Feingold says Bush is in 'attack mode' Patriot Act, wiretaps criticized

[papau]

Feingold says Bush is in 'attack mode'
Stance on Patriot Act, wiretaps criticized
By KATHERINE M. SKIBA
[e-mail]
Posted: Jan. 4, 2006
Washington - Sen. Russ Feingold on Wednesday accused President Bush of using "fear and intimidation" to push for renewal of the USA Patriot Act and characterized Bush as in "an attack mode" on issues from the Patriot Act to the expanded use of wiretaps by the National Security Agency.<snip>

In a conference call with reporters, Feingold sought to discount Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion in a speech Wednesday that the NSA's interceptions of certain terrorist-linked international communications might have led to two of the hijackers who flew a jet into the Pentagon on Sept. 11. The senator said it was the kind of argument people make "when they're trying to cover their tracks."<snip>

Feingold said he was skeptical that Bush had acted under the law in authorizing expanded use of such wiretaps.
Feingold was the sole senator to vote against the original Patriot Act in 2001. Last month, he led a filibuster to halt a Senate vote on reauthorization of the act, garnering support from key Republican allies who agreed that a compromise hammered out by House and Senate negotiators did not go far enough in protecting civil liberties.<snip>

In the conference call, Feingold also called for lobbying reform in the wake of scandal involving lobbyist Jack Abramoff and said that central to next week's nomination hearings for Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court should be his views on executive branch powers during time of war and terrorist threats.

http://www.jsonline.com/news/nat/jan06/382860.asp

[radio4progressives]

1. Conference call with other reporters, I'd be interested in seeing

other reports on this call. The article goes into great deail of Cheney's remarks made in a speech yesterday, infact a significant portion of the article was actually quoting Cheney. I hate these stories using sleight of hand hooks to sucker readers to read Cheney's propaganda while, i suspect editing Feingold's response, so it would appear. (just projecting wishful thinking)

[C_U_L8R]

2. As long as he's in attack mode...

here's to hoping he gnaws his own arms off.

I don't think the country has ever seen a president
who is this mean and spiteful before. ..not even Nixon.
Bush should be in a straightjacket... for the good of everyone.

[The Backlash Cometh]

3. The problem before 9/11 was not the lack of wiretaps.

The problem was the shortage of translators because they eliminated gay translators; and it was the FBI's lack of supervision of those that were allowed to translate so that one sole translator could bury any translations they wanted; and it was the military's cowardly decision to protect its own ass, instead of sharing important information...

Nope. We didn't need more wiretapping prior to 9/11. What we needed was an honest process of translation and information sharing.

[DeadManInc]

4. Patriot act need fluched down the toilet.