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White House Says Phone Wiretaps Will Resume For Now
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sun Feb 24, 2008 09:03 AM
from the can-we-hear-you-now dept.
from the can-we-hear-you-now dept.
austinhook brings us news that the U.S. government has resumed wiretapping with the help of telecommunications companies. The companies are said to have "understandable misgivings" over the unresolved issue of retroactive immunity for their participation in past wiretapping. Spy agencies have claimed that the expiration of the old legislation has caused them to miss important information. The bill that would grant the immunity passed in the Senate, but not in the House.
Related Stories
[+]
Telecom Immunity -- We're Down to the Wire(tap) 219 comments
The law says telecom providers can't wiretap your phone calls or net traffic, but as long as their taps are legal or they acted in good faith they're already immune from prosecution and lawsuits. That said, your telecom providers are still trying to get Congress to immunize them for cooperating with NSA wiretaps (presumably because the taps were both illegal and done in bad faith). Retroactive immunity wouldn't just mean they get away with it, it would crush our ability as citizens to find out what happened using the power of the courts.
Last month,
Sen. Chris Dodd temporarily stopped the bill, but within days -- probably on Monday -- it's going to be reintroduced, and it's not at all clear it will be stopped again. He'll need strong allies, because he's fighting not just the Bush administration and GOP Senators, but his own party's Sen. Harry Reid and
"AT&T's personal Senator" Jay Rockefeller. So Dodd needs more Senators backing him up, preferably joining a full-blown filibuster on the Senate floor. If you ever want accountability for whatever companies illegally forwarded your data to the NSA, you basically have today and tomorrow to
say
something.
[+]
US Senate Votes Immunity For Telecoms 623 comments
Ktistec Machine writes to let us know that the telecom companies are one step closer to getting off the hook for their illegal collusion with the US government. Today the US Senate passed, by a filibuster-proof majority of 67 to 31, a revised FISA bill that grants retroactive immunity to the telecommunications companies that helped the government illegally tap American network traffic. If passed by both houses and signed by the President, this would effectively put an end to the many lawsuits against these companies (about 40 have been filed). The House version of the bill does not presently contain an immunity provision. President Bush has said he will veto any such bill that reaches his desk without the grant of immunity. We've discussed the progress of the immunity provision repeatedly.
[+]
House Declines To Vote On Telecom Immunity 341 comments
freedom_india alerts us to news that the House of Representatives declined to bring the surveillance reform bill to vote, prompting House Republicans to walk out in the middle of a session. The bill, recently passed by the Senate, includes retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies who assisted with illegal domestic wiretaps. The walk-out comes after a proposal was shot down on Wednesday that would have extended the current legislation for another three weeks.
[+]
Politics: Democrats Propose Commission To Investigate Spying 302 comments
metalman writes "Wired has a story on a proposal by House Democrats to 'establish a national commission — similar to the 9/11 Commission... to find out — and publish — what exactly the nation's spies were up to during their five-year warrantless, domestic surveillance program.' The draft bill would also preserve the requirement of court orders and remove 'retroactive immunity for telecom companies.' (We've discussed various government wiretaps, phone companies, and privacy violations before.) But it seems unlikely that such an alternative on phone immunity would pass both the House and Senate, let alone survive a Presidential veto."
[+]
Politics: House Republicans Renew Push for Telecom Immunity 123 comments
CNet is running an update to the controversy over giving telecommunications giants such as AT&T immunity from lawsuits involving the assistance they gave the NSA for illegal wiretaps. Republican leaders are circulating a petition which would force a vote on the bill passed by the Senate but not by the House. Democrats are holding out for a version of the FISA bill which opens the telecoms to prosecution. President Bush still intends to veto any such document.
"At a wide-ranging House hearing on Wednesday, FBI Director Robert Mueller again urged passage of a bill that includes immunity for phone companies, arguing that 'uncertainty' among the carriers 'affects our ability to get info as fast and as quickly as we would want.' He admitted, however, that he was not aware of any wiretap requests being denied because of Congress' inaction."
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How do they know? (Score:5, Interesting)
Darwinian M&M duels (Score:3, Funny)
I have found that, in general, the brown and red M&Ms are tougher, and the newer blue ones are genetically inferior. I have hypothesized that the bl
Re:Darwinian M&M duels (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:How do they know? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:News at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
Look at it this way. His attorney general when he first announced the program has left the post in disgrace. Congress refused to pass an act providing retroactive immunity to the telcos who first participated in program. The ACLU and EFF have filed lawsuits because of the wiretapping program. People across the county have spoken out against the program. And still he announces that the warrantless wiretapping has resumed. Sounds pretty brazen to me.
On the one hand, I want to believe that he is doing it with the best of intentions but is just to stupid to realize the long-term implications of such a thing. On the other hand, I am very, very afraid that he knows exactly what he is doing. In either case, this program is a (tm) Bad Thing and needs to end, permanently.
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Re:News at 11 (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not like any lawsuit can do anything to him. He's got immunity. And it's not like he cares what people speak out against.
Courage requires risking something. Bush's merely an obstinate simpleton, something a coward can easily be. As long as he doesn't risk getting smacked in the face about it.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:How do they know? (Score:5, Informative)
Assume they recorded a conversation that was important, and part of that conversation was let's talk every Thursday. Or they said we're putting everything in place, we'll contact you shortly with the time.
Yah, that would be true if the current wiretaps were to expire when the legislation expired. But the law was written to specifically say they didn't. Any existing wiretaps expire when they were originally set to expire.
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Re:How do they know? (Score:5, Interesting)
That is the White House line and its a lie. Existing authorizations continue to be in force for a year. That takes us past the next inauguration.
The only case where the administration could not conduct a warantless tap is if there was an entirely new terrorist organization to emerge in the next twelve months. And they could still get a wiretap, they just have to get a warrant.
The issue here is not providing immunity to the telcos, it is providing immunity to the Administration. They want to be able to shred all the evidence of their criminal activities before a Democrat takes over. And they are willing to hold the security of the country hostage till they get their way.
Up till now it has been sufficient for the Bushies to cry National Security and the Democrats would run frightened to hide. Now they have accidentally called the Administration's bluff they have discovered the consequences of standing up to Bully Bush - absolutely nothing. Bush's approval ratings dropped by ten points to 19%. The wiretap issue was gone after a single media cycle.
Parent
Re:How do they know? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think you're wrong, something quite significant has come out of this: Bush has proved himself wrong. The gov't has been, and still is, saying that without this warrantless wiretapping, we are no longer safe. By calling their bluff, they forced Bush to say that he would veto the bill if it didn't include telecom immunity. In effect, and in his on words, he has put the well-being of the telcos over the safety of the American public! If this wiretapping is so instrumental to our safety, why would he threaten a veto, or in this case, let the legislation expire?
Parent
Re:How do they know? (Score:5, Interesting)
He means that Bush's argument goes something like this:
1. The warrantless wiretapping program is essential for our national security.
2. We must not let it expire and we must enhance its regulation or else the country will be unsafe.
3. Oh and by the way, we could use retro-active immunity for the telcos in order to ensure their cooperation.
His focus when speaking to the American people has been on #1 and #2, in essence playing the "fear card".
By threatening to veto a bill that provides #1 and prevents #2 (his primary argument), just because it does not contain #3 (an auxiliary argument), he is conveying the message that retro-active immunity is more important than national security itself.
Now, you can argue -- as you you seem to do in your comment -- that it is Bush's opinion that retro-active immunity is essential for national security, and that may very well be the case. However, whether it is more important than having the program in the first place is debatable, and understood by many to be an indefensible position; and at the very least gives the appearance of a strawman to the first two arguments I mentioned.
-dZ.
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Resuming wiretaps (Score:5, Insightful)
Which just goes to show you that they never had any intention to stop wiretapping, just to throw a big tantrum over it and then go back to spying on Americans the good old fashioned way, illegally.
AG agrees wiretaps are illegal (Score:5, Interesting)
Glen Greenwald has been on this beat for a long time now. Read more about Mukasy's recent admissionhere [salon.com].
Parent
Re:Resuming wiretaps (Score:5, Informative)
So it's perfectly OK for the government to wiretap someone's phone, if they get a warrant. However, this raises three concerns: first, if they get a tip, they need to act immediately, and getting a warrant from a judge normally takes time. Second, it may be difficult to explain to a judge who hasn't dealt with matters of national security before why the government really should be wiretapping this person's phone. Finally, warrants are normally a matter of public record, and we wouldn't want terrorists to know which phones we're wiretapping!
So, Congress addressed these concerns by passing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It establishes a secret court that can issue warrants without making them public; the judges have a ridiculously high security clearance and have training and experience dealing with matters of national security, and the warrants issued by the FISA court are retroactive for 72 hours - so the government can start eavesdropping immediately, then file the paperwork a couple days later and everything is OK. As it turns out, the FISA court is little more than a rubber stamp (apparently out of thousands of warrant applications, they've only ever rejected five). But this allows the government to comply with the Constitutional requirements laid out in the fourth amendment.
The problem is that the Bush administration is ignoring the law and wiretapping people's phones without getting warrants from the FISA court.
You mentioned that these calls have at least one party overseas. Even if you interpret "the people" to include only US citizens on American soil, if only one party is overseas, you're still eavesdropping on a conversation involving an American, so it's still illegal regardless of who they're talking to (if you don't have a warrant).
Also, how do you know the conversations the government is wiretapping all involve foreigners? Sure, that's why President Bush says he wants the power to wiretap without a warrant, but with no oversight whatsoever, all we have is his word, which most of us don't hold in high esteem at the moment.
Does this clear things up?
Parent
Re:Resuming wiretaps (Score:4, Insightful)
So does that make the CIA an illegal organization then? I mean, it's their job to spy on foreign countries.
That's a strawman. Firstly because it's the NSA that's conducting surveillance, not the CIA. Secondly because I said the Constitution requires a warrant to conduct a search, not that spying is illegal. Having judicial oversight is the designated balance between the government not being able to perform its duties to defend the country and the government growing into an oppressive tyranny. I have no problem with legal intelligence gathering. The rules are spelled out, and there's a process that allows for changing them.
If the Constitution applies to ALL people of the earth, shouldn't we be invading all these other countries and removing their current, illegal governments? Shouldn't these people be voting in elections and sending the winners to Washington to serve in Congress? Shouldn't we be taxing their populations? Shouldn't we be using our military to guarantee these rights to the peoples of the world?
We have been using our military to "spread democracy" for 60 years, and the CIA to overthrow democracy and install dictators, and then often have to send in the military to remove them. It's why so many people around the world hate us. If an oppressed group of people need and seek outside help, then I have no problem with international forces coming to the rescue. We just need to follow our Constitution by declaring war with a clear and well-defined goal and follow the Geneva Conventions.
Also, "inalienable human rights" was in the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution. Tell me how I'm the confused one again?
You're confused because you inferred a quotation where the was none, notice the lack of such notation in my original post. The discussion is regarding the legality of certain government actions. The Declaration of Independence says why we needed a new government. The Constitution defines that government, in such a way as to honor those inalienable human rights. So any discussion of what the government can and can't do must therefore refer to the Constitution.
Parent
Well that answers the immunity question... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well that answers the immunity question... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Obama is elected - "I haven't had enough time in four years to change anything, so elect me again".
At the next congressional elections - "We haven't had enough time with a Democrat as President, so elect us again".
(Note, this post is not a message against Obama, or for any other candidate. Just pointing out details regarding a candidate who everyone thinks will change things, but who is simply another politician, and an individual person, up against the whole of the political machine).
Parent
Impeachment (Score:4, Insightful)
I beg to disagree, Impeachment is as important now as it ever was, and should be pursued (IMHO) even after the present administration has left office.
Why? Because the basic purpose of impeachment is not political theater, throwing the bums out, or any of the other nonsense that is commonly cited. Impeachment is about investigating plausible claims of wrong doing by high ranking officials and if the claims are true meting out appropriate consequences. We are in a very risky point in our history, but not because of the offenses against our constitution presently being perpetrated, but rather because of the precedent we setting by ignoring them. The third amendment
is interesting in that it is the only part of the Bill of Rights that the present administration hasn't been plausibly accused of violating. And yet we do nothing.
So turn the question around: if we aren't going to impeach now, when would we? And what sort of message does that send to future administrations, of either party?
--MarkusQ
Parent
I call B.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
Riiiiiiiiight. If you can't illegally wiretap, how could you possibly know what you missed? Besides, there is a perfectly good FISA court still around; you can even wiretap and get a warrant 72 hours later.
Fear mongering sucks. We're a better nation than this.
Re:I call B.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I call B.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
But the issue, I think, is the paperwork. For instance, each application must be personally approved by the Attorney General (can you imagine poor Mr. Gonzales having to review and sign hundreds or thousands of such applications at a time?).
The surveillance carried out in support of the "war on terror" is orders of magnitude greater than was contemplated when the FISA court was created. So Bush & Co. simply decided to ignore the problem and proceed without bothering to get warrants from the FISA court.
Parent
Re:I call B.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
So I hate to see the Republican Fear Marketing slogan War on Terror used. It is really like the 1984 war with the Northeast (if I remember right). That continuous war that keeps the population under martial law and rallied around the flag. For what, for accumlation of power.
So the War against Terror is just like the War against Poverty or the War against Aids. Its not a war, its a slogan, lets not forget that. It should not invoke war powers for the Executive branch. Actually it did not, the war powers were granted to go to war against Iraq because they were claimed (falsely and brazenly and seemingly with full knowledge of that falsness) have weapons of mass destruction. Valerie Elise Plame Wilson was outed as a CIA agent because that lie was being exposed by her husband.
Lets not forget the War on Terror is just a marketing slogan and get on with the business of cleaning up the mess in Iraq and the mess in Afganistan.
Terrists exist, there are terrorist who are targeting the US and other countries as well, but giving up our Constitutional rights and protections isn't the way to go. The Executive has lead us into improsonment with no charges, lack of due process, torture, rendition, wiretapping,
Marketing slogans should be reserved for those selling soap.
Parent
Re:I call B.S. (Score:4, Informative)
Apparently we are not.
Parent
Re:I call B.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
I find it interesting that rather than address the issue on the merits, you chose instead to make an ad hominem attack on all reporters, say they are unintelligent and shouldn't be trusted, and project an air of arrogance and disdain to further deflect any disagreement.
You seem to be willfully diverting the question from the merits of the administration's remarks to an untruthful characterization of the reporting, a typical tactic of administration apologists. So let's summarize:
1) The administration says something
2) It gets accurately reported
3) You call reporters unintelligent, an ad hominem attack on the messenger,
without actually showing they did anything wrong
4) You assume an air of arrogance and disdain to deflect any questioning of your unjustified statements
5) In the end you have contributed nothing to the discussion of what actually happened
Maybe next time you can actually address the issue rather than mischaracterizing its reporting? What's actually a bit sad is that your comment was modded +3 insightful for making that little bit of flamebait.
Parent
I just don't get it (Score:5, Interesting)
What does Bush want, other than to spy on everyone with no supervision whatsoever?
Oh, yeah, he wants us to not sue Verizon, AT&T, whoever. Well, sorry guys, you had a responsibility, as citizens of the USA, to tell the government no. I mean, WTF, corporations run this country anyway...
Re:I just don't get it (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:I just don't get it (Score:5, Insightful)
Because the previous rubber-stamp system left a paper-trail (albeit one they could claim was "classified for reasons of national security") as to who they were spying on and why, and thus had some amount of accountability, no matter how tiny.
The new system does not.
If there's anything this administration hates, it's accountability.
Parent
Re:I just don't get it (Score:5, Insightful)
You get a warrant when you want to spy on SOMEONE. You don't get a warrant when you want to capture all inbound and outbound (from the country) telephone traffic and put it through your NSA analyzer supercomputer thingymajig looking for suspicious activity. You see, for something like this to work, you need a very large sample of data to compare to. You will never be given a warrant for little Felipe who wants to call mommy back in Italy to talk about spaghetti recipes. But you need that data as a base line.
Parent
Now he says that? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, what a brilliant idea! Too bad Bush didn't suggest that BEFORE authorizing an illegal program and goading the telecom companies into going along with it. Had he done so he wouldn't need to get retroactive immunity for them.
I think everybody understands that in the height of an emergency tough decisions have to be made, but the next priority should have been to move for revision to the FISA legislation [wikipedia.org], not keep the thing secret for several years and then try to bail out the organizations involved once people found out the law was being broken. Don't like constraints of the FISA law? Conform to it, revise the legislation, or break the law and face the legal consequences. There is no other option for a person holding office who has sworn an oath to uphold the law. Well, there isn't supposed to be.
Bush Blows It (Score:5, Insightful)
Bush has his new Attorney General lying to back him up [dailykos.com], but they can't even keep their stories straight [washingtonpost.com]:
It's obvious that it's Bush's fault [salon.com] the PAA expired without extension:
The bottom line is that Bush's own Attorney General just admitted that he and Bush and the rest are repeatedly breaking the law:
What does it take to get impeached in this country? Will someome please blow Bush already, so we can finally get it over with?
Re:Bush Blows It (Score:5, Informative)
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approximately 40 cases (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Bush Blows It (Score:4, Insightful)
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oblig (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Bush Blows It (Score:4, Insightful)
With which Democrats can abuse all those "Bush/Cheney" tyrannical powers without the Iraq War that gets you caught. But with the Iraq War that gets you paid.
Quite a racket. Which is why Americans should force them to impeach, or at least make it as costly as possible not to. Because Republicans will be in no position of any kind to offer the kind of "opposition party" these Democrats couldn't muster even the past 8 years with very solid minorities and blatant catastrophes.
The missing party, as usual. is the American people. And decent country would be out in the streets with pitchforks and torches by now, especially with economic collapse staring everyone in the face. Instead, we've got Slashdot and the Daily Kos. And President VP Cheney.
Parent
Corporate intrest (Score:3, Interesting)
~Dan
Re:Corporate intrest (Score:4, Interesting)
First, don't minimize the scope of the government of the largest and strongest nation coercing private enterprise to bend to its will and to do illegal acts. That goes WAY beyond the issues of private commerce between individuals and recordings-producers.
With that said; what the fux do you think DRM *is* except a way to "wiretap" the private individual (aka. customer). Without judicial review. Unilaterally.
Personally I think it's a violation of RICO and monopolistic to enforce law through technology when the issues of fair-use are not resolved by a court. That's another rant though.
Parent
They're playing to cover their own crimes (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a word for this: Fascism (Score:5, Insightful)
The sad part? There is no promise that any democratic administration would stop this.
Why? Because it's fascism, or, as one of the guys who invented fascism (Mussolini) caled it: Corporatism.
The American Empire is dying and it's a sad thing to watch it act, as WS Burroughs said in 1984, as the single greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams. [youtube.com]
RS
It's a smokescreen - you're already wiretapped (Score:4, Informative)
Just by way of reminder (Score:5, Insightful)
We were not completely surprised by the 9-11 hijackers, the problem was we didn't act on what we did know. Even then we knew. We knew without the Patriot Act, we knew without wholesale spying on the American public, we knew without the Protect America Act. We knew and did nothing. So now the solution is to spy on Americans. Makes almost as much sense as being attacked by terrorists operating out of Afghanistan and responding by attacking Iraq.
Only a Republican would think it makes sense to fight terrorism by monitoring my 83 year old mom's phone calls.
And, just in case this dust up has interfered with the intelligence community's ability to monitor the activity of Americans, the bake sale has been postponed until next week because the lady running it broke her hip and mom change her hair appointment to 11 am this week because Marge's family is flying in from Montana. And dad still can't figure out why his pineapple plants keep dying in the front yard. Now you're up to date.
Re:Just by way of reminder (Score:4, Insightful)
subject lives in climate where pineapples can grow, similar to asian areas with high islamic radical populations. relatives in Montana which is known abode of militia groups. subject altering appearance at 11am.
action: subject to be reclassified as probable threat to national security.
Parent
Revolution 2.0 (Score:5, Insightful)
Resume? (Score:5, Interesting)
This whole issue of the US gov. spying on .... (Score:4, Interesting)
Why such spying has resumed, or hasn't stopped, is because its an election year.
And that should be obvious.
Is this against the constitution of the united states? Absolutely, as it is an intent to invade privacy in order to deceive.
This is nothing new as even the "Declaration of Independence" identifies government abuse of its citizens, even being specific.
To All: When was the last time you read it?
Now what? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know what's worse, not having any input at all, or knowing that it won't be used in any decisions in the end anyway.
Re:Now what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Beyond that, this isn't just about wiretapping phones. It sets a very dangerous precedent through which the executive branch can bypass the legislative branch's powers and act illegally with no fear of repercussions.
Parent
LAST TIME - Pay Attention (Score:5, Insightful)
It's wholesale data-mining.
Spying in the Death Star: The AT&T Whistle-Blower Tells His Story
Mark Klein = Patriot
Former AT&T technician
http://www.wired.com/politics/onlinerights/news/2007/05/kleininterview [wired.com]
In room 641A at 611 Folsom Street in San Francisco, California is a SPLITTER that duplicates ALL traffic and diverts it by the way of a proprietary black box to an unnamed acronymed agency.
Mark Klein called it a "Big Brother Machine".
It can't be more clear than that.
For all the folks that still don't get IT, good God!, go back to sleep, and or, quit posting drivel.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Somebody should troll a terrorist attack, get caught, and then expose the whole mess of no fisa warrant.
Re:Criminal charges (Score:5, Insightful)
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