The Register [UK]
by Mark Rasch

01/12/06

US wiretapping laws, FISA and Presidential powers given to the NSA to intercept communications make for interesting times when coupled with technology. What are the issues surrounding privacy, search, seizure and surveillance? Whenever a new technology is developed, or a new threat that causes us to deploy these technologies, questions invariably arise about their legality. When the telephone was first developed and used, it was not clear that the constitutional dictates on unreasonable searches and seizures applied to conversations that were neither 'searched' nor 'seized.' The recent revelations that the US Department of Defense, through the National Security Agency, was targeting the international communications of US citizens for interception as part of a classified program raises questions about the constitutionality and legality of the program itself...

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/12/us_wiretapping_laws/


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Boston Globe
by Ezekiel J. Emanuel & Dennis F. Thompson

01/12/06

In the wake of the Abramoff scandal and the DeLay difficulties, Congress is scurrying to enact new ethics rules governing lobbying. But as with other ethics reforms, the changes will not make much difference unless the rules are enforced. Even the most minimal kind of regulation -- disclosure -- has been widely disregarded in recent years. Since 1998, lobbyist organizations failed to submit about 14,000 disclosure documents as required by law. Members and staff fail to report travel as required by House and Senate rules. Without more effective enforcement, new rules will be evaded or ignored like the old rules. Why has enforcement been so lax? As in other professions, self-regulation among politicians does not work well. Congressional ethics committees are prone to partisan paralysis or bipartisan collusion. The rule seems to be: If we investigate a Republican, we have to investigate a Democrat (and vice versa); therefore, we had better not investigate anyone...

http://tinyurl.com/cntro


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Mother Jones
by Tom Engelhardt

01/12/06

2006 is sure to be the year of living dangerously -- for the Bush administration and for the rest of us. In the wake of revelations of warrantless spying by the National Security Agency, we have already embarked on what looks distinctly like a constitutional crisis (which may not come to a full boil until 2007). In the meantime, the President, Vice President, Secretaries of Defense and State, various lesser officials, crony appointees, acolytes, legal advisors, leftover neocons, spy-masters, strategists, spin doctors, ideologues, lobbyists, Republican Party officials, and congressional backers are intent on packing the Supreme Court with supporters of an 'obscure philosophy' of unfettered Presidential power called 'the unitary executive theory' and then foisting a virtual cult of the imperial presidency on the country...

http://tinyurl.com/9hly3


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Human Events
by Lynne Woolley

01/13/06

Every now and then, the lobbying cesspool in Washington rears its ugly head and we writers are all obligated to create vast lists of reforms to fix the mess. How about this one: Elect honest people to Congress. So many of the talking heads seem to miss the point: the current scandal is less about lobbyists than it is about members of Congress and other people in high government positions. If members all refused to take bribes, there would be no bribery...

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=11537


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Free Market News Network
by Noel Gibeson

01/12/06

The newsmedia and nation are currently focused on the Judge Samuel Alito's Senate confirmation hearings in Washington, DC. Because the confirmation hearings are underway for the next Supreme Court seat, now is an excellent time to reflect, in a very broad way, on how far we have come since our founding fathers wrote the U. S. Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court is supposed to interpret laws to ensure that they strictly conform to the U.S. Constitution; that the government was to have only limited powers and that all other powers were reserved to the people since they already possessed them under natural law anyway. The Constitution limited government, but not people’s natural rights. The Constitution was designed to stop the tyranny of kings and other despots – by limiting the power of the new government to prevent such despotism. This was and is the primary function of the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS)...

http://www.fmnn.com/Analysis/94/3426/2006-01-12.asp?wid=94&nid=3426


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

AntiWar.Com
by Justin Raimondo

01/13/06

As the U.S. gets ready to move on Iran, under the pretext of a gathering Iranian nuclear threat, the news that the War Party got creative when WMD were nowhere to be found in Iraq should give us pause. According to a report in Raw Story by Larisa Alexandrovna, the Office of Special Plans (OSP) -- a parallel intelligence agency set up by the neoconservatives to do an end run around the mainline U.S. agencies -- was sent into Iraq in 2003 in order to cook up phony 'evidence' of 'weapons of mass destruction'...

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8383


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Lesson two
Strike the Root
by Per Bylund

01/12/06

When you have finally gained power, it is important not to make people believe the struggle has ended. People tend to engage in social activities, study or reading if they are not put to work, so make sure they are always thinking of the conflict and how to finally get rid of their oppressors. Yes, you have gained power through the help of the poor and your competitors may already be reduced and weakened. That is not enough! As soon as there is no conflict, your power base is dissolved!

http://www.strike-the-root.com/61/bylund/bylund2.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Framingham Tab

01/12/06

Calling the NSA surveillance program authorized by the president a violation of the Constitution, U.S. Rep. and Democrat Edward Markey of Massachusetts told an audience at a special forum last week that, 'Tonight we are going to sound the alarm that a threat to our democracy is afoot.' With an image of the U.S. Constitution as a backdrop projected behind him, Markey, who represents the 7th Congressional district, which includes Framingham, spoke to a nearly filled-to-capacity crowd in Lexington's National Heritage Museum's auditorium on Jan. 4 . He compared the current controversy with the struggle of colonists during the American Revolutionary period, drawing laughter from the audience when he referred to the POTUS as our 'King George' in his alleged usurpation of Constitutional rights in the wiretapping...

http://tinyurl.com/9g38f


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Washington Post

01/13/06

The Bush administration took the unusual step yesterday of asking the Supreme Court to call off a landmark confrontation over the legality of military trials for terrorism suspects, arguing that a law enacted last month eliminates the court's ability to consider the issue. In a 23-page brief, U.S. Solicitor General Paul D. Clement said the justices should throw out an appeal by Yemeni national Salim Hamdan, an alleged driver and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden, because a new statute governing the treatment of U.S. detainees 'removes the court's jurisdiction to hear this action.' ... [US Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-MI), co-author of the law) Levin, in a statement issued yesterday, said that 'the Justice Department is in error. Far from deciding that the relevant statutory language applies to pending cases, Congress specifically considered and rejected language that would have stripped the courts of jurisdiction in cases that they had before them'...

http://tinyurl.com/byap4


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

An anti-terrorism law creating a national standard for all driver's licenses by 2008 isn't just upsetting civil libertarians and immigration rights activists. State organizations such as the National Governors' Association have blasted the law as well.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306N.shtml