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Latest Articles: Dead Constitution
We’re Bringing the War Back Home (Marines blocking internet sites)
Post Date: 2006-03-01 12:04:03 by Zipporah
2 Comments
Folks, our fighting boys need your help. Here’s the email we received today from one of them: Just to let you know, the US Marines have blocked access to “Wonkette” along with numerous other sites such as personal email (i.e. Yahoo, AT&T, Hotmail, etc), blogs that don’t agree with the government point of view, personal websites, and some news organizatons. This has taken effect as of the beginning of February. I have no problem with them blocking porn sites (after all it is a government network), but cutting off access to our email and possibly-not-toeing-the-government-line websites is a bit much.Initially all web blocking was done locally at the hub sites in Iraq. ...
Study: Few Americans Know 1st Amendment
Post Date: 2006-03-01 10:16:52 by Brian S
3 Comments
(03-01) 05:55 PST Chicago (AP) -- Americans apparently know more about "The Simpsons" than they do about the First Amendment. Only one in four Americans can name more than one of the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment (freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly and petition for redress of grievances.) But more than half can name at least two members of the cartoon family, according to a survey. The study by the new McCormick Tribune Freedom Museum found that 22 percent of Americans could name all five Simpson family members, compared with just one in 1,000 people who could name all five First Amendment freedoms. Joe Madeira, director of exhibitions at the ...
Republicans Don't Have Fast Answers on Legislating Bush's Eavesdropping
Post Date: 2006-02-28 22:25:36 by Brian S
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WASHINGTON - A group of Republican senators failed to reach an agreement Tuesday on legislation that would write the Bush administration's controversial eavesdropping program into law. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said he formed the "informal working group" to craft legislation that will strengthen its legal basis. More than a half dozen senators left an hourlong meeting offering few details about progress. The negotiations put Republicans in a politically tricky spot. The White House has argued for more than two months that President Bush had all the authority he needed to order the surveillance of international communications of U.S. residents without first ...
Sen. Byrd Regrets Voting for Patriot Act
Post Date: 2006-02-28 21:22:07 by Zipporah
3 Comments
WASHINGTON — Sen. Robert Byrd, the dean of the Senate and its resident constitutional expert, counts only a few regrets in his 48-year Senate career: filibustering the 1964 Civil Rights Act, voting to expand the Vietnam War, deregulating airlines. ADVERTISEMENT Add to the list a new one from this century: supporting the anti-terror USA Patriot Act after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "The original Patriot Act is a case study in the perils of speed, herd instinct and lack of vigilance when it comes to legislating in times of crisis," the West Virginia Democrat said Monday on the eve of the Senate's final votes on its renewal. "The Congress was stampeded, and the ...
Patriot Act Renewal Clears Final Hurdle
Post Date: 2006-02-28 20:41:55 by Zipporah
3 Comments
Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va. takes part in a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill in this Feb. 7, 2006 file photo. Byrd, the dean of the Senate and its resident constitutional expert, counts only a few regrets in his 48-year Senate career: filibustering the 1964 Civil Rights Act, voting to expand the Vietnam War, deregulating airlines. Add to the list a new one from this century: supporting the... WASHINGTON — Months overdue in a midterm election year, the USA Patriot Act renewal cleared a final hurdle in the Senate Tuesday on its way to President Bush's desk. But the bill's sponsor said he is unsatisfied with the measure's privacy protections and far from ...
Prosecutor likens Guantanamo defendants to vampires
Post Date: 2006-02-28 18:44:21 by Zipporah
2 Comments
By Jane Sutton GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE (Reuters) - Confronting the defendants at the Guantanamo war crimes tribunals with the evidence against them will be like dragging vampires into the sunlight the chief prosecutor said on Tuesday. The cases of two Guantanamo captives charged with conspiring with al Qaeda to attack civilians, commit murder and destroy property will begin pretrial hearings on Wednesday. A scheduled hearing for a third defendant was delayed at the request of his military lawyer, who sought more time to prepare his case. The war crimes tribunals are the first held by the United States since World War II and convened in August 2004, over 2-1/2 years after the ...
AK-47 Rifle Raffle Triggers Ruckus At Clemson
Post Date: 2006-02-28 16:16:58 by Mind_Virus
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Rifle Raffle Triggers Ruckus At Clemson Independent student newspaper's editor hopes to raise money, awareness of 2nd Amendment Published: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - 6:00 am By Ron Barnett STAFF WRITER rbarnett@greenvillenews.com CLEMSON -- An independent student newspaper at Clemson University that last week published Danish cartoons of Muhammad is sponsoring a drawing this week for an AK-47 assault rifle, stirring some student and faculty protests. Andrew Davis, editor-in-chief of the conservative tabloid The Tiger Town Observer, said his purpose is to celebrate the Second Amendment's guarantee of the right to bear arms. "The Second Amendment is probably one of the least ...
Patriot Act Renewal Clears Final Hurdle; on its way to President Bush's desk
Post Date: 2006-02-28 15:48:44 by Brian S
1 Comments
(02-28) 12:23 PST WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Months overdue in a midterm election year, the USA Patriot Act renewal cleared a final hurdle in the Senate Tuesday on its way to President Bush's desk. But the bill's sponsor made clear that he is unsatisfied with the measure's privacy protections and far from done tinkering with the centerpiece of Bush's war on terrorism. "The issue is not concluded," warned the bill's chief author, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa. He said he plans more legislation and hearings on restoring curbs on government power that had been rejected by the House. The Senate voted 69-30 to limit debate and bring the bill up for a vote, ...
Patriot Act E-Mail Searches Apply to Non-Terrorists, Judges Say
Post Date: 2006-02-28 14:54:26 by Jethro Tull
6 Comments
Two federal judges in Florida have upheld the authority of individual courts to use the Patriot Act to order searches anywhere in the country for e-mails and computer data in all types of criminal investigations, overruling a magistrate who found that Congress limited such expanded jurisdiction to cases involving terrorism. - Snip
Poster Comment:(searches) in all types of criminal investigations
Mental Case To Return (To School) After 'Sex Change' : Jewish Groups Back 'Pervert As Role Model' Strategy To Corrupt Gentile School Children
Post Date: 2006-02-28 14:33:16 by Mind_Virus
20 Comments
Mental Case To Return After 'Sex Change' News; Posted on: 2006-02-28 12:35:05 Jewish Groups Back 'Pervert As Role Model' Strategy To Corrupt Gentile School Children EAGLESWOOD, NEW JERSEY - He used to be Mr. William McBeth. Now, after undergoing a sex change, 71-year-old Lily McBeth is ready to return to teaching kindergarten through sixth grade as Miss McBeth. After hours of public debate and a private meeting with McBeth and his lawyer, the Eagleswood Elementary school board took no action on calls to bar McBeth from returning to the school where he taught for five years before "becoming a woman." McBeth, a retired sales executive who was married for 33 years and has ...
Sen. Byrd Regrets Voting for Patriot Act
Post Date: 2006-02-28 12:46:02 by Brian S
0 Comments
(02-28) 08:37 PST WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Sen. Robert Byrd, the dean of the Senate and its resident constitutional expert, counts only a few regrets in his 48-year Senate career: filibustering the 1964 Civil Rights Act, voting to expand the Vietnam War, deregulating airlines. Add to the list a new one from this century: supporting the anti-terror USA Patriot Act after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "The original Patriot Act is a case study in the perils of speed, herd instinct and lack of vigilance when it comes to legislating in times of crisis," the West Virginia Democrat said Monday on the eve of the Senate's final votes on its renewal. "The Congress was stampeded, and the ...
NYT sues Pentagon over domestic spying
Post Date: 2006-02-27 19:32:42 by Zipporah
0 Comments
1 hour, 20 minutes ago The New York Times sued the U.S. Defense Department on Monday demanding that it hand over documents about the National Security Agency's domestic spying program. The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval. It also seeks the names of the people or groups identified by it. The Times in December broke the story that the NSA had begun intercepting domestic communications believed linked to al Qaeda following the September 11 attacks. That provoked renewed criticism of the way U.S. President George W. Bush is handling his declared war on terrorism. Bush called the ...
Part II of BATFE Hearings
Post Date: 2006-02-27 19:29:51 by ChareltonHest
3 Comments
Part II of BATFE Hearings Part II of the Congressional hearings on BATFE enforcement at Virginia gunshows will take place at 2pm EST on February 28. You can find an archive of Part I at http://www.jpfo.org/batfehearings.htm , and our original alert on the BATFE hearings is available at http://www.jpfo.org/alert20060209.htm . As before, the hearings will be webcast. You can find the webcast information at http://judiciary.house.gov/schedule.aspx and clicking on the date of February 28. We ask that you pay particular attention to who would dare to defend this rogue agency, who tries to cover up for their arrogance, and who tries to "compromise" (read: "betray") gun ...
NYT sues Pentagon over domestic spying
Post Date: 2006-02-27 18:41:37 by Eoghan
0 Comments
The New York Times sued the U.S. Defense Department on Monday demanding that it hand over documents about the National Security Agency's domestic spying program. The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval. It also seeks the names of the people or groups identified by it. The Times in December broke the story that the NSA had begun intercepting domestic communications believed linked to al Qaeda following the September 11 attacks. That provoked renewed criticism of the way U.S. President George W. Bush is handling his declared war on terrorism. Bush called the disclosure of the program to ...
Egotism blamed in undoing of lawmaker: Psychiatrist offers Cunningham profile
Post Date: 2006-02-27 15:58:15 by aristeides
3 Comments
Egotism blamed in undoing of lawmaker Psychiatrist offers Cunningham profile By Onell R. Soto UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER February 24, 2006 A psychiatrist says Randy “Duke” Cunningham's fall from Vietnam War hero to corrupt politician grew out of “an outsized ego and a mantle of invulnerability” that allowed him to rationalize his behavior. That mindset evolved from a military career in which Cunningham was taught to embrace aggressive tactics and ignore danger signs and enabled him to perform heroically during the Vietnam War, the doctor said. Those traits, imperative for fighter pilots, were so engrained in Cunningham that although he was expected to behave ...
TIA Lives On (Total Information Awareness)
Post Date: 2006-02-27 15:38:25 by Zipporah
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A controversial counter-terrorism program, which lawmakers halted more than two years ago amid outcries from privacy advocates, was stopped in name only and has quietly continued within the intelligence agency now fending off charges that it has violated the privacy of U.S. citizens. It is no secret that some parts of TIA lived on behind the veil of the classified intelligence budget. Research under the Defense Department's Total Information Awareness program -- which developed technologies to predict terrorist attacks by mining government databases and the personal records of people in the United States -- was moved from the Pentagon's research-and-development agency ...
Total Information Awareness Lives On Inside the National Security Agency
Post Date: 2006-02-27 15:31:32 by Zipporah
6 Comments
Listen to Segment || Download Show mp3 Watch 128k stream Watch 256k stream In 2003, lawmakers voted to shut down Total Information Awareness - a program that developed technologies to predict terrorist attacks by mining government databases and the personal records of people in the United States. Months earlier New York Times columnist William Safire had warned about the dangers of the program. In a column headlined "You Are A Suspect" Safire wrote: "If the Homeland Security Act is not amended before passage, here is what will happen to you: "Every purchase you make with a credit card, every magazine subscription you buy and medical prescription you fill, every ...
White House Rejects House Democrats' Call for Special Counsel to Investigate NSA's Eavesdropping
Post Date: 2006-02-27 15:19:28 by Brian S
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WASHINGTON - The White House on Monday rejected the call by several House Democrats for a special counsel to investigate the Bush administration's eavesdropping program. "I think that where these Democrats who are calling for this ought to spend their time is on what was the source of the unauthorized disclosure of this vital, incredible program in the war on terrorism," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. "I really don't think there is any basis for a special counsel. ... But the fact that this information was disclosed about the existence of this program has given the enemy some of our playbook." In a letter released Monday, 18 House Democrats told Bush that ...
Specter Wants Court to Monitor Spy Program
Post Date: 2006-02-26 20:19:17 by Brian S
1 Comments
(02-26) 15:07 PST WASHINGTON, (AP) -- The attorney general would have to get approval from a secretive intelligence court every 45 days to preserve the Bush administration's controversial surveillance program, according to a draft bill from the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman. The proposal being developed by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., would require the Justice Department to ask the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to determine whether the program is constitutional. The court also would have to certify the government is collecting information when there is probable cause to believe the program "will intercept communications of the foreign power or agent of a foreign ...
The CIA's 'Black Sites'
Post Date: 2006-02-26 20:04:59 by Zipporah
4 Comments
What are we going to do with the secret prisoners who cannot be tried in our courts? The CIA's top counterterrorism official [Robert Grenier] was fired last week because he opposed detaining Al Qaeda suspects in secret prisons abroad, sending them to other countries for interrogation, and using forms of torture such as "waterboarding," [making a prisoner believe he is about to be drowned] intelligence sources have claimed. The Sunday Times, London, February 12 For more than three years, I've been reporting on what has been increasingly, but fragmentarily, revealed about secret CIA prisons around the world. On September 17, 2001, the president, in a classified order, gave the ...
Bush's Mysterious 'New Programs'
Post Date: 2006-02-26 15:59:06 by FormerLurker
16 Comments
Bush's Mysterious 'New Programs'By Nat Parry, Consortium News Posted on February 23, 2006, Printed on February 26, 2006 Not that George W. Bush needs much encouragement, but Sen. Lindsey Graham suggested to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales a new target for the administration's domestic operations -- Fifth Columnists, supposedly disloyal Americans who sympathize and collaborate with the enemy. "The administration has not only the right, but the duty, in my opinion, to pursue Fifth Column movements," Graham, R-S.C., told Gonzales during Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on Feb. 6. "I stand by this president's ability, inherent to being commander in chief, to find out about ...
Contract with America
Post Date: 2006-02-26 15:26:57 by Zipporah
3 Comments
February 22, 2006by Steve Osborn The American People signed a contract. An agreement between the Governed and the Government. It is called the Constitution of the United States. The first ten amendments to that Constitution is known as the Bill of Rights. As Justice Hugo Black stated, "It is my belief that there are absolutes in our Bill of Rights, and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what words meant and meant their prohibitions to be 'absolutes.'" Think about it: Without the First Amendment, newspapers could only print the "party line" or be suppressed. Books and plays would be censored or banned. We might have to attend the State Authorized ...
The Spy Who Bills Us: Your telephone company is most likely cooperating with federal wiretapping programs
Post Date: 2006-02-26 14:31:58 by Zipporah
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Your telephone company is most likely cooperating with federal wiretapping programs. And guess what? It's illegal. When your phone bill arrives this month, you might want to take a moment to think about how much you trust your telephone company. While the National Security Agency has gotten a lot of press since it was revealed in December that its analysts engaged in the warrantless surveillance of US citizens, the eavesdropping agency would not have been able to conduct the operation without the intimate—and likely illegal—cooperation of private telecommunications providers. After the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the NSA adopted a bold new approach. Seeking more ...
Taking Spying to Higher Level, Agencies Look for More Ways to Mine Data
Post Date: 2006-02-26 14:28:54 by Brian S
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PALO ALTO, Calif., Feb. 23 — A small group of National Security Agency officials slipped into Silicon Valley on one of the agency's periodic technology shopping expeditions this month. On the wish list, according to several venture capitalists who met with the officials, were an array of technologies that underlie the fierce debate over the Bush administration's anti-terrorist eavesdropping program: computerized systems that reveal connections between seemingly innocuous and unrelated pieces of information. The tools they were looking for are new, but their application would fall under the well-established practice of data mining: using mathematical and statistical techniques to scan ...
From Superpower to Tinhorn Dictatorship?
Post Date: 2006-02-26 13:11:52 by Kamala
1 Comments
From Superpower to Tinhorn Dictatorship? By Paul Craig Roberts America is headed for a soft dictatorship by the end of Bush's second term. Whether any American has civil rights will be decided by the discretionary power of federal officials. The public in general will tolerate the soft dictatorship as its discretionary powers will mainly be felt by those few who challenge it. The congressional elections this coming November are the last chance for Americans to reaffirm the separation of powers that is the basis of their civil liberties. Unless the voters correct their mistake of putting both the executive and legislative branches in the hands of the same party and deliver the House or ...
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