As usual, FireDogLake gives us some common sense ideas, along with phone numbers — you’ll also find a link to the “restore act” the Dem’s are considering [and which may be swatted back with a Dubby veto, if they can even get a consensus to start with] along with a primer on how to make phone calls to talk radio — and an excellent piece on how to write a letter to the editor [this last is Very Important ... give it a shot!] Lots of link for exploring, here.
Op/ed at the bottom by Rick Perlstein on todays doin’s — and alert to another Dem cave-in that just makes no damned sense.
Jude
FISA: The Constitution Needs Your Calls Today
Christy Hardin Smith, FireDogLake
Tue Oct 9, 2007 at 08:29 am
ThinkProgress has some preliminary summary information on the FISA bill up for the reading. It was put out today in a joint release from Reps. Conyers and Reyes.
Huge thanks needs to go out to the Progressive Caucus in the House – who collectively issued a joint statement earlier in the process standing up for civil liberties over fear tactics. If any of these members are your representatives, please give them a hearty thank you for fighting the good fight on this. Major kudos. It is also my understanding that members of the Progressive Caucus plan on offering improving amendments to various parts of the bill as the legislation moves forward — so they need to know we have their backs on this. Please send them thanks for doing the hard work today.
As Glenn says, in response to the spinfest from the NYTimes, there has been a lot of action on this bill that would have been marginalized even a year ago. Via Glenn:
…To begin with, the bill to be proposed today by the House Democratic leadership actually contains some surprisingly good and important provisions.
That bill would compel the administration “to reveal to Congress the details of all electronic surveillance conducted without court orders since Sept. 11, 2001, including the so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program.” It would also require the maintenance of a data base to record the identities of all Americans whose conversations are surveilled. And it provides nothing at all in the way of amnesty or immunity for lawbreaking telecoms or administration officials. The bill introduced by House leadership is a bill the White House will never accept and would certainly veto, and it is vastly better — in important ways — than the atrocity they enacted in August.
It is important here to recall that there is actually an amendment to FISA that is at least arguably justifiable. Even the original FISA law never required warrants in order to eavesdrop on (a) foreign-to-foreign calls or (b) calls involving a U.S. citizen where the target was a non-citizen outside the U.S. (who just happened to call into the U.S.). But recently, technological developments resulted in such calls, even foreign-foreign calls, being routed through the U.S. via fiber optics, and a FISA court ruled this year that the language of FISA requires warrants for such calls. That was never the original intent of FISA….
It is definitely possible that this is all just deceit, that House leaders introduced this bill strictly to placate their Progressive Caucus and their base and that they have no real intention of fighting for these provisions, but instead will give Bush what he wants once Mike McConnell starts accusing them of Helping the Terrorists and they begin negotiating in secret again. But it seems that there are important House Democrats really ready to fight on these issues, to prevent Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel (who unfortunately seem to be the real Speakers of the House) from conniving like they did in August to manipulate their caucus into supporting something far worse….
What is needed is lots of calls, faxes and other contact with legislators asking them to stand up for constitutional principles and the rule of law — American values that ought to be valued by all of us. Please make calls today to all of your elected representatives in the House and Senate and tell them this is important to you — and that it is important that they get this right. That means no retroactive immunity for telecom companies that may have already broken the law. No bypassing the FISA court where jurisdiction is appropriate for US citizen surveillance. And serious checks and balances for any so-called “umbrella warrants” need to be built in, if not those types of warrants removed altogether. The ACLU has more on the FISA issues involved.
Am still digging on the details on this, gang, and will get back to you on this as I get information for you.
You can find direct dial information for your House member here. And for your Senator here. And katymine found some great toll-free numbers through the Capitol switchboard as well:
1 (800) 828 - 0498
1 (800) 459 - 1887
1 (800) 614 - 2803
1 (866) 340 - 9281
1 (866) 338 - 1015
1 (877) 851 - 6437
PS — Thanks to everyone who donated to the Blue America PAC yesterday. Every little bit helps — and primary threats for Bush Dogs and others who don’t stand up for the Constitution and the rule of law is a very real way of moving the ball forward in the best direction for all of us. If you can help out with a donation to the Blue America PAC, we sure would appreciate it.
A List of To Do’s snipped from another Christy Hardin Smith post:
Writing letters to the editor, to your elected officials, calling local talk radio, making phone calls, showing up in person in front of these folks’ various offices, making an appointment to sit down and talk with your elected officials and their staff, showing up at scheduled public events and speaking your mind, videotaping public events and asking questions there and then sending that tape around for others to see…it all adds up.
Mike Stark’s Tips For Calling Talk Radio
Correspondence School: Letter To The Editor Basics
Christy Hardin Smith, FireDogLake
Monday, October 8th, 2007
[open for additional links]
It is Columbus Day, a federal holiday, and thus calling Congressional offices would likely be an exercise in futility for a whole lot of us. What’s an activist to do? Spend that time productively on a letter to the editor.
Today is Correspondence School: Letter To The Editor Basics. (Following up on Correspondence School: Congressional Contacts.)
Why bother writing a LTE in your local newspaper? Two big reasons: (1) congressional staffers scan these LTEs to gauge how much attention they should pay to particular issues and votes; and (2) editorial staffs keep a watch to gauge which issues deserve more news coverage. A well written letter to the editor can sometimes sway local public opinion, or at least spark some debate and that is well worth the price of a stamp. Additionally, a lot of local talk radio folks pull commentary ideas from LTE topics.
I want to first direct you to the spot-on angry letter-writing piece that TRex did for us a while back. A key point:
…To this end, one should write as if you are doing your duty to the addressee by snatching them up by the scruff of their neck and setting them straight. You are saving them from future embarrassment and error. You are doing it For Their Own Good. This is where phrases your parents used on you can come in very handy, “I’m not angry with you, I’m just very, very disappointed” or “It grieves me to have to point this out to you, but I thought it best for your reputation and career that I do it rather than someone who really, really hates you.”
The person to whom you are writing has failed in some way. The purpose of your letter is to address this failure and make certain that the recipient will think twice before making this kind of error again….
That particular aggrieved yet caring tone can be a very effective one for letters to the editor, and much more readable than angry ranting for most folks who are not so politically involved. Which leads me to the considerations for letters to the editor:
– No more than two paragraphs, max. Try to limit yourself to the 100-200 word range. As TRex said, this is no time for the Unibomber Manifesto. Be succinct and you are more likely to get published. Longer letters are more likely to be edited by someone else — you are much better off doing your edit yourself.
– Stick to a single issue.
– Mention your Representative and/or Senator by name. Their staff is much more likely to pay attention, and the editorial folks at the newspaper will as well. A lot of Congressional offices use clipping services to pull LTEs for them where the name is mentioned, so you have a much greater chance of them seeing your letter by including names.
– Highlight the local impact of the issue, this has a much more effective reach for your letter and makes a broader potential statement to readers who may not be as familiar with the subject matter.
– Do send in LTEs to your local newspapers, to newsletters in your community and other smaller publications. These have quite a reach in terms of readership, and you are more likely to be published there than in a larger national publication.
– Humor can be very helpful. So can doing a little research on the style of your local newspaper and its editorial staff.
– Avoid being shrill, name-calling, or getting personal. You want to criticize facts not beliefs. Be sure to do your homework on your subject. Use facts, figures, and expert information in the form of short quotes where it is useful.
– Always proofread. And then proof it again.
– Try to read your letter from the perspective of a reader who has no background in the subject. Will it make sense to someone who isn’t watching a lot of C-Span? Who doesn’t read blogs? This is important, because those are people you are trying to reach.
– Always include your name, address, day-time phone number, e-mail information and signature. Editors like to verify letter content before publication, so make it easy for them and you are more likely to get yours published.
Some helpful sites on this: here, here, here and here. And try here for information about local media contacts. Take a peek here (PDF) to see the sort of wingnut/congregation outreach set-up that the right wing has been doing for years, and see why we all need to get on the ball to rebut these points. Someone has to do it — why not make that someone you? Just remember the following:
–Letters to the editor should be thought of as bits of a sustained civic conversation. You are not going to change hearts and minds with a single letter. But you might have a chance with several, well-written letters offered over time. Write for the moment. Write for the one point you’re making today. Don’t write as if you expect to slam-dunk the issue for all time.
Ain’t going to happen.
As egregious says, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Give it a try today. Let’s start with SCHIP as an issue to hit nationwide. Do share some examples of what you plan to do in the comments and we can all talk about tailoring the message for different regions and helpful facts to include and such. Let’s get typing!
Surrender, Dorothy
Rick Perlstein, CommonSense via TomPaine
October 9, 2007
Quite a day for Democratic capitulations.
Early this August, recall, Democrats were asked by the administration to cooperate in passing a technical fix in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act so the NSA could listen in on foreign-to-foreign calls looped thorugh U.S. facilities. Democrats replied, “yes, of course, that’s perfectly reasonable”—which it was.
Then the Administration promptly sandbagged them by ramming through a radical bill that went far further than what had just been agreed to—”seemingly subtle changes in legislative language,” the New York Times reported, that “would sharply alter the legal limits on the government’s ability to monitor millions of phone calls and e-mail messages going in and out of the United States.” Even the neo-cons now running the Washington Post editorial page judged it an outrage—”strong-armed through both chambers by an administration that seized the opportunity to write its warrantless wiretapping program into law — or, more precisely, to write it out from under any real legal restrictions.”
Then, two weeks ago, we learned that they greased the skids for this madness by laundering a bogus terror threat against Capitol Hill.
Not to fear, Democratic leaders assured us. The blanket eavesdropping was authorized for a mere six months, at which time they promised to fix the outrage.
Apparently, they changed their mind.
“Democrats Seem Read to Extend Wiretap Power”, the Times today informs us—now, not in six months.
Why the rush? It turns out to be very simple. The Justice Department said “jump!” So how does a majority party that, had they resisted, would have been both politically and morally in the right respond? By replying, of course, “How high?” Because, the Times quotes some professor, “Many members continue to fear that if they don’t support whatever the president asks for, they’ll be perceived as soft on terrorism.”
How I wish these members would read Glenn Greenwald, who demonstrates that those fears are absurd.
But then, moving to our second astonishing Democratic capitulation of the day, these are the same people who can’t get through, or refuse to get through, a bill to tax the income of private-equity firm execs—billionaires!—at the ordinary rate of 35 percent, instead of the current 15 percent. The Washington Post is reporting that Harry Reid met with private-equity firms and told them not to worry: no bill on carried interest would get through this year. He claims there’s simply not enough time. And that it has nothing to do with one of the largest lobbying campaigns on record, encompassing some twenty firms and a single payment by one private-equity firm, the Blackstone Group, of $3.74 million, to its own Gucci Gulf denizens—”one of the largest recorded fees to any lobbying firm during a six month period.”
Yes, not enough time. For if the measure doesn’t pass this session, it won’t go anywhere in 2008—for, as the Post points out, recording the conventional wisdom of a city gone mad, “lawmakers and lobbyists agree that if the tax is not raised this year, its chances are not strong in 2008, either; Congress tends to be leery of tax increases in election years.”
Even tax increases on billionaires. What a world!
“So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.”
~ Molly Ivins, 1944 - 2007
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
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October 9th, 2007
Not them [the Dem's, getting ready to give away the farm;] US [standing here, looking on in horror, wondering if these Pod People are even listening to the will of the people, or hardwired to think about their oath to the Constitution.]
Maybe the first thing you get when you go to WaDC is the “chip” — the one that scrambles your brain and erases any memory of integrity or respect for the commonwealth. The “Village” isn’t missing an idiot — it’s FULL OF THEM.
If the Dem’s are doing all this limp, quivering backpedal so they can protect their political careers, I’ve got a surprise for ‘em. It’s the same kind of triangulation and self-protection that screams out of every word Hillary Clinton says [or giggles through.] Politics is supposed to be about public service — if you can’t walk the talk, get out!
There’ll be some grassroots remedies in the next hours and days — I’ll get back to you on that.
Here’s a short collection, a few reads about the Dem’s latest [craven and repugnant] cave-in … at the bottom, some good news out of the judicial branch — some of us still use the Constitution as guide for the Republic; those are the only people worth spit. That’s still First Cause in the nation, still heavily under assault … and still being pissed away by people who should know better!
Jude
Democratic Concessions Are Expected on Wiretapping
ERIC LICHTBLAU and CARL HULSE, New York Times
October 8, 2007
WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 — Two months after vowing to roll back broad new wiretapping powers won by the Bush administration, Congressional Democrats appear ready to make concessions that could extend some of the key powers granted to the National Security Agency.
Bush administration officials say they are confident they will win approval of the broadened wiretapping authority that they secured temporarily in August as Congress rushed toward recess, and some Democratic officials admit that they may not come up with the votes to rein in the administration.
As the debate over the N.S.A.’s wiretapping powers begins anew this week, the emerging legislation reflects the political reality confronting the Democrats. While they are willing to oppose the White House on the conduct of the war in Iraq, they remain nervous that they will be labeled as soft on terrorism if they insist on strict curbs on intelligence gathering.
A Democratic bill to be proposed Tuesday in the House would maintain for several years the type of broad, blanket authority for N.S.A. wiretapping that the administration secured in August for just six months. But in an acknowledgment of civil liberties concerns, the measure would also require a more active role by the special foreign intelligence court that oversees the N.S.A.’s interception of foreign-based communications.
A competing proposal in the Senate, still being drafted, may be even closer in line with the administration’s demands, with the possibility of including retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies that took part in the N.S.A.’s once-secret program to wiretap without court warrants.
No one is willing to predict with certainty how the issue will play out. But some Congressional officials and others monitoring the debate over the legislation said the final result may not be much different than it was two months ago, despite Democrats’ insistence that they would not let stand the August extension of the N.S.A.’s powers.
“Many members continue to fear that if they don’t support whatever the president asks for, they’ll be perceived as soft on terrorism,” said William Banks, a professor specializing in terrorism and national security law at Syracuse University who has written extensively on federal wiretapping law.
The August bill, known as the Protect America Act, was approved by Congress in the final hours before its summer recess after heated warnings from the Bush administration that legal loopholes in wiretapping coverage had left the country vulnerable to another terrorist attack. The legislation significantly reduced the role of the foreign intelligence court and broadened the N.S.A.’s ability to listen in on foreign-based communications without a court warrant.
“We want the statute made permanent,” Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the Justice Department, said today. “We view this as a healthy debate. We also view it as an opportunity to inform Congress and the public that we can use these authorities responsibly. We’re going to go forward and look at any proposals that come forth, but we’ll look at them very carefully to make sure they don’t have any consequences that hamper our abilities to protect the country.”
House Democrats overwhelmingly opposed the interim legislation in August and believed at the time they had been forced into a corner by the Bush administration.
As Congress takes up the new legislation, a senior Democratic aide said House leaders are working hard to make sure the administration does not succeed in pushing through a bill that would make permanent all the powers it secured in August for the N.S.A. “That’s what we’re trying to avoid,” the aide said. “We have that concern too.”
The bill to be proposed Tuesday by the Democratic leaders of the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees would impose more controls over the N.S.A.’s powers, including quarterly audits by the Justice Department’s inspector general. It would also give the foreign intelligence court a role in approving, in advance, “basket” or “umbrella” warrants for bundles of overseas communications, according to a Congressional official.
“We are giving the N.S.A. what it legitimately needs for national security but with far more limitations and protections than are in the Protect America Act,” said Brendan Daly, a spokesman for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California.
Perhaps most important in the eyes of Democratic supporters, the House bill would not give retroactive immunity to the telecommunications companies that took part in the N.S.A.’s domestic eavesdropping program — a proposal that had been a top priority of the Bush administration. The August legislation granted the companies immunity for future acts, but not past deeds.
A number of private groups are trying to prove in federal court that the telecommunications companies violated the law by taking part in the program. A former senior Justice Department lawyer, Jack Goldsmith, seemed to bolster their case last week when he told Congress that the program was a “legal mess” and strongly suggested it was illegal.
In the Senate, the Democratic chairman of the Intelligence Committee, John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia, is working with his Republican counterpart, Christopher S. Bond of Missouri, who was one of the main proponents of the August plan, to come up with a compromise wiretapping proposal. Wendy Morigi, a spokeswoman for Mr. Rockefeller, said that retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies is “under discussion,” but that no final proposal had been developed.
The immunity issue may prove to be the key sticking point between whatever proposals are ultimately passed by the House and the Senate. Representative Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat who was among the harshest critics of the legislation passed in August, said he would vigorously oppose any effort to grant retroactive legal protection to telecommunications companies. “There is heavy pressure on the immunity and we should not cave an inch on that,” he said in an interview.
Mr. Nadler said he was worried that the Senate would give too much ground to the administration in its proposal, but he said he was satisfied with the legislation to be proposed Tuesday in the House.
“It is not perfect, but it is a good bill,” he said. “It makes huge improvements in the current law. In some respects it is better than the old FISA law,” referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Civil liberties advocates and others who met with House officials today about the proposed bill agreed that it was an improvement over the August plan, but they were not quite as charitable in their overall assessment.
‘This still authorizes the interception of Americans’ international communications without a warrant in far too many instances and without adequate civil liberties protections,” said Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies, who was among the group that met with House officials.
Caroline Frederickson, director of the Washington legislative office of the American Civil Liberties Union, said she was troubled by the Democrats’ acceptance of broad, blanket warrants for the N.S.A., rather than the individualized warrants traditionally required by the intelligence court.
“The Democratic leadership, philosophically, is with us, but we need to help them realize the political case, which is that Democrats will not be in danger if they don’t reauthorize this Protect America Act,” Ms. Frederickson said. “They’re nervous. There’s a ‘keep the majority’ mentality, which is understandable. But we think they’re putting themselves in more danger by not standing on principle.” ++
Democrats Wiretap Bill: Cave-in or Strong Stand?
James Joyner, OutsideTheBeltway
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
The press coverage of the Democrats’ answer to the Bush administration’s call for enhanced domestic wiretapping authority is rather confusing. Pam Hess, until recently with UPI but now with AP, makes it seem like a rather sharp rebuke to Bush:
The Justice Department would have to reveal to Congress the details of all electronic surveillance conducted without court orders since Sept. 11, 2001, including the so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program, if a new Democratic wiretapping bill is approved.
The draft bill, scheduled to be introduced to Congress Tuesday, would also require the Justice Department to maintain a database of all Americans subjected to government eavesdropping without a court order, including whether their names have been revealed to other government agencies. The Bush administration has refused to share that information with Congress so far. The Terrorist Surveillance Program was a secret eavesdropping program undertaken after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks without the approval of an intelligence court created 30 years ago to monitor such programs.
The Democratic legislation is certain to draw sharp objections and possibly a veto threat because it lacks at least one feature the White House demands: it does not grant retroactive legal immunity to telecommunications companies that cooperated with government surveillance between 2001 and 2007 without the court orders. Around 40 lawsuits name telecommunications companies for alleged violations of wiretapping laws, according to administration officials.
Eric Lichtblau and Carl Hulse, writing for the NYT, seem less sure. Indeed, they’ve written two drafts, both of which are currently online. One, “Democrats Seem Ready to Extend Wiretap Powers,” is rather bland but seems to suggest this is a win for Bush:
Two months after insisting that they would roll back broad eavesdropping powers won by the Bush administration, Democrats in Congress appear ready to make concessions that could extend some crucial powers given to the National Security Agency.
Administration officials say they are confident they will win approval of the broadened authority that they secured temporarily in August as Congress rushed toward recess. Some Democratic officials concede that they may not come up with enough votes to stop approval.
As the debate over the eavesdropping powers of the National Security Agency begins anew this week, the emerging measures reflect the reality confronting the Democrats. Although willing to oppose the White House on the Iraq war, they remain nervous that they will be called soft on terrorism if they insist on strict curbs on gathering intelligence.
A Democratic bill to be proposed on Tuesday in the House would maintain for several years the type of broad, blanket authority for N.S.A. eavesdropping that the administration secured in August for six months. In an acknowledgment of concerns over civil liberties, the bill would require a more active role by the special foreign intelligence court that oversees the interception of foreign-based communications by the security agency.
A competing proposal in the Senate, still being drafted, may be even closer in line with the administration plan, with the possibility of including retroactive immunity for telecommunications utilities that participated in the once-secret program to eavesdrop without court warrants.
No one is willing to predict with certainty how the question will play out. Some Congressional officials and others monitoring the debate said the final result might not be much different from the result in August, despite the Democrats’ insistence that they would not let stand the extension of the powers.
“Many members continue to fear that if they don’t support whatever the president asks for, they’ll be perceived as soft on terrorism,” said William Banks, a professor who specializes in terrorism and national security law at Syracuse University and who has written extensively on federal wiretapping laws.
The other version, “Democratic Concessions Are Expected on Wiretapping,” is even stronger, with some subtle changes to the opening language in addition to the bolder headline.
Two months after vowing to roll back broad new wiretapping powers won by the Bush administration, Congressional Democrats appear ready to make concessions that could extend some of the key powers granted to the National Security Agency.
Bush administration officials say they are confident they will win approval of the broadened wiretapping authority that they secured temporarily in August as Congress rushed toward recess, and some Democratic officials admit that they may not come up with the votes to rein in the administration.
As the debate over the N.S.A.’s wiretapping powers begins anew this week, the emerging legislation reflects the political reality confronting the Democrats. While they are willing to oppose the White House on the conduct of the war in Iraq, they remain nervous that they will be labeled as soft on terrorism if they insist on strict curbs on intelligence gathering.
WaPo has yet to weigh in, relying on Hess’ wire copy and the LA Times has nothing at all. Regardless, there’s still House-Senate reconciliation to be done and President Bush has the threat of the veto to further help shape the legislation in his direction.
Steven Taylor has a lengthy analysis of what he terms “Congressional Kabuki” and argues that the Democrats face more trouble than being accused on being soft on terrorism.
Politically I am aware that being “soft on terrorism” could be problematic for the party, but by the same token one would think that their lack of fight on a panoply of issues, from the conduct of the war to questions about “coercive interrogations” to domestic intelligence gathering (to name three), would depress the enthusiasm of their core constituency and undercut their appeal to moderates who are unhappy with the GOP on the above listed issues. On all of these topics there is much squawking, yet ultimately very little action. It is as if they are more interested in the political issue than they are in actually, well, doing something about issues that supposedly upset them greatly.
One would think that congressional leadership would recognize that part of the reason that they have been experiencing such low popularity ratings is that they really haven’t behaved all that differently (in terms of results) than did the GOP when they were in control.
It’s really the classic damned if they do, damned if they don’t scenario. Either way, someone will think they’re weak. I’d agree that standing on principle and thus appealing to at least their base would be the smarter move.
Once again, though, those who argue, as George Wallace famously said, there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the national Democratic and Republican parties, are given more ammunition. Despite the incredibly heated and polarized rhetoric we’ve become accustomed to, we’re really arguing about niggling changes in policy. Which makes calls for impeachment and war crimes trials and all the rest even more laughable. ++
I Officially Give up On the Democrats
Cenk Uygur, HuffPo
October 9, 2007
It’s going to take a generation to move these spineless Democrats out of office. Unfortunately, that is our only alternative. You can’t vote for a Republican these days and the Democrats make you embarrassed to ever be associated with them.
Jack Goldsmith is one of the most conservative lawyers in the country. He was the head of the Office of Legal Counsel for George W. Bush. He is telling you that what the Bush administration did for years in its first term was definitely illegal (that’s why he demanded changes in their practices when he was at OLC) and strongly suggesting that what they are doing now might also be illegal.
So, what is the Democratic response? They are considering changing the law to make it legal in hindsight. The equivalent would be if the Republicans tried to pass a law saying it was acceptable to lie under oath after they saw Clinton perjure himself in the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Could you imagine?
Of course, not. Because the Republicans are fighters. As loathsome as their policies have been for these last six years, at least I respect their willingness to fight for their side. I also respected President Clinton when he fought back against them, whether it was when Newt Gingrich shut down the government or when they tried to remove him from office.
Read this New York Times article [posted above.] The Democrats are going to help Bush break the FISA law. They are going to change the law so that he doesn’t have to get a warrant. They are going to ignore the fourth amendment and current federal laws. Why would you help the least popular president in history? Why would you allow him to keep breaking the law?
The answer is at the end of the article. Interest groups that are working closely with the Democrats explain their primary concern - being called weak on terror. But don’t you see, you are weak! Miserably weak. Not because of any actions you might or might not have taken on the war on terror, but because you keep caving into an administration that has no political capital because you don’t have the nerve to fight for your principles.
How is it possible to have any respect for these Democrats? Every day, I struggle not to call them cowards and weaklings. And every day they make it harder. They are truly pathetic. I’m so tired of encouraging them to grow a backbone. It’s a hopeless struggle. I give up.
So, we have to pursue a new tack. The long road of primary fights for the next decade or two until we clear out the losers out of this party. The people trained and encouraged to lose by their consultants.
Let me tell you a quick story told to me by a former staffer of one of the Democratic leaders. He said a consultant told this senator that the only way he could lose his senate seat is if he was challenged the Republicans in any meaningful way. His advice was to give in to them on every occasion, and specifically at the time, on the Alito nomination.
This particular senator did not give in on the Alito nomination (nor did he put up any kind of effective fight, either). But the message from the “Democratic” consultant was clear - you will never be challenged from the left, so always give into the right.
There is only one way to change that way of thinking. Challenge them from the left. Because this group of Democrats are hopeless. We need a whole new class of leaders. ++
How Congress Forgot Its Own Strength
MARIO M. CUOMO, New York Times
October 7, 2007
SENATORS Jim Webb of Virginia and Hillary Clinton of New York are right to demand that the president go before Congress to ask for a “declaration of war” before proceeding with an attack against Iran or any other nation. But there is no need for this demand to be put into law, as the two Democrats and their colleagues are seeking to do, any more than there is need for legislation to guarantee our right of free speech or anything else protected by the Constitution.
Article I, Section 8 already provides that only Congress has the power to declare war. Perhaps the founders’ greatest concern in writing the Constitution was that they might unintentionally create a president who was too much like the British monarch, whom they despised. They expressed that concern in part by assuring that the president would not have the power to declare war.
Because the Constitution cannot be amended by persistent evasion, this mandate was neither erased nor modified by the actions or inactions of timid Congresses that allowed overeager presidents to start wars in Vietnam and elsewhere without making a declaration.
Indeed, asking for more legislation now would imply that the Constitution doesn’t mean what it already says.
It would repeat the mistake made by Congress in 2002 when it tried to delegate to President Bush the non-delegable power that the founders chose to give to the legislative branch. Congress’s eagerness to shed the burden making the decision by passing resolutions that purportedly “authorized” the president to decide whether to start a war denied the nation the careful Congressional inquiry intended by the Constitution.
That deliberation might have revealed Iraq’s lack of complicity with Al Qaeda and the nonexistence of the country’s alleged cache of nuclear weapons. The members of Congress would have had to vote specifically on going to war (instead of on allowing the president to make that decision), which would have assured closer scrutiny than they actually gave the question.
Proceeding with the proposed legislation would also create the likelihood of still another failed Democratic legislative effort, because it would probably not get enough votes from Republicans to override a veto. Such a failure might have some political value as another reminder of the Republicans’ eagerness for war, but it would also remind voters that the Democrats have not been as effective as they promised in 2006 they would be.
Congress’s refusal to comply with Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution has led to a catastrophic aftermath. Such a tragedy should never be allowed to happen again. Rather than enact new legislation that would create constitutional ambiguity, the Democratic leadership in Congress should assert its strength by simply announcing it will allow no “resolutions” or “authorizations” purporting to delegate to the president Congress’s constitutional power to declare war against any other nation. Nor will there be any new war without Congress’s solemn deliberation and declaration of war.
The Democrats should go still further and announce that no money will be appropriated for any military action against another nation without a proper declaration of war. And this should be the position of the Democratic presidential candidates as well. How else can they make the case that they are less likely than President Bush to wage dangerous, improvident wars? ++
Mario M. Cuomo, the governor of New York from 1983 to 1995, practices law with Willkie Farr & Gallagher.
October 5: A Good Day for Liberty and the Constitution
Dave Lindorff, BuzzFlash
Mon, 10/08/2007
So it turns out there are still honest, thinking judges in the federal court system who take their Constitution seriously, despite 7 years of Bush Administration court packing (and years more of such packing under two prior Republican presidents).
The first sign of Constitutional life in the federal system came on October 5, when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in California issued an emergency injunction against the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), saying the space agency “could not require Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists and engineers holding non-sensitive positions to sign waivers of their privacy rights.” As lawyers for the scientists put it, “If the Court had not issued this injunction, thousands of scientists would have had to choose between waiving their privacy rights and keeping their jobs.”
Scientists at JPL and at Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, which was also facing the waivers, had been picketing their work sites, getting the staff to agree to hold off on submitting to the invasive security check. Some of these protesting scientists have said that the heavily politicized leadership of NASA is trying to take a scientific agency that, by law, only does public research meant to be available to all, and clamp a lid on their work — largely to quash word about evidence of global warming.
None of the scientists at NASA are involved in national security work, and there is no reason for them to be subjected to national security scrutiny.
“We are grateful for the court’s action. This is another egregious example of the Bush Administration’s assault on the Constitution. Our clients are exemplary employees who have spent their work lives bettering this country. This shows the court will not stand by and let this attack on the right to privacy take place,” said Dan Stormer of Hadsell & Stormer, the civil liberties law firm in Los Angeles that is representing the scientists at NASA.
“We are ecstatic,” said Robert Nelson, an astronomer who works on the Cassini space probe project, and an organizer of the protest against the security-screening program.
A second defense of Constitutional rule came the same day, when U.S. District Judge Benjamin H. Settle in Seattle took the unusual step of intervening in a military proceeding, ordering a halt to the second attempt by the Army to court-martial Lt. Ehren Watada, while he considers the merits of Lt. Watada’s claim that he is being subjected to double jeopardy by being re-court-martialed a second time.
Watada, who in June 2006 refused orders to ship out to Iraq with his Stryker brigade, claiming that it was an illegal war and that it would subject U.S. military participants to participating in war crimes, made his argument last February at a court-martial proceeding that ended in a mistrial when the military and the military trial judge realized that the young lieutenant was winning his case. Rather than risk losing on a claim of the Iraq War’s legitimacy, the judge in the prosecution sought, and the hearing officer granted a mistrial.
However, under established precedent all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, it has been accepted that it is not appropriate for prosecutors to declare mistrials and then seek another trial, for the obvious reason that prosecutors would always resort to such a tactic if they found themselves in danger of losing a case. Only when the defense wins a mistrial ruling can the prosecution seek a second trial.
Precedent notwithstanding, the Army decided it couldn’t let Lt. Watada walk away from the war claiming it is illegal, so it has attempted to court-martial him again.
Having taken the unusual step of injecting the civilian legal system into this case of military justice, Judge Settle made it clear not only that he was confident that he had jurisdiction in the case, but that Lt. Watada had a good argument. “The irreparable harm suffered by being put to a trial a second time in violation of the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment stems not just from being subjected to double punishment but also from undergoing a second trial proceeding,” Settle wrote in quoting case law.
Watada had appealed within the military system, but had received no answer from higher military authorities to his call for a second court-martial to be blocked. The Army has been given until October 16 to present its arguments to the judge justifying a second court-martial.
The Army had apparently been hoping that media interest in the Watada case had faded away, and that he could be quietly convicted of a charge of refusing to deploy, and packed off to the brig. But Judge Settle’s order has scuttled that plan.
The gutsy Watada himself has also refused to be quiet. Earlier this year, at a Veterans for Peace convention, with dozens of Iraq War vets standing by him, he called on other soldiers to take a stand against the war saying:
“Today, I speak with you about a radical idea. It is one born from the very concept of the American soldier (or service member). It became instrumental in ending the Vietnam War — but it has been long since forgotten. The idea is this: that to stop an illegal and unjust war, the soldiers can choose to stop fighting it…
“I tell this to you because you must know that to stop this war, for the soldiers to stop fighting it, they must have the unconditional support of the people. I have seen this support with my own eyes. For me it was a leap of faith.
“For other soldiers, they do not have that luxury. They must know it and you must show it to them. Convince them that no matter how long they sit in prison, no matter how long this country takes to right itself, their families will have a roof over their heads, food in their stomachs, opportunities, and education.” ++
“So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.”
~ Molly Ivins, 1944 - 2007
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October 9th, 2007