Look Everybody We're East Berlin, Pre-Wall Topple!

[richlevy]

I still remember this incident.

05/14/2003 The Department of Homeland Security's Air and Marine Interdiction Division (AMID) says its mission is to "Protect the Nation's borders and the American people from the smuggling of narcotics and other contraband with an integrated and coordinated air and marine interdiction force."
So it is easy to understand why Texans were scratching their heads when they learned that the division's Air and Marine Interdiction and Coordination Center in Riverside, California, played a critical role in tracking down the Democratic legislators who went missing from the Texas Capitol this week.

Now I know that FoxNews and some wacko Republicans consider Democrats traitors, but what was the Dept of Homeland Security doing tracking US citizens who were not terrorists?

So in addition to finding terrorists, how much effort will be made to insure that this database does not become abused in the same way that automobile license databases have been abused in the past? What law spells out penalties for misuse and how will it be enforced with no judicial oversight?

Our Constitution was built by men who distrusted goverment, and who designed a system of checks and balances to prevent tyranny, a system which we have been eroding in the past 4 years in the name of safety.

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

We need to get rid of the Bill of Rights in order to preserve our stance of world conquest and domestic terror.

You know, your probation officer needs to revoke your Internet access permanently. You show up here maybe once a month to spout neo-fascist propaganda and then vanish again.

I vote for you as board mod.

[Ibby]

I've never made it a secret that I'm not a big fan of the USofA. Does that make me fair game for the NSA? Where do you draw the line? What about the guy who bought a persian carpet from the guy down the street whos brother once prayed in the same mosque as an al Qaeda official? Is that a valid connection? I'd rather the government have less unchecked power, rather than more.

[Ibby]

Originally Posted by Ibram

I've never made it a secret that I'm not a big fan of the USofA. Does that make me fair game for the NSA? Where do you draw the line? What about the guy who bought a persian carpet from the guy down the street whos brother once prayed in the same mosque as an al Qaeda official? Is that a valid connection?

No supporters of the program (i.e. UG) ever responded to this. Where do you draw the line?

[Happy Monkey]

A question for supporters of this NSA program: do you think Clinton should have had the ability to, without a warrant, get a list of everybody Ken Starr and Monica Lewinski had called in the last year?

[Urbane Guerrilla]

And probable cause is determined by what process? The process boils down most of the time to "taking a look." And taking a look is not prohibited by law. That's what I see here. Read Michelle Malkin on the subject of the datamining for something from a cooler head. Read the most recent Larry Elder, too.

Resorting to the tactics of the Taliban... hmm. Have you locked up your sister in her home? Are you in the morality police, mostly bastinadoing women for walking abroad while female? Dynamited any figural religious art such as a crucifix, on the grounds that you yourself aren't a Catholic?

Yeah, sure, this kind of thing is positively thick on the ground in the US, these days, isn't it? Can't take a walk without checking out the latest public execution, hey?

Tactics of the Taliban, quotha!

I'll tell you what I see in your thinking, rzen: you don't want to admit that some damn body started a war with us -- and on their fifth try, over a period spanning eighteen years from 1983 in Lebanon to 2001 in NYC. Our foes have diligently sown the wind -- should they somehow not reap the whirlwind? We should not be a target for every fucking idiot with a bomb and a grudge, nor should we be a target for their national sponsors.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

And probable cause is determined by what process?

A court order.

[glatt]

And ABC News is reporting that the NSA is targeting them and other news organizations in an effort to find anonymous confidential government sources. Phone numbers called by these news organizations are being recorded, and the feds are looking for patterns in these lists of calls to identify the leakers.

How many amendments to the Constitution does this violate? Freedom of the press is supposed to be sacred in this country. How can the government be allowed to see who the press is calling?

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by glatt

And ABC News is reporting that the NSA is targeting them and other news organizations in an effort to find anonymous confidential government sources. Phone numbers called by these news organizations are being recorded, and the feds are looking for patterns in these lists of calls to identify the leakers.

How many amendments to the Constitution does this violate? Freedom of the press is supposed to be sacred in this country. How can the government be allowed to see who the press is calling?

Not that the administration will do anything. They'll just turn their back when they find the number everyone is calling is (800) KARL-ROVE

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

And probable cause is determined by what process? The process boils down most of the time to "taking a look." And taking a look is not prohibited by law. That's what I see here. Read Michelle Malkin on the subject of the datamining for something from a cooler head. Read the most recent Larry Elder, too.

Resorting to the tactics of the Taliban... hmm. Have you locked up your sister in her home? Are you in the morality police, mostly bastinadoing women for walking abroad while female? Dynamited any figural religious art such as a crucifix, on the grounds that you yourself aren't a Catholic?

Yeah, sure, this kind of thing is positively thick on the ground in the US, these days, isn't it? Can't take a walk without checking out the latest public execution, hey?

Tactics of the Taliban, quotha!

I'll tell you what I see in your thinking, rzen: you don't want to admit that some damn body started a war with us -- and on their fifth try, over a period spanning eighteen years from 1983 in Lebanon to 2001 in NYC. Our foes have diligently sown the wind -- should they somehow not reap the whirlwind? We should not be a target for every fucking idiot with a bomb and a grudge, nor should we be a target for their national sponsors.

Were they so bad when the US was funding them? They and Iraq... no, they were not.

The fact remains... you don't listen without a warrant in a free nation, a specific warrant for a specific time period that spells-out how and when you listen. That would be in a free nation that cares about freedom... not a police state. But that is not what this nation wants to be now, Dubya and his ilk want to be Pre-reformation Berlin.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Read Michelle Malkin on the subject of the datamining for something from a cooler head.

I will make you a deal. I will never refer to Janeane Garofalo and Al Franken as 'cooler heads', much as I might agree to their politics, and you do the same with Michelle Malkin. IMO, the woman is a first order nut. Not that I would kick her out of bed, I'd just make sure to run her through a metal detector first.

And why is it that everyone recognizes the 'slippery slope' when it deals with guns and abortion, but noone recognizes it on fundamental issues like privacy. Using the database for anything except terrorists should at a minimum require the signature of a judge.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by richlevy

I will make you a deal. I will never refer to Janeane Garofalo and Al Franken as 'cooler heads', much as I might agree to their politics, and you do the same with Michelle Malkin.

You're not reading. Quit wasting time.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

You're not reading. Quit wasting time.

Might I suggest The Truth, With Jokes by Al Franken, then?

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Might I suggest The Truth, With Jokes by Al Franken, then?

You may not. Al doesn't yet wish to keep the Republic. In related reading, scope out One Hundred People Who Are Screwing Up America (and Al Franken is #37), by Bernard Goldberg. Of late he's been hitting the talk shows plugging 110 People, instead of a mere hundred.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/006...lance&n=283155

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

You're not reading. Quit wasting time.

Actually, I am reading. I even know how to use italics, too. I do agree that it really is a waste of time to argue with you. You are the ultimate conservative. If you'd been in the Nuremberg docks or sitting next to Ollie in the Iran-Contra hearings, you would probably have been the one guy who stood up and said to the judges/senators "I still don't see what the fucking problem is".

It might be that we need guys like you. Too many men mix in conscience with duty, causing problems. You seem like you would be unhindered by any qualms. Illegal order? I doubt that you would even consider that such a thing is possible.