Serenity AS Constitution?
POSTED BY: chrisisall
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 15:15
VIEWED: 6265
PAGE 3 of 8
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Lincoln freeing the slaves was also 'UnConstitutional' but I'm not about to advocate we overturn the Emancipation Proclamation.
Please explain how slavery was upheld by the Constitution.
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Originally posted by STDOUBT:Quote:
Lincoln freeing the slaves was also 'UnConstitutional' but I'm not about to advocate we overturn the Emancipation Proclamation.
Please explain how slavery was upheld by the Constitution.
Way to twist the topic now. Sorry, I'm not going to waste time with this.
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Under no circumstances am I "OK" with the Gov't snooping me or any average Joe. But that isn't what they're doing.
It isn't?
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When they say they're monitoring KNOWN terrorist operatives, I have no delusions in thinking that means me. Nor is there any evidence to suggest that is what the Gov't is wasting its time w/ random searches of any/every American. That'd be ridiculous.
I'm not sure what your saying here. If you're saying that this is about Al Qaeda, you're sadly mistaken. If the president wanted to snoop on Al Qaeda, not one federal court, secret or public, would deny him the warrant. *That* is absurd.
The govt *is* spying on peace groups, leftists and in general, the opposition. While there are a lot of folks over there I disagree with, I don't think that anything will be gained other than the silencing of first amendment rights, in particulr, the right to peaceably assemble. I think this is an infraction of a fairly serious nature. I don't think it's the end of the world, but I am absolutely beyong a shadow of a doubt sure that it has zippo to deal with Al Qaeda.
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How Janet Reno wasn't at the very least sacked for the Waco debacle, I'll never know.
Hear, hear.
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The govt *is* spying on peace groups, leftists and in general, the opposition. While there are a lot of folks over there I disagree with, I don't think that anything will be gained other than the silencing of first amendment rights, in particulr, the right to peaceably assemble. I think this is an infraction of a fairly serious nature. I don't think it's the end of the world, but I am absolutely beyong a shadow of a doubt sure that it has zippo to deal with Al Qaeda.
How is *spying* , or keeping them under surveillance, in any way infringing on their 1st Amendment rights ? Hell, John Kerry was a member of a group who had planned to assassinate members of Congresss and the Senate, and that was over 30 years ago! I'll pardon the Feds for not turning a blind eye to some of these PEACE groups. They can monitor them all they want, imo. Of course, once they take action to silence or disrupt their right to freely assemble w/ out due cause...THEN come talk to me.
There are al Qaeda groups in Columbia getting busted for fake Passport rings. Tunnels under the US/ Mexico border, running drugs and who knows what else. Humvees w/ 50 cal machine guns and men in Mexican Army uniforms getting caught trying to run bales of weed into the country. I'm more than a bit pissed a ALL POLITICIANS for not doing more to protect our borders, North and South.
While folks are bickering about the wither- tos and why-fors, real bad folk are actually out there waiting to do very real bad things.
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Did you believe everything Clinton "said"? I doubt it. So why would you believe Bush? If Bush was really monitoring "known terrorists" why didn't he just go and present his "reasons" for monitoring these people to FISA? Then he could have shown that it wasn't UNreasonable search and seizure and the Fourth Amemdment would have been upheld.
Okay, time for me to get reactionary and quibble. FISA, and in particular, the 1995 Clinton FISA extensions, are *against* the fourth amendment. I think we should consider a course of action that goes like this:
1. Consider whether Bush is out of line, and file a court order to stop it.
2. Consider whether the 1995 Clinton extensions are unconstitutional, and if so, ban them.
3. Consider whether FISA itself is unconstitution, and whether or not it should be repealed.
At the very least we should try step one, and I'd be pretty happy with step two. I think, given how FISA has been abused, it should maybe be killed altogether, but that would take some thinking about first.
A couple things about the extensions for those who don't know them.
1. Retroactive warrants. If a warrant is not obtained in 72 hours, the evidence is in admissable in a court of law. So what? If what you are doing is spying on the Bob Dole campaign headquarters, then there's nothing that is ever intended to reach a court. Bill Clinton made it *legal* for him to watergate Dole. It's not a crime, he just can't use the information in a court of law. He can use it in an election campaign though. I strongly suspect he did just that.
2. Black bag searched. This is when the feds come into your home and search it without a warrant while you are not there. It also applies to anything you own which is unattended, your car at work, etc. This is pretty blatantly a violation of our 4th amendment rights. This sort of search is capable of determining if you are a terrorist, but if you were a suspected terrorist, I say again, no federal court in the country is going to deny them that warrant. But what else could be gained from this search? Your political affiliations, notes on strategies, groups you belong to, the names of people you work with, know, or what work you are working on, what products your company is developing. It could know who was at the head of alternative energy research and how to buy them, stop them or kill them. I'm not saying that Bush wants to do these things, but why would you even want to make it possible?
It strikes me that if this is someone's position, it's not just avidly anti-us, it's avidly anti-them.
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The goal is to detect communications between those who would pull off another 9-11-01 type attack.
Usually you state things less directly than this. I'm not sure what to call this, but I'll be nice and say it's an error. This is undeniably *not* the goal. That was the goal of FISA, in it's original, unaltered form. Whether or not it can do that without developing into what it's become is something that ultimately should be discussed. But without question, any of the subsequent deviations have something else as their goal.
Finally. I'm sick of this fear. I am not afraid of Osama Bin Laden. If Osama came knocking on my door, I wouldn't be quaking in my boots. It's not just that I don't think he's going to bomb a village of 200 year old stone cottages in the middle of nowhere, it's that I really don't think it's that scary. Al Qaeda is the enemy, and a reasonably working America can handle that.
And has done so for 200+ years. The British, the indians, Mexico, Germany, Japan. The USSR. Any of this ringing any bells? The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics had 6000 nuclear weapons pointed at us. Spies everywhere. They had capabilities on some outlet in bumphickistan that Osama Bin Laden hasn't even begun to dream about.
And the USA can't handle this? Give me a break.
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I'll pardon the Feds for not turning a blind eye to some of these PEACE groups. They can monitor them all they want, imo. Of course, once they take action to silence or disrupt their right to freely assemble w/ out due cause...THEN come talk to me.
Okay, fair enough. But I guess my point is, it's not up to us. This is something which is aimed not at protecting lives, but protecting a political idea: the war in the ME. But I guess that's not the point. The point is, These laws and constitutional provisions exist so that no one will monitor John Kerry unless he leads a groups of lunatics with M16s to crawl up the capitol steps - which he most certainly did, I read his book, the first one. He was quite proud of that. At this point, it's perfectly fine, there's no one going to stop you from getting a warrant. But *someone* *somewhere* has to know who is being spied on and why or we *become* joseph stalin and soviet union.
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There are al Qaeda groups in Columbia getting busted for fake Passport rings.
Sorry to do this, but a statement like this needs a link. I've read of commie groups doing this, but that's the enemy we ignore. I've read nothing about Al Qaeda doing it. In Columbia.
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I'm more than a bit pissed a ALL POLITICIANS for not doing more to protect our borders, North and South.
Again, I agree with this. It's not as bad as in Europe, where the open door policy has allow Bin Laden to assemble an army. Remember the 40,000 cars? That was meant as a show of strength, by mr. Bin Laden, saying "Hey, we have an army, inside your borders..|.." And, sure. I would be quite happy if that didn't happen here. I don't want to read about schools blowing up because the bombs were built into the foundation. Talk about living on the hellmouth. But anyways, you surely can't be happy with *Bush* for this. He seems to want to mimic the European open door policy. Revolving jihad while you wait.
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While folks are bickering about the wither- tos and why-fors, real bad folk are actually out there waiting to do very real bad things.
Because, as I said in my last rant, we've been through worse, much much worse, without sacraficing our freedom. If we, wait there's a quote here. I think it was "He who sacrafices liberty for safety deserves neither." as Mr. Ben Franklin said.
I think if you look at this country as a religion, Constitution is the new testament, DoI is th OT, Jefferson is Jesus and Franklin is God. Or at least Moses. I don't quibble with their take on it, founding fathers were very clear on this point. This is what America is. According to them, that invented America. If you change that, you don't have America any more. You have something else. I think you have the CCCA. Soviet Socialist Republic of America.
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Sorry to do this, but a statement like this needs a link. I've read of commie groups doing this, but that's the enemy we ignore. I've read nothing about Al Qaeda doing it. In Columbia.
K, here's your link: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060127/terror_pa
ssport_ring_060127/20060127?hub=World
Seems D.C. is contradicting the story now, I wonder why.
Colombia busts fake passport ring with terror ties
Updated Fri. Jan. 27 2006 10:16 AM ET
Associated Press
BOGOTA — Colombia has dismantled a false passport ring with links to al Qaeda and Hamas militants, the acting attorney general said Thursday after authorities led dozens of simultaneous raids across five cities in collaboration with U.S. officials.
In Washington, however, Justice and Homeland Security officials were surprised by the announcement of the investigation, which they said involved people posing as members of Colombia's largest rebel army, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC — not al Qaeda or Hamas.
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:AURaptor, thanks for that. That was a fine answer, a lot more to it that the "Because it's good" you gave me last time I posed the same question.
Originally posted by AURaptor:
As a conservative libertarian, and a Southerner too, I can identify w/ Mal's plight and the concept of letting folk do as they please, as long as they don't hinder or deprive anyone else of their freedom through force or fraud. Yet despite the yammerings of our personal freedoms being taken away, I simply don't see it.
It seems the only place we differ is the perception of what is possible, and what is actually occurring concerning big government trying to control our lives, and it's role in planetary corporate domination.
I see Big Brother; you see Wally Cleaver
Time, as always, will tell.
Satisfied Chrisisall
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Fair enough. I suppose there is a Bin Laden Opium connection. Now Morales has cocaine, the socialist all over SA, heroine, cocaine. I hadn't really made this connection, all our enemies are on drugs.
I was just reading about Clinton's brother's mafia drug connections. Hmm. I wonder if there's anything in this. Pirate News, you have a theory?
Anyway, thanks for the link, auraptor, I concede the point.
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