Glenn Greewald (Salon): The Bush doctrine under surveillance

[Dudley_DUright]

A federal district judge ruled Thursday that the Bush administration's warrantless eavesdropping program is unconstitutional, and on that basis ordered that the controversial program run by the National Security Agency cease immediately. The judge, Anna Diggs Taylor of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, found that warrantless eavesdropping violates both the First and Fourth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which makes it a criminal offense to eavesdrop on Americans without first obtaining warrants.

The decision is the first ruling by any court on the legality of the NSA program, a secret Bush program that was first revealed last December by the New York Times. In a ruling striking for its unusually emphatic language, the court rejected every argument advanced by the administration to defend its right to eavesdrop without warrants. The court also rejected the administration's claim that mere adjudication by the court of the legality of the NSA program would risk the disclosure of "state secrets," an assertion the administration has used repeatedly to avoid judicial review of its actions. And perhaps most significantly, the judge resoundingly rejected the administration's broad theories of executive power: "There are no hereditary kings in America," Taylor wrote, "and no powers not created by the Constitution."

The decision has already been appealed by the Bush administration to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, considered to be conservative-leaning, and the parties have agreed that the District Court's order will be stayed (that is, not enforced) until Sept. 7, when the court will further decide if the order will be stayed pending an appeal.

It is important to be clear about what this decision means and what it does not mean -- particularly since the White House, among others, is already depicting this ruling as some sort of epic blow to the administration's efforts to fight terrorism. This ruling does not, of course, prohibit eavesdropping on terrorists; it merely prohibits illegal eavesdropping in violation of FISA.

more (after Salon ad)...

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/08/17/nsa_michigan/

[MissWaverly]

1. Democracy is coming back to the old USA

I can feel it.

:-)

[Independent_Liberal]

2. God I hope you're right.

I've been having horrible anxiety attacks lately. I'm just really worried. You and others can probably understand how I feel.

[MissWaverly]

3. Yes, I know, It's been bad

We were afraid, after 9-11, it seemed like America adopted the bunker mentality but now people
crave a return to normalcy and Bushco is not it.