A Blast From The Past...This Is How The Left Viewed Bush Then

As I wrote about in an earlier post, the hypocrisy of the left in regards to Obama’s policy of allowing assassinations of United States citizens is quite telling.

Take for example this speech given by our Attorney General in 2004:

With all due respect to President Reagan, the problem is not government. The problem is with those who run the government. In the struggle against terrorism, these people have made a mockery of the rule of law…

And yet a disturbing pattern has emerged. Lawyers for this administration have attempted to sanction the wholesale roundup and extended detention of Middle Eastern men on routine immigration violations, and the indefinite detention of American citizens with minimal judicial supervision, and without access to legal counsel.

Now I understand that we live in difficult times, and that we face an extraordinary, unprecedented threat. We cannot be naive in how we expect to conduct this struggle. This is not a time for the liberal community to see our enemy for anything other than what they are: murderers bent on the destruction of our way of life, which is superior to that which they seek to impose. We must be aggressive in the conduct of the war, and in the interrogation of prisoners taken in that war. But this Administration’s view, that the President’s authority as Commander-in-Chief can almost always overcome what it views as burdensome laws, restrictive International treaties, and tired old customs is extremely dangerous.

Our history is replete with scandals and miscues that are tied to the unrestricted exercise of Executive Branch power, in peace and in war. We must employ techniques in the current struggle that are consistent with the spirit of our founding documents, and that will also stand the test of time. We must feel comfortable, fifty years from now, looking back at our actions in a way that we do not when we examine for instance, the detention of American citizens during World War II.

Now let me be clear. This is not to equate American al-Qaeda sympathizers with law abiding Japanese-American citizens. But citizenship must mean something. The guarantees that come with it must be respected.

The war on terrorism can be won and our tradition of respect for civil liberties can be respected. The tension that this administration sees existing between the two simply is not correct.

That was then, this is now:

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. asserted on Monday that it is lawful for the government to kill American citizens if officials deem them to be operational leaders of Al Qaeda who are planning attacks on the United States and if capturing them alive is not feasible.

“Given the nature of how terrorists act and where they tend to hide, it may not always be feasible to capture a United States citizen terrorist who presents an imminent threat of violent attack,” Mr. Holder said in a speech at Northwestern University’s law school. “In that case, our government has the clear authority to defend the United States with lethal force.”

…While Mr. Holder is not the first administration official to address the targeted killing of citizens — the Pentagon’s general counsel, Jeh Johnson, did so last month at Yale Law School, for example — it was notable for the nation’s top law enforcement official to declare that it is constitutional for the government to kill citizens without any judicial review under certain circumstances. Mr. Holder’s remarks about the targeted killing of United States citizens were a centerpiece of a speech describing legal principles behind the Obama administration’s counterterrorism policies.

“Some have argued that the president is required to get permission from a federal court before taking action against a United States citizen who is a senior operational leader of Al Qaeda or associated forces,” Mr. Holder said. “This is simply not accurate. ‘Due process’ and ‘judicial process’ are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security. The Constitution guarantees due process, not judicial process.”

I agree wholeheartedly with Bush’s practice of fighting this war on terror and I agree wholeheartedly with Obama’s new policy.

But the hypocrisy is mindboggling.

I never thought I would link to Glenn Greenwald but he is especially pissed at the hypocrisy from his side of the aisle:

(1) The willingness of Democrats to embrace and defend this power is especially reprehensible because of how completely, glaringly and obviously at odds it is with everything they loudly claimed to believe during the Bush years. Recall two of the most significant “scandals” of the Bush War on Terror: his asserted power merely to eavesdrop on anddetain accused Terrorists without judicial review of any kind. Remember all that? Progressives endlessly accused Bush of Assaulting Our Values and “shredding the Constitution” simply because Bush officials wanted to listen in on and detain suspected Terrorists — not kill them, just eavesdrop on and detain them — without first going to a court and proving they did anything wrong. Yet here is a Democratic administration asserting not merely the right to surveil or detain citizens without charges or judicial review, but to kill themwithout any of that: a far more extreme, permanent and irreversible act. Yet, with somerighteous exceptions, the silence is deafening, or worse.

How can anyone who vocally decried Bush’s mere eavesdropping and detention powers without judicial review possibly justify Obama’s executions without judicial review? How can the former (far more mild powers) have been such an assault on Everything We Stand For while the latter is a tolerable and acceptable assertion of war powers? If Barack Obama has the right to order accused Terrorists executed by the CIA because We’re At War, then surely George Bush had the right to order accused Terrorists eavesdropped on and detained on the same ground.

That the same Party and political faction that endlessly shrieked about Bush’s eavesdropping and detention programs now tolerate Obama’s execution program is one of the most extreme and craven acts of dishonesty we’ve seen in quite some time.

He goes on write and link to my post, saying “By stark contrast, right-wing leaders, pundits and bloggers are being commendably consistent”

Yup. We have.

I agreed with the policy then and do now.

And I completely agree with Glenn when he writes that the hypocrisy of the left is “the most extreme and craven acts of dishonesty we’ve seen in quite some time.”

Obama in 2006:

The bottom line is this: Current procedures under the CSRT are such that a perfectly innocent individual could be held and could not rebut the Government’s case and has no way of proving his innocence.

I would like somebody in this Chamber, somebody in this Government, to tell me why this is necessary. I do not want to hear that this is a new world and we face a new kind of enemy. I know that. I know that every time I think about my two little girls and worry for their safety–when I wonder if I really can tuck them in at night and know that they are safe from harm. I have as big of a stake as anybody on the other side of the aisle and anybody in this administration in capturing terrorists and incapacitating them. I would gladly take up arms myself against any terrorist threat to make sure my family is protected.

But as a parent, I can also imagine the terror I would feel if one of my family members were rounded up in the middle of the night and sent to Guantanamo without even getting one chance to ask why they were being held and being able to prove their innocence.

This is not just an entirely fictional scenario, by the way. We have already had reports by the CIA and various generals over the last few years saying that many of the detainees at Guantanamo should not have been there.

But it’s ok to assassinate that person without judicial review now eh?

Where’s the terror for your family members now?

H Y P O C R I S Y

In a sign that the left’s hypocrisy may not be going over so well is this editorial from the NYT’s today:

Perhaps most disturbing, Mr. Holder utterly rejected any judicial supervision of a targeted killing.

We have said that a decision to kill an American citizen should have judicial review, perhaps by a special court like the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which authorizes eavesdropping on Americans’ communications.

Mr. Holder said that could slow a strike on a terrorist. But the FISA court works with great speed and rarely rejects a warrant request, partly because the executive branch knows the rules and does not present frivolous or badly argued cases. In Mr. Awlaki’s case, the administration had long been complaining about him and tracking him. It made an earlier attempt to kill him.

Mr. Holder said such operations require high levels of secrecy. That is obvious, but the FISA court operates in secret, and at least Americans are assured that some legal authority not beholden to a particular president or political party is reviewing such operations.

Mr. Holder argued in his speech that judicial process and due process guaranteed by the Constitution “are not one and the same.” This is a straw man. The judiciary has the power to say what the Constitution means and make sure the elected branches apply it properly. The executive acting in secret as the police, prosecutor, jury, judge and executioner is the antithesis of due process.

While the NYT’s editorial pages maybe coming around to their hypocrisy, we do not hear the wailing and the crying from the rest of our media, the rest of the Democrat party, the rest of the liberals.

H Y P O C R I S Y

Lost But Now He Is Found, Poor Drunk Uncle Omar Obama

Corruption and Lies seem to be a tradition in the Obama family.

Every family has a “Black Sheep,” someone who embarrasses the family by getting drunk and in trouble. It’s possible some of us have relatives who are illegal aliens on the public dole and have repeatedly defied deportation orders: thankfully, not many of us fit into that category. However, not many drunk relatives tell arresting officers to call the White House, presumably before they do something stupid.

“Omar” or Onyango Obama is the long lost brother Kenyan half-brother of President Obama’s father. The same Uncle Omar mentioned by Bill Ayers in the best selling autobiography “Dreams From My Father”, the life story of President Obama as portrayed by the unrepentant terrorist, Bill Ayers. Although he was mentioned in the book, our president is wishing his drunken uncle would behave himself or live in the shadows.

Drunk Uncle Omar Obama was driving drunk after leaving the Chicken Bone Saloon and barely missed hitting a squad car. When he was pulled over, he demanded that he be allowed to call the White House in a belligerent manner. The cops didn’t find the drunk name dropper all that impressive; a drunk illegal alien with a long rap sheet had run down and killed a 23 year old Milford, Mass. man, two weeks earlier.

Open-borders and Open Society advocates of George Soros philosophy consider drunken Obamas to be “harmless”. However, drunken Uncle Omar has defied two court orders to leave the country. He also owes thousands in back taxes and has a fraudulent Social Security Card and has evaded authorities for 50 years.

The court policy that allows the drunk criminals like Omar Obama to simply stay in the country is the “voluntary departure” system that allows illegal aliens to evade the police and deportation for years. Omar lost his first deportation hearing in 1989, he lost a second time with the Board of Immigration Appeals in 1992.

Uncle Omar joined the ranks of an estimated 400,000 to 700,000 illegal aliens who give the law a one finger salute and look upon disregarding America’s Immigration Laws as a right or entitlement.

Drunk Uncle Omar will now be represented by the same Ohio law firm that fought the deportation of President Obama’s indigent welfare collecting aunt, Aunt Zeituni Onyango. Zeituni landed in the US in 2000 on a temporary visa and sought asylum in 2004. She was denied asylum and refused to leave. She hid with relatives in public housing for years before winning a second bid to stay in the US, a country she seems to despise.

Both parties play games with the immigration issues to win votes from the ever growing illegal demographic. Yes, illegals seem to be able to vote, have driver licenses, and Social Security numbers. Especially those who are here illegally and are related to our president.

Aunt Zeituni Onyango, Ward Of The State, Perpetual Welfare Recipient, President's Aunt, Former Illegal Alien

President Bush told Immigration and Customs Enforcement to stop deportations until after the 2008 election, when Aunt Zeituni was caught and identified as an Illegal Alien in October of 2008. Thank you former President Bush.

The question remains, how many more of these Obama welfare recipients are we going to be asked to support for the rest of their natural lives in a state of permanent Welfare and Public Housing. Our former inept and clueless President, Jimmy Carter, only had one embarrassing relative, Brother Billy, the one who inspired Billy Beer and became a cultural icon and a standing joke. At least, Billy was humorous; Zeituni and Omar are far from humorous.

We might remember the case of Gazi Ibrahim Abu Mezer, a Palestinian bomb builder by trade; he immigrated to the US illegally (considered legal by Napolitano and Obama) in 1996 through Canada. He claimed political asylum from alleged persecution by Israelis, was released on a $5,000 bond posted by another illegal, then skipped his asylum hearing. His lawyer dropped his asylum claim and a federal judge issued a laughable “voluntary departure order”. Obviously, illegal aliens who enter the country illegally or not interested in leaving the country voluntarily. He later joined a New York City group that was formulating a bombing plot and was arrested after his roommate tipped off local police. And once again we have another example of the DHS being on the ball and defending our country.

“Always remember. Never forget.” Words, just words.

A citizen is rebuffed by a judge for trying to unravel the nefarious facts concerning the president’s dubious Social Security Number.

Unfortunately for the plaintiff, today is not her lucky day.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURTFOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA____________________________________)ORLY TAITZ, ))Plaintiff, ))v. )) Civil Action No. 11-402 (RCL)MICHAEL ASTRUE, )COMMISSIONER OF THE SOCIAL )SECURITY ADMINISTRATION, ))Defendant. )____________________________________)MEMORANDUM OPINION
Before the Court is defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment [21]. Upon considerationof defendant’s motion, plaintiff’s opposition [31], the reply thereto [32], the entire record herein,and the applicable law, the Court will grant summary judgment in defendant’s favor for thereasons set forth below.
I.

BACKGROUND
Ever persistent, plaintiff has once again come before this Court in an effort to uncover“the biggest cover up in the history of this nation.” Pl.’s Opp’n to Mot. for Summ. J. 20 [31]. Shebelieves that the President is using a “fraudulently obtained” social security number and that theSocial Security Administration—among other agencies—is involved in a scheme to “cover[] upsocial security fraud, IRS fraud, elections fraud and possibly treason” committed by thePresident.
Id.
at 5–6, 13. As her numerous filings with the Court demonstrate, plaintiff will stopat nothing to get to the bottom of this alleged conspiracy. Unfortunately for plaintiff, today is nother lucky day.

The USS Stark (FFG 31) burns and lists to port on 18 May 1987, one day after the guided missile frigate was struck by two Iraqi-launched Exocet missiles. The attack killed 37 sailors.

The New Sovereign Investment Fund of Libya or of Colonel Qaddafi, there is no distinction in the money funds of Libya or Qaddafi, invested $1.3 Billion with Goldman Sachs; the bank used the funds on stock options at a variety of international banks and a collection of currency bets. Two years later, the Libyan fund had lost 98% of its value and was worth only $25.1 million.

Officials of Libya’s sovereign wealth fund were upset with Goldman Sachs and accused them of malfeasance; mainly, for making trades without authorization and misrepresenting investment deals.

In July 2008, [Mustafa] Zarti, the fund’s deputy chairman, summoned [Youssef] Kabbaj, Goldman’s North Africa chief, to a meeting with the fund’s legal and compliance staff, according to Libyan Investment Authority emails reviewed by the Journal. One person who attended the meeting says Mr. Zarti was “like a raging bull,” cursing and threatening Mr. Kabbaj and another Goldman employee. Goldman arranged for security to protect the employees until they left Libya the next day, according to people familiar with the matter.

Tip-top Goldman bosses, including CEO Lloyd Blankfein and finance chief David Viniar, scrambled to try to figure out how to fix the relationship with Libya and maintain access to its vast fortune. They also feared that word of the massive loss would spook other sovereign funds, so they offered the nation several ways to recoup the money. The last of the offers was made in a June 2010 meeting. Eight months later, the United States froze some $37 billion in Libyan assets as dictator Muammar Qaddafi turned on his rebelling people. Included in that large amount was what was left of Libya’s investment with Goldman.

In July 2008, [Mustafa] Zarti, the fund’s deputy chairman, summoned [Youssef] Kabbaj, Goldman’s North Africa chief, to a meeting with the fund’s legal and compliance staff, according to Libyan Investment Authority emails reviewed by the Journal. One person who attended the meeting says Mr. Zarti was “like a raging bull,” cursing and threatening Mr. Kabbaj and another Goldman employee. Goldman arranged for security to protect the employees until they left Libya the next day, according to people familiar with the matter.

Being enraged with a favored company of Obama might be dangerous to your position and your health; after all, Obama has the U.S. military and if he keeps his intervention small enough, he doesn’t need congressional approval.

relations between Goldman and Gaddafi became increasingly strained, the Wall Street firm made a total of three separate compensation offers to invest in the group on attractive terms between May and June of 2009, including the deal involving preferred shares. Another proposal would have given the LIA unsecured debt in Goldman, promising a stream of payments that would eventually have repaid the losses.

Over the next two years, discussions on these and a series of other compensation proposals were discussed by LIA and top-level Goldman staff – chairman Lloyd Blankfein, finance head David Viniar and European chief Michael Sherwood. However, they were unable to agree a solution and talks are thought to have eventually petered out last summer.

Now a company that can lose 98% of a 1.3 Billion Dollar investment might be first in line to receive Tarp Funds, thanks to Henry Paulson, Ex-Treasury Secretary. Tim Geitner who is connected to the Federal Reserve, who names Mark Patterson, former lobbyist for Goldman Sachs and the man replacing Geitner at the FED is William Dudley, former chief economist at Goldman Sachs.

Just How Close Are GS And Obama

Goldman offered Libya’s securities-wealth fund an opportunity to invest $3.7 billion in the securities firm, the paper continued, one of six options placed on the table over months of negotiations.

The proposals came at the same time Goldman had taken $5 billion in investments from Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in order to pass the Federal Reserve’s “stress test” to determine whether it had to raise additional capital.

The United States is now one of the NATO allies targeting Libya with rockets in an attempt to get Qaddafi, the decades-long despot, out of power and to see a Transitional National Council take his place.

With all the money wizards of GS and the Obama Administration swapping bunks, is it possible that the financial rip off of Qaddafi was about to become an embarrassment?

What better way to get rid of an embarrassment than to take him out with missiles when he threatens his people, while ignoring other despots that are actually killing their people by the thousands, we are talking about an embarrassment of Goldman Sachs for Muhammad’s Sake! Let’s remember GS used their bailout to start making a profit, they have managed to do so well with their wizardry that they can award 28,000 employees a $600,000 bonus. We can’t lament a few rockets that can help keep the reputation of a company like GS pristine and untainted by corruption. It is imperative that we keep things in perspective.

But damn Obama’s luck, the rockets didn’t kill the Desert Fox and the maniacal fanatics of the Muslim Brotherhood didn’t pull him to pieces, now what is happening to the reputation of Goldman Sachs. Qaddafi wants his money back and the wizards of Obama and Goldman Sachs ain’t looking too clever.

Obama’s promise to rid his administration of lobbyists is a standing joke when it comes to Goldman Sachs. Geitner has reportedly chosen a former GS lobbyist Mark Patterson to be his chief of staff. Patterson worked as a registered lobbyist for GS from 2005 to April of 2010.

It’s natural for Geitner, a former CEO of Goldman Sachs to select a Goldman Sachs insider for the number 2 position. At the Treasury, Jerry Rubin of the Clinton administration, was another Goldman Sachs CEO.

The man chosen to replace Geitner at the New York Fed was W. Dudley former Chief Economist for Goldman Sachs.

Goldman Sachs may as well be considered a part of the federal government. They paid Bill Clinton just under $950,000 for speeches between 2004 and 2007. Their Political Action Committee was the fourth largest donor to Clinton’s campaign, just below Citigroup. The Center for Responsive Politics maintains that Goldman’s Political Action Committee invested over a half million to congressional candidates in the 2008 elections, mostly Democrat incumbents. Goldman Sachs employees contributed more than $5,000,000. Obama received over $1,000,000 from GS for the 2008 election.

How quaint of Obama to promise to limit the influence of lobbyists in his administration. Goldman has had a seat at the table since regulations on finance were began to be unlaced during the Clinton years, they were among the first and largest recipients of TARP funding, receiving $10 billion immediately.

In matters of the economy, we can have faith in the intellect of men like Geitner, who according to Bernanke has two main guiding principles: “Life’s about alternatives” and “A plan beats no plan”. Bernanke also has referred to Geitner’s technique to thwart critics, “spray foam on the runway”; meaning, you take steps to limit collateral damage from crashes.

Would Obama be willing to use our military to cover for Goldman Sachs’ incompetence and corruption?

The answer may be hidden within another question, would Obama be willing to use the military to cover for his own incompetence and corruption?

James Taranto points out an incongruent position in regards to the New York Times editorial page:

Then:

* “The documents appear to have been acquired illegally and contain all manner of private information and statements that were never intended for the public eye, so they won’t be posted here.”–New York Times, on the Climategate emails, Nov. 20, 2009

Now:

* “The articles published today and in coming days are based on thousands of United States embassy cables, the daily reports from the field intended for the eyes of senior policy makers in Washington. . . . The Times believes that the documents serve an important public interest, illuminating the goals, successes, compromises and frustrations of American diplomacy in a way that other accounts cannot match.”–New York Times, on the WikiLeaks documents, Nov. 29, 2010

But of course no surprises here! After all, this is the same revered and respected newspaper read by millions all over the globe who proudly published leaked information damaging to our national security and defended that decision.

To add to Taranto’s case, here’s the NYTimes editorial from January 4, 2006:

Given the Bush administration’s appetite for leak investigations (three are under way), this seems a good moment to try to clear away the fog around this issue.

A democratic society cannot long survive if whistle-blowers are criminally punished for revealing what those in power don’t want the public to know – especially if it’s unethical, illegal or unconstitutional behavior by top officials. Reporters need to be able to protect these sources, regardless of whether the sources are motivated by policy disputes or nagging consciences. This is doubly important with an administration as dedicated as this one is to extreme secrecy.

~~~

When the government does not want the public to know what it is doing, it often cites national security as the reason for secrecy. The nation’s safety is obviously a most serious issue, but that very fact has caused this administration and many others to use it as a catchall for any matter it wants to keep secret, even if the underlying reason for the secrecy is to prevent embarrassment to the White House. The White House has yet to show that national security was harmed by the report on electronic spying, which did not reveal the existence of such surveillance – only how it was being done in a way that seems outside the law.

Leak investigations are often designed to distract the public from the real issues by blaming the messenger. Take the third leak inquiry, into a Washington Post report on secret overseas C.I.A. camps where prisoners are tortured or shipped to other countries for torture. The administration said the reporting had damaged America’s image. Actually, the secret detentions and torture did that.

Illegal spying and torture need to be investigated, not whistle-blowers and newspapers.

Yes, the world is a much safer place because we can trust the NYTimes to make the editorial decisions on what classified information is and what is not worthy of being leaked to the general public.

My, how things change.

Or not.

Remember this?

Eliminate Warrantless Wiretaps. Barack Obama opposed the Bush Administration’s initial policy on warrantless wiretaps because it crossed the line between protecting our national security and eroding the civil liberties of American citizens. As president, Obama would update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to provide greater oversight and accountability to the congressional intelligence committees to prevent future threats to the rule of law.

Naturally, that went the way of all Obama promises:

On the campaign trail, Barack Obama harshly criticized Bush administration policies allowing warrantless wiretaps. But, since he assumed office as president, Obama’s Justice Department has attempted to deny a private organization the right to sue the federal government for wiretapping communications without court authorization.

Ironically, more and more people are missing the old days:

In Warrantless Wiretapping Case, Obama DOJ’s New Arguments Are Worse Than Bush’s

We had hoped this would go differently.

Friday evening, in a motion to dismiss Jewel v. NSA, EFF’s litigation against the National Security Agency for the warrantless wiretapping of countless Americans, the Obama Administration made two deeply troubling arguments.

First, they argued, exactly as the Bush Administration did on countless occasions, that the state secrets privilege requires the court to dismiss the issue out of hand. They argue that simply allowing the case to continue “would cause exceptionally grave harm to national security.” As in the past, this is a blatant ploy to dismiss the litigation without allowing the courts to consider the evidence.

It’s an especially disappointing argument to hear from the Obama Administration. As a candidate, Senator Obama lamented that the Bush Administration “invoked a legal tool known as the ‘state secrets’ privilege more than any other previous administration to get cases thrown out of civil court.” He was right then, and we’re dismayed that he and his team seem to have forgotten.

Not content with phones, Obama wants to wiretap your email:

WASHINGTON – Federal law enforcement and national security officials are preparing to seek sweeping new regulations of the Internet, arguing that their ability to wiretap criminal and terrorism suspects is “going dark” as people increasingly communicate online instead of by telephone.

And that’s a lot of stuff!

Essentially, officials want Congress to require all services that enable communications — including encrypted e-mail transmitters such as BlackBerry, social networking websites such as Facebook and software that allows direct “peer-to-peer” messaging such as Skype — to be technically capable of complying if served with a wiretap order. The mandate would include being able to intercept and unscramble encrypted messages.

Even some lefties noticed Obama says one thing and does another:

Again, the gulf between Candidate Obama and President Obama is striking. As a candidate, Obama ran promising a new era of government transparency and accountability, an end to the Bush DOJ’s radical theories of executive power, and reform of the PATRIOT Act. But, this week, Obama’s own Department Of Justice has argued that, under the PATRIOT Act, the government shall be entirely unaccountable for surveilling Americans in violation of its own laws.

Republicans are understandably outraged at this new invasion. One even wrote:

On wiretapping, Obama isn’t listening to the Constitution

THE PRESIDENT is not above the law; he is not King Barack. Yet, with sorrow, we are now learning that in this great land we have an administration that has refused to follow well-crafted, longstanding procedures that require the president to get a court order before spying on people within the United States. With outrage, we learn that this administration believes that it does not have to follow the law of the land.

Not just above the law, this administration seems to be saying that it IS the law. It contends that it can decide on its own what the law is, how to interpret it, and whether or not it has to follow it. I believe that such an arrogant and expansive view of executive power would have sent chills down the spines of our Founding Fathers — as it does for every American hearing these startling revelations today.

The president, the vice president, the secretary of state, and the attorney general tell us that the president can order domestic spying inside this country — without judicial oversight — under his power as commander in chief. Really? Where do they find that in the Constitution? Time and time again, this president has used his express, but limited, constitutional power to command the military to justify controversial activities — after the fact.

Actually, that was Ted Kennedy writing about George Bush, but the irony was inescapable.

Charles Krauthammer makes a great point below regarding the leaks from WikiLeaks. During the Bush years Reporters were given Pulitzers for leaking the classified information. Now that Obama is the President it’s a bad thing.

You also see Colby King from the Washington Post taking a position that you know was completely different during Bush….the classified information doesn’t belong to the leaker so they should give it back.

Puhlease.

And just last week Gibbs said during a White House Presser that leaks like the recent one shouldn’t happen, people should register their disapproval with policy in a lawful way.

QUESTION: The head of Wikileaks tells us that he — he won’t identify the source of the material. He actually says we still don’t know who the source is. But if it was Private First Class Manning, who is already in custody, the head of Wikileaks says, “He’s a hero.” What does the president say to Wikileaks and those who believe that they are doing the right thing…

GIBBS: Well, look…

QUESTION: … in outing the policy they disagree with?

GIBBS: Well, I think there are ways in which one can disapprove a policy without breaking the law and putting in potential danger those who are there to keep us safe.
Again, if I were to have handed one of you these documents, I would be breaking the law.

I think there are certainly better ways to — to discuss and register one’s opposition, rather than putting people in potential harm’s way.

Hey, I think we all agree with that but where was the disapproval from Obama and pals when the NYT’s and the WaPo were leaking materials that undermined our war against terror? Where were the calls to silence such a lawbreaking leak?

There weren’t any, instead there was adulation and applause from the left side of the aisle.

Hypocrites one and all.

Are the NYT’s and James Risen at fault here?

Investigators of the failed car bombing in Times Square are looking for a money courier they say helped funnel cash from overseas to finance a Pakistani-American’s preparations to blow up the crude gasoline-and-propane bomb in the heart of New York, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press.

Investigators have the name of the courier they believe helped Faisal Shahzad pay for the used SUV and other materials to rig up a car bomb that would have caused a huge fireball in Times Square if it had gone off, the official told the AP. The official didn’t know how much money may have changed hands.

A money courier?

Now where would they have learned that this money couldn’t be tracked?

From Powerline:

“First, Shahzad used a disposable cell phone to communicate—the NSA leak may very well explain why he did that. Second, according to the AP this morning, he received funds from abroad via a courier. A courier!!! The SWIFT leak is almost certainly implicated here.”

As I wrote in 2006:

The complete arrogance and stupidity of the press is mindboggling. The arrogance to believe that they should be the keepers of secrets. They should decide what to disclose and what not to. The stupidity in believing that printing a article which describes a secret tracking program will not affect our war against terror.

It HAS affected it, and by pure luck many deaths were averted.

3 Provisions of the PATRIOT Act (“Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism”) are set to expire at the end of the year.

NYTimes:

WASHINGTON — As Congress prepares to consider extending crucial provisions of the USA Patriot Act, civil liberties groups and some Democratic lawmakers are gearing up to press for sweeping changes to surveillance laws.

Both the House and the Senate are set to hold their first committee hearings this week on whether to reauthorize three sections of the Patriot Act that expire at the end of this year. The provisions expanded the power of the F.B.I. to seize records and to eavesdrop on phone calls in the course of a counterterrorism investigation.

Is this really an “expansion” of power? Or a matter of updating existing powers in order for the F.B.I. to effectively do its job of protecting American lives in wake of 21st century technological advancements?

Laying down a marker ahead of those hearings, a group of senators who support greater privacy protections filed a bill on Thursday that would impose new safeguards on the Patriot Act while tightening restrictions on other surveillance policies. The measure is co-sponsored by nine Democrats and an independent.

The Judicious Use of Surveillance Tools In Counterterrorism Efforts (JUSTICE- ain’t that cute?) Act is being introduced by U.S. Senators Russ Feingold (D-WI), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Jon Tester (D-MT), Tom Udall (D-NM), Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Daniel Akaka (D-HI) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT- who might as well carry a “D” by his name).

“Every single member of Congress wants to give our law enforcement and intelligence officials the tools they need to keep Americans safe,” Mr. Feingold said in a statement when filing the bill. “But with the Patriot Act up for reauthorization, we should take this opportunity to fix the flaws in our surveillance laws once and for all.”

Really?! Feingold (and every single member of Congress) wants to give our FBI and CIA the tools they need to keep Americans safe? Is that what he wanted in Oct. 2001 when he alone opposed the Patriot Act? If he had a chance to vote against the entire Patriot Act today, would he do so? 8 years following the events of 9/11, and we have not experienced another such terror attack. How has the Patriot Act not contributed to that success?

One of the witnesses Democrats have invited to testify at both hearings is Suzanne E. Spaulding, who has worked for lawmakers of both parties as a former top staffer on the House and Senate Intelligence committees.

I love when it’s always pointed out that she’s “worked for lawmakers of both parties”, as if that gives her credentials of being down the middle/bipartisan. But on this issue, she has always aligned herself against the Bush Administration on the Patriot Act, FISA, NSA surveillance program.

Mrs. Spaulding said she would urge Congress to tighten restrictions on when the F.B.I. could use the Patriot Act powers.

The rapid build-up of domestic intelligence authorities after the Sept. 11 attacks, she said, had overlooked “important safeguards,” which has resulted “in a greater likelihood at a minimum of the government mistakenly intruding into the privacy of innocent Americans, and at worst having a greater capability of abusing these authorities.”

Still, she acknowledged, the public record contains scant evidence that the F.B.I. has abused its powers under the three expiring Patriot Act sections.

Yet Spaulding and others of her mindset continue to fear-monger a characterization of “abuses”, “spying on AMERICANS (not terrorists)”, “civil rights intrusion”. That’s how they define this.

Republicans invited Kenneth L. Wainstein, a former assistant attorney general for national security for the Bush administration, to testify at both Patriot Act hearings.

“We have to be careful not to limit these tools to the point that they are no longer useful in fast-moving threat investigations,” Mr. Wainstein said. “There is an important place for oversight of national security tools, and that oversight is being exercised by Congress and by the federal judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.”

The first such provision allows investigators to get “roving wiretap” court orders authorizing them to follow a target who switches phone numbers or phone companies, rather than having to apply for a new warrant each time.

From 2004 to 2009, the Federal Bureau of Investigation applied for such an order about 140 times, Robert S. Mueller, the F.B.I. director, said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last week.

The second such provision allows the F.B.I. to get a court order to seize “any tangible things” deemed relevant to a terrorism investigation — like a business’s customer records, a diary or a computer.

From 2004 to 2009, the bureau used that authority more than 250 times, Mr. Mueller said.

The final provision set to expire is called the “lone wolf” provision. It allows the F.B.I. to get a court order to wiretap a terrorism suspect who is not connected to any foreign terrorist group or foreign government.

Mr. Mueller said this authority had never been used, but the bureau still wanted Congress to extend it.

I wonder if Dennis Kucinich sees that last fact as a reason for scrapping it. 5 years after the enactment of the Patriot Act, the number of searches conducted at libraries under the business records provision was just one, prompting Kucinich to say: “If they haven’t used it, they shouldn’t have any problems with our efforts to get it repealed.”

As Ron Kessler points out, “That was like saying that because a policeman had never used his gun, it should be taken away.” [pg 65, The Terrorist Watch]

Kucinich, btw, was on a FOX morning news show this weekend, crying foul over the timing of arrests made last week to foil a terror plot in NYC, in close proximity of the upcoming debate on the Patriot Act. That accusation is a bit akin to Nancy Pelosi’s smear of the CIA. However, who would engage in political timing and advocacy? Why, the national security-averse NYTimes in 2005:

Before yesterday’s vote, opponents of the legislation rallied around a front page article in Thursday’s New York Times that reported Mr. Bush had secretly lifted certain limits on spying inside the United States. After more than a year holding the story, the paper decided to run it on the day of the Patriot Act vote.

The rhetoric of the Senators who are introducing the JUSTICE Act is one of striking balance between giving law enforcement and intell officials the tools they need on the one hand; while protecting American civil liberties on the other. But are Americans really in danger of being targeted for civil rights abuses and violations under the current Patriot Act?

Many of the proposals under discussion involve small wording shifts whose impact can be difficult to understand, in part because the statutes are extremely technical and some govern technology that is classified.

But in general, civil libertarians and some Democrats have called for changes that would require stronger evidence of meaningful links between a terrorism suspect and the person whom investigators are targeting.

In the same way, some are proposing to use any Patriot Act extension bill to tighten when the F.B.I. may use “national security letters” — administrative subpoenas that allow counterterrorism agents to seize business records without obtaining permission from a judge. Agents use the device tens of thousands of times each year.

The Patriot Act section that expanded the F.B.I.’s power to issue those letters is not expiring, but they have become particularly controversial because the Justice Department’s inspector general issued two reports finding that F.B.I. agents frequently misused the device to obtain bank, credit card and telephone records.

National security letters are similar to grand jury subpoenas, issued in international terrorism and espionage investigations.

Ronald Kessler, The Terrorist Watch, has some things to say regarding this matter, Pg 73-5:

As it turns out, the actual number of national security letters issued by the FBI each year averages around 50,000. While that number may sound like a lot, an investigation of one suspected terrorist may entail issuance of hundreds of national security letters to track down data from each bank account, credit card, cell phone, telephone, e-mail, and Internet account he may have used over time.

~~~

In a later audit, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine found minor deficiencies associated with 22 of the 293 national security letters he examined from 2003 to 2005. In some cases, the letters were issued after the authorized investigation period, or an agent had accidentally transposed the digits in a telephone number of a person under investigation.

In about half the cases, the problems were not the fault of the FBI: According to Fine’s report, recipients of the letters sometimes turned over more information than requested or provided information about the wrong phone number. These problems never should have been lumped in with FBI violations.

Mueller brought that up with Fine, who insisted he was right to do so.

Mueller says the reason the FBI did not keep proper track of requests for national security letters is that no separate system had been set up to keep track of them.

~~~

By the time the report came out, Mueller had already taken twelve steps to correct the problems,

~~~

Fine specifically found that the FBI had not intentionally violated any rules. He determined that, with the exception of situations where the recipient made an error, the FBI in most cases had obtained information to which it was, in fact, entitled. He noted the tremendous workload of FBI agents trying to stop the next attack. And he concluded that NSLs have contributed significantly to the FBI’s counterterrorism efforts.

The news accounts either ignored or downplayed these findings. Instead, they played up the story as a massive intrusion into people’s personal lives, suggesting NSLs had something to do with monitoring calls rather than simply obtaining subscriber information associated with telephone numbers and e-mail addresses or obtaining financial records.

The F.B.I and the C.I.A. are not interested in “spying” upon ordinary Americans. They are interested in being able to do their jobs and to do them well, which involves protecting their loved ones and ordinary Americans.

Whose rights were being violated more, those whose phones were tapped by court order or those who died in the 9/11 attacks?
- Ron Kessler, The Terrorist Watch, pg 64

JUSTICE Act 2009 fact sheet:

The Judicious Use of Surveillance Tools In Counterterrorism Efforts (JUSTICE) Act would reform the USA PATRIOT Act, the FISA Amendments Act and other surveillance authorities to protect the constitutional rights of Americans while ensuring the government has the powers it needs to fight terrorism and collect intelligence.

Title I – Reasonable Safeguards to Protect the Privacy of Americans’ Records

Sections 101-106 – National Security Letters

The bill rewrites the National Security Letter (NSL) statutes to ensure the FBI can obtain basic information without a court order, but also adds reasonable safeguards to ensure NSLs are only used to obtain records of people who have some connection to terrorism or espionage, and to provide meaningful, constitutionally sound judicial review of NSLs and associated gag orders.

Section 107 – Section 215 Orders

The bill would reauthorize the use of Section 215 business records orders under FISA, but with additional checks and balances to ensure these orders are only used to obtain records of people who have some connection to terrorism or espionage, and to provide meaningful, constitutionally sound judicial review of Section 215 orders and associated gag orders.

Title II – Reasonable Safeguards to Protect the Privacy of Americans’ Homes

Section 201 – “Sneak & Peek” Searches

The bill would retain the Patriot Act’s authorization of “sneak and peek” criminal searches but eliminate the overbroad catch-all provision that allows these secret searches in virtually any criminal case. It would shorten the presumptive time limits for notification, and create a statutory exclusionary rule.

Title III – Reasonable Safeguards to Protect the Privacy of Americans’ Communications

Section 301 – FISA Roving Wiretaps

The bill would reauthorize roving FISA wiretaps, but eliminate the possibility of “John Doe” roving wiretaps that identify neither the person nor the phone to be wiretapped. It would require agents to ascertain the presence of the target of a roving wiretap before beginning surveillance.

Section 302 – Pen Registers and Trap and Trace Devices

The bill would retain the Patriot Act’s expansion of the FISA and criminal pen/trap authorities to cover electronic communications, but would allow pen/traps to be used only to obtain information about people who have some connection to terrorism or espionage. It would impose additional procedural safeguards to serve as a check on these authorities.

Section 303 – Telecommunications Immunity

The bill would repeal the retroactive immunity provision in the FISA Amendments Act.

Section 304 – Bulk Collection

The bill retains the new warrantless authorities in the FISA Amendments Act but would prevent the government from using that law to conduct “bulk collection” of the contents of communications, including all communications between the United States and the rest of the world.

Section 305 – Reverse Targeting

The bill would ensure that the overseas warrantless collection authorities of the FISA Amendments Act are not used as a pretext to target Americans in the U.S.

Section 306 – Use of Unlawfully Obtained Information

The bill would limit the government’s use of information about Americans obtained under FISA Amendments Act procedures that the FISA Court later determines to be unlawful, while giving the court flexibility to allow such information to be used in appropriate cases.

Section 307 – Protections for International Communications of Americans

The bill would amend the FISA Amendments Act to create safeguards for communications not related to terrorism that the government knows have one end in the United States.

Section 308 – Computer Trespass

The bill would guard against abuse of a warrantless surveillance authority in the Patriot Act that allows computer owners who are subject to denial of service attacks or other episodes of hacking to give the government permission to monitor trespassers on their systems.

Title IV – Improvements to Further Congressional and Judicial Oversight

Section 401 – FISA Public Reporting

The bill would require limited additional public reporting on the use of FISA.

Section 402 – Use of FISA Evidence

The bill would apply the Classified Information Procedures Act to the use of FISA evidence in criminal cases, and allow the use of protective orders and other security measures in civil cases, to ensure that courts have discretion to allow litigants access to information where appropriate while still protecting sensitive information.

Section 403 – Nationwide Court Orders

The bill would permit a recipient of a nationwide court order to challenge it either in the district where it was issued or in the district where the recipient is located.

Title V – Improvements to Further Effective, Focused Investigations

Section 501 – Domestic Terrorism

The Patriot Act’s overbroad definition of domestic terrorism could cover acts of civil disobedience by political organizations. The bill would limit the qualifying offenses for domestic terrorism to those that constitute a federal crime of terrorism.

Section 502 – Material Support

The bill would amend the overly broad criminal definition of material support for terrorism by specifying that a person must know or intend the support provided will be used for terrorist activity.

Vindication of the effectiveness of Warfare over Lawfare, and a triumph for the Terrorist Surveillance Program.

The ambivelent news is that The UK recently managed to convict a group of three terrorists for attempted terrorism:

Airline terror trial: The bomb plot to kill 10,000 people
Three British Muslims have been convicted of planning a series of co-ordinated suicide bomb attacks on transatlantic airliners, which could have killed up to 10,000 people.
By Duncan Gardham, Security Correspondent
Telegraph.co.uk

The al-Qaeda cell plotted to cause mass murder by detonating home-made liquid explosives on board at least seven passenger flights bound for the US and Canada. The plot had the potential to be three times as deadly as the 9/11 attacks of 2001.

The convictions followed Britain’s largest counter-terrorism operation and two criminal trials which, in total, cost an estimated £60million.

All three men convicted on Monday had been found guilty at an earlier trial last year of conspiracy to murder, but prosecutors said it was vital to secure a conviction on another charge of conspiring to blow up the aircraft in order to prove that the threat to air traffic was genuine.

How, you ask, is this ambivalent news? It took two trials.

Part of the reason is why lawfare (as apposed to war crimes tribunals) is a bad idea.

Western Courts of Law, being primarily concerned with their own citizens, make it very difficult to introduce secret evidence. From a civil liberties point of view, and with regards to one’s own citizens, this is a good thing.

War Crimes Tribunals, charged with enforcing the Customary Laws of Warfare, are more concerned with discouraging violations of the Customary Laws of Warfare and have no bars against secret evidence.

The key to the successful second prosecution of the three terrorists in this case were e-mails electronically intercepted by the National Security Agency. The NSA was, as a matter of policy and law, interested in frustrating the plans of the terrorists while preserving the source of that intelligence.

NSA-Intercepted E-Mails Helped Convict Would-Be Bombers
By Kim Zetter
Wired

The three men convicted in the United Kingdom on Monday of a plot to bomb several transcontinental flights were prosecuted in part using crucial e-mail correspondences intercepted by the U.S. National Security Agency, according to Britain’s Channel 4.

The e-mails, several of which have been reprinted by the BBC and other publications, contained coded messages, according to prosecutors. They were intercepted by the NSA in 2006 but were not included in evidence introduced in a first trial against the three last year.

That trial resulted in the men being convicted of conspiracy to commit murder; but a jury was not convinced that they had planned to use soft drink bottles filled with liquid explosives to blow up seven trans-Atlantic planes — the charge for which they were convicted this week in a second trial.

According to Channel 4, the NSA had previously shown the e-mails to their British counterparts, but refused to let prosecutors use the evidence in the first trial, because the agency didn’t want to tip off an alleged accomplice in Pakistan named Rashid Rauf that his e-mail was being monitored. U.S. intelligence agents said Rauf was al Qaeda’s director of European operations at the time and that the bomb plot was being directed by Rauf and others in Pakistan.

The NSA later changed its mind and allowed the evidence to be introduced in the second trial, which was crucial to getting the jury conviction. Channel 4 suggests the NSA’s change of mind occurred after Rauf, a Briton born of Pakistani parents, was reportedly killed last year by a U.S. drone missile that struck a house where he was staying in northern Pakistan.

Students of history will recognize this as the same dilemma which confronted Prime Minister Churchill when the Allies intercepted German messages presaging the fire bombing of Coventry. The only reason the intelligence was subsequently released in this case was that the source had been eliminated by military action, thus obviating the clear advantages of protecting the source of the intelligence.

Wired’s article continues:

Although British prosecutors were eager to use the e-mails in their second trial against the three plotters, British courts prohibit the use of evidence obtained through interception. So last January, a U.S. court issued warrants directly to Yahoo to hand over the same correspondence.

It’s unclear if the NSA intercepted the messages as they passed through internet nodes based in the U.S. or intercepted them overseas. If the former, it’s possible the interception was part of the Bush administration’s warrantless surveillance program — a surveillance program aimed at intercepting foreign correspondence as it passed through domestic internet switches. Such interception was previously illegal unless conducted with a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. After news stories revealed that the NSA was conducting such surveillance without a warrant, however, Congress legalized such collection activities last year in its passage of the FISA Amendments Act.

(Hat Tip: The Lede)

Hat Tip: Gabriel Malor at Ace’s Place, who comments: “…Democrats wished they hadn’t.”

Glen “Instapundit” Reynolds twigs to the same story via Orrin Kerr at Volokh “…who doubts this story will get the attention it deserves.” Of course not, it doesn’t fit the narrative.

Coming on the heels of Cheney’s FOX News Sunday interview, in which the former Vice President leveled criticism toward the current President that he is increasing America’s vulnerability to terrorism, is an interview by Jake Tapper with the president’s National Security Adviser, Gen. Jim Jones (Ret.). Jones claims that under the Obama Administration, we have been more successful in putting terrorists out of business and in improving international relations:

“This type of radical fundamentalism or terrorism is a threat not only to the United States but to the global community,” Jones said. “The world is coming together on this matter now that President Obama has taken the leadership on it and is approaching it in a slightly different way – actually a radically different way – to discuss things with other rulers to enhance the working relationships with law enforcement agencies – both national and international.”

Jones said that “we are seeing results that indicate more captures, more deaths of radical leaders and a kind of a global coming-together by the fact that this is a threat to not only the United States but to the world at-large and the world is moving toward doing something about it.”

The former Marine General didn’t provide any specific numbers to back up his claim, but he said “there is an increasing trend and I think we seen that in different parts of the world over the last few months for sure.” He added that he was not “making a tally sheet saying we are killing more people, capturing more people than they did — that is not the issue.”

But the numbers are going up, he said. “The numbers of high value targets that we are successfully reaching out to or identifying through good intelligence” from both the CIA and intelligence agencies from US allies has made the difference, he said. “We have better human intelligence; we know where the terrorists are moving. Because of the dialogue and the tone of the dialogue between us and our friends and allies…the trend line against terrorism is positive, and that’s what we want. If we have a positive trend line we have a safer country.”

All this was going on under the Bush Administration. The Obama Administration is an inheritor of those successes, including cooperation amongst foreign nations in the GWoRIT.

Many of the tools and policies put in place in waging the Overseas Contingency Operations are Bush era creations, which President Obama has kept in place in his continuation of “Bush’s War(s)”.

Steve Schippert writes:

Someone is going to point to Pakistan to help him out here, where Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud was finally introduced to the working end of a Hellfire missile.

That’s a load of garbage the instant anyone attempts to take that easy way out. The cooperation within Pakistan has got jack to do with President Obama’s suddenly deft foreign policy prowess nor his wild popularity with global media and resulting coverage – which is to be astutely distinguished from wild popularity among world leaders. Pakistan’s cooperation was being lined up mostly by the Taliban itself, which made its insurgency against the government of Pakistan so bold that the Pakistanis could push it off no longer. They simply had to deal, and have been for the better part of the year.

Predator drone attacks? Those began under President Bush and continue on under President Obama. Under Musharraf and during the Bush tenure, Pakistani authorities handed over to us, Abu Zubaydah and KSM. How have relations improved under Obama’s watch?

The GWoRIT has not been waged ONLY militarily and ONLY in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s been waged globally, with kills and captures of leaders and operatives happening all the time, in 102 different countries, in cooperation with our CIA and FBI and our military. This all happened under President Bush.

Cowboy diplomacy and “go-it-alone” unilateralism? “You’re either with us, or with the terrorists”? America’s standing harmed; we’re hated all over the world….spin and the stuff of talking point mantra myth-perceptions.

“There is no military solution.”

So sick of this strawman! When had the Bush Administration ever claimed its solution to fighting terrorism was strictly a military one? When was its approach to Iraq and Afghanistan ever strictly a military solution?!

Reaching out to the Muslim community? Not exclusively unique to President Obama.

Closing Gitmo? Really?!? Please wake me when it actually happens.

The War in Iraq? President Obama rode in on the coattails of the surge success he opposed and is merely surfing the waves of SOFA, signed under President Bush.

The War in Afghanistan? He’s acting more like Bush, than not.

NSA warrantless wiretaps much criticized under Bush continue under Obama (partial list of plots averted under Bush)….Rendition programs begun under Clinton, leaked under Bush (which did harm our relations by embarrassing allies implicated in cooperation with the Bush Administration on the GWoRIT- but that’s thanks to the NYTimes, USAToday, and WaPo. We just can’t be trusted with keeping secrets), continue under Obama….