Great quotes from the Conyer's hearing on illegal spying last friday

[Marleyb]

"He is claiming absolute power that no one in American history has ever claimed. This cannot stand," said Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y.

"If you’re dealing with what appears to be a criminal conspiracy by the president, the vice president, the attorney general and others, you cannot ask the attorney general and the people under him to fairly investigate," Nadler said. "Obviously, they will dismiss this out of hand because they will not admit how real this is.

"I want to be absolutely clear, what the president ordered in this case was a crime," said Jonathan Turley "
"This type of violation should be a textbook example of an impeachment violation," ..."If you believe the president violated criminal provisions of the law, I don’t see how it wouldn’t qualify. ... If the president commits a criminal act, you are obligated to hold impeachment hearings,’’

"The implausibility of the president’s claim seems to be self-evident," said Bruce Fein, a Washington attorney who worked in the Justice Department during the Reagan administration. "I don’t think any more needs to be said about the fact that he is violating FISA."

"The Constitution was based on the principle that ’trust me’ isn’t good enough," Fein said.

President Bush’s argument that he has executive power to authorize such surveillance "flies in the face of both common sense and legal precedent," said Rep. John Conyers Jr.

"The president of the United States is violating our nation’s laws by authorizing the National Security Agency to engage in warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens,"

"If we let domestic spying programs continue, if we let our president convince us that we are at war, so that he can do what he wants, we will allow to stand the principle that the president alone can decide what laws apply to him."

Congressman Wexler-"I am eager to hear from this distinguished panel because I can simply not understand how the Administration can justify brazenly skirting existing safeguards that were put in place after Watergate to deter wanton domestic spying on American citizens. It is outrageous that law-abiding Americans like the peace activists and retirees who make up the Truth Project in my congressional district are considered to be a credible threat to this country...

This Administration has groundlessly circumvented judicial review and taken America down a frightening path to a police state, which preys on a culture of fear while casually disregarding existing civil liberties...

"Following the September 11 attacks, the President addressed this Congress and told the American people that the terrorists hate our "democratically elected government. ... They hate our freedoms." Why then did the President circumvent this democratically elected government and disregard those very freedoms?

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=5026
http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/nation/13677784.htm
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.nsa21jan21,1,7619610.story?coll=bal-nationworld-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/21/MNGNEGQPIR1.DTL&feed=rss.news
http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=33211&dcn=todaysnews

[Immad2]

1. Thanks for posting this!

[Marleyb]

2. no problem

I think DU needs to continue to pay attention to what was said at these hearings, help raise awareness for what is really important and give praise to the few patriots who are standing up for our democracy.

Too many play right into the media's hands by moving on to whatever they want to talk about...Bush's stupid speech...crazy whackjobs at anti-choice rallies etc...

[Just Me]

3. A weakness we must confront: the inability to maintain focus.

x(

[Marleyb]

4. kick

no one cares about this? really?