ACLU: Plan for Restoring Civil Liberties in the Next Administration

[G_j]

(reposting)

http://www.aclu.org/transition/

The next president will become chief executive of a nation that has been greatly weakened - in particular, our freedoms, our values, and our international reputation have been greatly undermined by the policies of the past eight years.

Presidents have enormous power not only to set the legislative agenda, but also to establish policy by executive order, federal regulation, or simply by refocusing the efforts and emphases of the executive agencies. The new president must use all of these tools to restore our freedoms and move the country forward.

Doing so will require determined action in the face of inevitable opposition. It will require conveying to the American people why grants of unchecked power do not actually make us safer, and why Americans must stand firm in protecting the values that at our best we have always represented and defended at home and around the world.

It will not be easy to undo eight years of sustained damage to our fundamental rights. But it can be done.

This paper lists many of the actions that the new president should take in order to decisively signal a restoration of American values and a rejection of the shameful policies of the past eight years.

The first year of any new administration is crucial and sets the stage for what will follow. The new President needs to hit the ground running and to make full use of that first crucial year.

We have grouped needed actions into those that the new president should take on day one, in the 100 days and then the first year.
Those actions include executive orders as well as mandates or directives from the president to his cabinet secretaries and agency heads
..more..

~~~~~~~~~~~


contents:

PART 1 - DAY ONE
Stop Torture and Abuse
Close Guantanamo and Restore the Rule of Law for Detainees
End and Prohibit the Practice of Extraordinary Rendition

PART 2 -
FIRST 100 DAYS
1. Warrantless spying.

2. Watch lists.

3. Freedom of Information - Ashcroft Doctrine.

4. Monitoring of activists.

5. DOJ's Civil Rights Division.

6. Real ID Act.

7. Abortion gag rule.

8. Ban all workplace discrimination against sexual minorities by the federal government and its contractors.

9. Death penalty.

10. "Faith-based initiatives.
"

PART 3 - FIRST YEAR RECOMMENDATIONS
Torture and Abuse
Guantanamo
Extraordinary Rendition
Spying on Americans
Monitoring of activists
Real ID Act
Watch lists
Financial watch lists
Employee databases
Secure Flight
Harmonize privacy rules
Civil Liberties Oversight Board
DNA databases
Freedom of Information
FOIA ombudsman
Scientific freedom
Signing statements
Presidential documents
Federal websites
DOJ politicization
Overclassification
Death penalty
Human rights treaties
Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties
'Special Administrative Measures' for prisoners
Prisoner communications
Crack/Powder Sentencing
Medical marijuana
Discrimination against sexual minorities with federal dollars
The Civil Rights Division
Other Agencies' Civil Rights Enforcement
Federal Racial Profiling
Affirmative action
Rights of the disabled
School harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity
Benefit plans covering domestic partners
Same-sex couples under Medicaid
Discrimination against sexual minorities in adoption and foster care
Discrimination By the Federal Government and Federal Contractors Against People with HIV
Political protest
Media Consolidation
Network neutrality
Online censorship of soldiers
Fleeting expletives
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
The faith-based initiative
Broaden the mandate of the Special Counsel for Religious Discrimination
Local immigration enforcement
Immigration raids
ID theft prosecutions
Deportation to nations that torture
Detention standards
Expedited removal
Board of Immigration Appeals
Single-sex education
Fair housing for domestic violence victims
Discrimination remedies
Home health care workers
Global gag rule on abortion
Abortion restrictions
Emergency contraceptives
Regulations on birth control and religious refusals
Abortion clinic violence
Affordable birth control
The shackling of pregnant prisoner

[unpossibles]

1. so much to do

but we can do this.

[paulphoenix]

3. Yes, we can.

'nuff said.

[ixion]

2. what I don't see: End the so-called 'wars' on abstractions

that is, end the so-called 'War on Drugs' and it's ugly younger brother, the so-called 'War on Terror'. These two 'wars' have been used as an excuse to create most of what is above.

Fix the problem, not the symptoms.

[aikoaiko]

4. Still waiting for the ACLU to get correct on the 2nd Amendment.

If they did, they would neuter the NRA's ability to manipulate voters with exaggerations and distortions.

[Peace Patriot]

5. "Media Consolidation"--Oh my God YES! After ending torture and Gitmo!

But there is a curious missing item on this list of violations of civil and human rights and civil liberties, one that goes to the very heart of our democracy--its very foundation: TRANSPARENT VOTE COUNTING IN THE *PUBLIC VENUE*.

Of all the secrecies of this most abusive regime, 'TRADE SECRET' vote counting, with virtually no audit/recount controls, by private corporations with close ties to extremist rightwing causes, is the one that strikes most mortally at our democracy and all of our other rights. Our country is in the gravest peril from this continuing menace.

Let me give just one example--one less well known than the infamous Diebold CEO who was a Bush-Cheney campaign chair. ES&S (a spinoff of Diebold)--one of the three major election theft vendors--has, as it initial funder and chief investor, the reclusive fascist billionaire, Howard Ahmanson, who also gave one million dollars to the extremist 'christian' Chalcedon foundation, which touts the death penalty for homosexuals (among other things).

These are the sorts of people who have been 'counting' all our votes with 'TRADE SECRET' code that we, the people, are not permitted to review. This coup occurred during a very short period--2002 to 2004--and makes it impossible now to prove that Barack Obama or any member of Congress was actually elected. With Obama, we have the intuitive sense that he was. Neither he nor anyone else can show us the ballots, in half the systems in the country that have no ballot TO count--and, where there IS a ballot, no one bothers to count more than 1% of them (totally inadequate). All rely on these rightwing vendors and their secretly coded electronic tabulators to tell us the result.

This is outrageous! And it makes all sorts of deviousness possible--including these Corpos permitting Obama to win but significantly and fraudulently shaving his mandate, and giving him a difficult 'Blue Dog' Congress, so that his hands are tied on reforms like these, recommended by the ACLU.

You want real reform? You MUST have transparent vote counting.

You want to know how anti-gay marriage initiatives are passing? Ask Howard Ahmanson.

[annabanana]

6. lol... I re-posted this too. .

(They wouldn't let me kick)

[G_j]

7. any time

you want to kick is fine with me!
I'm glad you recognise the importance of this.
If I see yours, I'll give it kick also.
thanks
:hi:

[defendandprotect]

8. THIS is where immediatre attention should go --

[margotb822]

9. Wow, that is a long list

These have been long years...

[annabanana]

10. The Old Regime worked overtime smashing our Constitution.

They wanted to place it beyond our grasp and out of our memory. It is the most powerful "damn piece of paper" in the World.

[G_j]

11. there are details and background for each item at the link

here; http://www.aclu.org/transition/

[pleah]

12. K&R

[pat_k]

13. There is no "restoring" that which should never have been surrendered.

The tenets of our constitution are crystal clear. They are being violated. You do not "restore" the law. You enforce it.

Impeachment is the means.

Call on the ACLU to quit talking about "restoring" and start calling for a special session to take up articles of impeachment. Or failing that, to call on the 111th to take it up on Day One.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=4387354&mesg_id=4387354">Failure to impeach: A new "covenant with death and agreement with hell"

[Kansas Wyatt]

14. Shouldn't the last eight years of wiretaps, spying, etc. etc.

Be turned around on the Republicans and Reich Wing Nuts to even things up?

It would certainly be useful with the approaching onslaught of mindless screeching that is about to start from right wing extremists.

After all, 'if they aren't doing anything wrong, then they have nothing to fear.'