 21:14:41 by Zipporah
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Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, May 25, 2006; Page A08 Civil liberties lawyers yesterday questioned the legal basis that Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales used Tuesday to justify the constitutionality of collecting domestic telephone records as part of the Bush administration's anti-terrorism program. While not confirming a USA Today report May 11 saying the National Security Agency has been collecting phone-call records of millions of Americans, Gonzales said such an activity would not require a court warrant under a 1979 Supreme Court ruling because it involved obtaining "business records." Under the 27-year-old court ruling in Smith v. Maryland , "those ...
Paul Craig Roberts: Wake Up and Smell the Chains (of tyranny)
Post Date: 2006-05-24 21:08:10 by BTP Holdings
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Wake Up and Smell the Chains Can America wage a “war on terror,” respect the Constitution and make the Founding Fathers proud of us —all at the same time? By Paul Craig Roberts May 29, 2006 | American Free Press The neo-conservative Bush regime has adroitly used 9-11 to create fear of terrorism among Americans that blinds them to the Bush regime’s assault on our constitutional system. Americans have meekly acquiesced to the Bush regime’s brutal assaults on civil liberties, human rights, the separation of powers and statutory law, because Americans have been brainwashed to believe that the “war on terror” takes precedence and cannot be waged under the ...
These photos illustrate AT&T's phone, Internet tracking activities for NSA
Post Date: 2006-05-24 18:58:47 by Zipporah
9 Comments
http://ZDNet.com Blog&category=17'">Digg This!
Wired Magazine has obtained, and has posted, the complete text of a document that attempts to chronicle how AT&T equipped a "secret room" at 611 Folsom Street in San Francisco to track domestic and international phone calls made by American citizens and others.
That's the entrance to the secret room at the top of this post.
The document, entitled AT&T’s Implementation of NSA Spying on American Citizens, was prepared by now-retired AT&T communications technician Mark Klein and is posted here.
I am going to highlight and illustrate key components of Klein's paper here. But first, it would be useful to get a ...
History of ‘Speech or Debate’ Clause on Capitol Hill
Post Date: 2006-05-24 16:59:36 by aristeides
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History of ‘Speech or Debate’ Clause on Capitol Hill By Daniel J. Parks, CQ Staff The “speech or debate” clause found in Article 1. Section 6 of the Constitution was intended to protect members of Congress from politically motivated criminal and civil harassment while performing legitimate functions of their office. It has proved difficult at times for both prosecutors and defense attorneys to navigate in criminal cases involving of members of Congress. In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Brewster that the speech or debate clause protects members of Congress from prosecution for their legislative actions per se, but not from prosecution for crimes ...
Update 20: House Leaders Demand FBI Return Papers
Post Date: 2006-05-24 16:18:21 by aristeides
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Update 20: House Leaders Demand FBI Return Papers By LAURIE KELLMAN , 05.24.2006, 03:41 PM House leaders of both parties stood in rare election-year unanimity Wednesday demanding the FBI surrender documents it took and remove agents involved in the weekend raid of a congressman's office. "The Justice Department must immediately return the papers it unconstitutionally seized," House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said in a statement. The leaders said that the congressman, William Jefferson, a Louisiana Democrat, should then cooperate with the investigation. Earlier, Hastert had said any FBI agents involved "ought to be frozen out of that ...
WAYNE MADSEN ON FBI HOUSE RAID
Post Date: 2006-05-24 15:35:47 by aristeides
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May 24, 2006 -- The recent Saturday raid by 19 armed FBI agents on the House of Representatives office of Rep. William Jefferson was not a warning to the current 109th Congress but a threatening broadside against the 110th Congress, which looks to have at least one house controlled by the Democrats. The unitary fascist Bush White House is sending a message to a future Democratic Congress -- "engage in investigations, hearings, subpoenas of Bush administration current and ex-officials, and impeachment notions, and this type of ransacking of congressional offices will be the rule and not the exception." That is why pathetic GOP leaders like Dennis Hastert, Bill Frist, and Trent Lott ...
U.S. Supreme Court may consider FBI raid
Post Date: 2006-05-24 15:03:27 by aristeides
2 Comments
U.S. Supreme Court may consider FBI raid WASHINGTON, May 24 (UPI) -- The GOP majority leader in the U.S. House of Representatives wants the Supreme Court to review a controversial FBI raid. House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Tuesday the Supreme Court will probably have to sort out the issues raised by the unprecedented FBI raid on the Rayburn Building office of Rep. William Jefferson, D-La. "I've got to believe at the end of the day this is going to end up across the street at the Supreme Court," Boehner said. "I don't see anything short of it." Boehner told reporters Tuesday that he supports the position of House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., ...
Secret FEMA Plan To Use Pastors as Pacifiers in Preparation For Martial Law
Post Date: 2006-05-24 12:53:45 by Brian S
5 Comments
Nationwide initiative trains volunteers to teach congregations to "obey the government" during seizure of guns, property, forced inoculations and forced relocation Paul Joseph Watson/Prison Planet.com | May 24 2006 A Pastor has come forward to blow the whistle on a nationwide FEMA program which is training Pastors and other religious representatives to become secret police enforcers who teach their congregations to "obey the government" in preparation for a declaration of martial law, property and firearm seizures, and forced relocation. In March of this year the Pastor, who we shall refer to as Pastor Revere, was invited to attend a meeting of his local FEMA chapter ...
Hastert Keeps After Bush on Congressional Office Raid
Post Date: 2006-05-24 11:17:16 by aristeides
6 Comments
Hastert Keeps After Bush on Congressional Office Raid By Susan Ferrechio, CQ Staff House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert is so angry over being kept in the dark about the first-ever raid on a congressional office building that he has taken his grievance to President Bush three times over two days. Hastert, R-Ill., discussed the FBI search with Bush on May 22 as they traveled to Washington together aboard Air Force One, again Tuesday at the White House, where GOP leaders join Bush weekly for breakfast, and again by telephone later in the day, said a House Republican source familiar with the Speaker’s actions on the issue. That is an extraordinary amount of high-level complaining, but what ...
The wrongful arrest and false charges against Icarry.org - Illinois founder
Post Date: 2006-05-24 10:06:06 by christine
6 Comments
In Illinois, law-abiding citizens are prohibited from carrying a loaded firearm for self-defense. Every other state allows it to some extent, but Illinois politicians deny that basic human right to their constituents. We may lawfully carry, however, so long as the firearm is unloaded, enclosed in a case, and we hold a valid “firearm owner identification (FOID) card”. This allows us to be seconds away from safety, and is without a doubt the best way to lawfully stay safe in Illinois. Countless people throughout the state exercise this severely-infringed right to keep and bear arms. My name is Shaun Kranish, and I’m a law-abiding citizen as well as the founder of ...
Senate Panel Backs Hayden CIA Confirmation
Post Date: 2006-05-23 19:05:19 by Zipporah
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1 hour, 23 minutes ago Gen. Michael Hayden moved a step closer Tuesday to becoming the nation's 20th CIA chief, where he will take over a spy agency looking for a leader to steer it through troubles ranging from al-Qaida to Washington politics. The Senate Intelligence Committee recommended confirmation, 12-3, with three of the panel's seven Democrats voting against him. If the Senate approves him before Memorial Day, as expected, Hayden could be sworn in by the end of the week. "We think he is an outstanding choice to head the CIA," committee chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., said after the vote. "He is a proven leader and a supremely qualified intelligence ...
The nature of the beast
Post Date: 2006-05-23 18:05:48 by loner
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The nature of the beast By Sheila Samples Online Journal Contributing Writer May 23, 2006, 01:24 "The demonic appears most terrible when it assumes dominance in some one person. They are not always the most admirable persons, either in mind or in gifts. But a tremendous force goes out from them, and they exercise an unbelievable power over all creatures. It is in vain that the brighter part of mankind tries to throw suspicion on them as betrayers or betrayed; the masses are attracted by them." --Johann Wolfgang von Goethe America has lost its way. We are a confused nation, beset on all sides by fear and paranoia. After the orchestrated 9-11 attack on New York City and ...
Lies, All Lies
Post Date: 2006-05-23 15:35:39 by aristeides
2 Comments
Lies, All Lies by John in DC - 5/23/2006 01:13:00 PM From an amazing diary on DailyKos by Dave V. I had to copy the entire list to give you the full effect - read these (the names towards the end are the readers who contributed the "lie.") Stephen Colbert was not funny. Helen Thomas is old and batty. Mexicans are taking our jobs. Iraq sent its WMDs to Syria. Democrats don't want to wiretap terrorists. Joe Wilson admitted that Valerie Plame wasn't covert. Karl Rove has a faulty memory. Scooter Libby has a faulty memory. Tom DeLay is like Jesus Christ. No one could have anticipated that the levees would be breached. We do not torture. There is no global warming. ...
DEAR AMERICAN TAXPAYERS - Todays Power Structure and its' connection to Tesla
Post Date: 2006-05-23 15:22:58 by Itisa1mosttoolate
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Click for Full Text!
WIRED publishes internal AT&T documents showing company sold out customers to the NSA
Post Date: 2006-05-23 07:21:20 by aristeides
4 Comments
WIRED publishes internal AT&T documents showing company sold out customers to the NSA by John in DC - 5/22/2006 01:20:00 PM UPDATE: Here is the link to EVERYTHING, the documents, the story, you name it. Better download it now, because you know the government will be shutting down this story fast. Oh man, this is bad. And it's worse than we realized: In 2003 AT&T built "secret rooms" hidden deep in the bowels of its central offices in various cities, housing computer gear for a government spy operation which taps into the company's popular WorldNet service and the entire internet. These installations enable the government to look at every individual message on the ...
The Wiretapping Tango
Post Date: 2006-05-23 06:09:44 by robin
1 Comments
This article can be found on the web at http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060605/shapiro The Wiretapping Tango by BRUCE SHAPIRO [from the June 5, 2006 issue] As more facts emerge in the NSA's warrantless call-tracking scandal, it's clear that this isn't about government abuses alone: It's also a delicate tango between security agencies and telecommunications executives. The government may lead, but its essential partners are the phone companies that own the switches, computers and call-routing software. To me and other residents of at least one American city, this is a familiar dance. Beginning in 1964 New Haven police persuaded executives of the Southern New England Telephone Company ...
In the Black(water)
Post Date: 2006-05-23 06:06:32 by robin
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This article can be found on the web at http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060529/scahill In the Black(water) by JEREMY SCAHILL [posted online on May 17, 2006] Tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina victims remain without homes. The environment is devastated. People are disenfranchised. Financial resources, desperate residents are told, are scarce. But at least New Orleans has a Wal-Mart parking lot serving as a FEMA Disaster Recovery Center with perhaps the tightest security of any parking lot in the world. That's thanks to the more than $30 million Washington has shelled out to the Blackwater USA security firm since its men deployed after Katrina hit. Under contract with the Department of ...
NATIONAL SECURITY DEPT. - LISTENING IN (Seymour Hersh)
Post Date: 2006-05-23 01:35:26 by robin
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NATIONAL SECURITY DEPT. LISTENING IN Issue of 2006-05-29 Posted 2006-05-22 A few days before the start of the confirmation hearings for General Michael Hayden, who has been nominated by President Bush to be the head of the C.I.A., I spoke to an official of the National Security Agency who recently retired. The official joined the N.S.A. in the mid-nineteen-seventies, soon after contentious congressional hearings that redefined the relationship between national security and the public’s right to privacy. The hearings, which revealed that, among other abuses, the N.S.A. had illegally intercepted telegrams to and from the United States, led to the passage of the 1978 Foreign ...
One out of 136 Americans in Jail
Post Date: 2006-05-22 21:52:42 by christine
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Washington - Prisons and jails added more than 1,000 inmates each week for a year, putting almost 2.2 million people, or one in every 136 US residents, behind bars by last summer. The total on June 30, 2005, was 56,428 more than at the same time in 2004, the government reported Sunday. That 2.6 percent increase from mid-2004 to mid-2005 translates into a weekly rise of 1,085 inmates. Of particular note was the gain of 33,539 inmates in jails, the largest increase since 1997, researcher Allen J. Beck said. That was a 4.7 percent growth rate, compared with a 1.6 percent increase in people held in state and federal prisons. Prisons accounted for about two-thirds of all inmates, or 1.4 ...
Supreme Court Rules Police Don't Need Warrants in Emergencies
Post Date: 2006-05-22 19:52:12 by Zipporah
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WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court reaffirmed Monday that police can enter homes in emergencies without knocking or announcing their presence. Justices said four Brigham City, Utah, police officers were justified in going inside a home in 2000 after peering through a window and seeing a fight between a teenager and adults. Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the unanimous court, said that officers had a reasonable basis for going inside to stop violence, even though they could not announce their arrival over loud noise of a party. "The role of a peace officer includes preventing violence and restoring order, not simply rendering first aid to casualties; an officer is not like a ...
Why We Published the AT&T Docs
Post Date: 2006-05-22 14:45:19 by Zipporah
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View documents here Why We Published the AT&T Docs A file detailing aspects of AT&T's alleged participation in the National Security Agency's warrantless domestic wiretap operation is sitting in a San Francisco courthouse. But the public cannot see it because, at AT&T's insistence, it remains under seal in court records. Inside the Secret Room Courtroom Clash!A federal judge refuses to give AT&T back its internal documents, but orders the EFF not to give them out. Whistle-Blower's PrecognitionYears before the NSA's warrantless surveillance program made national headlines, then-AT&T technician Mark Klein suspected his company was colluding with the government ...
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