Full Speed Ahead: After 9/11 Bush + Cheney pushed (+ Ashcroft said NO!)

[bettyellen]

This Newsweek article is the first I've seen saying Ashroft refused to okay it from the hospital bed....
it's a good read, more detailed than the NY Times report. Check the second paragraph.

Full Speed Ahead
After 9/11, Bush and Cheney pressed for more power and got it. Now, predictably, the questions begin. Behind the NSA spying furor.
By Evan Thomas and Daniel Klaidman
Newsweek
Jan. 9, 2006

"At the Justice Department, it was a former prosecutor, James Comey, who forced the White House to back away from the so-called Torture Memo, which appeared to give intelligence agencies a license to use any interrogation method that did not cause the extreme pain associated with organ failure. Comey was the No. 2 man at the department at the time. Although the details are unclear, it appears that Comey's objections were also key to slowing the warrantless-eavesdropping program in 2004 for a time. According to several officials who would not be identified talking about still-classified matters, Comey (among other government lawyers) argued that the authority for the program—the 2001 "use of force" resolution—had grown stale. It was time to audit the program before proceeding in any case, Comey said.

But in March 2004, White House chief of staff Card and White House Counsel Gonzales visited Ashcroft, the seriously ill attorney general, to try to get him to overrule Comey, who was officially acting as A.G. while Ashcroft was incapacitated. Ashcroft refused, and a battle over what to do broke out in the Justice Department and at the White House. Finally, sometime in the summer of 2004, a compromise was reached, with Comey onboard: according to an account in The New York Times, Justice and the NSA refined a checklist to follow in deciding whether "probable cause" existed to start monitoring someone's conversations."


more....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10663996/site/newsweek/

[goclark]

1. So they made Ashcrafty resign? nt

[cornermouse]

2. More likely Ashcroft got nervous and left on his own.

He may still have some scruples after all.

[MissWaverly]

5. I think Ashcroft had more on the ball than we realize

remember it's not his fingerprints on the torture memo and he did not turn
the Plame investigation into a cover up.

[sweetheart]

18. so he was a good "nut"

Well, ain't jose padilla relieved.

[MissWaverly]

28. what I meant was there was someone who knew what the law is

It's amazing how few in power now are aware of any laws at all, it would be interesting to
see how many have bail bondsmen on speed dial.

[sweetheart]

35. ignorance of the law is bliss

And clearly the leadership partakes in "bliss" quite a bit. I myself am
very happy not to have to read or know about the boring trials that have
gotten us to this point of blithering stupidity. I really believe justice
should be entirely up to the judge and jury with a precedent system entirely.
This way, even the judicial system challenges fairly all legal views, something
it hasn't been up to very much really... in terms of real justice, no.

And laws are products of their times, as much as a constitution in a time
of horses and slaves is only interpreted as guidance, and then where are we?
The president has admitted publically to impeachable high treason.
Why do people get parking tickets, but criminals get a free ride?
This central injustice ripples across the planet until something is done...

oh, what law does a king know, except the crawford twostep.

[TheMadMonk]

36. So who selects the Judges sweetheart?

Should the "sweetheart" methods currently used in the US be continued? The government selecting the folk who decide the laws that apply to them (as well as everyone else) and the people selecting the fellow who decides what's what in their own balliwick?

¿que? Let's see?

• Election 2000; and
  
• Virtually every jaywalking furiner in US history.
  

And you suggest removing the small handful of rules that the judiciary are forbidden to alter?

Wouldn't it just be kinder to smother babies in their beds?

[sweetheart]

37. more like in britain

The judiciary is still effective, but the laws are based on precedents that can
be overturned, rather than legislated with minimum term limits, 3 strikes limits
and rigid formulae that judges and juries are not able to review in light of
what crime they see in front of them.

[TheMadMonk]

38. Constutional matters

Constitutions invariably require ammendment and contain mechanisms allowing this.

Surely by now, we have a better grasp on change and the pace of change and semantics, sufficiently to avoid "horse and buggy" impediments and chose terms wisely: "vehicles of information transport" instead of "telegraph/telephone/postal service"; "private" (letter/phone), "closed" (e-mail/SMS/PM); "Open" - conversation/postcard/chat; "Public" - speech/blog/ communications. instead of letters and papers, etc; "One month's wages at minimum pay rates" instead of $20.

I'm thinking that it should not be impossible to create a new "ammemndment" in the form of a combined reverse "index" and "constitutional dictionary" of specific instances of words in the (any) constiution which redines only the specific instance(s) indexed in period neutral semantic terms.

A nice little side effect might well be to eliminate legal hairsplitting, especially in the civil system. ie, "It wasn't wire fraud because my client used e-mail." and applied to all subsequent "dubious legal decicions" on appeal to cement up the semantic cracks in existing case law.

[sweetheart]

41. I think its deeper, the problem

There are some fundamental unwritten new features of the "unwritten" constitution we live
by today that allows unfettered executive spying on citizens. And gosh, the 4th amendment
seemed pretty clear when i read it. But there is no indictment as the system has failed to
check and balance like it was designed-to.

But i see this corruption as by the 2 structural and 1 sociological factor in the original
document. The latter factor is simply the endemic slave owning, and that even today, the
new consensus has fought against equal rights for women. This ongoing reality of attempting
to disenfranchise massive swathes of society from voting, either by plunging women in to
poverty or throwing millions of persons in prison for trivial drugs charges and stripping
them of their voting rights. This systemic disenfranchisement of persons is social, perhaps
a 100+ year byproduct of corporate personhood and unfettered kapital.

Structurally, they failed to recognize that a written constitution and print media were bound
to be displaced by new media technologies. One of these media is central banking, the issueance
of currency and the modern economic theory that underlies corporate imperialism. These have
become the core of the unwritten constitution, a grossly undemocratic federal reserve, and
totally corrupting private media oligopolies in electronic media. The former, combined with
corporate personhood, allocates capital, putlic-credit to white-racist war/prison industry
rather than public good industry by credit-creation voodoo in the open markets committee.
Back in the federalist debates, the bank of the united states and the printing of the currency
was discussed and finally left out of the constitution. This was a heinous omission that has
corrupted the entire project. New media is an outgrowth of that, but surely the intent of the
original founders really was a plural, independent free press able to scrutinize goventment
that coult not keep secrets from its masters the people.

And frankly, it has gotten so far from the original agreement, that i no longer agree at all
that the constitution is at all in force. A totalitarian USSR of corrupt single-partisan
corporatists against the individual, against liberty, against women, disabled people, foreigners,
non-white peoples, poor people, veterans, drugs users, gay people and the mentally ill.

They need good consumers that don't muck up the system, and all those classes are not good
consumers, so they are exterminated. Not a single policy of the american government that i've
voted in, and paid for my entire life in my 5th decade, not a single policy is one i actually
support. I am totally unrepresented by my own government. When do i gain the right to rebel
like the countries founders did over being taxed and thieved-from by a gang of bandits who
hyjakked an agreement signed 200 years ago by slave owners to fuck 300 million people today
in to destroying their own society.

I don't believe that a constitution is the way. I think it is the problem. Rather, they
should have kept alive constantly the knowledge of "designing" constitutions and negotiating
the agreement. Really, the constitution should time-out every 20 years and the people should
have to sign up to a new one by referendum... if we must have such a document.

The other way, is simply to have an ongoing constitutional council that has a zero'th
estate in the government, with the 1st estate the executive, 2nd legislature, 3rd judiciary, 4th the press,
5th the citizen.

By too many rules, we've created a citizenship of amoral persons who do not choose their actions
out of moral or ethical reasons, but because they avoid fines and jail... if you are not fined, or put
in jail, it must be good... thats the new citizenship, stripped of their humanity by a system of
overambitioous laws that seeks to instituionalize the individual's choices and free will.

individual

[TheMadMonk]

42. Of course these things are all problems.

However, your solution merely concentrates all power in a different branch of govt., and you did not address the obvious problems of how these paragons of virtue would be sellected. Locally on a level of pure self interest on nepotistically at the top.

Several times in the past US executives have overstepped their constitutional bounds and been punished for it, both through the power of the constitution and the people. Best to see if they don't save the Union this time first, before deciding to tear up whatever scraps of parchment are left after Scrubbie and cronies have done with using the constitution and the people as arsewipes.

And I think so much shit is going to fly that the media itself might follow Abramhoff's lead to save its own skin. After all it already seems to be doing so regarding the latest constitutional breaches and Scrubbie coming out as a self declared oathbreaker.

Certain parts of big business, beginning with the oil industry and the military industries in the US are going to see major changes in the near future I think. Global warming is becoming impossible to ignore and the military industrial complex is absolutely unsustainable without radical changes somewhere. People who make sense are starting to bridge the "green divide" and explore the posibility of compromise "alternatives" to fossil fuel. Decent compromises are becoming available. Sequestration, Solar convection, sealed mini-nukes, true reprocessing and making safe of spent nuclear fuel.

And, whatever the final choices to make the make the move away from fossil fuels, the cost and scope of implementing such a huge program of change will dwarf the Hoover Dam. Now is the time for a once in a generation choice: Fascism if you chose business as usual politically; Literally murerous weather, energy wars, shortages and price increases (including flow on effect to commerce) and eventually a mindless escape (if one is possible at all) implementing the quickest and dirtiest replacement;

If there is one true enemy for every man Jack of us, it is the baggage of our past. Be it: Meter's deep beds of poisonous sludge in the Great lakes; the entire judaeo/christian/islamic mess; The endemic corruption of poor nations; The internal conflicts due to arbritrary lines drawn in colonial times which are at least partialy to blame for events like Rwanda, and contribute to keeping these nations poor.

Keeping the oil flowing for the sake of some "old town buddies" can't be sustained, particulary not with China and India coning on line with energy damands that will rival or exceed our Western usage. Something will give in this inevitable scenario. We will either be screwed for centuries or millenia to come (at the best) if we continue business as usual; or we must find a way to fix our excesses of the past, and if we do, it's going to take every effing red cent available to fight this "enemy" and there won't be jack left over for Oggish squabling over what their Ayathola said about Our Sharron.

[sweetheart]

43. we have a 4th estate failure

Had the country a truly functional 4th estate, bush would have been out'ed as a criminal
before he ran for president. The rescinding of the fairness doctrine, and the failure to
block media mergers has pitted the mass-market profit motives of media mind-share against the
ethical basis of news media in telling the truth and exposing all truthful evidence
systemically without bias.

If i were US dictator for a day, i would declassify and make freely-available every single piece of
non-military information in the government, and end corporate personhood and ratify the united
nations declaration of human rights.

ahh, but it ain'ta gonna happen. I appreciate your optimism, but the financial system
and the entire system has been so corrupted, i no longer see the old "hegemony" vision,
and with that, a collapse in market potential that will trim the balance sheet, and the GNP of
US corporations... and with that, an increasing credit crisis that will eventually, worldwide
establish a multi-polar international order, where the US empire, like the soviet one, will be
memories only for our generations.

The "kali-yuga" scenario of massive overpopulation, toxicity and ignorance is sadly very likely.
Some sparsely populated areas of the world might keep the light alive, like monastaries did
in the middle ages. And i expect those of today to be in canada, australia, nz, the EU and
south america. .. first world places with rule of law, equal rights for women and secure
civil rights for the enlightened refuge.

[goclark]

14. The rapture! nt

[neuvocat]

3. VERY interesting question.

This admin has bigger cracks in it than I thought. Much bigger.

[leftchick]

4. I thought the NYT article said March 2003

right at the time of the UN spying by the NSA.

[LizW]

19. I posted something about that and now I think I was wrong

I think I had the dates wrong. Ashcroft's illness was in March of 2004, and the U.N. spying would definitely have been in 2003.

[leftchick]

21. Thank you for clearing that up Liz

I have been traveling this past week and it has been tough keeping up with this here and there on the net.

I seem to remember the UN spying story hitting the news in the fall of 2002. Is that right? Or was it indeed right before the invasion?

[bettyellen]

27. spying on the UN was before the invasion.... it was reported in the UK

in March of 2003. Except for Slate, the American press ignored it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20051227/cm_huffpost/012927

[Ediacara]

6. Wait.... what was wrong with Ashcroft?

Was it widely known he was in the hospital "seriously ill," or am I just forgetful?

[kskiska]

9. severe Gallstone Pancreatitis

Attorney General Ashcroft entered G.W. Hospital on March 4, 2004 with a severe case of Gallstone Pancreatitis. On March 9, 2004, Attorney General Ashcroft underwent surgery to remove his gallbladder which contained several gallstones that were of concern to the doctors. Doctors performed this procedure to better prevent the recurrence of Pancreatitis, which can be a life-threatening illness with many complications.

http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2004/March/04_opa_159.htm

[Ediacara]

13. Thanks!

Hmm... I wouldn't have called that "seriously ill," but instead, "emergency gallstone surgery." Anyway, thanks for clearing that up!

[Sarah Ibarruri]

24. Gallstone pancreatitis is quite serious.

A couple of years ago, my mom developed gallstone pancreatitis. The symptoms were, excrutiating, agonizing pain in the abdomen, nausea, dizziness, and vomiting of a very concentrated yellow liquid (bile). Turned out a stone was lodged in the pancreatic duct. The pancreas had become inflamed, she had acute infection, and a very high fever. She was immediately admitted, put on two sets of antibios, and prohibited any eating or drinking of any sort (not even water!!) because it was imperative that the pancreas be as still as possible.

After a week of being in the hospital, she still was not out of danger. The doctors needed to operate and couldn't, because of her infection. The doctors were very concerned, so I asked them about the pancreas. Turns out the pancreas is a very important organ. If the pancreas dies, so does the owner of the pancreas. My mom was not out of the woods, they told me.

Eventually, the infection seemed to be abating, so they did an endoscopy to remove the stone from the pancreatic duct. Then they waited some days before going in and removing her gallstone-ridden gallbladder.

During this time, my mom cried and asked to be released from hospital, and the doctors refused, saying she was in danger.

Mom is fine now (knocking on wood).

(Of course none of this has anything to do with the fact that Ashcroft is an ass, and the Bush administration an even bigger ass).

[Cha]

29. I'm glad your Mum is

improving and I thought it sounded serious without your explanation.

Nothing to mess around with ..that's for sure!

[Sarah Ibarruri]

33. Thanks! :) nt

[journalist3072]

7. You know Bush has hit the bottom of the barrell

When he's rebuffed by John Aschcroft!

[Inland]

8. Remember, this program is reviewed every 45 days

and if it gets a negative review, it goes to a different person until somebody with no conscience or a hankering for fascism gives it a green light.

[bowens43]

10. OMG Ashcroft was the sane one in this administration?!?!?

[bettyellen]

12. i know, too scary, huh?

[noonwitch]

44. A fundamentalist who gets at least part of the big picture?

If he identifies with Christ's sufferings at the hands of the jewish council and the Romans, he has realized the deep wrong that it would be for westerners (seen as christians by the muslim world) to torture their prisoners.

Ashcroft, who always kind of scared me, proves again that people can always surprise you when they step outside of the public expectations and think for themselves.

[Zhade]

11. You know things are fucked up when Crisco Johnny refuses to go along!

NT!

[hootinholler]

15. First I've seen about him refusing too.

I thought the conversation was more like

John, sign off on this or your eagle will soar, if you catch my drift.

-Hoot

[bettyellen]

16. i know, i saw it in GD or GDP, in a thread asking why Dems aren't all

over this, and i was like holy shit, it's not even in LBN. i could only find it in newsweek. :shrug:

hiya hoot! :hi:

[hootinholler]

34. Seems like we should ask them why they're not all over this?

Hi yerself, you hottie :hi:

-Hoot

[warbly]

17. Newsweek was the first to print this news

but i disagree that it's a good read. This article basically took the ny times story and turned it into an pro bush editorial. very much from the administration's POV, this article is. full of little nuggets like this:
"In a perfect democracy trying to strike a balance between civil liberties and national security, there would be reasoned, open debate between representatives of the different branches of government. But human nature and politics rarely work in neat and orderly ways. In moments of crisis, presidents, if they believe in executive power (and most inevitably do), will do almost anything to protect the country."

[bettyellen]

20. you're right, it's slanted. i meant more from a historical POV it's a good

summary and points out that this encroachment on privacy has never in the past worked out to make us safer.
And I think it gets a bit vague about what happened with Ashcroft after the hospital stay. It doesn't sound like he was part of the "compromise" , it also doesn't delve into details of what the compromise was ot of the requested (and much touted) review ever took place.
:shrug:

[Mandate My Ass]

22. Meanwhile, Newsweek poll says 86% against warrantless spying

but according to Newsweek's crack analysis, the president has merely "pushed the boundaries" a bit. F**king fascist enablers.

"The message to White House lawyers from their commander in chief, recalls one who was deeply involved at the time, was clear enough: find a way to exercise the full panoply of powers granted the president by Congress and the Constitution. If that meant pushing the boundaries of the law, so be it." :eyes:

[bettyellen]

23. ...

[Catrina]

25. What an incredibly weak article

that is. They are attributing noble motives to the same administration who we know has so abused the power of the office of the presidency, from telling lies about WMD, to paying journalists for propaganda, to advocating and implementing torture as an American value, not to mention their total and criminal neglect of the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

To even think this crowd had anything noble in mind when they tried to force the DOJ to go along with their spy program on their own citizens, is just plain stupidity!! God, I really, really wish we had people who spoke plainly, who called a spade a spade. I am so sick of the mealy-mouthed 'well, maybe they thought they were doing good' each time another crime is uncovered that involves this administration. The press is like a bad parent, who not matter what their child does, excuses it, refuses to demand better behavior, and in the process, creates a monster.

If Ashcroft said 'no', something really wrong was going on that even he could not condone. So, what our useless press ought to be doing is their job. That would be, in this case, finding out what they were up to. Who they were REALLY spying on, and why, if it was only terrorists or terror suspects, Ashcroft was more scared of going along with them, than he was of THEM!!

[bettyellen]

26. i know it's disappointing- i tried to find any other source for it

but no one else had even reported that ashcroft said no, which is really important, i think.

[bpilgrim]

31. M$M doing it's very best to make spying on everyone without ANY warrant

seem legit/nobel.

i am only half way through it and there is so much spin it is like the WH wrote this to make it sound not so bad.

america is in serious trouble without a independent media. hopefully the www will be able to effectively counter the cover the M$M is giving to the elite and the neoCONs.

hopefully our leaders (right & left) will go after this dictatorial regime and not let them get away with this suspension of our rights.

For all its histrionics, the debate was narrow and somewhat vacuous. It is still hard to know if America has not been attacked for the past four years because (1) the Bush administration has waged an effective war on terror or (2) the threat is not as severe as originally thought. The answer may be a bit of both. Likewise, it is unclear whether the eavesdropping has done much to thwart terrorist plots or, on the other hand, whether it has truly robbed Americans of their privacy. Much of the eavesdropping is by a computer searching for key words, not a human being listening to a private conversation.

from page 2

i find it interesting how the M$M without, obviously, knowing all the facts find ways to come down on the side of the admin vs their critics, every-time, in the guise of being fair&balanced.

they must think we are all idiots!

well, thank GORE he 'invented' the INTERNETs :evilgrin:



peace

[IkeWarnedUs]

30. on Countdown now

KO is talking about this on Countdown now.

[Stand and Fight]

32. Very slanted article. Cuts the administration too much slack.

I'm set to wondering if Karl Rove had a play in the publication of this one. It tip-toes around the issues and seems to excuse the Bush administration from their excesses and crimes. Quite sickening... Ashcroft's role is glossed over and I have to wonder what he found so reprehensible that he felt it necessary to back up Comey. Furthermore, and perhaps even more importantly, what did Comey find so nefarious that he originally opposed and what turned him? These are the questions that the article should have tried to answer more in depth. I think we're witnessing not only the most criminal administration to inhabit the White House but the most dangerous.

[katty]

39. CRIMINALS, ALL OF THEM

[wordpix2]

40. "probable cause" to monitor Greenpeace and ACLU? Gimme a break