Government May Help Bells Defend Against Wiretap Suits

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "As lawsuits mount against phone companies from plaintiffs who allege their call records were handed over to the National Security Agency illegally, the companies' defense may get help from the U.S. government, the Wall Street Journal reports. From the article: 'The plaintiffs, who accuse Bell phone companies of privacy violations and are seeking billions of dollars in damages, would need to delve into the depths of the NSA's surveillance program to make their cases. But the government considers such information top secret, and legal experts expect the Bush administration to assert the "state secrets" privilege in the 20 or more lawsuits filed by privacy advocates in recent weeks. If judges accept the claim, as has been the case in nearly every instance in which it has been asserted since the early 1950s, the suits will dissolve.'"

Proposed Strategy

[eldavojohn]

The information itself may be classified but the fact of whether or not they collected it shouldn't be.

Why don't they ask the director of the NSA, Michael V. Hayden, whether or not their information was collected? They don't need the classified records, just to have him swear under oath (after checking appropriate databases) whether or not AT&T gave it to the NSA.

I would think a simple "yes" or "no" answer would be enough evidence and also keep the classified information concealed.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[TheSpoom]

Personally, if he answered "no", I'm afraid that wouldn't be good enough for me.

He Could Lie

[eldavojohn]

Personally, if he answered "no", I'm afraid that wouldn't be good enough for me.

He could lie but you have to remember that there are people in the NSA with an axe to grind.

He could get up there and contemplate lying. But what if he lied and the information was leaked from the NSA or released after his death that the collections did occur?

Hayden is an important man. Important men (when intelligent enough) are constantly worried about how history sees them after they die. I would wager that h

Re:He Could Lie

[AuMatar]

No they aren't. Important men are concerned with maintaining their power/money/influence. While a few are megalomaniacs, most don't give a shit about history. As such, they'll lie in a second if they think they can get away with it and the lie will help them. Hell, Bush lied about WMDs and started a war over it, you don't think Hayden will lie over a few wiretaps?

Re:He Could Lie

[skarphace]

The Bush Administration did not fabricate evidence, they merely ignored the evidence that did not support their agenda. This is not lying.

A lie of ommission is still a lie.

This is the nature of intelligence.

No, the nature of intelligence is to find out which ones are correct and which ones are false by INTELLIGENCE ANALYSTS. The nature of intelligence is NOT filtering out intelligence reports that do not support your agenda by someone totally not qualified to do so.

Re:He Could Lie

[Darby]

This is my $0.02 about why I do not subscribe to the belief that Bush intentionally mislead Congress and the American public. If blame is to be placed on anyone for the war, it should be on the NSA, CIA and Executive/Congressional branches of the government for crippling our ability to gather reliable intelligence in the field.

You make some very good, well presented points, but you left several major critical facts out of your analysis.

We know for a fact that one of if not the most important goals of this administration since before they even got into office was starting a war with Iraq. We know for a fact that they knew the American people wouldn't go for it. We know for a fact that they knew that it would require a "Pearl Harbor" level event to convince the American people to back the invasion.
We know for a fact that once said event happened that they immediately began agitating to attack Iraq even though there is no evidence of their involvement. We know for a fact that they intentionally misled people in an attempt to make them think Iraq was responsible for 9/11..

If you are not aware of all of these facts, then feel free to read it in their own words. [newamericancentury.org]

Add in the fact that the CIA specifically told them not to run with the known bad information that they had and they intentionally ignored it in order to make out Saddam to be a big threat and it's obvious that the situation is not even anywhere near as unclear as your argument would indicate.

Re:He Could Lie

[Darby]

On the contrary, we know none of these to be facts. We know that Saddam tried to assasinate Bush v1 and that Bush v2 was pissed about that, but we "know" the later only by heresay.


I provided you a link to the web page where the members of this administration stated exactly those facts in no uncertain terms. Go read the website. Then look at whose website it is. Don't say something isn't a fact after I present the proof right to you. It lowers you.


The idea that Bush consciously thought that the only way he c

Re:He Could Lie

[Darby]

You know, I absolutely, 100% remember reading a statement like that on that website very shortly after 9/11 - and the paper was from the mid-to-late 90s. I distinctly remember emailing people about it at the time, it was such a shocker even for my own jaded ass.

The particular paper I'm linking the pdf [newamericancentury.org] from that same site (your googlefu could use some improvement. I got it on the first hit with this search: "site: www.newamericancentury.org would take pearl harbor iraq") lists its own publication date as Se

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Proposed Strategy

[Qzukk]

Intelligence is kind of like encryption. Excluding things like infiltration, if it only works because it's super-sekrit, it's probably not working anyway.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[susano_otter]

A lot of intelligence-gathering techniques rely on the fact that your enemy is unaware that he is leaking intel in some way.

As long as he remains unaware, and continues to leak intel, you can stay a step ahead of his game (whatever it may be).

The moment you describe your techniques, the enemy has an opportunity to become aware of his leaks, and plug them.

Leveraging your enemy's ignorance is a key component in getting good intel on your enemy. It is very different from encryption, in the sense that good enc

Re:Proposed Strategy

[Pendersempai]

Right, and that's why one necessary component of a court system is that it can compel people to do things whether or not they want to do them. So Hayden presumably wouldn't have a choice -- or rather his choice set would look like {answer the question, keep mum and be held in contempt}. Ask Judith Miller how much fun that latter choice is.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[NoTheory]

FYI, Michael V. Hayden is the former head of the NSA. Also, i sincerely doubt that they'd put the head of the CIA under oath. The republican senate has been extremely leery about putting anyone under oath who might face tough questions (I.e. justice department officials such as Alberto Gonzales).

Recursive Iteration

[H3lldr0p]

But what if the fact that the information was handed over was itself a state secret? Then we get into a wonderful recursive cycle of classifing the classified classification into a new category of secret classfications. This is perfect for the government agentcies involved becuase they can continue to deny that they have denied any denials about programs that have been denied to exist.

See? It's all so simple for them.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[demachina]

I'm pretty sure he can plead the fifth. To get and keep his security clearance he can never divulge classified information. This program is no doubt still classified despite the fact that it was leaked. If he were to just confirm its existence he would be breaking the laws relating to his security clearance and subject to prosecution. You can't make people break the law, or incriminate themselves on the witness stand assuming the Bush administration hasn't unilaterally overturned this basic civil liberty yet. To get Hayden or anyone else in the NSA to testify about this program it would have to be declassified which ain't gonna happen.

If there was enough information leaked already to clearly establish that the records were turned over illegally then they might still have a case, but the government probably will try to have all the leaked evidence thrown out and to prevent anyone in the phone companies, who might not have a clearance to worry about, from testifying on national security grounds.

You would hope that if the law was broken, and it almost certainly was, that the phone companies and the government would be held to account. There is a communication act the explicitly forbids releasing your phone records without a court order.

It is an unfortunate fact that laws are much more vigorously enforced against ordinary citizens than they are against people in power. When the DOJ brings a Federal case against a citizen their success rate is extremely high like 80%. When citizen's bring a case against the government their success rate is extremely low. Welcome to Fascism.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[demachina]

I forgot to add you can setup a trial where classified information and testimony is involved but I think the judges, lawyers and everyone else involved have to have a security clearance, and I'm not sure you can have a jury trial in this case. This is done when the government needs to convict someone for espionage. I just bet it would be nearly impossible for private citizens to bring a case where classified information is involved and this case will probably follow in that mold

Re:Proposed Strategy

[NoTheory]

The Fifth Amendment protects SELF-incrimination. It does not protect you against testifying about other matters. If you have been called to testify and have been sworn in, and do not testify, you can be held in contempt of court or congress. At least, so far as i understand it. Since Michael Hayden != NSA or any telecommunications company, the 5th amendment has no relevance to this case.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[demachina]

I found the Criminal Information Protection Act [usdoj.gov] which codifies classified information in a trial, but as I expected it is completely written in the context of the government being the plaintiff when they need to use classified information to convict a defendant of espionage, terrorism or leaking. You see the government will divulge classified information to nail you but they wont allow you to use classified information to nail them.

Having researched it I agree that the government will try to just use the state-secret privilege so Hayden wont even make it to the stand. If by some miracle the judge doesn't cave to it and Hayden does have to testify then I assume either CIPA will have to come in to play and be bent to this novel case, or Hayden will just refuse to answer any questions that would divulge classified information because it would in fact incriminate him in the process if he did it in a public court.

The Wikipedia article on the states-secret privilege [wikipedia.org] is quite interesting and probably more interesting than the WSJ article.

Its not even a law, its just a precedent that was established during the McCarthy era where the Air Force used it, apparently fraudulently, to cover up the fact a B-29 crash was due to poor maintenance of the air plane, and was basicly negligence on the part of the Air Force.

"In United States v. Reynolds (1953), the widows of three crew members of a B-29 Superfortress bomber that had crashed in 1948 sought accident reports on the crash, but were told that to release such details would threaten national security by revealing the bomber's top-secret mission. The Supreme Court ruled that the executive branch could bar evidence from the court which they had deemed a threat to national security. In 2000, the accident reports in question were declassified and released, and were found to contain no secret information. They did, however, contain information about the poor state of condition of the aircraft itself, which would have been very compromising to the Air Force's case. Many commentators have alleged government misuse of secrecy in the landmark case."

Just goes to show you that once you let your government establish an illegal and unconstitutional precedent, during times of war or paranoia, to screw you, they can continue to abuse it forever. The Bush administration has been successfully using the fact that Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the civil war to justify denying American citizens basic due process today, and that FDR spied on American cables in World War II to justify spying on Americans now indefinitely.

Another interesting invocation of the "state-secret privilege" was in 2005 in a patent suit brought against none other than AT&T. Apparently a company called Crater Corp thinks AT&T is violating its patents for "WetMate underwater fiber optic coupling devices" which I'm guessing is probably being used by the U.S. to tap and evesdrop on fiber optic cables on the ocean floor. I would assume it must be used for tapping otherwise it wouldn't be classified. Now the U.S. has used underwater tapping technology against the Soviet Union for a long time, both on copper and fiber optic cables, but I bet you the NSA in concert with the U.S. Navy is underwater tapping any fiber optic cable they can't eavesdrop on land with the help of U.S. phone companies. It would be an interesting case to tack in to this case against AT&T.

The "state-secret privilege" was also use to defeat a case brought by Maher Arar, the Canadian detained by the U.S. at a New York Airport on his way home to Canada. You probably remember reading about it here on slashdot. He was shipped by the U.S. to Syria where he was abused for a year or so before Canada finally managed to free him. His crime as best I remember was he signed as a reference on a lease for a friend of a family member

Re:Proposed Strategy

[PapayaSF]

The information itself may be classified but the fact of whether or not they collected it shouldn't be.

Really? Isn't that like saying circa 1943: "The information itself may be classified but the fact that there is a secret project at Los Alamos and Oak Ridge and Hanford involving uranium shouldn't be"? Or perhaps "The photos themselves should be classified, but the fact that many photo recon missions are being flown over the Normandy coast shouldn't be?"

Sometimes keeping secret the fact that information is being collected is as important, or even more important, than the information itself.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Sometimes keeping secret the fact that information is being collected is as important, or even more important, than the information itself.

In this case, the existence of the thing is itself illegal, so your example doesn't really hold water.

Re:Proposed Strategy

[gstoddart]

The information itself may be classified but the fact of whether or not they collected it shouldn't be.

Unless they're not willing to share the fact that they've collected it, and deem even that to be a state secret.

All they have to do is say "Your honour, if people knew the ways in which we spied on them, they'd switch to other ways to avoid us". If they were stubborn, or just the invasive idiots we believe them to be, they'd fight this just on principle and to deny you the knowledge of if they did it or

EFF's bungling again

[Anonymous Coward]

The issue is that EFF took this as a press-release opportunity and not as a get-to-the-bottom-of-it opportunity. From EFF's first press release on their lawsuit, they believed the NSA would try to shut the case down with state secrets (and, when the NSA filed the paperwork to do so, it said "NSA is not required to demonstrate specific harm when invoking this statutory privelege, but only to show that the information relates to its activities" (http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/DeclKeithAlex a nder.pdf). K

Re:Proposed Strategy

[bill_kress]

Doesn't invoking state secrets at all imply that there is something to keep secret?

Bah!

[Umbral Blot]

This is so much bullshit. One of the principles of democracy is that the people get a say in how the government is run; preventing people from knowing what the government is up to, and preventing them from suing the government when it does something wtrong, goes against this principle. We aren't quite to the maching on congeress phase, but we are getting there fast.

Re:Bah!

[Firehed]

I think the idea of suing the government rather than dissolving and recreating it when it goes severely afoul is wrong enough already. The fact that we can't even sue is at least fourth degree bullshit.

Re:Bah!

[TheGratefulNet]

to put it in the simplest possible terms:

"this is not your father's america".

what we have, now, is nothing close to what the founding fathers envisioned.

Re:Bah!

[Intron]

Yes. I understand women are allowed to vote and slavery has been abolished.

Re:Bah!

[Intron]

You are absolutely correct about women's rights not being limited by the constitution. Whether the majority of the framers were for or against women's sufferage or slavery is another question. Certainly not all were on the same side. As for ad hominem attacks, I don't seem to be alone in that regard.

Re:Bah!

[BalanceOfJudgement]

"So I guess them owning slaves means they didn't support slavery?"

Actually no, it doesn't. Read up on the opinions written by Thomas Jefferson and George Washington regarding the owning of slaves - the founders who did own slaves by and large owned them ONLY so that their positions as wealthy, powerful men would not be questioned. They were well aware of the contradiction between advocating freedom and owning slaves.

They were still politicians, and they weren't perfect. They had their flaws. George Washi

Re:Bah!

[BalanceOfJudgement]

"Contextually the criticism levied against the founding fathers is completely warranted, appropriate, and expected from a modern American."

This depends on the context. If, as you appropriately point out, you're measuring CURRENT standards of freedom and liberty against those achieved by the founders, you can say they missed something.

That is not the spirit of posts like "The founders envisioned a world with slaves and enslaved women." The spirit of such words is to say that the founders did NOT envision a

Re:Bah!

[nuzak]

> We do (sort of) have a say. In November, you can vote out the incumbents. That's what I'll be doing.

I'm sorry but that's not good enough. The rule of law is not something that should be lumped in with tax cuts and gay marriage and all the other happy fun wedge issues.

We can start with trying to vote out the current elite. But we need laws that hold the government accountable, we need to impeach after the fact (strips 'em of pensions and the rights to hold any other office), and so on. We cannot allow tyranny to be the natural result of a term-limited official.

Re:Bah!

[Tackhead]

> We do (sort of) have a say. In November, you can vote out the incumbents. That's what I'll be doing.

Remember, Remember, the Seventh November,
Congress, Corruption and Rot.
I see no reason Dempublican treason,
Should ever be forgot.

Re:Bah!

[spun]

I'm reminded of an old political cartoon. In the first panel it shows an ugly rat in an excercise wheel in front of the US Capitol. He is running to catch a bundle of money dangled in front of him by a fat cat in a tuxedo. Behind him a mob bearing pitchforks and torches advances on him yelling "Throw the rats out!"

In the second panel, the mob has installed a cute mouse in the excercise wheel. The mouse is running after that same bundle of money while the mob walks off congratulating itself on a job well done.

Re:Bah!

[greg_barton]

In November, you can vote out the incumbents.

And what if the election system isn't valid? [rollingstone.com] What then?

the next step...

[geoffspear]

Why stop with the telecomms?

Classify all information about lung cancer as a "state secret" and you can get rid of all the lawsuits against tobacco and asbestos companies. Do the same with medical records, and *poof* there go all of the malpractice claims.

It would certainly save trying to ram all those tort reform packages through pesky Congressional committees.

Re:the next step...

[NoTheory]

I am kind of depressed that parent got modded funny. This is a valid point. The question at hand is really what is the purpose of classifying information, and what is a just use of the powers of classification. The Bush administration does clearly use it for their political benefit (Cheney's energy task force being the most egregious example). And i don't know whether a non-partisan case can be made for using classificational powers in this manner.

Re:the next step...

[DAldredge]

It's funny, the Dems think the ETF was bad but Hillary's health care meetings we OK while the GOPers think the exact opposite.

If it is wrong - it is wrong when the side you support does it too.

Re:the next step...

[NoTheory]

But that's the point. The only justifications are partisan ones. Behavior like this should be unacceptable regardless of who you are. Just because the Dems did it, like the Republicans before them, and the dems before them, and the republicans before that, does not justify current behavior.

Nothing to hide

[Toby The Economist]

Lovely comment in that recent /. article about that wiretapping equipment show -

The State broadly speaking may argue if we have nothing to hide, then why do we object to being watched?

If this is so, why does the State hide so much from *us*?

Re:Nothing to hide

[MrSquirrel]

Exactly -- if they think it's okay to spy on us then why can't we "spy" on the information they obtained from us? With a new non-civilian intelligence head, things don't look good for American civil liberties. I don't see any form of oversight keeping the government in check from abusing/misusing information. Power corrupts -- absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Kill the bells with decentralized telephony

[w33t]

Does it seem plausable that someday voice communications could be handled completely by the people without the need for a big centralized entity like a government or a phone company?

I can see that VOIP is starting to show the potential of decentralized telephony. But could it go completely wireless? I know the technology would be tricky, but it's certainly plausable, yes?

Take for example the LP. Back in the day only very large companies could press records. The machines to mass produce these were expensive

VOIP can't exist without centralized utilities

[drhamad]

Be it telephony, cable or power lines, VOIP can't exist without the centralized utilities. Laying lines is a massive expense with little in the way of reward. Only companies that can be gaurunteed some profit on them can handle it. And that's just the end user (lines to the house) part of it. You have to have bandwidth, and it's the centralized companies that have that. Decentralization only works when you have free or standard access to already laid (as in, by those centralized companies) lines/bandwi

A very serious issue...

[__aaclcg7560]

Even Fox Trot [yahoo.com] is affected by this.

Re:Yeah Asshole

[__aaclcg7560]

Gotta love AC lawyers without a sense of humor.

Really now...

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anyone realize that the State Secrets legal tactic has been used by the Bush administrations than ALL PREVIOUS PRESIDENTIAL ADMINISTRATIONS COMBINED?

Ask yourself this:

DO WE REALLY live in a time more dangerous than the Vietnam War?

DO WE REALLY live in a time more subversive than the Free Speech Movement of the 60's?

DO WE REALLY live in a time more frightening than the Cuban Missile Crisis?

DO WE REALLY live in a time more threatening to our way of life than the 70's Oil Embargo?

State Secrets was ONLY used in the past when classified data could be revealed in a case such that it would greatly hinder or be a serious detriment to National Security. Now I ask you this: What is that danger? Is it Osama Bin Laden? Is it a terrorist in the Middle East who hates us even more for a War that wasn't justified to begin with? Who is our enemy?! Damn, this is the most infuriating thing!

WHY IS NO ONE IN THE MEDIA ASKING THESE QUESTIONS?

Re:Really now...

[10100111001]

WHY IS NO ONE IN THE MEDIA ASKING THESE QUESTIONS?

No one in the mainstream media is asking these questions because if they did they would lose their jobs. More than 95% of all the media we see (radio, newspapers, tv & movies) comes from one of five media corporations. [corporations.org] These corporations are interested in maintaining and gaining power. They do not want the general population to start asking these questions, so they rarely allow any dissenting viewpoints to enter the mainstream media.

If you want to hear these and other questions being asked, you need to go to independent media sources.

Re:Really now...

[demachina]

"WHY IS NO ONE IN THE MEDIA ASKING THESE QUESTIONS?"

After 9/11 the Bush Administration was extremely successful in their "You are either with us or you are against us" strategy which painted anyone who questioned the Bush administration's actions, including journalists, as unpatriotic, or practically terrorists themselves. This is a classic propaganda and nationalism card and they played it very well. This campaign along with the general mood after 9/11 completely terrified journalists out of questioning anything the Bush administration did. Its just now starting to wear off because a few journalists are realizing they were played for complete suckers by the Bush administration.

Rupert Murdoch built Fox News to completely destroy the liberal media and independence in the news room and it worked. He single handedly turned news networks in to sensationalist propaganda tools for the executive branch, witness Fox's Tony Snow is now the press secretary. The fact Fox sky rocketed to #1 news network after 9/11 made all the other networks try to emulate them, not refute them. CNN is now an embarrassing Fox News parody, they aren't even good at it, so they are tanking. I can't stand watching CNN anymore. One liberal media outlet down. The Daily Show is the only liberal news outlet left and its a comedy show, parody. The best thing that could happen to American media right now would be for Time-Warner to sell CNN back to Ted Turner so he could rebuild a news network to challenge the Fox propaganda machine.

TV journalists are hired and rise through the network ranks based on how photogenic they are and on how much of a sycophant they are to both corprate executives, and politicians, not based on their ability as investigative journalists. The networks White House Correspondents and the Pentagon correspondents are just regurgitating the stuff the White House and the Pentagon want them to say on the TV that night. They are thinly veiled propaganda tools of the government. They don't do ANY independent investigation.

Most media outlets are now owned by large corporations thanks to consolidation, and most large corporations have no interest in investigative journalists who attack the government or stoke controversy that might cost them revenue or political good will.

One of the more disturbing invocations of state-secret privilege [wikipedia.org] by George W. Bush was on November 1, 2001, when he signed Executive Order 13233 [wikisource.org]. This order allows George W. to unilaterally prevent any access to his presidential papers for 12 years after he leaves office, unless he and only he authorizes it. Even if the sitting president authorizes it, he can still veto the release.

If its upheld, this should prevent future Congresses or courts from even seeing incriminating executive branch documents to investigate or charge him with illegal or unconstitutional acts, until 2020. Future Presidents can see them but can't release or act on them unless George W. authorizes it. You have to figure that a few weeks after 9/11, George W. was about to sign some orders to do some things that future governments might consider criminal or unconstitutional and his lawyers created this executive order so he could unilaterally obstruct any future investigations, even when he is no longer President. What might those acts be? Massive domestic spying on Americans without court approval, a prison on Gitmo outside the jurisdiction of any court, arresting American citizens without due process, authorization of torture by the military and CIA, secret prisons, launching an illegal war in Iraq based on a web of lies, dramatic expansion of the Rendition program to snatch people anywhere in the world, in violation of other nation's sovereignty to send people to secret prisons to be tortured?

Rendition is particularly apt in a discussion of state-secret privilege. It was used to kill a case brought by

Would these be these same bells

[WindBourne]

that said that they had nothing to do with the NSA? Or are they now acknowledging that CNN was honest.

In other I'll-scratch-your-back news...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12952860/ [msn.com]

"President George W. Bush has bestowed on his intelligence czar, John Negroponte, broad authority, in the name of national security, to excuse publicly traded companies from their usual accounting and securities-disclosure obligations. Notice of the development came in a brief entry in the Federal Register, dated May 5, 2006, that was opaque to the untrained eye."

Land of the free?

[Cicero382]

I don't mean to knock America, but really!

I left the UK in 2001 (just before 9/11) to escape crippling taxes and what I saw as an increasingly oppressive government. I considered two possibilities; the USA and Italy. My wife persuaded (OK, ORDERED) me that Italy was the best bet. On the face of it, at the time, it was the lesser choice. But now...

Forget the taxes, I'm still better off - I'd be even better off in the States, but it's the other thing that concerns me.

Since I've been here I've watched (from a safe distance) a dramatic reduction of the rights someone living in a democracy should expect, both in the UK and the US. Why are you allowing it to happen?

What *really* gets me is - why is it happening? I've asked this question on /. before. It's obviously nothing to do with terrorists and so forth.

It's getting to the point where I'm seriously considering making a tin foil helmet.

PS. Yes, I know similar laws are being considered here, but we have one major advantage. We just say "AAh, F*ck off!" (And that includes the police).

That aid will take the form of . . .

[mmell]

notifying Night Watch of the names and addresses of all plaintiffs attempting to sue a Bell company for complicity in NSA's wiretapping scheme.

Re:That aid will take the form of . . .

[tweek]

Gotta love a good B5 reference.

The sad part is, it fits.

[mmell]

Thankfully, we don't need to worry about the Psi Corps, but President Clark, err, I mean Bush, well . . . that's another matter.

Re:The sad part is, it fits.

[tweek]

I'd take Clark over Bush any day. At least he was being controlled by the Shadows. With Bush, I think he really thinks he's doing the right thing.

Re:The sad part is, it fits.

[blincoln]

I'd take Clark over Bush any day. At least he was being controlled by the Shadows. With Bush, I think he really thinks he's doing the right thing.

My take on that part of the B5 arc was that Clarke and his government weren't so much controlled by the Shadows as they were willingly working with them because they thought they were doing the right thing.

E.g. Clarke and "the ascension of the common man." The diplomat who justified the non-aggression pact with the Centauri because "we will know peace in our time.

Can you hide crimes behind a veil of secrecy?

[metoc]

The big question is can using the "state secrets" privilege be used to permit illegal behaviour now that a secret court exists under FISA?

State Secrets Privilege was abused from the start

[molo]

The State Secrets Privilege [wikipedia.org] was abused from the start. The landmark case that established it via the Supreme Court, United States v. Reynolds [wikipedia.org], was used to cover up the military's negligence. The B-29 crash did not involve national security, but rather a poorly maintained aircraft. Fraud all around. The State Secrets Privilege should never have been made in the first place and should be removed from legal precedent.

-molo

+1, correct

[rodentia]

Yes, the *state secrets privilege* was established in the 50's precisely to limit liability claims against pet military procurement contractors, not to guard secrets. The current case would seem to be a tailor-made situation for the invocation of these dubious privileges.

Re:State Secrets Privilege was abused from the sta

[molo]

You can know for sure. Here are the declassified documents:

Declassified case appendix which contains the allegedly sensitive documents, via Federation of American Scientists: http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/reynoldspetapp.pdf [fas.org]

Also that kind of under-cover spy information has not been what the SSP has been used for. Read the Wikipedia articles about Siebel Edmonds for an example of the modern abuses.

-molo

No wiretaps involved here

[steveg]

There are wiretaps involved with the NSA's FISA violations, but there has been no accusation of domestic wiretapping in the suits against the Bells.

The Bell suits all have to do with turning over call records, not wiretapping. Wiretapping is *live* monitoring of the contents of telephone calls, and the legal bar to performing a wiretap is considerably higher than "trap and trace" or "pen register" monitoring. The massive turnover of call records is equivalent to trap and trace and pen register, and according to the PATRIOT Act, all the authorities have to do to get an order authorizing these latter types of surveillance to to atest that such monitoring is "necessary to an ongoing investigation."

So when the NSA claims that those requests for records was legal, they're probably right. The question to be asked, of course, is *should* it be legal, and that's a whole different question. Congress had the chance to fix that, but they passed the renewed PATRIOT Act, so I guess that means that *they* thought it was OK.

And there may be actual domestic wiretapping going on, but we don't know that since if there is, that story hasn't yet broken.

Re:No wiretaps involved here

[steveg]

Good point. If there was no court order (and are we sure there was no *secret* court order?) then even the PATRIOT Act wouldn't make it legal.

But there's still no wiretap involved.

Vote!

[posterlogo]

I know that people are a bit disillusioned right now with the going-ons in government, and feel waiting until Nov 2006 or 2008 to vote is not enough to deal with the immediate threats and violations of the constitution. A unoffical poll of Slashdot posters would demonstrate a near-unanimous discomfort with the wiretapping, but some of the same people would not be willing to vote out the perpetrators. I ask that everyone here put their money where there mouth is. In this particular matter, there is one party that is thrilled to be spying on Americans and questioning our patriotism, the party of "with us or against us": the Republicans. Though it seems almost certain that the violation of the bill of rights offends most republicans (just look at gun-control attempts), in this case the mob mentality has overruled just about any one Republican's personal moral choices. The solution is to not vote Republican: if you are truly uncomfortable with the way the country is headed, it is necessary to realize that the neo-con movement has usurped the moral authority the Republicans once had.

Re:Vote!

[tweek]

Don't think for a minute that Dems wouldn't do the same thing if they were in power and the Repubs would be bitching about it. Make no mistake that the parties involved are exactly the same but they are just the minority.

Re:Vote!

[Reverend528]

Don't think for a minute that Dems wouldn't do the same thing if they were in power and the Repubs would be bitching about it.

You're missing the important distinction. The democrats would raise taxes to fund the illegal wiretapping, whereas the the republicans don't raise taxes and fund it by sinking our country deeper into debt.

What Will It Take?

[ewhac]

Government and corporations, working hand in hand!

There's a word [wikipedia.org] for that, you know...

Let's review:

• The United States Government is spying on you;
• The United States Government lied to you to get you to agree to go to war;
• The United States Government is sending your children half way across the world to be killed;
• The United States House and Senate are refusing to their jobs of representing you and advocating for your rights and interests;
• The United States Government has undermined your reputation among nations by abandoning global cooperation and diplomacy and acting unilaterally;
• The United States Government has endangered your safety by antagonizing and attacking foreign people, thereby turning them into extremist people;
• The Federal Government and the governments of several states are eliminating your right to self-determination via voting by systematically ignoring all evidence placed before them of voting irregularities and compromised electronic voting machines;
• Etc., etc., etc....

In case you haven't been paying attention for the last seven years, it may interest you to know: You are being systematically fucked. The press has been bought off; they will do nothing to help you. There is only one person left who can do something about it...

But, you see s/he's too busy, and can't be bothered, at least not yet. See, there was the American Idol finale a couple weeks ago where whatshisface (or was it whatsherface?) won, thanks to your attentive help and eager phone calls. Oh! And, and missing the final episodes of Survivor, Will and Grace, The Amazing Race, and House were simply unthinkable! And then there was "March Madness" back in... uh, March, I guess...

"Public corruption? Senate scandals? Incompetent emergency management officials? Mendacious Attorney Generals? Fuck that! I need to know if Natalee Holloway is still dead... [dailykos.com]"

See? Very very busy. So if something important is going on, it will need to be really important before we get his/her attention and they start to act and save the United States. It will need to be shocking so that we grab his/her attention. And it will need to be big so that they understand the importance of acting now. In fact, it will need to be so big that it will swamp out all the other "important" stuff for months.

And so, the question we all need to ask is:

What Will It Take?

Schwab

In a previous post...

[erroneus]

...I stated that it's time to take a stand. And from what I've seen so far, the US Congress is also pretty pissed off about the way the executive has been skirting the checks and balances that this republic depends on. Bush does whatever he wants, claims it's legal and when anyone attempts to validate the claim in court, he claims executive priviledge or state secrets. He hasn't replaced ALL of the supreme court judges yet but I wouldn't be surprised if another judge was replaced pretty soon with the turnover in presidential appointees lately. And once he has enough of his cronies on the bench, THEN he might let a couple of issues actually reach the courts for decision.

I keep hearing that line from Star Wars, Episode 1 --- "...I will MAKE it legal!"

Re:In a previous post...

[blincoln]

I keep hearing that line from Star Wars, Episode 1 --- "...I will MAKE it legal!"

That, and "I *am* the Senate!"

Your tax dollars at work...

[hrrY]

You get what you pay for. In other countries they have a certain *way* of dealing with this stuff; third world countries in particular... but here...we vote to pay the salaries of people that lie to us and create a detriment in rights and privelleges that we have enjoyed and expanded on for decades. And then we come to places like here in an attempt to find perspective that we have always had. Almost everybody knows what has to be done, but we won't do it because it's easier to brew contempt, than to nullif

US gov't needs practice

[MrNougat]

They just want to have a dry run at such lawsuits before their own [boston.com] gets going full speed.

So amend the suit...

[Loki_1929]

The best defense against this sort of action which I can think of would be to amend the suit to add charges of criminal conspiracy between the Executive branch of the Federal government and the telecos. Allege that a pattern of controlled, organized, criminal behavior has been occuring, thus invoking the criminal enterprise definitions from RICO. At that point, so long as you can sustain the criminal conspiracy charges, you can argue that successful invocation of the "state secrets" privilege would be a fur

Another step to totalitarism

[flibuste]

Dissolve any lawsuit against invasion of privacy through "State secret"

Get rid more and more of freedom of speech everyday.

Arbitrarily deport and detain people to lawless countries to interrogate them freely.

Use torture on presumably innocent people.

Best recipe for growing a fascist country. Good job Bush and good luck fellow americans!

plaintiffs...seeking billions

[dougman]

When I see "plaintiffs...seeking billions" I see Lawyers seeking billions who will get me a three dollar credit on my long distance bill and cost me twenty dollars in taxes.

Regardless of where you come down on the issue, the way the lawyers are going about this makes me want to puke.

No way to defend? No kidding.

[necro2607]

"As it stands right now we have no way to defend against these lawsuits"

No shit. That's the whole point. You fucked up. You're now liable for some serious legal action. GJ HF TTYL ^_^

Is it just me, or is it getting fucking old hearing about huge corporations avoiding responsibility for anything at all costs?

Will this even help anything?

[bigtrike]

The thought that this type of thing is even necessary is based on the flawed assumption that terrorists are trying to be covert in the first place.

Several of the 9/11 terrorists were wanted as suspects and living under their real names for at least 9 months in Los Angeles. One even purchased a car in his own name and was listed in the Los Angeles white pages.

Even if a massive reduction in privacy would help save a couple lives, I'd personally rather not live a life without liberty. We're mocking the sacrifice made by hundreds of thousands of patriots who have died to protect our liberties by giving them up without much of a fight.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[geoffspear]

The only time an attack by a foreign power was ever carried out on U.S. soil was Pearl Harbour.

While I agree with your sentiment in the rest of your post, your grasp of history leaves a lot to be desired.

Unless you consider the War of 1812 to be a continuation of the Revolutionary War and hold the opinion that the US was still British territory until the Treaty of Ghent, which not even the British at the time would have asserted.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[eno2001]

You are correct. I should have specified within the last 100 years.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[Nf1nk]

And you would still be wrong
http://www.militarymuseum.org/Ellwood.html [militarymuseum.org]
although this is a very small footnote in the history of world war II

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[Phillup]

And... let's not forget that the Japanese actually occupied [hlswilliwaw.com] a portion of US soil during WW2 also.

The Japanese occupied Attu island as well as several others in the Aleutian chain during WWII. For an interesting read, check out the book titled "The Thousand Mile War: World War II in Alaska and the Aleutians" by Brian Garfield.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[slughead]

The only time an attack by a foreign power was ever carried out on U.S. soil was Pearl Harbour. 9/11 was done by the U.S. government. WAKE UP NOW!

I woke up this morning, drank some coffee.. but since this got modded up I must still be asleep.

9/11 was done not by the US government but by Saddam Hussein! Wait that's not right either.

Couldn't there be some sort of middle-ground? Truth, maybe?

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[lawpoop]

"9/11 was done not by the US government but by Saddam Hussein! Wait that's not right either.

Couldn't there be some sort of middle-ground? Truth, maybe?"

I like the way you think! I am interested in finding this truthy middle-ground.

How about a real investigation, where high-ranking folks like Bush and Cheney testify under oath?

Who says that the truth is in the middle?

[chaboud]

This is one problem I have with the current mindset.

Why is it that the truth is in the middle between two seemingly extreme viewpoints? Why wasn't there facilitation of 9/11 by the Bush administration? There are a lot of unnervingly unanswered questions. Why wasn't Saddam responsible?

Okay... Sorry... That's just stupid.

Still, my point is that the middle between two opposed viewpoints shouldn't be where we assume the truth lies. It just allows someone who is willing to say or do anything shift the frame

Re:Who says that the truth is in the middle?

[lawpoop]

You are right. I agree that usually the truth is something that is widely removed from the public mindshare. ( As an example, look at anything about the nature of the cosmos that science has revealed -- the structure of the solar system, gravity, DNA, etc. ) Anywho, triangulation, or the truth being 'between' two sides, is a false conception. The idea of triangulation just means that you have to pit someone who is more extreme in their views against your adversary. Then, since both sides have to agree to me

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[The-Pheon]

The only time an attack by a foreign power was ever carried out on U.S. soil was Pearl Harbour.

Maybe you forgot that the United States was invaded by Great Britian in 1812? The Aleutian Islands were invaded in june of 1942.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[pete6677]

Do you care to back up any of the lofty claims you just made (George Bush crimes and 9/11 conspiracies)? No, I suspect not. I'm guessing you'll just make an immature profane rant of a reply. Grow up little kid, your crap is getting old.

For the record, I am not a G.W. fan by any means, but there is plenty of real evidence to be used to bash Bush without resorting to hysterical fabrications.

Bush? You mean President Clark?

[mmell]

Don't blame me - I voted for Kodos.

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[truthsearch]

I'd hate to break it to you, but he's not a criminal. A weak president perhaps, but not a criminal.

He's responsible for the actions of the military. Here's therefore guilty of war crimes. His own lawyer told him so (2 years ago, IIRC).

Re:Still Think the US isn't Headed for Fascism?

[JavaLord]

Although, we're there at the invitation / permission of the local countries. Bin Laden should direct his anger about this point toward the host nations instead of the U.S., but won't for obvious political and ego/ethno-centric reasons.

This is very true. He is not right minded, but it doesn't change the underlying fact. If we were not there, they would not be here.

Also, I suspect that many other middle easterners hold the same feelings Bin Laden did. If you are American, do you enjoy it when Europea

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[plasmacutter]

I don't break any laws as I conduct my telephone conversations, nor do (I would speculate) 99.99% of Americans. But if we catch terrorists and avert attacks, what's the harm in the government monitoring these phone calls?....And folks, please spare me the privacy argument/nonsense... this statement is nothing more than a more sophisticated way of saying "if you've done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear", the last portion really disqualifies you from saying anymore on the subject. It reflects absolutely no respect for the constitutional protections for the people of this nation. Point1: there are many "unenforcible" and antiquated laws on the books which can be used against you if the dominant party doesnt like what you are doing or who you are associating with Point2: even if it is not used for legal abuse, it can be used for closed door blackmail/threats to keep the opposing political groups and corporations "in line" Point3: We have had technically feasible ways to invade people's privacy en wholesale since the late 40's but you didnt see it happen because when they try they face the public wrath Point4: according to that statement above, why are they trying to invoke state secrets to hide their obvious breach of the constitution on multiple amendments? hmmm?

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[plasmacutter]

the majority of this reply is clearly idealogical, no i don't propose you being gagged, and by the way people who moderate are not allowed to post replies in the same article, I would not have modded you troll

that said, i do want to address some things:

But you need to understand something: We are at WAR.
war against what? an abstract concept of "terror"? that concept is being ever expanded to encompass, at latest, journalists and whistleblowers.
The definition of war in the constitution is clear, war must b

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[QCompson]

if we don't take EVERY POSSIBLE MEASURE to prevent an attack (whatever manner or form it may be), THERE MAY WELL NOT BE A CONSTITUTION TO PROTECT OUR RIGHTS WITH.

So you don't care if we lose some constitutionally protected rights in the war on terror, because otherwise the scary boogeymen terrorists will blow us all up and then we wouldn't have a constitution anyway, right?

Place a lot of trust in the government, do you? Wouldn't it just be better then to tear up the constitution and structure ourselv

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[jaystrick]

> But if we catch terrorists and avert attacks, what's the harm in the government monitoring these phone
> calls? It doesn't affect my daily life one bit - but an attack not thwarted most definitely would!

That's the point. Why make sweeping changes that will get everyone up in arms when you can do it little by little, one basic right after another. By the time mainstream America finally gets the gumption to protest about it, it's too late. The USA 'democracy' is brought down, not by terrorists, but

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[Proteus]

But if we catch terrorists and avert attacks, what's the harm in the government monitoring these phone calls? It doesn't affect my daily life one bit - but an attack not thwarted most definitely would!

Sure, it doesn't affect your life, but what about the lives of the current administration's (whomever that may be at any given time) political opponents? And no, this isn't tinfoil-hat talk: it's been done before by other administrations, and is a large part of why we have the wiretapping laws to begin with!

F

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[koreth]

Jeez, the above should not be modded "Troll." A whole lot of people feel the way the poster does. I am not one of them, but even though I vehemently disagree with this point of view, I see that it's one whose popularity makes it very much germane to the discussion. Moderate based on whether something contributes to an interesting discussion, not whether you agree with it.

With that off my chest, I will try to answer the question. You should be concerned about this because once the infrastructure to spy on

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[truthsearch]

But if we catch terrorists and avert attacks, what's the harm in the government monitoring these phone calls?

Names, please? Name one terrorist caught or one attack averted due directly or indirectly to the NSA having these phone records.

Can I have an estimate of how many lives have been saved so I can weigh that against the loss of privacy and/or potential abuses?

That's ok, I'll wait for the answer...

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[blcamp]

Names, please? Name one terrorist caught or one attack averted due directly or indirectly to the NSA having these phone records.

Can I have an estimate of how many lives have been saved so I can weigh that against the loss of privacy and/or potential abuses?

That's ok, I'll wait for the answer...


Here's one example:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/security/ops/milleni um-plot.htm [globalsecurity.org]

You can Google for the rest yourself.

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[BalanceOfJudgement]

Sorry, do not pass go, do not collect $200, as my mother used to say. The event you have linked to occurred before September 11, 2001. LONG before, in fact. Which just weakens your case: These people can be, and WERE, caught, without the extreme measures that our current government is attempting to use.

In fact, dozens of FBI agents already knew that 9/11 was being planned long before it happened, but the "big wigs" decided to ignore them. So it seems then, that what we need isn't more information and mo

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[truthsearch]

"Ressam handed the Customs agent a Price Costco membership card in the same false name as his passport. As that agent began an initial pat-down, Ressam panicked and tried to run away."

What the hell do phone records have to do with that story? He was only caught because he freaked and tried to run. You can keep googling and get back to us, because you won't find any stories showing NSA analysis of these phone records have caugh anyone.

Also, the phone records were elegedly recorded after 9/11/2001. This st

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[blcamp]

Sorry, do not pass go, do not collect $200, as my mother used to say. The event you have linked to occurred before September 11, 2001. LONG before, in fact. Which just weakens your case: These people can be, and WERE, caught, without the extreme measures that our current government is attempting to use.

In fact, dozens of FBI agents already knew that 9/11 was being planned long before it happened,

And how was it that they found out? What measures of surveillance did they use?

Carnivore and other means of elect

Re:Uncle Sam will get to collect all he wants.

[DM9290]

If the Government wants to find out who I talk to and when... it's pretty easy to get that information now as it is.

without a warrent? how do they do that?

If they want to actually listen... it's a waste of time but hey, what do I care? Knock yourself out.

May I listen as well? Its a waste of time but I'll be keeping a record just in case I ever need it for your protection.

My point: I hardly think the Government is interested in what I am asking my wife to make for dinner tonight, or whether I need to pick u

Re:show me the proof

[BalanceOfJudgement]

I think the grandparent poster was joking.. at least that's how I read it. Extreme hyperbole.