Is this accurate?
POSTED BY: AnthonyT
UPDATED: Wednesday, May 3, 2006 21:33
VIEWED: 7022
PAGE 4 of 6
Perhaps you don't know how to read? I was referring to "signing statements"- statements that presidents add to signed legislation. I personally find the practice an abuse of power. Clinton wrote 140 signing statments in eight years, GW Bush 750 in five years. That's the unparalleled part.
But to address YOUR point- IMHO Clinton was wrong to authorize a warrantless search. And that makes Bush wrong too... but worse by several orders of magnitude.
{What, did you think I was going to defend Clinton? heh heh heh!!! 
)
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Don't piss in my face and tell me it's raining.
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bringing up Clinton in any context is just obscuring the issue. It doesn't matter what Clinton did; he's not president anymore, and we had plenty of time to deal with his problems when he was in office. But now someone else is president, someone whose leadership ability is being called to question.
Clinton is not the issue. I didn't necessarily like him, but he's totally irrelevant when it comes to attacking or defending G.W.
"I'd be totally hacked if Stimutacs wasn't so . . ."
"Outrageously chill?"
"Word."
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Hello everyone,
Forget about persecuting or exonerating Bush for a moment.
Doesn't everyone think that this ability to simply disregard laws, by any President, is wrong?
I mean, the process is supposed to be that Congress makes the law, and the President either Executes it or Vetoes it. If he Vetoes it, Congress can still have a chance to push it through with a big majority. Then the President must Execute it.
But the idea that the President can choose to neither Execute it nor Veto it seems like the system is broken.
I think the concept, the idea behind it, is wrong. I can't condemn any President too harshly for using this power, because it is available to them. I just think it should NOT remain available to them.
--Anthony
"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner
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Hello everyone,
Forget about persecuting or exonerating Bush for a moment.
Doesn't everyone think that this ability to simply disregard laws, by any President, is wrong?
I mean, the process is supposed to be that Congress makes the law, and the President either Executes it or Vetoes it. If he Vetoes it, Congress can still have a chance to push it through with a big majority. Then the President must Execute it.
But the idea that the President can choose to neither Execute it nor Veto it seems like the system is broken.
I think the concept, the idea behind it, is wrong. I can't condemn any President too harshly for using this power, because it is available to them. I just think it should NOT remain available to them.
--Anthony
"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Even further in the article the author basically refutes the intepretation that spying on foreign agents is substantially different from spying on citizens where they may overlap because of- among other reasons- lack of internal controls over who is defined as a foreign agent. He goes on to say that no court has ever approved warrantless searches of American citizens. My exerpt - unlike yours- was entirely reflective of the author's point.
...but the author of that article is not the final arbitor of the Constitution. The Judiciary is. If the Judiciary, up to the Supreme Court if it keeps getting appealed and the Supremes choose to review the last decision, rules that tapping conversations with foreign nationals is un-Constitutional, then it is. Until that time, it is not settled law. Your opinion, my opinion, doesn't matter.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Quote:Well, you already did that. I was just checking to see if you could remain consistent.
Originally posted by SignyM:
What, did you think I was going to defend Clinton? heh heh heh!!!
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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Of course a huge difference is that Clinton was spying on foreign nationals, embassies, the like. Bush is spying on American citizens. Big difference. In addition, Clinton discussed the issues with Congress and attempted to legally modify the law. Bush just ignored the law and did things his way - lying to congress and the American people.
Now, I'm not saying that what Clinton did was right, but I don't think it is the same as what Bush did. Not even close.
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Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
But the idea that the President can choose to neither Execute it nor Veto it seems like the system is broken.
Then its been broken since the begining. A good examples is Nixon (one of only a handful of good examples he provided...China was another), who refused to spend money appropriated by Congress for projects he didn't agree with.
Then there was Jackson, who refused to honor a Supreme Court ruling regarding the resettlement of Indian tribes.
There are nuances to the power structure and they change over time depending upon the political strength of those who hold the offices in question.
H
H
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Quote:
Originally posted by jmb9039:
Of course a huge difference is that Clinton was spying on foreign nationals, embassies, the like. Bush is spying on American citizens. Big difference.
No. The program Bush authorized is limited to listening to international calls were one party is a known terrorist or terrorist supporter. Signals intellegence of the enemy in time of war is a Presidential power, the legality of signals intellegece specifically goes back to FDR during WW2. That the other party is an American citizen coincidental.
Essentially it comes down to a reasonable expectation of privacy. If you are calling overseas to talk with a known terrorist, you have no reasonable expectation of privacy. If you are innocent and make the call unawares then its not likely they will come breaking down your door. No harm...no foul. If you are conspiring...then you deserve to be caught.
Citizen to citizen, domestic calls are not monitored. Only in Congress who have not been briefed say otherwise and there is no evidence that such monitoring is going on.
H
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JM
The Washington Post Article I posted said,
Quote:
"The legislation grew out of a legal debate surrounding the government's secret surveillance of CIA official Aldrich H. Ames, who pleaded guilty in April to charges of spying for the former Soviet Union. Key evidence in the case was collected during secret searches of Ames's office and home in June and October 1993, both without a federal warrant."
Aldrich Ames was a U.S. Citizen living in the U.S., not as you put it a,
Quote:
"foreign nationals, embassies, the like"
The Clinton Administration entered his home seized his personal property and used it as evidence against him in court. Not really that different at all in my opinion.
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"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon."
---Napoleon Bonaparte
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