Bush invalidates Fifth Ammendment by Executive Order
 

Bush says that if the Sec'y of the Treasury decides that you poses a risk to the stabilization of Iraq, your property can be seized.

Think about that for a minute. I'll wait.

If you're a US citizen, your property could be "blocked", legalese for "you can't use it". Why? If one person says so. Which one person? The Secretary of the Treasury. Or anyone he delegates authority to. Or anyone to whom that authority is redelegated.

Due process? Overruled! "...there need be no prior notice...".

The crime for this punishment? Something like supporting someone who violates this order. If the Charity-R-Us ran afoul of this order, and you put a dollar in their donation box, all your property could be forfeit.

Bush is a pathetic bully. You know why he picks on civil liberties? Because they can't fight back. He's no better than the big kid on the playground menacing the little kids. Who'll stick up for the little kids?

Who will stick up for the Constitution? Will you?

Now look, do you find anything there that you couldn't unfreeze these assets by due process upon discovery?

Does not matter... due process should be first.
He is and always has been a punk-ass-bitch.

First or last, the results are the same either way -- process.

One can certainly see how this would impede electronic funding of terrorist operations, which is the whole point. Yelling about Bush being totalitarian (he isn't, but only the ignorant don't get that -- he is fighting a war and trying to win it, and the ignorant seem to believe he shouldn't) forgets that day by day January 2009 marches closer and GWB terms out, in accordance with the Constitution. Some bozos will mutter, "We hope!" and I say to the bozos, "Oh, puh-leeze! You know what I hope? I hope the Republicans take back at least one house of Congress and keep the Presidency, because I want us to win and the Democrats quit wanting that about 2003!"

If the Dems get the Oval Office in January 2009, they will have irredeemably lost the war by February.

The war is not here and he and his fellow morons started that unnecessary invasion, we should leave those folks alone.
Proper process is the only process.

Good grief, your fucking with us now. Not even you can believe that shit.

It'll sound like a cliche, but: cognitive dissonance, man. People can "believe" whatever they need to believe.

Patriot Act is to the Constitution as Anti Christ is to _____.

The Constitution prohibits seizure without due process. Period. Notice that unlike the wiretapping laws, this one includes US citizens.

As for unfreezing, how much do you think that would cost in legal fees? $10,000? $50,000. How long would someone have to wait, while bills piled up and foreclosure became more and more possible?

If someone did lose their house because of this, how much would it cost and how long would it take to recover compensation from the government, assuming they could be sued?

The reason this is an executive order and not a law is that it's a blatant Constitutional violation that would have never made it through both houses, even with a Republican majority.

Everyone knows that government has continually grown in size and scope during this past century, but how and why has it done so? Is this growth inherent in the nature of government or because of some greater social needs, or are there other causes?

In Crisis and Leviathan, Robert Higgs shows that the main reason lies in government’s responses to national “crises” (real or imagined), including economic upheavals (e.g., the Great Depression) and especially war (e.g., World Wars I and II, Cold War, etc.). The result is ever increasing government power which endures long after each crisis has passed, impinging on both civil and economic liberties and fostering extensive corporate welfare and pork. As government power grows, writes Higgs, it achieves a form of autonomy, making it ever more difficult to decrease its size and scope, and to resist its further efforts to increase its reach, so long as the citizenry remain uninformed of its true effects.


An oldie but still right on the mark.

No shit, "First you get arrested, locked-up, THEN we.... "
"see how we did that"?
"you like that?", "It's all backward now, something fun for tha' kids ta' watch!"
"Next week we are going to garnish wages, then if you DON'T speed, we may give you your money back".

I ain't buyin' your argument.

When are your assets seized? When are the assets of anyone you know seized? When are the assets of anyone you don't know seized?

It is acutely annoying how certain people have squawked at every single solitary measure taken by an Administration trying to win a war -- and apparently on the grounds that such measures might win the war. Fatuous and fascistic, for my money. The squawkers have no plan nor any desire to win it, so fuck 'em with a splintery fence post lubed with Ass In Antarctica(tm) pepper sauce.

Hotsauce.com rates this pepper sauce at three or four flamy icons, depending on which page you look.

Why would they make the rule if they don't plan to ever use it? What people seem to overlook with these "special powers" is that somebody has to decide who the bad guys are. Today, you think you agree with the people who would make that decision. If people you disagree with were elected, the rule could still be used. Think ahead a little. The government doesn't deserve this much power, they aren't that trustworthy.

I only see this ever being done to terrorist funding channels. The Administration sees it that way also -- such is their instinct, in contrast to the instincts of the previous Administration.

Those who are really worried can always consider that it's easier to revoke or revise an Executive Order than it is to repeal a law.

Why make it, with the reasoning that it would be easy to revoke?

Actually, that would be one of the reasons TO make it.

It's like it's easier to toss a Starbucks venti paper cup in the trash when its job is done than it would be a Mil-Art coffee mug with your unit logo on it.

Win... funny. You let me know when they tell you what that means, then we can talk.

Win away, don't touch the Constitution or Bill of Rights. It is not their place.
Americans know that is the reason we fight... not to lose them and what they stand for. Get rid of them, may as well give-up.
May not know how we can win, but that is how they do.

Maybe you should ask those flaming liberals at the Cato Institute (note sarcasm).

We're already abusing 'war on drugs' forfeiture. Now we want to introduce forfeiture based on vague definitions of undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq. According to Fox News, %20 of the U.S., and some members of the administration, that includes anyone who criticizes the war in Iraq.

Since when is a war in Iraq a 'national emergency' in the U.S.?

To paraphrase a hero of Urbane's, they'll seize my assets from my cold dead hands.

Exactly on target.

HOUSTON (AP) -- A U.S. citizen convicted of receiving training at a terrorist camp alongside al-Qaida members in his efforts to help overthrow the Somali government was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison.

Daniel Joseph Maldonado, 28, a Muslim convert also known as Daniel Aljughaifi and Abu Mohammed, also was fined $1,000.

Maldonado admitted to traveling in December to a terrorist camp in Somalia, where he was trained to use firearms and explosives in an effort to help a group called the Islamic Courts Union topple the government and install an Islamic state. Members of al-Qaida were present at the camp.

Maldonado was captured by the Kenyan military while trying to flee Somalia in January and brought back to the United States in February.

Ten years was the maximum prison sentence Maldonado could have received. He faced a fine of up to $250,000.

Federal prosecutor Gary Cobe said after the hearing that the sentence was just.

"We're fighting a war against terrorism. We need to send a message that anyone who gets involved with terrorism will pay the price," he said.

"He wants it to be known he never intended to hurt Americans," Newton said.

Maldonado, who grew up in Pelham, N.H., lived in Houston for four months in 2005 before moving with his wife and three children to Cairo, Egypt, then Somalia. Just before his arrest as he and his family tried to leave Somalia and go to Kenya, they became separated. His wife, Tamekia Cunningham, later died of malaria. His three children are being cared for by his parents in New Hampshire.

Defense attorneys described Maldonado as a man who, driven by anti-Muslim sentiment in America after the Sept. 11 attacks, moved away with his family so they could live in peace as Muslims.

-> -> 10 years is the maximum for training to be a terrorist, yet they can seize your assets if they SUSPECT you are helping terrorists. That makes NO sense.

Your rights seem to decrease in an inverse proportion to the amount of evidence they have against you.

Oh my God.

You have no concept of: the rule of law, checks and balances, the value of our Constitution.

You believe in: the end justifying the means and letting other people think for you.

You are a fanboy.

Now now. I know fanboys, I've shared the same convention center with fanboys. I wouldn't pin the "fanboy" label so lightly on someone such as UG with a proven track record of coherent sentence structure.

The penultimate problem I have with this order (other than an inarguable contradiction with established legal boundaries) is the assumption of infallibility it takes on the part of the government. This EO - and others like them - would work and would be tolerable, if the powers-that-be exercised its force only upon the criminal element of society.

Government is a human creation, and by definition, fallible. The cost of both an error made by the government under the terms of this order and the effort to reverse it would be life-altering, if not life-ending. As Rich brought up before, the cost of confirming your innocence in the light of a false accusation, then reclaiming your lost property and assets, all while trying to keep yourself fed/sheltered/clothed during the process could run into the tens of thousands of dollars - perhaps even the hundreds of thousands for the first, precedent-setting case.

I am a registered Democrat. I do believe in an effective and central government. However, this kind of power is just too much for any government of any partisan or ideological stripe. In any expansion of the government, one has to weigh the pitfalls against the promises. What I have to ask is what is this government - that trumpets its prevention of attacks since September 11th - unable to do now, against those that would wish us harm, that they could do under this new authority?

If all I can see are the new dangers, it is because no one has shown me the new benefits.

I can't help thinking that this isn't even going far enough to describe the danger. To me, the real danger is that we enact these things with all good intention, and they are carried out by a well-meaning government for a few years, MAYBE have a few high-profile success stories, touted to justify their existence; but THEN, as the political winds shift, and the original purpose is forgotten or glossed over, somebody comes along behind the scenes and figures out a way to pervert them, to use them to the advantage of questionable purposes.

And this is a very generous, almost BEST-CASE scenario.

Being such as these things are, these "trust us" laws, we have absolutely no reason to believe that they will not be abused, except blind faith. As Reagan said, government programs have three phases, "a beginning, a muddle, and no end" - we don't trust the government with good reason.

In addition to your well founded objections, Chewbaccus and Flint, there is the implied lack of confidence in our system as it exists today.

I don't know if either of you are a parent, but you've certainly been a child at some point. Do you remember being confronted with the reasoning "Because I'm the <strike>decider</strike> daddy, that's why!" in response to your questions as to why you couldn't do something? As a very generous, almost BEST-CASE evaluation of this parenting strategy, this is weak. It shows laziness, ineptitude, surrender and/or ignorance, or worse. It is the justification of (next to) last resort. The next step is just smacking the kid.

I am no kid, yet Bush arrogates to himself the authority and attitude of a weak parent. There may be those adult citizens among us who crave this kind of paternalistic governance--"Save me daddy!"--but I am not among them. Count me out! I find it highly insulting, to me as a citizen and to my country. I don't like his reasoning and I damn sure don't want to be smacked next.

If you can't get the job done with the tools at hand, we have a well established, properly functioning method for making new tools. Wholesale edits of our Constitution with the Executive Order pen is not one of them. He doesn't cotton to Congress's "running this war", but he blithely writes new laws to suit himself.

Chewbaccus: You've clearly been here a long time, so I don't mean to lecture you. Do not confuse his loquacious sesquipedalian logorrhea for mere coherence. But I don't lightly pin the label "fanboy" on UG. With apologies to fanboys the world over, I would pin it on him with a sledgehammer.

He's not "young", though...

"fan-guy"?

And V..."loquacious sesquipedalian logorrhea"?

You. Me. Scrabble. It's go time. :)

UG is often Fanboyish, but the anti-Bush crowd is the most Fanboyish I have ever seen.

For example, you often see headlines written with the most inflammatory exaggerated take possible, and then when you read the article, it turns out to say nothing of the sort.

And when someone asks WTF, or asks specific directed questions about the topic in simple disagreement, they're called names -- as if to simply beg the question is a sign that one is somehow inferior.

Thankfully, this sort of thing doesn't happen here. I'm talking about Digg and Reddit and places like that. Not here.

I would not have expected that would be a thread-killer.

So what you're saying is that we can depend on the good judgment of the executive branch to only use this power on bad guys.

<sarcasm>Right. Because they've shown such good judgment in the past.</sarcasm>

UT: Yeah, it looked like a thread killer, but I don't think it is, really. Unfortunately, the conversation part of the thread, the back and forth part, needs some.. tension, some difference. Without that, everyone's saying, Yup, I agree. And in this case, the only dissenting voice is UG's. This happens sometimes, but in this case, since his remarks are the nail sticking up, *that's* what gets hammered down.

We wound up all agreeing, unanimously, that this Executive Order is a bad idea. Great. Now what do we talk about? UG's fidelity to the definition of "fanboy"? The only thing I see that doesn't apply is the word "young", but then we're talking about UG again.

Show of hands: Who thinks this EO is a bad idea? Too bad I can't retro this thread and put a poll on it. EO: Good Idea or Bad Idea.

The thread's not dead. But without being fanboyish a'la Digg or Reddit, I say this is wrong wrong wrong.

Frankly, I see this as doing the bad guy's work for them.

What are we at war *for* anyway? I know we're *against* terrorism (don't get me started on the semantic stupidity of being at war with tactic). But, I guess, we're at war *for* the United States of America, wouldn't you agree?

For me, the USA is not merely territory; indeed, we're in no danger of losing any territory in this war. It is not just people, because the USA was here before me and all of you were around, and will be here after we're all gone, so it be can't just people. As well as I can articulate it, the USA is territory, and people and a million other things, held together by our system of government. Literally, without our government, there would be no USA. And our government, that government of the people, by the people and for the people, hangs together because of our mutual respect for our laws.

Without our laws, there would be no government, there would be no USA.

And *THAT* is why I'm incandescent with anger at the actions of the Bush administration. This particular action is a poster child for what's wrong. It tears down the very stones that make the foundation of our country. If you love the USA, you must hate actions like this. This *is* the destruction of our country.

It is far less dramatic than a plane flying into a building, but it is far more insidious. We lost lives and property on September 11, 2001. That was certainly sad and tragic; it was shocking to see foreign invaders attack us. On July 17, 2007 we lost a part of the Constitution, the definition of our country. This was a hundred times more sad and tragic, shocking and disgraceful because it was done by the very person in charge of upholding the Constitution, **SWORN** to defend it from all enemies, foreign and domestic.

I won't pretend to know what's inside Bush's head. I'll grant myself the small comfort of faith in human nature, and forgo the question of his motives. I'll believe that he believes his motivations are good. But I am dead set against his methods. I've remarked elsewhere on the Bush Administration's famous effectiveness, but preventing the bad guys from destroying America by destroying it himself is the wrong thing to do, even if he's doing it brilliantly.

If you want to determine truth from a fair conversation with people, don't start by demanding "I'm mad as hell! Who's with me!"

Googling for the phrase "there need be no prior notice of a listing or determination" finds it in use in two places:

1. Progressive blogs who are furious at Bush for the use of the phrase in this EO.

2. Previous uses of the phrase in other EOs.

Having myself believed in several sky-is-falling slippery slopes, I can only suggest to you that you have fallen into the same trap as I did ten years ago. I was pretty certain we were on the slope. And I was convinced of it by people more worried than I, using crazy rhetoric exactly like this thread title.

The only thing that finally convinced me otherwise was the passage of time. It turned out that, after ten years of my cautioning against the slope, we are no closer to the bottom than we were back then.

So, wow. I'm wiser now, but what a pain in the ass I must have been. I can only thank my remaining friends for having the patience to deal with me during those times.

-

You are wrong about this, Biggie. If need be, let time be the judge. It's always the final arbiter after all.

I guess it depends on what slope you were worried about. The one that this EO is most similar to- drug war forfeiture- is one that we have gotten much closer to the bottom of in the past 20 years.

Maybe it just seems like we're not going down the slope because they keep moving the bottom down.

People, especially those under BushCo. need to tell them that his executive orders are "just pieces of paper".

If I see a house on fire, I'm not going to undertake to determine truth from a fair conversation with people, I'm gonna yell "FIRE!" You're right on one part though: this is *my* house on fire, and I am mad as hell.

On the subject of truth, fair conversations and such, what is your opinion of this recent Executive Order? You've only said "you're wrong, Biggie". I'd like to know your mind on the subject.

What's your point? I can understand why progressive blogs would be furious with Bush's language and actions--no surprise there. I can just as easily understand writers at the other end of the spectrum giving it a pass. So what?

My objection is that, in my layman's understanding, this phrase overrides the protections (or obstacles, if you're on the other end of the scale) offered by due process. It's a big deal, it's in the Constitution. It's a direct negation of an important part of what makes ours a more perfect union. Furthermore, it's a part that *I* can easily see myself benefiting from.

I don't have much power, not even a tiny fraction of the power the government has. Nothing approaching the physical force that can be brought to bear, nothing like the financial resources available to the government, nothing close to the legal power, whether it's interpreting the existing laws, or, indeed, making *new* laws at the stroke of a freakin' pen. I do have the shared devotion to our country, shared by those that would be assigned (or volunteer) to defend me. And in their arsenal, due process is a powerful tool.

Due process would let other people see what's happening. The facts, as the government sees them and as I see them, would have the chance of an equal hearing. Maybe my side will not prevail. But perhaps one of those judges or juries would have a different opinion than the government, yay me. But without due process, I don't get the chance to even have my day in court. That is a problem for me, a big problem.

I don't know where your head was at ten years ago, but I do know what I wrote in the thread title. What's your objection to it? Crazy rhetoric? Are you kidding me? I suppose I could have refined it thus:

Bush's recent Executive Order invalidates *part of* the Fifth Ammendment.

Ok, protection against self incrimination remains intact. Likewise double jeopardy remains illegal, blah blah blah. Really? Sorry, that's not my thread title. I don't find the one I did use to be much like Chicken Little at all. Did you read the EO? Do you disagree on the facts I've presented. Nevermind your dislike of my tone, do you or don't you agree that this EO overrides the due process protections of the fifth ammendment?

I may seem combative on this point, but seriously, if I'm wrong on the facts, I sincerely want to be reassured that our Constitution is intact. And if it's not, if our ship of state has sprung a leak, you're damn skippy I want everybody to know about it. I'm not combative, I'm worried.

I'm glad you made it through those ten years. I'm glad your friends stuck by you.
-

Wrong about what? Have I said something untrue? Have I misquoted someone? I have said that this EO is wrong, and I have said why I think so. Please tell me what you think is wrong here.

It invalidates nothing! If it did invalidate the fifth amendment, the amendment was already invalidated in 2001 and 2003. But it wasn't. And it wasn't invalidated by any of the other previous EOs signed by other Presidents intended to address other asset seizure situations.

If a judge was presented with a search and seizure case today, would s/he say, "Oh no, sorry, Bush signed several EOs which appeared to layman's eyes to invalidate this, case dismissed."

The Legislature often writes unconstitutional laws and the Executive signs them. Holy crap, end of the world noticed! But they aren't really tasked -- really! -- with the job of determining what's Constitutional. The Constitutionality of a law is determined by the courts.

The courts can rule that an EO is unconstitutional and away it goes. The Legislature can rule that an EO is not law and away it goes. But more often an EO is nullified by another EO.

OK, you don't know what "due process" means. If you are suspected of a murder, you will not be given "prior notice" that the cops are going to arrest you. You won't get a polite phone call asking you when you want to show up at the station.

Your due process does not end with your arrest. It starts with it. It continues through your arraignment, your prosecution and your appeal.

Similarly, if your assets are seized, your due process does not end.

And so we come back to the question posed by post #2, which I would note is the second post in the thread. You answered it by claiming that UG was a fanboi with no concept of the rule of law.

That's weak, mister, so I'll ask the question again.

Do you find anything in the EO that says you couldn't unfreeze these assets by due process upon discovery?

Think about it, but don't investigate it. If you do, you'll find that precisely the same language has been used in every overseas asset seizure EO for ages. Clinton used it on Haiti. Haiti! What a fucking bully, that Clinton! Who stuck up for the Constitution then?

Yep, I did. But I was wrong then, and you are now.

Oh yes, and also on the Sec'y of the Treasury matter:

If you really think about it, for even longer than a minute, you'll realize that having the Secretary of the Treasury be the sole arbiter of whether a case is prosecuted or not, actually limits the scope of the EO.

Amendment 6, which this EO does not address, tells us the accused enjoys the right to confront the witnesses against him. There aren't going to be 10,000 cases in which the Sec'y is a witness when s/he must at the very minimum produce evidence for each one.

The points that it would be hard to actually use, or that it would be easy to overturn, or that it wouldn't be impossible to fight; don't address the matter of whether it is ill-conceived, or the matter of whether concerned citizens of a democracy should take not of, and encourage discussion of, such actions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . But I guess your main point was objection to the use of perceived hyperbole.

Well I think it's a good idea to seize assets that would go to our biggest enemies in the world, because it's better than having to go and kill them. I understand the controversy in that, and I'd like to discuss it, but the hyperbole makes it nearly impossible to have an honest conversation about it, and I think that's a worse problem. It's hurting America, as Mr. Jon Stewart once told them on Crossfire.

Our "biggest enemies in the world" are people that "[undermine] efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq" ???

Could that possibly include protestors, planning demonstrations against war profiteers? Better be on the safe side, and keep our mouths shut.

If there were no bars, the tiger would eat us mercilessly!

But there are bars, so do not let the fear of lack of bars guide your actions.

Hell, let's remove a few bars, right?


It's not like that tiger is ever gonna bite anyone's face off...

In logic, one counter-example is devastating.

In the real world, one counter-example is expected.

Only when that logic is boiled down to one size fits all.... which is not logical.

The fear of lack of bars should guide you to prevent the removal of bars.

If you fear bar removal enough, someone will eventually tell you bars are being removed to get you to vote for the barman.

I'm lost, are we in a bar now?

No, we can't reach the bar because it's at the top of the slippery slope. It's okay though because my generation doesn't remember a time when we could reach the bar... Maybe I'll put a bar in my basement.

Maybe we should lower the bar.

Are you with NASA?

The barman is the Constitution, so I'd vote for him whatever the somebody is telling me.

This is a no-holds-barred thread! You've got people barging in, barking up the wrong tree, basically behaving like Bart Simpson. :::barf:::

Eat my shorts.
Violations of/to the constitution, instituted, even if never actually used, hang over all of us like the sword of Damocles. We all suffer from these indignities.

Barman - A round for everyone please - on me.

I agree, Bruce.

ditto

Except that it's not a violation. Biggie says it is because he misinterpreted it.

All right, recess it over. Climb down off the "bars" and back to class. Good grief.

Let me ask you some questions, UT. What the heck does this EO do? I mean, ten days ago, could you have committed acts of violence that threatens the Government of Iraq with impunity? Was the violence and potential violence outlined in this order legal two weeks ago? What has been going on?

I have read and reread this order and I see two actions that are now prohibited:

Violence, or the risk of violence that is:

(A) threatening the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq; or

(B) undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq or to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people;

and now the penalty for that violence or risk of violence is seizure. I'm pretty sure we already had laws that prohibited violence in this country. Why this new one? (I have an idea why.)

Another thing I find troubling, very troubling, is the criminalization of potential. You brought up murder earlier, let's play that out a little here. If I shoot someone dead, that's murder. It's a crime, and I should be punished. But what about having a gun? There's a much greater risk of shooting someone dead if I have a gun than if I don't, and in this EO, to extend my analogy, committing murder, and the risk of committing murder are precisely equal, subject to the same penalty. You'll be rotting in jail long after the lawyers stop yammering as to what "significant" means. What kind of determination of "significant" do you expect from a federal mindset that won't allow fingernail clippers and bottles of breast milk on airplanes due to the "risk" of hijacking? Ok, to be fair, the Feds recently increased the volume of breast milk allowed on planes from the previous three ounce maximum, but it still must be declared.

Do you want to live in a country where you can be punished because you might do something? I don't. It was merely stupid and annoying to have to throw out my shaving kit at the airport security screening, but under this EO, the stakes are much much higher. And, for pity's sake, how can you defend yourself against a charge of potential violence when all your assets are seized? I hope to God Due Process descends from the clouds in a flaming chariot to smite my enemies, but I'm not holding my breath.

I said I have an idea why this new rule was made. I agree with you that it is a good thing for our enemies to have no resources to use against us. That's what I think this rule is really about. They took an action that was already illegal, violence, and wrapped it up in a new set of penalties. Then, watch carefully, they wrapped it up in a recursive bow of complicity. Are you violent against Iraq? If you are guilty, then your assets are seized. Nothing new here, except perhaps the penalty. But this is the new twist: any person, entity, or United States person is equally guilty of violation of this order, and subject to the same penalties, seizure, if that person/entity/citizen has supported the person who committed the violent act.

I don't find this scenario much of a stretch. Let's say I'm a bad guy. I am guilty of violating this order. In the course of my planning, I posted on the cellar, setting up my evil plan. You are guilty by association. Everything you have is seized. Where is your due process now?

So. Once again, I'll give Bush the benefit of the doubt and grant him credit for good intentions. But this is a messed up rule. There was a story in this morning's news about medical marijuana. Legal in California, illegal in the United States. So the DEA is sending letters to the landlords of these shops saying all kinds of scary things about jail and forfeiture. On the face of it, it's legal because Bush signed it. But that doesn't make it right. We're just one brick closer to Hell, thanks to this work.