DISQUS

hearts and flowers . . .


We all have our opinions and the right to express them but isn't there a point where we need to disengage instead of continually raising the stakes?



yes. there is. so i'll not be back here again. y'all have fun with your great new president come fall.

junglecat, you're correct. D is being deliberately obtuse, likely a bored government employee feeding at the public trough, while decrying liberal political values.


that last comment does it for me: "when you show me some evidence . . . "



so utterly absurd and, as i said, deliberately obtuse. that is what the whole fucking fight is about. they will NEVER have to show evidence if this bill passes. that is the point.



goodbye y'all. it's been real. take care of yourselves.

michelle, since you're so into psychoanalysis, do tell "what he is about" in your view?

d. . . . your naivete is breathtaking and kind of sweet, even if utterly misguided.

i predict this will not be a popular thread ;-)

and this, d. . . . from the Baltimore Herald (and many other sources)


This shocking, perhaps unprecedented declaration by a senior military officer was just one of many instances during the week when Establishment figures – not just retired officials like Wilkerson and Taguba, but serving officers as well – confirmed and condemned the injustice and criminality of the Bush gulag system. Even corporate media types began openly using the "T" word, after years of ridiculing or marginalizing those who dare call the Administration's "harsh interrogation techniques" what they plainly are.



This nascent coventional wisdom line was perfectly illustrated in a new piece by Tim Rutten of the Los Angeles Times. Rutten is a lifelong newsman, a liberal of the old school, whose columns have been scathing in their criticism of Bush and all his works. In his latest outing, Rutten doesn't flinch from telling it like it is on Bush's torture regime. Drawing on the Congressional hearings and other sources, Rutten gives chapter and verse on "how the White House forced the adoption of torture as state policy of the United States."



He notes also the highly significant fact that one major impetus behind the construction of the torture system was the Bush Faction's extremist "unitary executive" theory: the crank belief that a president can exercise unbridled, unaccountable authoritarian power in his role as "commander-in-chief." This includes the power to break the law -- and order others to break the law -- as he sees fit.



that "extremist unitary executive theory" is the same one at issue with FISA.



http://baltimorechronicle.com/2008/062008Floyd.shtml



You might take the time to read that entire article. It goes into some depth about Obama's view of all of this, which I find terribly disheartening.

hearts . . . Would we be having this conversation with Clinton as the nominee right now - and with such vigor? yes.


d. . . . I've never not seen the relation between Iraq and the War on Terror as a whole. . . . i am honestly interested to know what that is?

by the way, my nephew's in the navy now. does NOT support this administration because he knows they have been desperately, fatally wrong.

I, d., do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. (So help me God.)


apologies for the misstatement about your branch of service.



about that oath . . . what do you do when the two are in conflict?

d. . . . when is it okay with you to dissent? or is it not okay?


i can't criticize george bush? isn't that another guarantee of our constitution?



i am baffled by your blind loyalty to these people.



was torture acceptable when you were an active marine? did you practice techniques? discuss methods? my father is a WWII veteran and he is OUTRAGED by what has happened in iraq. and he is a republican.



and you speak of democrats blindly falling in lockstep????



i think i'm wasting my breath. you're just arguing to be arguing because you are making. no. sense.

craig hickman, that link . . . it's a pretty ridiculous argument. "he's a constitutional law professor!" exactly. "he will do the right thing when president!" so said george bush.


it's ironic, really, that half of the folks who were vigorously pushing congress to stand up on fisa in february, are now willing to turn a blind eye just because barack obama has had a big gulp of republican kool-aid and has bought into the old, old rethug meme that dems are weak on terror. it's ridiculous. and he had it going on when he was confronting this bullshit, not selling out to it.

If at some point there is concrete evidence that the government overstepped their bounds with FISA, I'll cry foul.


But I'm not going to give up on a valuable tool for preventing terrorism just because it makes people uncomfortable.





you'll never get that evidence if this law passes. that's what it's about.



the government's power to wiretap WILL NOT VANISH IF THIS BILL FAILS!! that's what they want you to believe, but that's not the case.



the only thing that will happen is that it will not be solely the decision of the executive (remember? we have Three branches of government???) as to when wiretapping or surveillance occurs.



you are not safe. and that stupid ignorant fool george bush could have prevented 9/11 if he hadn't been so arrogant and defiant of those who tried to tell him about the attack. that's a fact.



now that he attacked FOR NO REASON a sovereign nation, there are millions of people who couldn't be bothered with us who now hate us. you are endangered by the policies of this administration. if you can rest easier at night with these incompetent jackasses in charge, then you're blissfully unaware of the truth.

What were his real options? Endorse the compromise, or say nothing and vote no/"present" and be seen as soft on terror. Dhimmicrats make a lot of noise, but when its time to put up or shut up, they get right back in line.


d. for an alleged conservative, you're just not very educated on matters of the founders' intent, eh?



Obama's response is not optional. It should be to defend the Constitution of this land. If he does not do that, then he is no better than Bush et al and we can be assured that an Obama presidency will be more of the same.



As CPL said above, the Reagan thing got my attention and yes, I remember discussing that very thing right here and getting flamed for it.



(And yes, CPL, thank you, thank you, I did not mean to leave you out.)



d., you refer to democrats as "getting in line," but it seems there are vast numbers of people in these times willing to submit to this authoritarian administration and to give up their freedom in exchange for the promise (not the actuality) of protection from . . . what. Protection from what, that which we have brought upon ourselves?



I'm not going to debate Republican v. Democrat because there are as many republicans and libertarians wrought up about this assault on our constitution as there are democrats.



This is profoundly important. It is not a political issue, it is not something you can just blow off and be uninterested in, it is not something you can, as a citizen of this country, ignore.



The Constitution of this country is what hundreds of thousands have fought and died for. It is this country; without it, we are nothing. And increasingly, I fear, that is the case.



Last fall Obama promised to filibuster this bill. We'll see if he does it. MoveOn has a campaign to educate him ~ to remind him of his obligation to defend the constitution.



ptcruiser has it right. This is police state bullshit. Earlier, you said "if you act right, why worry," or words to that effect.



I don't know if you're being intentionally obtuse, if you are just ignorant of this country's history, or if you are out of touch with reality, but if you can't envision this increasingly authoritarian administration acting to eavesdrop on you, to surveil you and your associates, to swooop up every bit of electronic information about you, to spy on your home, your business, to pick you up on bogus charges, to search you without cause, then you just need to start paying attention.



You cannot ~ cannot ~ be paying attention to what has happened here since 9/11 and feel safe with this kind of power being vested in the executive. It is NOT safe. The founders knew that. They put in place safeguards to ensure that what has happened, is happening, would not be tolerated and could be stopped.



Barack Obama standing up on this issue, just as he has done on other issues, is critically important.



He needs to give the same thought, reasoned speech on the Constitution and why we must protect it that he did on race.



Reagan, the AIPAC pandering episode, his alliance with neoliberal economic theorists, his defense of hedge fund managers . . . all of that bodes ill, in my mind, for an Obama who will speak truth to power. We'll see what he does this week, but if he does not truly try to stop this bill, I am done with him and I will do everything in my power to educate everyone I know on how he sold out the last vestiges of this democracy.

pt cruiser joins bruce dixon as my hero of the day. thank you for saying it far better than i could.

Most liberals would rather see us fight the War on Terror with warrants and handcuffs. We tried fighting terrorism as a law enforcement problem...and got 9/11.


and the right wing lunatics would rather us pretend that the "war on terror" has nothing to do with US policy, with our single minded support of anything israel does, with our depradations around the globe, with our looting of the riches of 3d world countries, with our active promotion of puppet governments in nations around the world.



that's what we want to sweep under the rug: that we brought 9/11 on ourselves and it is only by changing our policies, changing the way we do business, by making this a democracy once again instead of a subsidiary of global corporations, that we'll be safe. ever.



fact: by invading the sovereign nation of iraq for no other reason than that we wanted their oil, we have created terrorists where there were none.



fact: by dipping out greedy fingers into the governments of virtually every middle eastern government at one time or another, we have enraged a populace previously unconcerned with us.



fact: by continuing our reliance on foreign oil to meet our energy needs, our vulnerability increases every damn day.



fact: because we continue to serve the needs of big oil, we will never, as a nation, officially act on energy independence or on climate change issues.



fact: our groveling before the forces of globalization keeps every one of us in danger.



fact: global corporations are enemies of the people.



fact: most americans can't be bothered to care, to educate themselves on these issues, or even to read the most superficial analyses of what we're really facing in this country, in the world.

One of the fears I have is that if we were to dig deeper into these whole Wiretapping thing we'll find a lot of malfeance done by Bush-Cheney-Rove-Gonzalez axis of evil. . .


and that is another outrage with this bill. it prevents us EVER knowing what they have done. ever.



it's bad enough that these war criminals aren't already impeached and incarcerated. this bill will ensure that their crimes are never known.



simply: it's legal if the president says so.



does that sound like america to all of you unconcerned people? it sounds like a fucking monarchy to me. or a dictatorship. but then he is the one who said he'd love to live in a dictatorship, as long as he's the dictator.

with the exception of Bruce, and a few others, apparently no one here, Ms. Martin.

I've always been of the opinion that if you're a law-abiding citizen, you don't have anything to be concerned about with FISA.




d. that is so utterly stupid it defies my ability to even put together a cogent response.

michelle.


go read the constitution and the bill of rights. it's apparent you have no idea what those documents mean or what went into the making of them.



then you'll know what i'm so "personally" upset about. good grief, you're making this into some kind of personal psychological issue?





there's a term for that: projection.

and equally horrible, is his parroting the right wing talking points on protecting us from the terrorists while destroying the constitution.


Given the grave threats that we face, our national security agencies must have the capability to gather intelligence and track down terrorists before they strike, while respecting the rule of law and the privacy and civil liberties of the American people. . . .





that's REPUBLICAN bullshit. they've used it since 9/11 to eviscerate the founding documents of this country. this isn't some campaign silliness, it is the fabric of our nation.

After that, we can hold congressional hearings to air all the dirty laundry of the Bush administration.


no we can't. the bill prevents that.



this is pure politics and sucking up to his constituency: his corporate supporters.



that's what makes me feel so hopeless. all this hope and change crap is just more lies.



he is supporting the evisceration of the Constitution.



if that doesn't bother you, think about search and seizure laws, probable cause. will that not affect the black community? to castrate the 4th amendment? can you imagine how law enforcement will ultimately take this and run with it?

and that last paragraph would be predicated on their not wanting to pass this bill, so it's moot.


they want it. they want it for their "people" ~ the corporations.

the democrats want this fisa bill, they want it primarily for the telecom companies.


they are enormous donors to political campaigns, the telecoms.



the fisa bill has been fought back by activist democratic citizens several times now.



the democratic sellouts in congress keep allowing it to come up. over and over.



they want this bill to pass. want it.



the democrats could, if they wanted to, do precisely on this bill what the republicans do over and over:



play obstructionist politics and filibuster the motherfucker. but no, that would require some bit of spine and there doesn't seem to be a fucking backbone in the whole lot of them (feingold, dodd and a few others excluded).

and what of the heroic presidential candidate who's supporting the evisceration of the constitution? do we turn away from him as well?

As a centrist ~ and now, apparently, center right ~ candidate, Obama is nowhere near liberal enough for me.


But I have supported him in large part because of his stand on foreign policy ~ that we must do things differently, that democrats are the better party to "keep us safe" (so fucking tired of that phrase).



With his support of FISA, he did a 180 degree turn back to the tired old destructive republican narrative that we can only be strong on security if we trash the Constitution.



As ptcruiser said: "Obama either believes the government can act unlawfully against American citizens or he does not."



which is it? and one of the most disappointing results of his statement is the sudden appeasement being promulgated by former staunch advocates of the defeat of this bill. it seems that the thing is just to elect Obama, no matter what, no matter what he does, says, anything. just elect him!!



bullshit. if we don't hold our candidates' feet to the fire ~ all of our candidates ~ we have nothing.