This MYDD Article blows a hole in bush's domestic spying cover-up and lies. The article cites six instances where bush illegally spied on critics. The question still is: What will it take for the masses to say "We have had enough"?
Posted by smooth at February 8, 2006 10:54 PMHmm, early on in the Iraq thing, the question was:
Are these guys
a) lying
b) utterly incompetent
Turned out the answer was (c), both of the above.
The current question seems to be:
Are they
a) plotting a fascist takeover
b) spying on domestic political rivals
c) just incompetent, lying assholes
We'll find out soon enough, but my money this time would of course be on (d), all of the above.
Posted by SJ at February 9, 2006 03:51 AMMy concern is that Congress will change FISA for Bush, retroactively, of course, and never even investigate who is being spied on. I think we should all send the examples in smooth's link to our Congresspeople and point out that FISA should not be changed at all because Bush has clearly used the spying on terrorists rhetoric to spy on his opponents. The man is not to be trusted with a wiretap.
Posted by ann at February 9, 2006 05:45 AMI agree that there is nothing wrong with FISA but there is a lot wrong with this administration.
Is it possible that the reason behind the refusal to come clean with details of the wiretapping is that there is evidence that Joe Wilson was immediately tapped when his yellowcake op-ed piece was published?
Posted by Jim at February 9, 2006 06:17 AMI suspect that the "no-fly list" is actually an "enemies list." after all, if a person should not fly due to suspecion of links to terrorist activities, how does it make any sense that the person is turned away at the gate and not arrested?
as with anything else in Bushworld, the media has spoonfed this crap to the public at the regime's bidding-and we have swallowed it uncritically.
Posted by at February 9, 2006 06:53 AMMeasure me for a tinfoil hat if you like (I'm a 7&7/8ths), but what if the real target of all this surveilliance is not enemies but friends—or at least, fellow Republicans?
If Karl and the Mayberry Machivellians been using the national security apparatus to get dirt on members of Congress, it might explain a number of things: The extraordinary discipline they've been able to maintain in their party even in the face of failure and scandal. Why they've been so insistent on sidestepping the warrant process. And, if they've also dug up skeletons in the media, the ease with which they've been able to manipulate the press.
It's not as if this hasn't been done before. J. Edgar Hoover's unprecedented longevity was due in large measure to the dossiers he collected and kept on anyone who might threaten his power. (When LBJ was urged to can Hoover, his response was, "It's better to have him inside the tent pissin' out than outside the tent pissin' in.")
Posted by ZakAttack at February 9, 2006 07:21 AM
BTW - the administration's mis-direction on the spying question is working.
Polls are showing a slight majority of the country agreeing with the proposition that we should spy on terrorists. Which we all know isn't the question. But most people don't.
But that's the question the administration is getting in people's heads. They're good at this. They know the main media players are lazy.
And the Democratic leadership has failed to "frame" the debate.
Despite all that the public is queasy about the whole thing - but politically the opposition is failing to capitalize on that queasiness.
OOps, forgot to sign...
Posted by Samuel Knight at February 9, 2006 08:20 AMGood point Zak, but there's no reason the illegal spying shouldn't include enemies as well as "friends". Can't trust anyone in a time of war, don'tcha know?
This administration is likely violating dozens of federal laws under its theory of the inherent constitutional power of a "wartime" preznident. There simply is no reason Bushco would limit their illegal operations simply to electronic surveillence under their insane constitutional theories.
This will go on until the Congress says "No More". Which they are afraid to do, so we're screwed. Sorry, kids, we gave up on the country in 2006.
We can't rely on the federal courts anymore, the creation of the RATS block was the death knell of the Supreme Court.
It's interesting that Lindsay Graham thinks that Nero Jr's legal theories vis-a-vis his violation of FISA will upset the balance of powers under the Constitution, while at the same time Graham lead the fight, and is substantially responsible for, the confirmation of Alito----an historic disaster that will usher in a very dark age of constitutional history for us.
Posted by euzoius at February 9, 2006 08:28 AMReddHedd at FDL has this suspicion about Wilson's demand for information on the NSA spying:
I smell a rat by the name of Rove giving some political cover to Heather Wilson and her hotly contested race in NM. (Hotline says the race is a "dead heat," btw.)
Let's see: you're Karl and your boss is already caught spying domestically and you have to do some public damage control -- why not use this as an opportunity to allow a Republican in a questionable district to claim a hollow victory for the rubes back home? Might as well manufacture your own silver lining, especially when no one is going to ask you the tough questions when your party controls both houses of Congress, right?
Makes a whole heckuva lot of sense to me.
Posted by ann at February 9, 2006 08:36 AM
"so we're back to the quewstion: who were they really spying on without warrants?"
yes.
that's the heart of the matter;
the core of the immediate political problem for bush.
that's why the white house has been like a bootlegger running from the revenoovers, first throwing out one "reason" for the spying, then another, then another, yet another. all false.
the media, the web logs, and even some congresmen chase down each one, as they should.
but these multiple "reasons" are only provided, in toto, to distract from the central damaging revelation:
"who were they really spying on without warrants."
right now a good guess is anti-war groups, to begin with. but with the gang of right-wing authoritarians we have in the white house, it would take little,
once the spying was in place,
to shift to other individuals or organizations that posed a "threat" to the white house.
as my sister said to me recently:
"these are some scary guys, aren't they."
amen to that, sis.
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