In watching the opening speaches in the Alito Confirmation Hearings it became obvious that the atitude of the Democrats is very similar to something I read in the humor site ScrappleFace: Isn’t the role of the majority to ensure that the minority gets its way.... We don’t want to be accused of discriminating against them just because they lost the elections.
When the Senate confirmed Clinton's choices for the Supreme Court, a number of conservative Senators approved his nominations, feeling that he won the election, and thus was entitled to name liberals to the court. After seeing how the Democrats have behaved with Bush appointees to the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court, I wonder what Conservative Senators will do if we ever again have a Democratic President. I hope they will give the Dems back some of what they have given Bush's nominees.
Despite this, I believe and hope that Alito will be approved.
Monday, January 09, 2006
Alito Hearings
How to Stay Out of Power
Joe Klein wrote in TIME House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat, engaged in a small but cheesy bit of deception last week.
Sounds like Pelosi.She released a letter, which quickly found its way to the front page of the New York Times,
That will print anything if they think it will hurt George Bush.that she had written on Oct. 11, 2001, to then National Security Agency director General Michael V. Hayden. In it she expressed concern that Hayden, who had briefed the House Intelligence Committee about the steps he was taking to track down al-Qaeda terrorists after the 9/11 attacks, was not acting with "specific presidential authorization."
Tracking al Qaeda was not important, what was important was how it was done.Hayden wrote her back that he was acting under the powers granted to his agency in a 1981 Executive Order. In fact, a 2002 investigation by the Joint Intelligence Committees concluded that the NSA was not doing as much as it could have been doing under the law—and that the entire U.S. intelligence community operated in a hypercautious defensive crouch. "Hayden was taking reasonable steps," a former committee member told me. "Our biggest concern was what more he could be doing."
That is the right way to look at it.The Bush Administration had similar concerns. In the days after 9/11, it asked Hayden to push the edge of existing technology and come up with the best possible program to track the terrorists. The result was the now infamous NSA data-mining operation, which began months later, in early 2002. Vast amounts of phone and computer communications by al-Qaeda suspects overseas, including some messages to people in the U.S., could now be scooped up and quickly analyzed.
The release of Pelosi's letter last week and the subsequent Times story ("Agency First Acted on Its Own to Broaden Spying, Files Show") left the misleading impression that a) Hayden had launched the controversial data-mining operation on his own, and b) Pelosi had protested it. But clearly the program didn't exist when Pelosi wrote the letter. When I asked the Congresswoman about this, she said, "Some in the government have accused me of confusing apples and oranges. My response is, it's all fruit."
In other words she can't tell the difference.A dodgy response at best, but one invested with a larger truth. For too many liberals, all secret intelligence activities are "fruit," and bitter fruit at that. The government is presumed guilty of illegal electronic eavesdropping until proven innocent.... It would have been a scandal if the NSA had not been using these tools to track down the bad guys. There is evidence that the information harvested helped foil several plots and disrupt al-Qaeda operations.
And that is the important thing.There is also evidence, according to U.S. intelligence officials, that since the New York Times broke the story, the terrorists have modified their behavior,
Why do they need Al Jazeera if they have the New York Timeshampering our efforts to keep track of them—but also, on the plus side, hampering their ability to communicate with one another.
Pelosi made clear to me that she considered Hayden, now Deputy Director of National Intelligence, an honorable man who would not overstep his bounds. "I trust him," she said. "I haven't accused him of anything. I was, and remain, concerned that he has the proper authority to do what he is doing." A legitimate concern, but the Democrats are on thin ice here. Some of the wilder donkeys talked about a possible Bush impeachment after the NSA program was revealed.
The latest version of the absolutely necessary Patriot Act, which updates the laws regulating the war on terrorism and contains civil-liberties improvements over the first edition, was nearly killed by a stampede of Senate Democrats. Most polls indicate that a strong majority of Americans favor the act, and I suspect that a strong majority would favor the NSA program as well, if its details were declassified and made known.
In fact, liberal Democrats are about as far from the American mainstream on these issues as Republicans were when they invaded the privacy of Terri Schiavo's family in the right-to-die case last year.
But there is a difference. National security is a far more important issue, and until the Democrats make clear that they will err on the side of aggressiveness in the war against al-Qaeda, they will probably not regain the majority in Congress or the country.
Sunday, January 08, 2006
All Parts of New Orleans Included in Rebuilding Plan
NYT reported The city's official blueprint for redevelopment after Hurricane Katrina, to be released on Wednesday, will recommend that residents be allowed to return and rebuild anywhere they like, no matter how damaged or vulnerable the neighborhood, according to several members of the mayor's rebuilding commission.
No federal funds should be used to rebuild on land that is 7 to 15 feet below sea level.The proposal appears to put the city's rebuilding panel on a collision course with its state counterpart, which will control at least some of the flow of federal rebuilding money to the city.
It better prevent ANY federal funds from going into the below sea level areas.The primary author of the plan, Joseph C. Canizaro, said teams of outside experts would try to help residents of each neighborhood decide whether to rebuild or relocate. Those teams would help increase the odds of success for those residents who decided to return, Mr. Canizaro said.
The commission will propose that the city should discourage homeowners from rebuilding in the hardest hit areas until a plan can be hammered out, but will not forbid them from doing so.
If someone wants to spend his own money, and assume the total risk of building in that area, they should be able to, but if they are flooded out again they should not expect federal funds to rebuild again.But ultimately, the areas that fail to attract a critical mass of residents in 12 months will probably not survive as residential neighborhoods, Mr. Canizaro said, and are likely to end up as marshland as the city's population declines and its footprint shrinks.
That sounds reasonable. Even more reasonable would be to take down the levees protecting that area and allow it to become a large lake.People who rebuild in those areas will be forced to leave, according to the proposal. Though such a requirement would be emotionally wrenching, the commission will propose a buyout program to compensate those people at the market price before Hurricane Katrina, but it is not clear whether there will be federal financing for such a program.
Not a penny of federal money should be made available for that.
Saturday, January 07, 2006
Report Rebuts Bush on Spying
WaPo reported A report by Congress's research arm concluded yesterday that the administration's justification for the warrantless eavesdropping authorized by President Bush conflicts with existing law and hinges on weak legal arguments.
And a report from the executive branch (the Attorney General) says he does have the power. Congress is interested in increasing its power, and limiting the power of the executive branch, so what do we expect Congress's research arm to say.The Congressional Research Service's report rebuts the central assertions made recently by Bush and Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales about the president's authority to order secret intercepts of telephone and e-mail exchanges between people inside the United States and their contacts abroad. The findings, the first nonpartisan assessment of the program's legality to date, prompted Democratic lawmakers and civil liberties advocates to repeat calls yesterday for Congress to conduct hearings on the monitoring program and attempt to halt it.
Why would they want to halt it. Do they want to help the terrorists communicate with their cells in the US, to encourage another strike here? If Congress feels the President does not have the necessary authority, then they should give it to him. Like the original Patriot Act, which should be renewed, they can sunset the authority in four years, and thus have another chance to look at it, but the taps should be continued and even expanded now.The 44-page report said that Bush probably cannot claim the broad presidential powers he has relied upon as authority to order the secret monitoring of calls made by U.S. citizens since the fall of 2001. Congress expressly intended for the government to seek warrants from a special Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court before engaging in such surveillance when it passed legislation creating the court in 1978, the CRS report said.
Friday, January 06, 2006
Saddam's Terror Training Camps
Stephen F. Hayes wrote in Weekly Standard The former Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein trained thousands of radical Islamic terrorists from the region at camps in Iraq over the four years immediately preceding the U.S. invasion, according to documents and photographs recovered by the U.S. military in postwar Iraq.
this is somewhat inconsistent with the Dems screaming that Saddam had no connection to Al Qaeda.The existence and character of these documents has been confirmed to THE WEEKLY STANDARD by eleven U.S. government officials. The secret training took place primarily at three camps--in Samarra, Ramadi, and Salman Pak--and was directed by elite Iraqi military units. Interviews by U.S. government interrogators with Iraqi regime officials and military leaders corroborate the documentary evidence. Many of the fighters were drawn from terrorist groups in northern Africa with close ties to al Qaeda, chief among them Algeria's GSPC and the Sudanese Islamic Army. Some 2,000 terrorists were trained at these Iraqi camps each year from 1999 to 2002, putting the total number at or above 8,000. Intelligence officials believe that some of these terrorists returned to Iraq and are responsible for attacks against Americans and Iraqis. According to three officials with knowledge of the intelligence on Iraqi training camps, White House and National Security Council officials were briefed on these findings in May 2005; senior Defense Department officials subsequently received the same briefing.
The photographs and documents on Iraqi training camps come from a collection of some 2 million "exploitable items" captured in postwar Iraq and Afghanistan. They include handwritten notes, typed documents, audiotapes, videotapes, compact discs, floppy discs, and computer hard drives. Taken together, this collection could give U.S. intelligence officials and policymakers an inside look at the activities of the former Iraqi regime in the months and years before the Iraq war.
Murtha Fears a Withdrawal
Byron York wrote in National Review Online Representative John Murtha, the Pennsylvania Democrat who has come to national prominence since his call for a quick withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, said Thursday night that he worries about "a slow withdrawal which makes it look like there's a victory." Appearing at a town meeting in Arlington, Virginia, with fellow Democratic Rep. James Moran, Murtha said, "A year ago, I said we can't win this militarily, and I got all kinds of criticism." Now, Murtha told the strongly antiwar audience, "I worry about a slow withdrawal which makes it look like there's a victory
What he fears is not the slow withdrawal; it is that it may be considered a victory.when I think it should be a redeployment as quickly as possible and let the Iraqis handle the whole thing."
He wants us to withdraw immediately so that Iraq will break into a Civil War, which the Dems can then say shows we were wrong to go in.The meeting, which attracted an overflow crowd, was promoted by the Internet activist group MoveOn.org, which said that "Congressman Moran has extended a special invitation to MoveOn members in his district and nearby."
MoveOn is the extreme left wing group Soros supports. I am tempted to say that they got Murtha's name wrong, and that the y misspelled it, because it should be Congressman Moron, but there are two congressmen named Moran, one from Kansas and one from Virginia, and since it was held in Virginia I suspect they mean Jim MoranIt was also promoted on some antiwar websites like afterdowningstreet.org. War supporters organized by the conservative freerepublic.com demonstrated outside.
Ariel Sharon
WorldTribune claims that Ariel Sharon was declared dead by physicians at Jerusalem's Hadassah Hospital before 1 p.m. Israeli time [6 a.m. EST], but most other sources say he is still in a coma. Maybe the WorldTribune did not print anything about the "Miracle in the Mines" that just about every newspaper and tv station went with for three hours, before they learned the truth, and the WorldTribune wants to be first, whether accurate or not.
Pat Robertson suggested Ariel Sharon's stroke was divine retribution for "dividing God's land" of Israel. Apparently Pat is sad that his 15 minutes of fame expired, and the only way he can get in the spotlight is to stick his foot in his mouth, and make an absurd statement.
The Iranian President just hopes Sharon dies.
Charles Krauthammer sees Sharon's stroke as a calamity for Israel because he does not see anyone else being able to take a centrist role between the left that just wants to negotiate everything away, and the right that does not want to talk until they see that the Palestinians really want peace.
Haaretz reports a senior Kadima figure said Thursday the party would suffer a huge blow if Shimon Peres were to lead it. He believes Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert should take the lead.
I am praying for Ariel Sharon, but I doubt he will be able to resume his position as Prime Minister, and I dont know enough about Israeli politiecs to know whether Kadima can survive without him as its leader (I doubt it).
Thursday, January 05, 2006
$11 billion judgment awarded in spam case
MSNBC reported An Internet service provider was awarded an $11.2 billion judgment against a Florida man for sending millions of unsolicited e-mails advertising mortgage and debt consolidation services.
A few more of these and I suspect spammers in the US will disappear, but unfortunately they will probably just move to another country, at least for a server to send out the spam.The lawsuit, filed in 2003 by CIS Internet Services owner Robert Kramer III, also prompted earlier judgments against companies in Florida and Arizona worth more than $1 billion. "This ruling sets a new standard," Kramer said in a statement. "Gross abusers of e-mail risk exposure to public ridicule as well as the economic death penalty."
Bush Appointments Avert Senate Battles
WaPo reports President Bush yesterday made a raft of controversial recess appointments, including Julie L. Myers to head the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau at the Department of Homeland Security, in a maneuver circumventing the need for approval by the Senate.
Good for him. The Senate has plenty of important work to do, including passing the Patriot Act, consenting to the Alito nomination, etc and these people need to get to work now.
Reporter defends release of NSA spy program
MSNBC reported James Risen says his sources are ‘patriots,’ CIA calls them ‘unreliable’
If you think they are patriots, reveal their names, so they can be honored for their patriotism. And if it turns out they have violated the law, well patriotism sometimes has a price..... Mitchell: Did you have any concerns about revealing this secret program?
Risen: No, I thought that the American people really needed to know about this. I think it had to be debated publicly.
So if a reporter thinks that a classified program should be debated publicly, does he have a right to expose anything he wants. Eisenhower is certainly lucky that some reported did not think the Normandy Invasion should be debated publicly..... Mitchell: What changed to permit The Times to publish this story after holding it for a year?
Risen: Well, I think that you know we got more information as the paper has said, but I have agreed not to discuss in any detail what happened. But I just think that it was a great decision to go forward.
After all, I have a book coming out this month, and the publicity will cause me to sell many more copies.Mitchell: The Justice Department is now investigating the leak. Are you concerned about being forced to reveal your sources?
Risen: Well, I would rather not, obviously. I hope that doesn't happen, but I can't really talk about that until the time comes. Hopefully, we won't have to face that.
Call a Grand Jury and let us see what happens.Mitchell: Will you resist revealing sources?
Risen: Well, I don't want to get into what I'll plan to do, because it's not something I have to think about right now.
I hope I don't have to go to jail. It will interfere with the tour to sell my book.Mitchell: Couldn't some people call your sources traitors?
Risen: People can call them anything they want. It's a free country. You can call something anything and people today call people all kinds of things. I know what they are and I know what they did and I believe they're patriots.
Then reveal their names.
Democrat Says Spy Briefings Violated Law
NYT reported The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee said on Wednesday that the limited Congressional briefings the Bush administration has provided on a National Security Agency eavesdropping program violated the law.
Note she is not saying the eavesdropping violated the law, she is saying that the briefings violated the law, because she was not included in the briefings.In a letter to President Bush, the representative, Jane Harman of California, said the briefings did not comply with the National Security Act of 1947. That law requires the House and Senate Intelligence Committees to be "kept fully and currently informed" about the spy agencies' activities.
And the gang of 8 was briefed. As Michelle Malkin points out, the paragraph before that readsThe briefings on the program under which Americans and other people in the United States are selected for eavesdropping without court warrants were limited to the so-called Gang of Eight. That consists of the Republican and Democratic leaders of each house and of the Intelligence Committees. Because of turnover in those positions, 14 members of Congress attended one or more briefings. Ms. Harman wrote in her letter that the law allowed briefings to be limited to the eight leaders only in cases of covert action.To the extent consistent with due regard for the protection from unauthorized disclosure of classified information relating to sensitive intelligence sources and methods or other exceptionally sensitive matters, the Director of Central Intelligence and the heads of all departments, agencies, and other entities of the United States Government involved in intelligence activities shallAlso under 50 USC 413b(c)(2)If the President determines that it is essential to limit access to the finding to meet extraordinary circumstances affecting vital interests of the United States, the finding may be reported to the chairmen and ranking minority members of the congressional intelligence committees, the Speaker and minority leader of the House of Representatives, the majority and minority leaders of the Senate, and such other member or members of the congressional leadership as may be included by the President.And apparently the President determined that Jane Harman did not need to be informed.
The eavesdroping was covert, until the New York Times exposed it to try to affect the reneewal of the Patriot Act and to get some publicity for a reporter who had a book coming out this month.The National Security Agency program does not qualify as a covert action, which the law says does not include activities whose "primary purpose is to acquire intelligence," she wrote.
That is what NSA's purpose is. We use the CIA to go in and shoot someone, or blow something up.Asked about the letter, a spokesman for the National Security Council, Frederick Jones, said, "We believe Congress was briefed appropriately on this matter."
I agree.Representative Peter Hoekstra, the Intelligence Committee chairman, defended the limited briefings in a letter to Ms. Harman that was released today. He said the law's requirements were met by the briefings given to him and Ms. Harman. "The committee has been informed, in good faith by the president of the United States," Mr. Hoekstra wrote.
NSA whistleblower asks to testify
Washington Times reports Russ Tice, a whistleblower who was dismissed from the NSA last year,
The Whistleblower Protection act prevents one from being fired for blowing the whistle, so if he was dismissed it must have been for something he did or did not do, and not for blowing the whistle, so if he is now seeking to testify that something is illegal, then he should be called a disgruntled former employee out to get revenge.stated in letters to the House and Senate intelligence committees that he is prepared to testify about highly classified Special Access Programs, or SAPs, that were improperly carried out by both the NSA and the DIA. "I intend to report to Congress probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts conducted while I was an intelligence officer with the National Security Agency and with the Defense Intelligence Agency," Mr. Tice stated in the Dec. 16 letters, copies of which were obtained by The Washington Times. The letters were sent the same day that the New York Times revealed that the NSA was engaged in a clandestine eavesdropping program that bypassed the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court.
Does this mean Tice is the source that betrayed classified information a year ago when the NYT first wanted to run the story, and is the the source for the classified information in the book the NYT reporter has written, or is he just a disgruntled fired employee seeking to pile on and get revenge.The FISA court issues orders for targeted electronic and other surveillance by the government. President Bush said Sunday that the NSA spying is "a necessary program" aimed at finding international terrorists by tracking phone numbers linked to al Qaeda. Mr. Bush said during a visit to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio that al Qaeda is "making phone calls, [and] it makes sense to find out why." Critics of the eavesdropping program, which gathered and sifted through large amounts of telephone and e-mail to search for clues to terrorists'
It absolutely makes sens to find out why, and if FISA is not adequate to do the job, then I am happy Bush found another way.communications, say the activities might have been illegal because they were carried out without obtaining a FISA court order. The Justice Department has said the program is legal under presidential powers authorized by Congress in 2001. Mr. Tice said yesterday that he was not part of the intercept program.
If he was not a part of the intercept program, then what makes him an expert on what was being done?In his Dec. 16 letter, Mr. Tice wrote that his testimony would be given under the provisions of the 1998 Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act, which makes it legal for intelligence officials to disclose wrongdoing without being punished.
But if he is the traitor that leaked the information a year ago he should be tried for that crime.The activities involved the NSA director, the NSA deputies chief of staff for air and space operations and the secretary of defense, he stated. "These ... acts were conducted via very highly sensitive intelligence programs and operations known as Special Access Programs," Mr. Tice said. The letters were sent to Sen. Pat Roberts, Kansas Republican, and Rep. Peter Hoekstra, Michigan Republican. Mr. Roberts is chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and Mr. Hoekstra is chairman of the House counterpart. Spokesmen for the NSA and the Senate intelligence committee declined to comment. Spokesmen for the House intelligence committee and the DIA said they were aware of Mr. Tice's letters, but had not seen formal copies of them.
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Agency Initiated Growth of Spying Effort
NYT reported The National Security Agency acted on its own authority, without a formal directive from President Bush, to expand its domestic surveillance operations in the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to declassified documents released Tuesday.
Good for themThe N.S.A. operation prompted questions from a leading Democrat, Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, who said in an Oct. 11, 2001, letter to a top intelligence official that she was concerned about the agency's legal authority to expand its domestic operations, the documents showed. Ms. Pelosi's letter, which was declassified at her request,
Because she now thinks it might be able to hurt the administration, while if she had gone public in 2001 she knew everyone would turn against her.showed much earlier concerns among lawmakers about the agency's domestic surveillance operations than had been previously known. Similar objections were expressed by Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, Democrat of West Virginia, in a secret letter to Vice President Dick Cheney nearly two years later.
It takes Senators a little longer to write CYA letters.The letter from Ms. Pelosi, the House minority leader, also suggested that the security agency, whose mission is to eavesdrop on foreign communications, moved immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks to identify terror suspects at home by loosening restrictions on domestic eavesdropping.
I hope they did. The foolishness of the Clinton administration, of establishing a wall between the intelligence agencies and the FBI, and not wanting to do anything unless they were sure they could win in court, had just resulted in the loss of two buildings and nearly 3,000 lives.The congresswoman wrote to Lt. Gen. Michael V. Hayden, then head of the N.S.A., to express her concerns after she and other members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees received a classified briefing from General Hayden on Oct. 1, 2001, about the agency's operations. Ms. Pelosi, then the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said, "I am concerned whether, and to what extent, the National Security Agency has received specific presidential authorization for the operations you are conducting."
The answer, General Hayden suggested in his response to Ms. Pelosi a week later, was that it had not. "In my briefing," he wrote, "I was attempting to emphasize that I used my authorities to adjust N.S.A.'s collection and reporting." It is not clear whether General Hayden referred at the briefing to the idea of warrantless eavesdropping. Parts of the letters from Ms. Pelosi and General Hayden concerning other specific aspects of the spy agency's domestic operation were blacked out because they remain classified.
She only asked to declassify the stuff she though would hurt the administration.But officials familiar with the uncensored letters said they referred to other aspects of the domestic eavesdropping program.
Bush administration officials said on Tuesday that General Hayden, now the country's No. 2 intelligence official, had acted on the authority previously granted to the N.S.A., relying on an intelligence directive known as Executive Order 12333, issued by President Ronald Reagan in 1981. That order set guidelines for the collection of intelligence, including by the N.S.A.
"He had authority under E.O. 12333 that had been given to him, and he briefed Congress on what he did under those authorities," said Judith A. Emmel, a spokeswoman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. "Beyond that, we can't get into details of what was done."
In 2002, President Bush signed an executive order specifically authorizing the security agency to eavesdrop without warrants on the international communications of Americans inside the United States who the agency believed were connected to Al Qaeda. The disclosure of the domestic spying program last month provoked an outcry in Washington, where Congressional hearings are planned.
General Hayden's October 2001 briefing was one of the first glimpses into the expanded but largely hidden role that the N.S.A. would assume in combating terrorism over the last four years.
In the briefing, Ms. Pelosi wrote to General Hayden, "you indicated that you had been operating since the Sept. 11 attacks with an expansive view of your authorities" with respect to electronic surveillance and intelligence-gathering operations.
"You seemed to be inviting expressions of concern from us, if there were any," Ms. Pelosi wrote, but she said that the lack of specific information about the agency's operations made her concerned about the legal rationale used to justify it.
One step that the agency took immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks, Ms. Pelosi wrote in her letter, was to begin forwarding information from foreign intelligence intercepts to the F.B.I. for investigation without first receiving a specific request from the bureau for "identifying information."
Good for them.In the past, under so-called minimization procedures intended to guard Americans' privacy, the agency's standard practice had been to require a written request from a government official who wanted to know the name of an American citizen or a person in the United States who was mentioned or overheard in a wiretap.
A totally stupid procedure established under the Clinto administration.In the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, the agency began monitoring telephone calls and e-mail messages between the United States and Afghanistan to track possible terror suspects. That program led to the broader eavesdropping operation on other international communications, officials have said.
The agency has also tapped into some of the nation's main telecommunications arteries to trace and analyze large volumes of phone and e-mail traffic to look for patterns of possible terrorist activity.
Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the new documents, along with previous reports of objections to the program from Senator Rockefeller and James B. Comey, the former deputy attorney general, underscored the need for a comprehensive investigation.
Just make it a secret investigation, and if any of it appears in the New York Times, prosecute the leakers with charges of treason."There's an increasing picture of concern, if not outright opposition, within the government," Mr. Rotenberg said. "But we can't second-guess anyone's actions on a document-by-document basis," particularly if the documents are released only in part, he added.
The way the N.S.A.'s role has expanded has prompted concern even from some of its former leaders, like Bobby R. Inman, a retired admiral who was N.S.A. director from 1977 to 1981. Admiral Inman said that while he supported the decision to step up eavesdropping against potential terrorists immediately after the 2001 attacks, the Bush administration should have tried to change the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to provide explicit legal authorization for what N.S.A. was doing. "What I don't understand is why when you're proposing the Patriot Act, you don't set up an oversight mechanism for this?" Admiral Inman said in an interview.
Because they felt they already had the legal right to do it, and they did not want the terrorists to know they were going to do it."I would have preferred an approach to try to gain legislation to try to operate with new technology and with an audit of how this technology was used."
Tuesday, January 03, 2006
For Bush, a Test in the Midterms
E. J. Dionne Jr. wrote in WaPo Elections at midterm can be low-interest affairs or immensely important. This fall's congressional elections will be a big show with large consequences, because 2006 is looking a lot like the political years 1958, 1966 and 1978, all of which heralded major political transformations.
Or at least the Democrats, and their lap dogs in the MSM, are certainly hoping it will.The Democratic sweep in 1958 presaged the party's strength in the Kennedy-Johnson years. Democratic dominance peaked in LBJ's 1964 landslide. But just two years later, big Republican gains signaled problems in the Democratic coalition that the party struggles with to this day.
Like not having a plan.The 1978 elections during Jimmy Carter's presidency marked the emergence of a powerful New Right that swept Ronald Reagan into office in 1980 and continues to be the dominant force in the Republican Party.
The 2006 elections will be a test of the audacious Karl Rove-George W. Bush plan to launch a long-term Republican Era. They foresee an alliance of corporate interests and religious conservatives, with the South as its home base. Business provides the money. Middle-class traditionalists furnish the troops.
But the alliance always threatens to disintegrate because its wings have very different priorities and competing values.
Just as the Democratic party finds its extreme left wing very much at odds with the moderates that have stayed in that party.Moreover, conservatives can't win elections on their own. They need moderate votes,
Just as liberals can't win without moderate votes as well.and significant support outside the old Confederacy. Bush's carefully cultivated image as a strong, trustworthy leader in the war on terrorism brought around enough middle-of-the road voters to create the Republican monolith that is now our national government.
And with the loudest voices in the Democratic party pushing to defeat the Patriot Act and stop the NSA Wiretaps, that have prevented another attack in this country since 9/11, how many of those moderate voters are going to trust the Democrats to keep them safe?
Murtha says he wouldn't join military now
Reuters reported Rep. John Murtha, a key Democratic voice who favors pulling U.S. troops from Iraq, said in remarks airing on Monday that he would not join the U.S. military today.
According to his bio on Wikipedia, he is 73 years old. I don't think the military would want him, even if he wanted to join.A decorated Vietnam combat veteran who retired as a colonel after 37 years in the U.S. Marine Corps, Murtha told ABC News' "Nightline" program that Iraq "absolutely" was a wrong war for President George W. Bush to have launched.
Murtha is absolutely wrong in saying that, and most of 26 million Iraqis that are free from Saddam's oppressive government would probably agree."Would you join (the military) today?," he was asked in an interview taped on Friday. "No," replied Murtha of Pennsylvania, the top Democrat on the House of Representatives subcommittee that oversees defense spending and one of his party's leading spokesmen on military issues.
Murtha is a coward"And I think you're saying the average guy out there who's considering recruitment is justified in saying 'I don't want to serve'," the interviewer continued.
Fortunately recruitment numbers are not suffering that badly, and re-enlistment numbers, from people who have actually been in Iraq or Afganistan, are extremely high."Exactly right," said Murtha, who drew White House ire in November after becoming the first ranking Democrat to push for a pullout of U.S. forces from Iraq as soon as it could be done safely. At the time, White House spokesman Scott McClellan equated Murtha's position with surrendering to terrorists.
Saddam prefers death by shooting
Washington Times reported Saddam maintains that he is still commander in chief of Iraq's armed forces -- and that a firing squad is "the right way" to execute a military leader.
Actually the right way would probably be to torture him to death as he had so many others tortured to death, but if Iraqi law provides that the condemned man gets a choice, then go ahead and shoot him."I'm not afraid of death," he told two of his lawyers in an astonishingly candid five-hour meeting, as he sat in a comfortable chair at the head of the table.
Then why don't you change your plea to guilty."Of course I'm not guilty, but I know they want me dead."
That is because you are guilty as sin.
Sunni Group Near Deal With Kurds on Iraqi Government
NYT reported The largest Sunni Arab political group in Iraq unexpectedly moved toward agreement with Kurdish leaders Monday on a broad framework for a coalition government. The group, the Iraqi Consensus Front, said it would abandon claims that national elections last month had been rigged once international election monitors finish their review of the allegations. The move drew a rebuke from other Sunni Arab political leaders who accused the Sunni consensus party of violating an agreement to press ahead with claims of Sunni disenfranchisement during the vote on Dec. 15 and to not bargain on their own for a role in the new government.
That would be absolutely stupid for them to ignore an opportunity to get a role in the government and just end up with something to complain about."They violated an agreement with us that they will not go alone to talk about the government," Saleh Mutlak, a leader of the Iraqi National Trend, another leading Sunni Arab political group, said Monday night.
They probably should have brought the other Sunni groups along with them, unless it was obvious that the other groups just wanted to bitch, and not participate in the government.The Sunni consensus party and the Kurds remain far apart on several crucial issues, including one they highlighted at a news conference on Monday: the Kurds support introducing federal states throughout Iraq, while the Sunnis, who fear the loss of revenue from large oil fields in the Shiite-dominated south, want only the Kurds in the north to have a semi-autonomous state.
New Rules Set for Giving Out Antiterror Aid
NYT reported Facing cuts in antiterrorism financing, the Department of Homeland Security plans to announce today that it will evaluate new requests for money from an $800 million aid program for cities based less on politics and more on assessments of where terrorists are likely to strike and potentially cause the greatest damage, department officials say.
It is about time. Just using the program as a mechanism to send federal pork all over the country, where it was used to buy air conditioned garbage trucks and other such foolishness was sheer stupidity.The changes to the program, the Urban Area Security Initiative, are being driven in part by a reduction in the overall pool of money for antiterrorism efforts.
If it takes a cutback in funds to cause money to be spent the right way we need more cutback in funds for other programs. In fact we need more cutbacks in funds for other programs in any event, but having the reduced funds spent wisely is an additional benefit.For 2006, Congress has appropriated $120 million less in these urban grants than for 2005. Domestic security grants in general, including the urban area ones, have been criticized because they have sent more antiterrorism money per capita to sparsely populated states like Wyoming and Alaska than to states like New York and California.
Monday, January 02, 2006
Blanco orders remodeling just after storms
2theadvocate reports Some members of the governor's staff will return from the three-day holiday on Tuesday to newly renovated offices at the State Capitol. Shortly after the two hurricanes, Gov. Kathleen Blanco decided to renovate some of her staff's offices. At the time of her decision, Blanco also was hinting at deep budget cuts to state programs and the possibility of laying off 20 percent of the state workforce. The project cost $564,838.
The newly refurbished office space on the sixth floor of the State Capitol includes hookups and mounts for two flat screen televisions,
So the next time New Orleans floods, the governor will be able to watch it in comfort. And if she is going to waste over 1/2 Million on her own comfort, while they are still working on New Orleans recovery, she better not ask for more federal funds to be spent in Louisiana.Swedish granite countertops, walnut paneling and frosted laminated glass. The floor, which will not be accessible to the public
We certainly dont want te public to see the Swedish granite countertops, walnut paneling, and the other luxuries the Governor's staff got., was redesigned to add three new offices, a conference room and file storage areas.
Michelle Malkin blogged She's earning her crown as one of America's Worst Governors.
Big Imam on Campus
Deborah Solomon interviewed Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal in NYT Q: You just gave $20 million to Harvard and another $20 million to Georgetown to advance the study of Islam, and some are concerned that you are trying to increase the on-campus influence of the Saudi royal family, of which you are reportedly the single wealthiest member.
I don't have control, and I don't want control. Period. They approached us with a proposal. Harvard, Georgetown, University of Chicago, University of Michigan and several of the Ivy Leagues.
But your investment company, Kingdom Holding, invited the schools to submit the proposal, didn't it? Whom else did you approach?
Please. Keep the other universities out. I'd rather not embarrass them. The two winners were Georgetown and Harvard.
Then why did you just name University of Chicago, University of Michigan, and refer to several of the Ivy Leagues?Since you're said to be worth more than $20 billion, with major holdings in Four Seasons Hotels, Saks Fifth Avenue and Murdoch's News Corporation, why not give an unrestricted gift instead of such a narrowly focused one?
The gift is unrestricted!
No, it's not. It has to be spent on Islamic studies. Georgetown is renaming a center after you, and Harvard is naming a program after you.
Well, sure! The studies that concern me and fit my overall global vision - they're Islamic studies. As you know, ever since 9/11, we have been trying to bridge the gap between West and East.
Then why support Islamic Studies. Why not fund a study to bridge the gap between West and East, and focus it on how to stop Saudia Arabia from exporting its Extreme Wahabi version of Islam?Which has backfired at least once. You became notorious in New York when Mayor Giuliani declined to accept a $10 million donation from you to victims' families after you suggested that the U.S. was too friendly with Israel.
By the way, my check was taken to the bank and cashed. The problem was with my statement. I accepted that. Subject closed.
Subject reopened. The money was returned to you. Have you told Harvard, as you told the City of New York, that the U.S. needs to "adopt a more balanced stance toward the Palestinian cause"?
Let me tell you my position. We need to have good relations between the Arab world and Israel. When I sold my Plaza Hotel in New York, it was sold to Elad, which is an Israeli company.
Doing business with the citizens of a country is not the same thing as believing in that country's right to exist.
We are doing so many things to bridge the gap between Christianity and Islam and Judaism. For example, at my hotel in Paris, George V, you are going to find the Christian Bible, the Jewish Bible and the Islamic Koran in each single room.
That is nice for France. How about making sure that every hotel in Saudi Arabia also has all three holy books?That's a wonderful idea, but a luxury hotel in Paris is a long way from Saudi Arabia, where you could surely spend more money on Judeo-Christian studies.
Look. You have to understand that the population of Saudi Arabia has zero Christians.
That is because your religion police beat anyone caught with a bible, and they burn the bibles.That's the point. Why shouldn't you should spend your millions educating your own students before you educate kids at Harvard?
Obviously, it could be something we are contemplating.
Are you going to teach them to respect other religions. Remember We are all "People of the Book" (or ahl al Kitâb) Surat Al 'Imran, 64 (Qur'an 3:64) says "O People of the Book! Let us rally to a common formula to be binding on both us and you: That we worship none but God; that we associate no partners with Him; that we erect not, from among ourselves, Lords and patrons other than God."Are you spending any money in Iraq?
So far, I am investing nothing. Zero.Very simple. I have investments in 150 nations, but I will not invest in Iraq until they have political tranquillity and a functioning government.
But where will they get money to rebuild?
Uncle Sam. The United States is spending like hell over there.
Why don't you help us?
If I go there right now and say, "I want to build a hotel," they will laugh at me. You need schools and hospitals and the airport, and then after, you can talk about the hotels.
Then build schools and hospitals.You find the situation very volatile still?
You have not done a very good job there. After 9/11, the U.S. needed to have a big revenge, and Saddam Hussein was a sitting duck. The U.S., with its huge ego, needed to have something big and dramatic.
That's not what I would call a bridge-building sentiment.
You have to understand. I am a friend of the United States, and these days to be in the Arab world and to be a friend of the United States is a liability. But nevertheless I say it. I am a great friend.
With friends like you, who needs enemies?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
