Friday, January 23, 2009
Muhahahahahaha
Obama Sides With Bush in Spy Case
By David Kravets January 22, 2009 | 4:32:47 PMCategories: Surveillance
The Obama administration fell in line with the Bush administration Thursday when it urged a federal judge to set aside a ruling in a closely watched spy case weighing whether a U.S. president may bypass Congress and establish a program of eavesdropping on Americans without warrants.
In a filing in San Francisco federal court, President Barack Obama adopted the same position as his predecessor. With just hours left in office, President George W. Bush late Monday asked U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker to stay enforcement of an important Jan. 5 ruling admitting key evidence into the case.
Thursday's filing by the Obama administration marked the first time it officially lodged a court document in the lawsuit asking the courts to rule on the constitutionality of the Bush administration's warrantless-eavesdropping program. The former president approved the wiretaps in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
"The Government's position remains that this case should be stayed," the Obama administration wrote (.pdf) in a filing that for the first time made clear the new president was on board with the Bush administration's reasoning in this case.
The government wants to appeal Walker's decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, a legal maneuver requiring Judge Walker's approval. A hearing in Walker's courtroom is set for Friday.
The legal brouhaha concerns Walker's decision to admit as evidence a classified document allegedly showing that two American lawyers for a now-defunct Saudi charity were electronically eavesdropped on without warrants by the Bush administration in 2004.
The lawyers — Wendell Belew and Asim Ghafoo — sued the Bush administration after the U.S. Treasury Department accidentally released the Top Secret memo to them. At one point, the courts had ordered the document, which has never been made public, returned and removed from the case.
The document's admission to the case is central for the two former lawyers of the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation charity to acquire legal standing so they may challenge the constitutionality of the warrantless-eavesdropping program Bush publicly acknowledged in 2005.
The Friday hearing is needed, because disputes with pretrial decisions generally require the trial judge to permit an appeal.
The Obama administration is also siding with the former administration in its legal defense of July legislation that immunizes the nation's telecommunications companies from lawsuits accusing them of complicitity in Bush's eavesdropping program, according to testimony last week by incoming Attorney General Eric Holder.
That immunity legislation, which Obama voted for when he was a U.S. senator from Illinois, was included in a broader spy package that granted the government wide-ranging, warrantless eavesdropping powers on Americans' electronic communications.
A decision on the constitutionality of the immunity legislation is pending before Judge Walker in a separate case brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
By David Kravets January 22, 2009 | 4:32:47 PMCategories: Surveillance
The Obama administration fell in line with the Bush administration Thursday when it urged a federal judge to set aside a ruling in a closely watched spy case weighing whether a U.S. president may bypass Congress and establish a program of eavesdropping on Americans without warrants.
In a filing in San Francisco federal court, President Barack Obama adopted the same position as his predecessor. With just hours left in office, President George W. Bush late Monday asked U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker to stay enforcement of an important Jan. 5 ruling admitting key evidence into the case.
Thursday's filing by the Obama administration marked the first time it officially lodged a court document in the lawsuit asking the courts to rule on the constitutionality of the Bush administration's warrantless-eavesdropping program. The former president approved the wiretaps in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
"The Government's position remains that this case should be stayed," the Obama administration wrote (.pdf) in a filing that for the first time made clear the new president was on board with the Bush administration's reasoning in this case.
The government wants to appeal Walker's decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, a legal maneuver requiring Judge Walker's approval. A hearing in Walker's courtroom is set for Friday.
The legal brouhaha concerns Walker's decision to admit as evidence a classified document allegedly showing that two American lawyers for a now-defunct Saudi charity were electronically eavesdropped on without warrants by the Bush administration in 2004.
The lawyers — Wendell Belew and Asim Ghafoo — sued the Bush administration after the U.S. Treasury Department accidentally released the Top Secret memo to them. At one point, the courts had ordered the document, which has never been made public, returned and removed from the case.
The document's admission to the case is central for the two former lawyers of the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation charity to acquire legal standing so they may challenge the constitutionality of the warrantless-eavesdropping program Bush publicly acknowledged in 2005.
The Friday hearing is needed, because disputes with pretrial decisions generally require the trial judge to permit an appeal.
The Obama administration is also siding with the former administration in its legal defense of July legislation that immunizes the nation's telecommunications companies from lawsuits accusing them of complicitity in Bush's eavesdropping program, according to testimony last week by incoming Attorney General Eric Holder.
That immunity legislation, which Obama voted for when he was a U.S. senator from Illinois, was included in a broader spy package that granted the government wide-ranging, warrantless eavesdropping powers on Americans' electronic communications.
A decision on the constitutionality of the immunity legislation is pending before Judge Walker in a separate case brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Re: Sweet Deee Says We're Fooked. I Agree.
Are we fooked?
Indeed, the last year/next year are an equilibrium-shifting period of change (note the lack of calling it a negative change). The US economy will enter in the worst and longest recession since WW II while unemployment is flirting with Great Depression levels.
But really, truely, the US is the world's strongest economy and its relative strength is only increasing with time. The Wall St Master's of the University teamed up with the Legislative Brach, and to a lesser extent George W Bush, to get rich. The risk of their gain was transferred to US Debt holders and really no one else, not even the tax payer.
The Get Out of Jail Free card is devaluing the US Dollar and we can play it whenever we feel like it. No one else can. Arbusto took control of the world. This is much like an economic MAD we hold over the debt holder's head. China, Japan, Russia, and Saudi Arabia play by our rules now.
'If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. But if you owe your bank a million pounds, it has.' - John Maynard Keynes in 1982. Chang Pounds to Dollars and multiply by 100,000 and the statement summarizes where we are.
Indeed, the last year/next year are an equilibrium-shifting period of change (note the lack of calling it a negative change). The US economy will enter in the worst and longest recession since WW II while unemployment is flirting with Great Depression levels.
But really, truely, the US is the world's strongest economy and its relative strength is only increasing with time. The Wall St Master's of the University teamed up with the Legislative Brach, and to a lesser extent George W Bush, to get rich. The risk of their gain was transferred to US Debt holders and really no one else, not even the tax payer.
The Get Out of Jail Free card is devaluing the US Dollar and we can play it whenever we feel like it. No one else can. Arbusto took control of the world. This is much like an economic MAD we hold over the debt holder's head. China, Japan, Russia, and Saudi Arabia play by our rules now.
'If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. But if you owe your bank a million pounds, it has.' - John Maynard Keynes in 1982. Chang Pounds to Dollars and multiply by 100,000 and the statement summarizes where we are.
Obama: "All those things I said about Gitmo... ummm... "
There may be less than meets the eye to the executive orders President Obama issued yesterday to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and prohibit the torture of prisoners in American custody. Those pronouncements may sound dramatic and unequivocal, but experts predict that American policy towards detainees could remain for months or even years pretty close to what it was as President Bush left office.
“I think the administration’s commitment to close Guantanamo is heartening; the fact they want to give themselves a year to do it, not so much,”, said Ramzi Kassem, a Yale Law School lecturer who represents prisoners like inmate Ahmed Zuhair, who was captured in Pakistan in 2001. “That would bring men like my client to eight years imprisonment for no apparent reason.”
Here are a few of the delays, caveats and loopholes that could limit the impact of Obama’s orders:
1. Everyone has to follow the Army Field Manual—for now…
Obama’s executive order on interrogations says all agencies of the government have to follow the Army Field Manual when interrogating detainees, meaning the CIA can no longer used so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, which have included waterboarding, the use of dogs in questioning, and stripping prisoners.
However, the order also created an interagency commission which will have six months to examine whether to create “additional or different guidance” for non-military agencies such as the CIA. One group that represents detainees, the Center for Constitutional Rights, deemed that an “escape hatch” to potentially allow enhanced interrogations in the future.
White House counsel Greg Craig told reporters such fears are misplaced. “This is not an invitation to bring back different techniques than those that are approved inside the Army Field Manual, but an invitation to this task force to make recommendations as to whether or not there should be a separate protocol that's more appropriate to the intelligence community,” he said.
The distinction Craig made between “protocols” and “techniques,” though, seems less than clear.
“For now, they’re punting, saying they’ll comply with what’s in the Army manual…but at some point in the future this commission may revert to the executive” to recommend harsher techniques, said Kassem, adding that he was concerned about how transparent the commission’s recommendations would be.
“I’m happy to postpone that discussion [on “enhanced interrogation”]… on the condition that [it] happens transparently,” he said.
A Columbia law professor who worked on detention issues at the State Department under President Bush, Matthew Waxman, said Obama is wise to leave open the possibility of different guidance for the CIA’s experienced interrogators. “I’ve worked on drafts of the Army Field Manual,” Waxman said. “It’s designed to be in the hands of tens of thousands of people who may not have a lot of training or supervision.”
2. Obama ordered a 30-day review of Guantanamo conditions—by the man currently responsible for Guantanamo.
A section of Obama’s order on Guantanamo entitled “Humane Standards of Confinement” orders Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to spend the next thirty days reviewing the current conditions at the Caribbean prison to make sure they’re legal and follow the Geneva Convention. It seems doubtful that Gates, who has been atop the chain of command for Guantanamo for more than two years, will suddenly find conditions that were just fine on Monday of this week are now flagrant violations of the Geneva Convention.
“He’s not exactly impartial,” Kassem said.
Waxman pointed out that adhering to the Geneva Condition is “already the law,” and deemed that section of the order “bizarre.”
3. Obama vowed no torture on his watch, but force-feeding and solitary confinement apparently continue at Guantanamo for now.
It’s possible that the 30-day referral to Gates is simply an effort to buy the Obama team time to deal with two Guantanamo practices that some consider torture, or at least inhumane: force feeding and isolation of prisoners. According to detainee lawyers, about two dozen inmates who refuse to eat as a form of protest are currently being force fed, and about 140 are in some form of solitary confinement.
The Bush administration has argued that the feeding is humane and that the solitary, at least as practiced now, is not the kind of total isolation that amounts to torture. “There’s an important distinction to be made between isolation and separation” from other prisoners,” Waxman said.
As far as we know, the force feeding and solitary practices continued onto Obama’s watch. Craig dodged a question about the new president’s views on those issues. “I'm not going to get into the details,” Craig said.
4. The vast majority of detainees in American custody may see no benefit from Obama’s orders
While Obama ordered a case-by-case review of the 245 prisoners held at Guantanamo, the 600 prisoners held in indefinite American custody in Afghanistan and roughly 20,000 in Iraq won’t get such attention. The general policy review might aid them, eventually, but unless someone was about to torture them it’s unclear how they are better off.
“I think there’s a fairly good chance that on the whole from the perspective of my clients at Guantanamo and Bagram [the site of an American air base and prison in Afghanistan], their lives will be the same until those facilities are shut down, unfortunately,” Kassem said.
Asked why the reviews are limited to prisoners at Guantanamo, and those at Bagram or Abu Ghraib, Craig said, “The president asked us to look at Guantanamo. That's the answer.”
5. The orders downplay the possibility that some prisoners might be set free in America.
Obama ordered that when Guantanamo closes, any remaining inmates “be returned to their home country, released, transferred to a third country, or transferred to another United States detention facility in a manner consistent with law and the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States.” But Obama’s wordsmiths seem to have deliberately trimmed out any explicit mention of the explosive possibility of freeing prisoners on American soil.
While Obama’s aides seem to prefer trying prisoners in civil courts or freeing them abroad, there are no obvious charges to be filed against some of the detainees. Once Guantanamo closes, letting them loose in the U.S. may be the only option if other countries won’t take them.
Craig said he was “hopeful” that other governments will take many of the detainees, but some nations may not step up until the U.S. does. “One question a lot of countries keep asking is, ‘How many are you going to take?” Waxman said. “There may be some countries that want to earn some credit [with the] new administration…but I don’t expect this problem to go away.”
6. Military commissions are shut down…. for now
One of the attention grabbing provisions of Obama’s orders calls for military tribunals at Guantanamo to be “halted.” But the Obama administration is not ruling out returning to some sort of military forum to deal with some of the prisoners.
“This order does not eliminate or extinguish the military commissions, it just stays all proceedings in connection with the ongoing proceedings in Guantanamo,” Craig said, making clear that “improved military commissions” were still on the table.
That suggestion exasperates detainee lawyers like Kassem. “That would be a huge mistake, “ he said. “That system [is] set up to launder statements obtained through torture… What’s the point of getting rid of our offshore, improvised, sham, military tribunals in Cuba, only to recreate it here in the United States?”
“I think the administration’s commitment to close Guantanamo is heartening; the fact they want to give themselves a year to do it, not so much,”, said Ramzi Kassem, a Yale Law School lecturer who represents prisoners like inmate Ahmed Zuhair, who was captured in Pakistan in 2001. “That would bring men like my client to eight years imprisonment for no apparent reason.”
Here are a few of the delays, caveats and loopholes that could limit the impact of Obama’s orders:
1. Everyone has to follow the Army Field Manual—for now…
Obama’s executive order on interrogations says all agencies of the government have to follow the Army Field Manual when interrogating detainees, meaning the CIA can no longer used so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, which have included waterboarding, the use of dogs in questioning, and stripping prisoners.
However, the order also created an interagency commission which will have six months to examine whether to create “additional or different guidance” for non-military agencies such as the CIA. One group that represents detainees, the Center for Constitutional Rights, deemed that an “escape hatch” to potentially allow enhanced interrogations in the future.
White House counsel Greg Craig told reporters such fears are misplaced. “This is not an invitation to bring back different techniques than those that are approved inside the Army Field Manual, but an invitation to this task force to make recommendations as to whether or not there should be a separate protocol that's more appropriate to the intelligence community,” he said.
The distinction Craig made between “protocols” and “techniques,” though, seems less than clear.
“For now, they’re punting, saying they’ll comply with what’s in the Army manual…but at some point in the future this commission may revert to the executive” to recommend harsher techniques, said Kassem, adding that he was concerned about how transparent the commission’s recommendations would be.
“I’m happy to postpone that discussion [on “enhanced interrogation”]… on the condition that [it] happens transparently,” he said.
A Columbia law professor who worked on detention issues at the State Department under President Bush, Matthew Waxman, said Obama is wise to leave open the possibility of different guidance for the CIA’s experienced interrogators. “I’ve worked on drafts of the Army Field Manual,” Waxman said. “It’s designed to be in the hands of tens of thousands of people who may not have a lot of training or supervision.”
2. Obama ordered a 30-day review of Guantanamo conditions—by the man currently responsible for Guantanamo.
A section of Obama’s order on Guantanamo entitled “Humane Standards of Confinement” orders Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to spend the next thirty days reviewing the current conditions at the Caribbean prison to make sure they’re legal and follow the Geneva Convention. It seems doubtful that Gates, who has been atop the chain of command for Guantanamo for more than two years, will suddenly find conditions that were just fine on Monday of this week are now flagrant violations of the Geneva Convention.
“He’s not exactly impartial,” Kassem said.
Waxman pointed out that adhering to the Geneva Condition is “already the law,” and deemed that section of the order “bizarre.”
3. Obama vowed no torture on his watch, but force-feeding and solitary confinement apparently continue at Guantanamo for now.
It’s possible that the 30-day referral to Gates is simply an effort to buy the Obama team time to deal with two Guantanamo practices that some consider torture, or at least inhumane: force feeding and isolation of prisoners. According to detainee lawyers, about two dozen inmates who refuse to eat as a form of protest are currently being force fed, and about 140 are in some form of solitary confinement.
The Bush administration has argued that the feeding is humane and that the solitary, at least as practiced now, is not the kind of total isolation that amounts to torture. “There’s an important distinction to be made between isolation and separation” from other prisoners,” Waxman said.
As far as we know, the force feeding and solitary practices continued onto Obama’s watch. Craig dodged a question about the new president’s views on those issues. “I'm not going to get into the details,” Craig said.
4. The vast majority of detainees in American custody may see no benefit from Obama’s orders
While Obama ordered a case-by-case review of the 245 prisoners held at Guantanamo, the 600 prisoners held in indefinite American custody in Afghanistan and roughly 20,000 in Iraq won’t get such attention. The general policy review might aid them, eventually, but unless someone was about to torture them it’s unclear how they are better off.
“I think there’s a fairly good chance that on the whole from the perspective of my clients at Guantanamo and Bagram [the site of an American air base and prison in Afghanistan], their lives will be the same until those facilities are shut down, unfortunately,” Kassem said.
Asked why the reviews are limited to prisoners at Guantanamo, and those at Bagram or Abu Ghraib, Craig said, “The president asked us to look at Guantanamo. That's the answer.”
5. The orders downplay the possibility that some prisoners might be set free in America.
Obama ordered that when Guantanamo closes, any remaining inmates “be returned to their home country, released, transferred to a third country, or transferred to another United States detention facility in a manner consistent with law and the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States.” But Obama’s wordsmiths seem to have deliberately trimmed out any explicit mention of the explosive possibility of freeing prisoners on American soil.
While Obama’s aides seem to prefer trying prisoners in civil courts or freeing them abroad, there are no obvious charges to be filed against some of the detainees. Once Guantanamo closes, letting them loose in the U.S. may be the only option if other countries won’t take them.
Craig said he was “hopeful” that other governments will take many of the detainees, but some nations may not step up until the U.S. does. “One question a lot of countries keep asking is, ‘How many are you going to take?” Waxman said. “There may be some countries that want to earn some credit [with the] new administration…but I don’t expect this problem to go away.”
6. Military commissions are shut down…. for now
One of the attention grabbing provisions of Obama’s orders calls for military tribunals at Guantanamo to be “halted.” But the Obama administration is not ruling out returning to some sort of military forum to deal with some of the prisoners.
“This order does not eliminate or extinguish the military commissions, it just stays all proceedings in connection with the ongoing proceedings in Guantanamo,” Craig said, making clear that “improved military commissions” were still on the table.
That suggestion exasperates detainee lawyers like Kassem. “That would be a huge mistake, “ he said. “That system [is] set up to launder statements obtained through torture… What’s the point of getting rid of our offshore, improvised, sham, military tribunals in Cuba, only to recreate it here in the United States?”
Signs of the Great Deflationary Spiral v 2.0
Deflation is a pretty rough road to ho (if you need an explanation, I will provide it). Today's sign of deflation is discounts on Chrysler products which begs the question: is $6,000 off enough for you to buy a Chyrsler? Technical deflation is here but is applied deflation upon us? Or is a Chrysler just a crappy car that can't sell in good times?
Torture
So while I was thinking about the remains of the hijackers quagmire I recalled this argument that I had with a gf about 5-6 years ago. NPR had just released more info on the enhanced interrogation techniques that were being used in either or both Abu Ghirab and Gitmo.
My then gf, was really upset by the fact that they were using their religion against them. Here is how they did that:
-They changed clocks and kept them indoors so they had no concept of time and they prayed their 5 times but at the wrong times of day
-They destroyed their copies of the Koran. Which to me meant that they gave them copies of the Koran to begin with.
-They had a female interrogator act as if she were removing a female sanitary napkin from here pants and then smear what appeared to be blood on the detainee. I believe that it may have been on his face.
Apparently the last two things will send you straight to hell. The first one is just rude. Now I was not upset by any of this because it did not physically hurt any of the detainees. My gf was livid -she was also a religion major.
Any thoughts?
I figure since we never talk about enhanced interrogation techniques we could go ahead and get this thing started.
My then gf, was really upset by the fact that they were using their religion against them. Here is how they did that:
-They changed clocks and kept them indoors so they had no concept of time and they prayed their 5 times but at the wrong times of day
-They destroyed their copies of the Koran. Which to me meant that they gave them copies of the Koran to begin with.
-They had a female interrogator act as if she were removing a female sanitary napkin from here pants and then smear what appeared to be blood on the detainee. I believe that it may have been on his face.
Apparently the last two things will send you straight to hell. The first one is just rude. Now I was not upset by any of this because it did not physically hurt any of the detainees. My gf was livid -she was also a religion major.
Any thoughts?
I figure since we never talk about enhanced interrogation techniques we could go ahead and get this thing started.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
HFS I never even thought of this
We have remains of 13 of the 19 hijackers from 9/11 in refrigerators in NY and VA.
Fun Factoid - The total weight for all hijackers that have been identified through DNA is less than 24 lbs or basically the weight of 1 meat sack. (for you trivia buffs)
The question is what do we do with them? No one has came forward and asked for them. We obviously can't hold on them forever that is just gross and why would you bother? Is there anything in Islam that dictates how to get rid of evil fuckheads remains? Obviously burning didn't work. Any suggestions?
Fun Factoid - The total weight for all hijackers that have been identified through DNA is less than 24 lbs or basically the weight of 1 meat sack. (for you trivia buffs)
The question is what do we do with them? No one has came forward and asked for them. We obviously can't hold on them forever that is just gross and why would you bother? Is there anything in Islam that dictates how to get rid of evil fuckheads remains? Obviously burning didn't work. Any suggestions?
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Well, its nearly 5 PM on Day 1 of Heaven on Earth
Troops are still in Iraq.
Guantanomo is still open.
Its still official government policy to wiretap without warrants.
Bush & Cheney have not been indicted.
Global warming hasnt stopped.
Dont ask, Dont tell -- still official government policy.
Holding on with baited breath.
What did we get ?
"Ethics rules" -- White House staffers must wait 2 years before lobbying.
Salary freeze for Executive staff making over $100,000.
Shivering with excitement.
Guantanomo is still open.
Its still official government policy to wiretap without warrants.
Bush & Cheney have not been indicted.
Global warming hasnt stopped.
Dont ask, Dont tell -- still official government policy.
Holding on with baited breath.
What did we get ?
"Ethics rules" -- White House staffers must wait 2 years before lobbying.
Salary freeze for Executive staff making over $100,000.
Shivering with excitement.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Best news of the day ??? Too soon ???
Both Senators Kennedy and Byrd had medical trouble at the post-inaugural luncheon, cable nets reporting. No concrete details for now, but according to some reports Kennedy convulsed and collapsed.
I daresay you will never find...
video footage of the crowd in 2000 booing Clinton & Gore, and their wives, at the inaugural.
Democrats always say they want a classless society.
Today, we got to see it in action.
Fuck all of you boo-ers.
I hope you children have seizures and fall in a tub.
Democrats always say they want a classless society.
Today, we got to see it in action.
Fuck all of you boo-ers.
I hope you children have seizures and fall in a tub.
I figured that this belonged here since it's somewhat controversial
On NPR they stated that he was the first black president and the first biracial president. How can you be both?
I for one say that he is the first biracial president. He is not 100% black or of african/african american descent. He is and always will be the son of a white woman and a black man. I call bullshit on NPR and every other news network and blog that calls him the first black president.
I do realize that the races are mixing. I am contributing to this mixing and blending and in the future it will be difficult to find anyone who is 100% anything. But seriously in this case it seems like it is a 50/50 deal so let's just call it like we see it.
I for one say that he is the first biracial president. He is not 100% black or of african/african american descent. He is and always will be the son of a white woman and a black man. I call bullshit on NPR and every other news network and blog that calls him the first black president.
I do realize that the races are mixing. I am contributing to this mixing and blending and in the future it will be difficult to find anyone who is 100% anything. But seriously in this case it seems like it is a 50/50 deal so let's just call it like we see it.
Monday, January 19, 2009
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