Bush's Shrinking Safety Zone

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Infighting within the party proves that politics is inevitable even amongst the supposedly "principled", which in turn proved to me that "principle" is not the operating consideration that even LPers think it is.

For parties that are not in power, internecine fights over who is the more principled is about all they have to do. Parties in power actually having a responsibility to craft wise and functional policy don't have the time for it. An out of power party might do better if it didn't waste any energy over who's purer than whom and simply set out to attain office instead.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

No, HM, Clinton wasn't remotely a libertarian of any stripe: his political instincts were formed in an essentially one-party State, which isn't going to make a libertarian. Even worse, the only thing Clinton ever cared about was the convenience of Clinton -- a bad habit in a President. This is how you can explain both his Administration's approach to foreign policy and to domestic policy: what conveniences the Clintons? Just the most conspicuous proof of this is in the behavior of the senior echelon of the DoJ during the Clinton era -- they largely confined themselves to running interference for the one-party-state operations of the Clintons.

That is even more true of Bush.

I haven't seen this aired, but is not what the Bush Administration trying to do is function under war powers?

That is what should chill the heart of any libertarian. Bush is claiming that "war powers" justifies anything he wants to do.

[Undertoad]

But don't ya see man? YOU think that because of where you stand. YOU think that because YOU are inside a school of thought where Bush lies, is evil, scarfing up power, etc.

Clinton made exactly the same claim, except it wasn't in wartime!

The feared XO, Executive Order. I remember it. Man was I scared. But I got a dog, and it's better now.

[Happy Monkey]

Um, that's Drudge, you know. Neither Clinton nor Carter's orders included American citizens. To use either order, the Attorney General had to certify that it wasn't likely that American people or property would be involved.

Not that I'm particularly happy with that either, but I never said Clinton was libertarian, just that Bush makes him look like one.

[Undertoad]

Fine, let's look at the act directly instead of filtering it through Drudge.

If the Bush administration had said that

the Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order, to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year, if the Attorney General makes the certifications required by that section

and then said that the people who could "make the certifications" included

Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Director of Central Intelligence, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Deputy Secretary of State, Deputy Secretary of Defense, and Deputy Director of Central Intelligence

...would or would you not shit yourself? Be honest.

[xoxoxoBruce]

No, the Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Director of Central Intelligence, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Deputy Secretary of State, Deputy Secretary of Defense, and Deputy Director of Central Intelligence under Clinton were all honorable, upright patriots.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Clinton made exactly the same claim, except it wasn't in wartime!

What UT forgets to mention is that such wiretaps of government employees in his position are legal- due to conditions Ames accepts as part of his employment. Is that Drudge Report a subsidiary of Rush Limbaugh Inc? Why do they also forget such details?

[tw]

From The Washington Post of 2 Jan 2006:

U.S. Has End in Sight on Iraq Rebuilding
The Bush administration does not intend to seek any new funds for Iraq reconstruction in the budget request going before Congress in February, officials say. The decision signals the winding down of an $18.4 billion U.S. rebuilding effort in which roughly half of the money was eaten away by the insurgency, a buildup of Iraq's criminal justice system and the investigation and trial of Saddam Hussein.

... When the last of the $18.4 billion is spent, U.S. officials in Baghdad have made clear, other foreign donors and the fledgling Iraqi government will have to take up what authorities say is tens of billions of dollars of work yet to be done merely to bring reliable electricity, water and other services to Iraq's 26 million people.

The country must import its oil. Iraq produces less electricity than when Saddam was in power even after America spent $2billion just on the electricity grid alone.

Some years ago, the US invited other nations to a conference for rebuilding of a 'just conquered' Iraq. European nations were stunned. US insisted the world contribute more money to Iraq than what is provided to all of Africa. $20 billion. So how much did American spend on Iraq? Almost $20 billion. And still Iraq - an oil rich nation - needs $tens of billions more.

More insteresting is where much of that money ended up. A 300 man task force that goes out most every night to rescue kidnap victims in Baghdad alone. But Iraq is safer? George Jr tells us so.

How much did the US spend to liberate Kuwait? Almost nothing. Brunt of that justified war was paid for by other nations. Remember that when a recession years from now, created by massive and uncontrolled US government spending, occurs. George Sr was so responsible as to have the world to pay for a justified war. George Jr was so irresponsible as to Pearl Harbor a sovereign nation for nothing more than his greater glory and his political agenda.

Pay we must - and somehow we like it. $200,000 per annum for each private guard (Blackwater) in Iraq. Good thing we have the Chinese to buy up America - just as America once did for Europe in the early 1900s when Europe saw war and military conquests as a justified solution to national interests.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by tw

What UT forgets to mention is that such wiretaps of government employees in his position are legal-

But that's not a part of the executive order.

[Griff]

Bush supporters need bigger dogs to protect them from the evil ones so we don't have to give up on an open society.

The problem as I see it is that we have two booster clubs willing to grant any powers necessary to their own side without realizing that the other team will always take that power and try to push it to the next level. To bring in that other thread, when you excuse Clinton's use of the ATF you are pimping for Bush.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

...would or would you not shit yourself? Be honest.

Maybe, maybe. But Bush didn't have to, did he? He could have left that one in place, or reissued it, couldn't he? But no, he thought that that was too restrictive. Here's what his powers were when he came in:

1) Wiretap anyone with a court order.
2) If the courts are balking, get a FISA court order, which has never denied a request.
3) If you can't wait for a court order, you can get it up to 72 hours after starting surveilance.
4) If the Attorney General certifies that all parties are not US people, no warrant is needed.

He came in there, looked at those powers, and said they were not enough. He needed completely unchecked surveilance power over everyone, US or not.

I never said Clinton was libertarian, just that Bush makes him look like one.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

But that's not a part of the executive order.

These members of the executive branch surrender their right of privacy as part of the job. That does not mean they can be wiretapped at any time. I never fully understood the legalities. But it does permit an executive order to authorize that wiretap of Ames. A president has no right to wiretap ordinary citizens using executive order. A president must get permission from the courts. Otherwise Nixon's bugging of Watergate could have been completely legal.

A president cannot authorize domestic wiretapping without judicial approval. Nixon got (he claimed) authority from British common law where the king was above the law. Apparently George Jr gets his authority from god - because the Constitution does not give him such powers.

Meanwhile, Rush Limbaugh says otherwise. Rush Limbaugh - who gets White House talking points - says you have no expectation of privacy. George Jr, through his propaganda machine Limbaugh, says he has power to wiretap anyone he wants. Apparently from the same powers that permit him to torture as he sees fit and that told him to invade Iraq.

[Undertoad]

The XO says nothing about whether someone is in the executive branch or not.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

The XO says nothing about whether someone is in the executive branch or not.

George Jr's Executive Order (XO) was issued using a reasoning that George Jr can wiretap anyone, without Judicial approval, if George Jr believes that person is a national threat. So if that person is working for impeachment of this corrupt president, then George Jr can now wiretap that person as a threat to national security.

Nixon used that same reasoning. No other president found such reasoning to be legal. And yet Rush Limbaugh says you have no right to privacy. Rush Limbaugh, as the administration's defacto spokesman, tells the naive among us that this president can wiretap anyone without Judicial review. No other president, except Nixon, was so corrupt.

[tw]

We sents Humvees mostly without armor. It took a soldier about one year later to literally ask Sec of Defense Rumsfeld - live and face to face - why American soldiers had insufficient armor. Then an Ohio company who makes that armour said they could more than double production - but Rumsfeld never asked. Extremists politicians declared "Mission Accomplished" - outrightly denied an insurgency - invented lies about Al Qaeda. Why provide armour for a problem that does not exist - according to extremist rhetoric? Same rhetoric that also left bin Laden to run free.

From the NY Times of 6 Jan 2006 that was leaked because this president only cares about his own popularity - like Nixon - at the expense of American troops:

Extra Armor Could Have Saved Many Lives, Study Shows
A secret Pentagon study has found that at least 80 percent of the marines who have been killed in Iraq from wounds to their upper body could have survived if they had extra body armor. That armor has been available since 2003 but until recently the Pentagon has largely declined to supply it to troops despite calls from the field for additional protection, according to military officials.

The ceramic plates in vests currently worn by the majority of military personnel in Iraq cover only some of the chest and back. In at least 74 of the 93 fatal wounds that were analyzed in the Pentagon study of marines from March 2003 through June 2005, bullets and shrapnel struck the marines' shoulders, sides or areas of the torso where the plates do not reach.

Thirty-one of the deadly wounds struck the chest or back so close to the plates that simply enlarging the existing shields "would have had the potential to alter the fatal outcome," according to the study, which was obtained by The New York Times.

For the first time, the study by the military's medical examiner shows the cost in lost lives from inadequate armor, even as the Pentagon continues to publicly defend its protection of the troops. ...

The vulnerability of the military's body armor has been known since the start of the war, and is part of a series of problems that have surrounded the protection of American troops. Still, the Marine Corps did not begin buying additional plates to cover the sides of their troops until this September, when it ordered 28,800 sets, Marine Corps officials acknowledge.

Had Rumsfeld et al acknowledged what their own studies said (and instead not have fired all those researchers all before the war started), then troops would have been provided with armoured HumVees and sufficient armored vests. Problems like this are directly traceable to an administration full of paper soldiers (including an AWOL president). But like MBAs and lawyers, these extremist politicans know they must be right. This same adminstration even called Rep Murtha a coward because Murtha told a correct and honest fact. Just like Nixon who sent 35,000 good Americans to their death knowing that war could not be won. Blame the troops for their own death? Why not if that will protect the president's popularity ratings. Same reasonings used by Nixon during his unjustified war.

An important phrase in that report:

... cost-cutting that left some armoring firms on the brink of collapse as they waited for new orders.