BS: I want your phone records

Subject: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 11 May 06 - 12:50 PM

Give me your tired, your poor, your phone bill records.
The White House already has them. The President today reminded us to bear in mind that every alleged questionable action, crime, torture or murder they have committed is perfectly legal and based on a need for additional security after 9-11.
I would like to send the white house several tons of phone records from people who agree to do so. Even if it only 4 bills it would be a great show of support and respect for the President.

While we are at it we should show support for every government agency to be headed by a military general, admiral or good buddy or the President.


-------
By the way I recently learned that our beloved General George Washington insisted upon the end of the Revolutionary war that all property in the form of American slaves be returned by the British Army.
The British refused and brought over 100,000 American slaves back to England and established their first schools for freed slaves.

This was never mentioned in my Social Studies text book.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 May 06 - 01:01 PM

England's action may not have been as altruistic as all that. Slavery in England itself was formally abolished in 1772 and ostnsibly abolished "throughout the Empire" in 1807 but she continued its practice in the Caribbean until 1848 Not to mention, of course, that England was the country that first brought African slaves to the Colonies.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 May 06 - 01:25 PM

I was pleased to see that our phone company, QWEST, has refused to provide Dumbya's regime with their customers' phone records.

With Dumbya creating his own monarchy through exempting himself and his minions from over 750 bills passed by Congress, this came as no surprise. And, now he wants to pass the crown on to brother Jeb...gonna be a revolution...

May 4, 2006 8:48 p.m. EST

Andrea Moore - All Headline News Staff Reporter

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, accusing the White House of a "very blatant encroachment" on congressional authority, says he will hold an oversight hearing into President Bush's assertion that he has the power to bypass more than 750 laws enacted over the past five years.

Specter says he plans to hold the hearing in June and intends to call administration officials to explain and defend the president's claims of authority, as well to invite constitutional scholars to testify on whether Bush has overstepped the boundaries of his power.

Specter's announcement follows a report in the Sunday Globe that Bush has quietly asserted the authority to ignore provisions in 750 bills he has signed - about 1 in 10. Over the past five years, Bush has stated that he can defy any statute that conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

Specter says that challenging Bush's contention that he can ignore laws written by Congress should be a matter of institutional pride for lawmakers, adding, "There may as well soon not be a Congress. And I think that most members don't understand what's happening."

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 11 May 06 - 01:55 PM

England's action may not have been as altruistic as all that. Slavery in England itself was formally abolished in 1772 and ostnsibly abolished "throughout the Empire" in 1807 but she continued its practice in the Caribbean until 1848 Not to mention, of course, that England was the country that first brought African slaves to the Colonies.

English bad. George Washington good.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 May 06 - 02:13 PM

Knock'toff. We're talking history here.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bill D
Date: 11 May 06 - 03:43 PM

phone records are available by court order to legitimate law enforcement agencies investigating a specific crime....NOT for casual browsing to see if anything 'looks interesting'.

If that changes, Little Hawk's suggestion that I move to Canada will begin to look interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: number 6
Date: 11 May 06 - 03:50 PM

Canada's changing ... we have now as our Prime Minister Stephen Harper ... a toady implemented by the Bush regime.

sIx

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Kaleea
Date: 11 May 06 - 03:53 PM

The decider is listening to you now.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 May 06 - 03:56 PM

BillD, hasn't that already happened with this latest *reveal*?

Also, if that isn't enough to make emigration interesting, perhaps this will:

Journalist Michelle Goldberg, a senior writer for the online magazine Salon, and covers the Christian Right. In her new book, Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism, she writes that Christian nationalists believe the Bible is literally true -- and they want to see the nation governed by that truth.

You may hear the interview at Fresh Air on NPR. The things she tells of are chilling to say the least. There are many prominent Congresspeople who are supporting the above.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Janie
Date: 11 May 06 - 04:14 PM

Here is the link to the Globe article. I had posted it to another thread, but this is probably a better place.

Bush has been using 'signing statements' to various provisions of laws passed by Congress related to national security and the military to give himself permission to OK torture and to otherwise circumvent Congress. No other president in the history of this country has come close to issuing the number of signing statements he has. It is a way to get around the Constitution and the most basic principles of the USA democratic system of checks and balances.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 May 06 - 04:23 PM

WASHINGTON -- The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, accusing the White House of a ''very blatant encroachment" on congressional authority, said yesterday he will hold an oversight hearing into President Bush's assertion that he has the power to bypass more than 750 laws enacted over the past five years.

''There is some need for some oversight by Congress to assert its authority here," Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, said in an interview. ''What's the point of having a statute if . . . the president can cherry-pick what he likes and what he doesn't like?"

Specter said he plans to hold the hearing in June. He said he intends to call administration officials to explain and defend the president's claims of authority, as well to invite constitutional scholars to testify on whether Bush has overstepped the boundaries of his power.

For more, read:
His Own Party

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bill D
Date: 11 May 06 - 04:47 PM

Arlen Specter is quite a guy....I may not agree with some of his politics, but I sure have to respect the man!

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Barry Finn
Date: 11 May 06 - 06:41 PM

Bill d, I believe you're right in that phone records are available to law enforcement agencies WITH A COURT ORDER for a SPECIFIC CRIME. Here there are no specific crimes, there is no court order & it's said by the Pres that this is not mining or fishing/trolling expedition. Then what the hell is it? I go fishing I bring a line, a pole & some bait. I go mining I bring a pick, a shovel & a flashlight. I go looking for terrorist I bring my phone records? And this isn't an invasion of public privicy, how so? This is a tool, how so? This was a voluntary action on the part of the phone companies with the exception of Quest & maybe a few smaller ones. I hope that Quest recives a windfall of customers that are so upset with the other companies that betrayed their trust & privicy. I hope that a CLASS ACTION will be brought against the offenders, I doubt that'll ever happen though. The government should also be held accountable & be prosecuted for what I belive is a violation of peoples civil rights. There are still some who are defending these actions in the name of fighting terrorism, well last month it was being defended because it only involved overseas calls, next month it'll be defended because we will have no civil rights.

If anyone still does not believe this is a Shadow Government doing as they please, where they please & when they please try speaking out against it & you'll soon find that the more you speak the harder it will become to be heard. The places where you can speak out will diminish as our rights diminish. The fewer rights we'll have so we can't excerise our rights to free speach & the cost of speaking freely will cost us more & the costs will become dear.

If this isn't changed your next year's phone call will probably be read back to you in a court of law & you will have to prove that you were innocent of not being guilty of some terrorist infraction. The NEW WAR ON TERROR WILL BE THE WAR AGAINST US.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Barry Finn
Date: 11 May 06 - 06:43 PM

A republican Congress damanding action against the White House, the fox is guarding the chicken coup.
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bobert
Date: 11 May 06 - 07:58 PM

Now I know that I'm going to get the "blast" here from some of my progressive friends but...

...hey, given the fact that there are folks who are out to do harm to other folks that if it can be shown that tracking (but not listening) to phone calls might stop an incident, then I can live with it...

(Are you nuts, Bobert???)

Wel, maybe I'm nuts, but I can live with it...

What I can't live with is the fact the the Bush folks thought it was okay to just go about doing this stuff without asking permission... They ***should*** have gone before the American people, explained how doing this tracking might stop a criminal action and if their sales pitch sounded reasonable I don't hink too many folks would have objected...

Listenin' in??? Different matter... Get a court order...

I mean, let's get real here... We pay "intellegence" folks to sniff out bad stuff that bad folks are plannin'... And there a few bad folks... Includin' a number of rednecks who think that attacking gays is okay... Or burning churches is okay...

Okay, now I'll retreat to ferrowing barn... No one comin' in that stinky thing to mess wid me... But fire away...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Barry Finn
Date: 11 May 06 - 08:23 PM

Hi Bobert, duck, I'm taking the 1st shot.

We also pay for the Intellegent to report & tell US that Iraq has WMD's. The money, time & effort can be spent better else where, & not wasted, without having to violate our civil rights. Yes they should get a court order, it's the leagle way. I'd rather them go fishing,,,,,,for real.    HAHAHA
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Charley Noble
Date: 11 May 06 - 08:36 PM

I feel safer already!

If only there was a 24-hour monitor in this room linked to the NSA then I know that Alkida would never get me, or the tooth fairy, or some of them wild things I used to hear of.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 May 06 - 09:01 PM

LOL,Charley!

Thanks for the link, Janie, and for the article, Ebbie.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST
Date: 11 May 06 - 09:02 PM

Arlen Spectator is an ass, and is years behind now in his duties of oversight.

You know, here is what pisses me off. I'm quite sure my records have been reviewed, because I regularly call Mexico, and have visited there twice in 2005.

Now, the reason for those visits were to see my dying father and stepmother. But that is completely ignored by "the system" that is spying on us. Just calling out of the fucking country, and then leaving the country, is what gets you on these lists.

Any of you call outside the US with any frequency? You are on the list. Been to another country since 9/11? You are on the list.

I know, because I'm still on the fucking lists from the Nixon/Reagan years.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 11 May 06 - 09:41 PM

I'm on the Reagan list.

It seems I may be on the Bush list now.

I am being denied continued service for my website.
My money is not good enough anymore.
By posting various cartoons about the Bush administration I may have violated the new laws and standards act...
But they are not saying why.


The LYCOS WEBSITE rules...

If you provide any information that is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete, or Lycos has reasonable grounds to suspect that such information is untrue, inaccurate, not current or incomplete, Lycos has the right to suspend or terminate your account and refuse any and all current or future use of the Products and Services.


You acknowledge and agree that the Lycos Network and its designees shall have the right (but not the obligation), in their sole discretion, to refuse to publish, remove, or block access to any Content that is available via the Products and Services at any time, for any reason, or for no reason at all, with or without notice. Without limitation Lycos and its designees shall have the right (but not the obligation), in their sole discretion, to refuse to publish, remove, or block access to any Content that violates the Terms and Conditions or is otherwise objectionable as determined by Lycos, in its sole discretion. Lycos may also terminate access to, or membership in, the Lycos Network, or any portion thereof, for violating these Terms and Conditions.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Susu's Hubby
Date: 11 May 06 - 09:43 PM

Bobert,

I applaud you. On the tracking part.

Very well reasoned and thought out.

Hubby

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 11 May 06 - 09:47 PM

May I have your phone records?

At least I asked.
W didn't.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bobert
Date: 11 May 06 - 10:18 PM

Bug off, Hubby...

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST
Date: 11 May 06 - 10:19 PM

Bobert has fallen victim to the propagandist false dichotomy, that in order to be safe, we must sacrifice our civil rights.

It simply isn't true.

And Bobert, why on earth do you think they aren't listening to us? How else will they know to flag certain peoples' calls? You aren't thinking this through very far are you?

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST,AR282
Date: 11 May 06 - 10:31 PM

Haha. I said right after the spy story broke that it was only a matter of time before we found out they spied domestically. I can't figure why they didn't say so up front. By lying this way, even those who want to support Bush, are having their faith tested in ways Job never dreamed of. The guy is pissing away his core support. Oh, well, suits me.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bobert
Date: 11 May 06 - 10:39 PM

Well, GUEST... Yeah, I might admit to pea-brain-ness here but lets look at what I suggested... Yeah, if the intellegence folks want to track a very call made in the US (without listeing to the 1st) ***and*** can convince the American people that in "trackin" they are not **targeting** and that these so-called "trackin's" might somehow stop some folks from blowin jup some other folks then....

...Hey, I can live with that...

But, like I said... Come to me with the story first and let me hear what yopu ahve in minf here and then let me (Congress) with full knowledge of what's going down makwe the call...

Heck, seem as menay Repubs ain't too happy about Bush's secret snoopin' as Dems so I have no problems with Congrss makin' the call... But not until after Bush explains what can be achieved from such a venture but...

... no listenin' without as court order...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Janie
Date: 11 May 06 - 11:01 PM

Bobert--they don't have any business tracking people to start with 'just in case'. Suspicious minds put 2 + 2 together and come up with 5. That doesn't make me feel safe at all.

Things keep going the way they are in this country (and this world) it will soon be time to start studying how to live completely off the grid. Just in case....it becomes illegal to think and speak your piece....it CAN happen here.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST
Date: 11 May 06 - 11:10 PM

Uh, I'm pretty sure it already happened here some time ago.

Don't look at that man behind the curtain, though, and everything will be fine. You can keep drivin' yer SUV, drinkin' and singin' away yer problems...

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 11 May 06 - 11:44 PM

The 'tracking' works like this.

All phone numbers are cross referenced to see if regular calls are made between a regular group of phone numbers (this obviously includes mobiles, as Terrorists will want to be much harder to track down to particular places).

Only 'Terrorists' will ever want to do this, so all people doing this can now simply be deemed 'guilty till proven innocent' of 'preparing for a terrorist' act, and placed in a queue for further investigation when the funds become available during the next Session.

So now it is much easier to catch all those 'Terrorists' who are secret sleepers masquerading as members of churches, social groups such as folkies...

I feel much safer now...

Boy! If you didn't think my mother always ringing me wasn't a terrorist act...

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST,G
Date: 12 May 06 - 09:45 AM

If you want my phone records, simply ask me and you will get them.

(did we not go thru this several months ago?)

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 12 May 06 - 10:46 AM

Well I did ask. Let me ask again, may I have them. Just PM me.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Les from Hull
Date: 12 May 06 - 11:31 AM

Ebbie – although the United Kingdom has nothing to be really proud about concerning slavery – I must point out that the trade was started by the Portuguese and Spanish, before the English go involved. The slave trade was abolished by the UK in 1807, but slavery became illegal in 1833, when the slaves were emancipated.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: katlaughing
Date: 12 May 06 - 08:14 PM

I don't think anyone has posted a link to Michelle Goldberg's book. HERE is the website for it, with an excerpt. You may read the whole excerpt at Salon by clicking on their sponsor's ad. It is well worth the read. I don't buy many books like this, but this is one I will definitely be ordering. IMO, anyone in the world who values their freedom should read this book. As the end of her article says:

Speaking to outsiders, most Christian nationalists say they're simply responding to anti-Christian persecution. They say that secularism is itself a religion, one unfairly imposed on them. They say they're the victims in the culture wars. But Christian nationalist ideologues don't want equality, they want dominance. In his book "The Changing of the Guard: Biblical Principles for Political Action," George Grant, former executive director of D. James Kennedy's Coral Ridge Ministries, wrote:

"Christians have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to reclaim the land for Jesus Christ -- to have dominion in civil structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.
    But it is dominion we are after. Not just a voice.
    It is dominion we are after. Not just influence.
    It is dominion we are after. Not just equal time.
    It is dominion we are after.
    World conquest. That's what Christ has commissioned us to accomplish. We must win the world with the power of the Gospel. And we must never settle for anything less...
    Thus, Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ."

kat

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Kaleea
Date: 12 May 06 - 08:25 PM

on the news this am, they said that all the phone records since 2001 were appropriated for a data base for the sake of national security.
For the security of whom, exactly?

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bobert
Date: 12 May 06 - 08:27 PM

Well, gol danged... According to a Washington Post survey 63% of Americans can live with phone calls being tracked... Yet only 33% approve of the way Bush is handlin' his job... This leads me to think that this one ain't strictly an anti-Bush thing...

Like others have pointed out on another thread, information is sold to marheters, right??? Well, if the NSA can glean out from what the US gov't is gettin' ibnfo that can stop a crime, then I can live with that...

But as fir listenin' in on folks calls, I can't accept this bveing done solely by the executive branch... That is way outta bounds...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Don Firth
Date: 12 May 06 - 08:52 PM

Organizing a phone tree to set up the pot-luck menu for the annual church picnic could get you hauled off to Guantanamo, where they might just work your goolies over with an electric cattle prod until you blurt out who volunteered to bring the potato salad.

The way it's going, I'm a helluva lot more scared of the United States government than I am of any terrorists!

Don Firth

P. S. Qwest has refused to cooperate. And I just received an e-mail this morning from Working Assets, my long-distance provider, that they are not cooperating either. AT&T (including Cingular and SBC), Bell South, and Verizon are cooperating. My wireless service is Cingular. I'm sticking with Working Assets, but I'm going to change wireless services.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bobert
Date: 12 May 06 - 10:08 PM

Come on, Don... I'm as radical a leftest as you but aren'r we gettin' a little carried away here... Guantanamo Bay fir orgabnizin' a pot-luck supper at yer church is a tad of a stretch...

I mean, if progressives are ever going to gain any power we're gonna have to pick our battles... This ain't one... The battle related to this isn't about whether or not it might prevent crimes but why we weren't told about it...

There in lies the true crime... A crime against ther American people and a crime against democracy...

Had Bush some and made a case for this, rather than do it in secret, hey, I think a lot of us could live with it but...

...he didn't becuase his administration is arrogant and herein lies the problems I have with the program...

Telling the American people wouldn't have compromised the program at all.. If anything, it would have sent a loud message to the criminals that we're out to get them...

What's wrong with that???

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Peace
Date: 12 May 06 - 10:13 PM

Telephone companies allowing government to have its records (of your phone use) just does away with the inconvenience of having to obtain a court order.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Don Firth
Date: 12 May 06 - 10:28 PM

Hyperbole, Bobert, hyperbole!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 May 06 - 12:30 AM

BTW, they won't want to know who brought the potato salad, they want to know who brought the dill pickles!

Now what was that pop song?

"Chip, chip, chip"...

... something about bringing the castle down. This IS a music forum after all. We should be interpreting everything here in terms of songs, you know...

:P

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 May 06 - 01:01 AM

CHIP SONG (Kurt Walther/S0CAN '03)

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Teribus
Date: 13 May 06 - 01:03 AM

Ebbie - 11 May 06 - 01:01 PM

"England's action may not have been as altruistic as all that. Slavery in England itself was formally abolished in 1772 and ostnsibly abolished "throughout the Empire" in 1807 but she continued its practice in the Caribbean until 1848 Not to mention, of course, that England was the country that first brought African slaves to the Colonies."

Ebbie believes that she is talking history, in stating, "that England was the country that first brought African slaves to the Colonies" She's not of course, she is spouting complete and utter rubbish. The first black slaves that the English encountered in the US had been brought there by the Dutch, the English had no idea what to do with them and they were registered as indentured servants.

The first indentured servants England sent to her colonies were Scots prisoners taken by Cromwell after the Battle of Dunbar (aka The Dunbar Drove) in 1650. They were sent, not to the American Colonies but to the Carribean Islands of the newly formed Commonwealth where they were used to work on the sugar plantations. They died off fairly rapidly and were replaced by African slaves. To save on book keeping the African Slaves on arriving at their new owners plantation were listed on the books and given the name of one of the deceased "indentured servants" - That is why there are so many people throughout the Carribean Islands who have Scottish surnames.

Sorry, Ebb's, England was NOT the country that first brought African slaves to the Colonies. Oh and another popularly held fallacy with regard to England/Britain and their former Colonies in America. The American colonists in the mid to late 1700's were not overburdened by harsh British laws and taxes, on the contrary they were being left very much to their own devices while at the same time being subsidised to the hilt (Example: A colonist in America paid one twenty-seventh of the taxes that his counterpart in England would pay) Niall Ferguson covers it in great detail. The colonists biggest beef was that the British Government generally held to treaties signed with the Indians and this limited the opportunities for expansion by the colonists. This was also the real reason for America's declaration of War in 1812, its primary objective was to break the terms of a treaty signed by the British in 1754 in order that American settlers could expand westwards into the Ohio and Wabash basin - That was why the Native American Indians under Tecumseh fought alongside the British against the Americans. It was a great pity that Britains main forcus at the time was on defeating Napoleon, otherwise it might have turned out a bit differently for the Indians.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 13 May 06 - 10:16 AM

Yhr issue I was surprised to learn was that England freed American slaves and brought them back to England against George Washington's urgent pleading.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: CarolC
Date: 13 May 06 - 01:47 PM

"Under Section 222 of the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, telephone companies are prohibited from giving out information regarding their customers' calling habits: whom a person calls, how often and what routes those calls take to reach their final destination. Inbound calls, as well as wireless calls, also are covered.

The financial penalties for violating Section 222, one of many privacy reinforcements that have been added to the law over the years, can be stiff. The Federal Communications Commission, the nation's top telecommunications regulatory agency, can levy fines of up to $130,000 per day per violation"

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.htm

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 May 06 - 05:05 PM

Thanks for posting that clause of the Communications Act, Carol. That definitely pins down the matter of whether the NSA's actions are or are not legal. That settles it. They are not. No matter how vociferously Bush and his minions insist they are. The provisions of FISA, necessitating the obtaining of a warrant in specific circumstances, allows for legitimate investigation, but NSA wants to merely blow that off and Bush claims that's perfectly okay because he says it is.

And I think the information NSA is "mining" goes quite a bit beyond what is found on your monthly phone bill, which, incidentally, is supposed to be between you and the telephone company and not anybody else's business. Sure, perhaps it's true that all they really want to do is monitor for possible terrorist activity, but freely allowing this kind of snooping without having to show probable cause and obtaining the necessary warrant as required by the Fourth Amendment sets a very dangerous precedent. If this is allowed, at some future time (and sooner that anyone thinks), it won't be just suspected terrorists who will be monitored. In fact, various peace and environmental groups have already been, and quite probably are still being monitored. Remember, among other things, Richard Nixon's "enemy's list?" Things such as THIS. This is exactly the reason for the Fourth Amendment.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Bush's claim that he, as President, has special powers, whether granted to him by law or by the Constitution or not remind me of a radio interview I heard some years back between David Frost and Richard Nixon. This was shortly after Nixon resigned, and among other things, they were talking about the Watergate thing. Nixon asserted that questions of whether or not something the President does, or orders, is legal or not are misguided because whatever it is is legal merely by virtue of the fact that it is done by the President. Frost, somewhat aghast, pointed out that what Nixon just said was that the President is the one who makes the law. This is incorrect. Congress is the body that makes the law, hence "legislative branch;" the President is charged with carrying out the law, hence "executive branch." This is the "separation of powers" as mandated by the U. S. Constitution.

Nixon didn't seem to get it. He reasserted that, no matter what it is, if the President does it, it is, ipso facto, legal. Frost said, "But what you are asserting here is 'the Divine Right of Kings!' That's the sort of thing that can easily lead to dictatorship!" Nixon still didn't get it, and stubbornly reiterated that whatever the President does is legal simply because he is the President. Frost sighed deeply and moved on to his next subject.

Bush's constant claims of "special powers of the President" and that "I am the President; I make the decisions," along with the powers he arrogates to himself whether granted by the Constitution or not, and many of the executive orders he gives indicate to me that he doesn't understand the actual powers—and limitations of power—of the office of President any more than Nixon did.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 May 06 - 06:01 PM

Don, I have missed your experience and scholarship. Thank you for the link and telling us baout the Frost/Nixon interview.

From your link: Through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, the ACLU of Pennsylvania obtained documents revealing that the FBI was monitoring gatherings at the Thomas Merton Center for Peace and Justice in Pittsburgh. According to the FBI's own description (PDF), the Thomas Merton Center "is a left-wing organization advocating, among many political causes, pacificism." However, the center is more of a gathering place and resource center "for over 30 different projects," according to the center's website.

Who knew "pacificism" was so subversive! It is good to know not all Americans are apathetic.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Bill D
Date: 13 May 06 - 07:09 PM

Bobert made the point that more Americans would 'tolerate' scanning phone records for terrorist links than approve of Bush....(quite apart from whether certain types of scanning are legal)...

I'm sure that since most of us have little to hide in the types of calls we make, *IF* we knew that this was simply an attempt to locate suspicious patterns related to terrorism, and would never be used for any other purpose, we could shrug.

But, there is some truth in the saying about "power corrupts". Since this administration is NOT asking permission, even from courts set up to GIVE permission, most of us are suspicious that the ability to track our phone patterns would inevitably lead to abuse for other reasons...including political ones!

   This practice MUST be controlled and used only by court order for VERY specific purposes.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: GUEST,crazyhorse
Date: 13 May 06 - 07:30 PM

This is all abit academic, google for echelon, which the US and UK say doesn't exist

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 May 06 - 08:55 PM

Ah, echelon, the main Aussie international phone exchange was sited next to a big building - which has no occupants! (supposedly) - strange! Funny how the design of the phone system was organised that, even though technically it didn't have to with current technology, all traffic is routed thru this big main phone headquarters...

Yes, since echelon is supposedly capable of doing all this and more already anyway, what the hell do they need to do this for, other than to prove that they can do just whatever they want, wherever they want, whenever they want, and sod any laws that the current individuals in power don't like, or perhaps even know about, and certainly don't seem to care about?

Well, when you are getting your instructions directly from an outside 'approved' source, how does that make these special governing individuals any different from those they claim to be 'communists', et al, getting their orders from a source outside the country?

You are watching a replay of Germany in the 1930's. At many points prior to the invasion of Poland, the 'people' or rather powerful individuals who were backing the 'government', might have pulled on the brakes, but they were either making too much money, or getting too much personal power themselves, to care.

I'm not making this up, you know.

Subject: RE: BS: I want your phone records
From: Donuel
Date: 13 May 06 - 09:01 PM

Not only does Echelon exist but it is being abused.

It is being met with encryption coding that renders the data we do pick up nearly impossible to decipher on a timely basis.

(there is no such thing as secret bidding anymore)