Wake up Democrats! There is no fucking spy program!

[BuyingThyme]

If Congressional Democrats don't get this, they're done; and so are we:

1. Immediately after taking office, President Bush ordered the NSA and other intelligence agencies to monitor the political activities of millions of Americans.

2. After 9/11, Bush started to brief a small number of congressional leaders about an extremely limited subset of this activity -- only about activity (arguably) related to al Qaeda.

3. Senior editors at the New York Times -- who either became aware of the NSA’s illegal spying activities as of mid-2004, or had in some way participated in it from the start -- cut a deal with the White House whereby they held back information relevant to this illegal activity in hopes of rigging the 2004 election to the favor of Bush.

4. Over a year later, in late 2005, the New York Times again cut a deal with the White House by which they finally printed limited information about the illegal spying, but, again, in an effort to protect Bush, they lied about when the spying actually began.

5. Arlen Specter then set up a shill hearing, not to look into the illegal spy activity, but only into issues which met an extremely limited list of criteria having to do with monitoring al Qaeda. Those criteria are now collectively known as the “program.” This “program” includes the al Qaeda information which Bush shared with a small number of congressional leaders. Alberto Gonzales, in agreeing to testify before Arlen Specter’s committee, agreed only to answer questions about this “program.”

6. Now, Pat Roberts and other Capitol Hill criminals are using the criteria to green-light an all-encompassing “program,” effectively green-lighting any crimes the Bushes choose to commit against Americans. He wants us to focus on the short-list “program” in hopes of approving the endless-list “program.”

The Republicans are fully to blame for attacking our country to the interests of their unitary executive fantasy, but the Democrats, as it turns out, are not nearly intelligent, honest, or brave enough to talk about, or even understand, what’s going on.

There is no fucking program! Stop using their language! Stop reading the fucking New York Times and Washington Post!

[BuyingThyme]

1. ::

[electropop]

31. It's "unwarranted" domestic spying.

I think that word is "truthier" than "warrantless."

[bigbrother05]

32. It is wholesale data mining, sweeping everything!

They tried to setup/legitimize it with Poindexter & the TIA. When Congress squashed that, they just skimmed the funds from other programs. They have a system in place that sees/hears/reads everything to decide what it wants to follow up on. Terror & crime, sure, but political & business too? They are running as fast as they can to lock in the total control of everything.

The one thing that should be able to stand up in court would be misappropriation of government funds. When TIA was unfunded, they spent money earmarked for other programs. That is against the law! Tax evasion took down Scarface, this could bring down this mob!

[Gold Metal Flake]

2. K&R

[Disturbed]

3. Russel Tice NSA

"Russell Tice, NSA Whistleblower, Alleges Illegal Spying ... Tice alleges that some of the secret "black world" operations by NSA were against the law. ..."


http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/nbbw.cgi

[librechik]

4. Bingo--

we are so screwed--and nobody will know how to stop it.

[SpiralHawk]

5. k & r fer sure

ugly but true.

[GuvWurld]

6. This is a good depiction of a false alternative

False Alternative

[BuyingThyme]

17. Wow, nice page, GuvWurld!

I wish I could write like that.

[GuvWurld]

20. Thank you, BuyingThyme

:hi:

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. So they're making it up as they go along.

One way to give this one legs. PROVE they were doing it before 9/11.

[BuyingThyme]

16. It's been proven, but not developed:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306Z.shtml

[Miss Chybil]

8. It doesn't matter what you call it. We're fucked.

I wonder if somebody could point out the differences to me between us, the US, and China. Anybody?

[The2ndWheel]

10. There's a US and China?

I thought it was just Wal-Mart by now.

Sure, it says the "US" Military, but we all know who they're fighting for. It ain't China either.

[Miss Chybil]

12. Well, I think the US was made in China, but I don't know. That's not what

the history books say. Of course, those were printed in China, so who's to say? As far as who we're fighting for... I'm thinking it's GE Capital, but again, that's just a guess. Perhaps, it's Visa.

[cyberpj]

9. Well, he sold US a short war to get his long war. Dems helped then too.nt

[Generator]

11. This is stuff I didn't know

Link?

Bush ordered spying after taking office? ( just number 1)

And if Bush has been spying since day uno-it fits it to all my other doubts. Doubts about actually stopping 9/11-the more information they actually HAD, the more it looks to me they intentially did nothing to stop it. And of course a real Watergate 2-as in-having information about all political enemies-namely that guy Kerry and all things relating to the emperor's great "victory" of November 2, 2004.

I'm not surprised because I have a feeling it's all a sham anyway.

[fooj]

13. It's all IN PLAIN SIGHT!

Peace.

[BuyingThyme]

18. Hi Generator. Here's some links:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306Z.shtml
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001737349
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/25/AR2005122500665.html?nav=rss_politics
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=30839
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=125&topic_id=67153#67173
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x337904
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/2/6/1496/16402

[Katherine Brengle]

14. Law Breaking not Terrorism Detection n/t

[Canuckistanian]

30. You got it.

Every illegal act is now part of the "program" and thus, untouchable.

[kster]

15. So there is no investigation, I'm not getting it

if someone admits to breaking the law according to what you are saying it is over. I think there should be more to it than that.


So what was * clowning around when he admitted he was breaking the law, isn't that a crime, if the president comes out and admits to breaking the law just for the hell of it, is there no penalty?

[BuyingThyme]

19. There are no real investigations going on.

There's a fake one being conducted by Arlen Specter, but he's agreed to pretend that the only domestic spying going on has to do with well-known al Qaeda people calling super-secret al Qaeda cells in the United States. (Yeah, right.)

[EFerrari]

22. kick

[lavenderdiva]

21. maybe I'm slow on the uptake...

so there's no spying program? but you state in point #1, 'Immediately after taking office, President Bush ordered the NSA and other intelligence agencies to monitor the political activities of millions of Americans.' I'm confused: this sounds like spying to me.

I get your point about there being no real investigation into the spying program, but it does sound like that there is a spying program going on. I would agree that the spying program is not about exclusively al Qaeda, but more importantly, a large group of American citizens.

[BuyingThyme]

23. Yes, they are spying, but they came up with the concept of this "program"

after the fact.

They created the "program" by creating a list of criteria to which nobody would object. Then they cherry-picked incidents, after the fact, which just happened to fit their "program" profile.

You may have noticed that when Chimpy talks about the "program," he always talks about al Qaeda. That's because nothing else qualifies to be included in this "program." In other words, they're ignoring all of the illegal spy activity which did not involve al Qaeda.

And Specter, being a tool of the Bush Crime Family, agreed to look only into the cherry-picked aspects. He agreed to look only at the "program."

[lavenderdiva]

25. ok, so there's spying but no program of spying?

an unofficial-official government broad-base spying on U.S. citizens, but not an OFFICIAL Spy Program On Al Qaeda (that happens to have accidentally caught a very few U.S. citizen conversations) (please note the caps)? IF that's the case, then I've got your point, and agree....

[BuyingThyme]

26. Kos may have said it better than I:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/2/6/1496/16402

[lavenderdiva]

28. Thanks so much for the link to Daily Kos...

this quote from there: In other words, Gonzales is talking about one programme concerned with wiretapping. His assertions that these are legal refers only to the wiretapping under this programme. Somewhere, the White House has other programmes but these are not part of the hearings. No doubt, those wiretaps that are more questionable fall under, or are hurriedly assigned, to these other programmes.



I think your headline may be misleading and confusing. It seems this article is referring to multiple spying programs, not just one NSA spying program. Nor is it saying, as I read it, that there is no spying program. IMHO.

[BuyingThyme]

29. There was never such a program. The took a hardcore porn flick

and cut out all the good parts to create a Disney film.

[dzika]

24. Video of Russell Tice Testimony

http://www.wakahiru-me.com/media/vid/cnn/cnn_pl_whistleblowers_kucinich_tice_060214b_464x260.flv&width=464&height=260">

http://www.wakahiru-me.com/media/vid/cnn/cnn_pl_whistleblowers_kucinich_tice_060214b_464x260.flv&width=464&height=260">
http://veredictum.com/node/77?file=http://www.wakahiru-me.com/media/vid/cnn/cnn_pl_whistleblowers_kucinich_tice_060214b_464x260.flv&width=464&height=260">Video in Streaming Flash format...

On Tuesday, a former NSA employee, Russell Tice, testified before the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations. Tice told the committee that he was concerned that undisclosed domestic spying programs were far more widespread than the recently exposed Bush/NSA warrantless wiretap program.

One or more still classified "Special Access" surveillance program may be monitoring the communications of "millions of Americans". While Tice could not share classified details of the program(s), he believes that the Constitution and FISA laws are being violated.

http://veredictum.com/node/99

[BuyingThyme]

27. Good stuff there. Why can't they all be like Kucinich, and why

can't all Americans care enough about democracy to speak up like Tice wants to.

[BuyingThyme]

33. ::

[EVDebs]

34. Where the NSA scandal and Plamegate converge...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2466336&mesg_id=2466336

Domestic spying and the NSA's 'policy shift', pre-9/11 I might add, away from OBL and Al Qaida's moneylaundering, and toward BushCo's perceived domestic enemies, those lawfully exercising their right to dissent !

[Hissyspit]

35. kick

[BuyingThyme]

36. ::

[wtmusic]

37. kick nt

[BuyingThyme]

38. ::