ACLU Files Lawsuit Challenging FISA 542
Wired's Threat Level blog reports that the American Civil Liberties Union has filed a lawsuit contesting the constitutionality of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Recently passed by both the House and Senate, FISA was signed into law on Thursday by President Bush. The ACLU has fought aspects of FISA in the past. The new complaint (PDF) alleges the following:
"The law challenged here supplies none of the safeguards that the Constitution demands. It permits the government to monitor the communications of U.S. Citizens and residents without identifying the people to be surveilled; without specifying the facilities, places, premises, or property to be monitored; without observing meaningful limitations on the retention, analysis, and dissemination of acquired information; without obtaining individualized warrants based on criminal or foreign intelligence probable cause; and, indeed, without even making prior administrative determinations that the targets of surveillance are foreign agents or connected in any way, however tenuously, to terrorism."
Re:hooray sortof (Score:5, Informative)
but the aclu will fail as always
Fail as always? What are you smoking? They frequently win. Don't forget their former solicitor general is on the supreme court.
Re:hooray sortof (Score:2, Informative)
Clinton did try to kill bin Laden, and the right cried about him "wagging the dog".
Hindsight is a motherfucker, huh?
Re:Standing (Score:5, Informative)
ACLU already listed the plantiffs in their case. [aclu.org] Let's not forget, the only reason for FISA was because the ACLU has already won, warrantless wiretapping is illegal.
Re:Hey Obama! (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Interesting... (Score:2, Informative)
The problem is when the terrorists are already in the Congress and the White House.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:us phone = us citizen? (Score:3, Informative)
The original FISA already allowed for that without being modified. The government already had up to three days after initiation of the tap to obtain a specific warrant. So why was this even needed?
I'm not so sure it works that way (Score:3, Informative)
IANAL, of course -- but when has that stopped anyone on /.?
However, I recall that it's still necessary to have an "actual case or controversy" where the plaintiff has a redressable wrong. "Maybe" and "could" don't count. Of course, the ACLU could cite the Court's ruling in the Massachusetts greenhouse-gas case to establish standing on behalf of people not yet born, but I think that only applies where a government body is acting as plaintiff on their behalf.
Re:In time of war (Score:1, Informative)
We are *NOT* officially at war. Congress has authorized the use of force, but stopped far short of declaring war.
For the folks at the pointy end of things, the difference is purely semantic. For the folks in Washington, the difference is wider than the US of A.
Congress does not like declaring war, exactly because of the powers that such a declaration grants to the President.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
...and PROTECT AND DEFEND our rights?
There, fixed that for you.
Re:Interesting... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:In time of war (Score:3, Informative)
Re:In time of war (Score:1, Informative)
Formal war has not been declared by congress as stipulated in Article I of the constitution. So we are not 'officially at war'.
Re:Option (Score:5, Informative)
"The only option at this point is to begin militant action against our failed government institution."
Isn't voting for Libertarian Bob Barr an option?
Well, if civil liberties are your priority, then I don't know if Bob Barr is your guy. Consider:
His support for the Patriot Act, his attacks on reproductive rights of women, his support for a constitutional ban on the rights of gay couples to marry, his support for banning adoption of children by gay parents, his restriction of freedom of speech and expression with respect to the US flag, his redefinition of habeas corpus to exclude death row appealates, his opposition to medical marijuana programs...
Bob Barr seems much more like an ideological conservative than a true libertarian to me.
Bob Barr on the Issues [ontheissues.org]
Re:It has nothing to do with terrorism [China] (Score:3, Informative)
Nope. The previous FISA laws gave them that exact same power but they just had to go through a secret court up to three days after the surveillance began. There can't be an argument that such an arrangement interfered with the process because it, literally granted 99% of the cases that ever came to it (IIRC, only two requests were ever rejected.) This whole Terror Surveillance Program (which we should never forget began BEFORE 9/11) was an unconstitutional, illegitimate executive powergrab, pure an simple. This new law effectively sanctioned the TSP and broadened the FISA powers even further. And the reason it passed now is because the hypocritical democratic leadership believes they're going to win the presidency in the Fall.
And what about our citizens' rights? Since when do you stop being an American citizen, with constitutionally-protected rights, just because you make an international phone call? Has it ever occurred to you that if people like Thomas Jefferson and John Adams were around today that such justifications could be used to wiretap their phones? We're in dire straits if the bar on human and civil rights is now being set by China.
-Grym
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
There is still a way to change this through the democratic system. But it requires people to actively vote for independent candidates; and to actively research the people running for office.
Obama was a civil rights lawyer and a Constitutional Law professor.
He was against this Telecom law.
Based on credentials, if anyone should have voted against such a blatantly unconstitutional law, it should have been Obama. After that vote, he can DIAF for all I care.
Change does not require actively voting for independent candidates, or researching the people running for office. It requires the people running for (and in) office to do what they said they'll do.
This is not FISA (Score:5, Informative)
FISA was passed back in 1978 after the Nixon abuses. This bill, the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, sought to legitimize the President's warrantless wiretapping program that was illegal under FISA - because that's what FISA was designed to prevent! President Nixon did the exact same thing this administration is getting away with. I guess Congress actually had the balls to rein in abuses of power back in the seventies, even with the Cold War, the Soviet Union, and the possibility of nuclear annihilation hanging over them.
It appears that Congress today has turned into a gaggle of cowards.
Re:Complicated (Score:4, Informative)
Here's Obama's change:
1) I will filibuster!
Changes to...
2) I vote AYE.
Re:Interesting... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:dumbass (Score:5, Informative)
If you'd been paying attention over the last couple of years, you'd know that Posse Comitatus will be changed at the drop of a hat [wikipedia.org]. Yes, the change was repealed - but it will be passed again as soon as there's a compelling "national emergency."
the ACLU wipes its ass with the Constitution (Score:3, Informative)
You dare to mention the ACLU and the Constitution in the same sentence?
The ACLU doesn't give two shits about the Constitution, and they never have. Thanks to the ACLU's reaction to the D.C. v. Heller decision [aclu.org], many more people are finally realizing that the ACLU's true purpose is to champion causes of the Left, and nothing more.
Yes, Heller was a 5-4 decision. But the important point is that all 9 Justices (in the opinion and the dissents) agreed that the Second Amendment protects an individual, not a collective right. In other words, the ACLU's position that the Second Amendment protects a collective right was unanimously refuted by the Supreme Court.
The ACLU could've excused themselves from the whole Heller debate by pointing out that many organizations exist to defend Second Amendment rights. In other words, they could've simply said that they were going to leave the task of defending Second Amendment rights to already-capable hands. But no; the ACLU just couldn't resist weighing in on Heller by taking a dump on the Constitution--the very document they claim to so stridently defend.
The ACLU is beyond contempt. It serves only to intercept donations that, if not for ACLU's hypocritical existence, might have actually gone to organizations that do defend civil liberties, instead of to a muckraking mouthpiece of the Left. They do not deserve respect (let alone support) in any form.
Re:Interesting... (Score:1, Informative)
USSR - United States of Sheep and Retards
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
subsidies (Score:3, Informative)
For a US example, look at electrical and phone service in rural areas. It wasn't profitable for companies to offer service in those areas at a price consumers were willing to pay, but We The People decided electricity and telecommunications were important enough that people in those areas should have them anyway, so out came the subsidies.
Ah but phone service wasn't subsidized with general taxpayer money. Those who had phone service paid a tax which was then used to fund service in rural areas. This tax was the Federal telephone excise tax [wikipedia.org].
Falcon
Re:McCain's Change... (Score:3, Informative)
>They're exactly the same
Not according to their voting records. The ACLU legislative scorecard [aclu.org] shows Obama voting for civil liberties 80% of the time, McCain 17%.
Re:Interesting... (Score:3, Informative)
What they never do in war, in civilized countries that is, civilized such as for example in Nazi Germany, is to treat soldiers of war the way the US is treating captives of it's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq
I think that you could have made your argument just fine without bringing up Nazi Germany [wikipedia.org]. It's not usefully helpful towards a productive debate or conversation to do so.
Even Germany treated their captives (soldiers) with a reasonable amount of respect
Really? So you would have wanted to be a Soviet POW captured by the Germans on the Eastern Front?
We have now sunk far lower than the Germans of WWII.
I'm disgusted by our actions in the last seven years but by making a statement like this you cost yourself a lot of creditability. It's either pure hyperbole (in which case you should know better) or pure ignorance of history. Go read about German activities behind the lines in the Soviet Union, Poland or the Balkans and tell me if you really think sending Taliban and/or Al Quada fighters to Gitmo comes remotely close to the anti-partisan methods adopted by the Wehrmacht and SS. They would march into villages and execute every single man, woman and child in response to partisan activities. Do you really think the United States has done anything remotely close to that?
Please note that I'm not trying to defend our activities by bringing this up. Just trying to point out the absurdity of your statement that we've "sunk far lower than the Germans of WWII".
That is why our Repugnican leadership refuses to grant them the rights soldiers have
I'd agree but I don't think using the word "Repubnican" makes for a productive debate or respectful conversation.
And this is where you just ran into serious trouble. You see, when we broke the Geneva Convention, and we have done that, it no longer applies to our soldiers in the field. This means that the torture and beheading of our soldiers is justified by our actions. That is why you, as a civilized country always abide by the rules
Have you ever actually read the Geneva Conventions? How about the actions behind the lines during the Battle of the Bulge? We captured several English speaking German soldiers who had infiltrated behind the lines wearing American uniforms. They were summarily executed for this -- and it was all perfectly legal because the Germans lost the protections of the conventions by fighting in a false uniform.
Re:Interesting... (Score:3, Informative)
Nonononono! As long as the government "believes" that somebody is a bad person, that makes it OK to violate one of the foundational rights of western civilization and hold him without a trial indefinitely. Citizenship is irrelevent.
See Padilla, Jose.
Re:Interesting... (Score:4, Informative)
US constitution, Article I, Section 9, guarantees habeas corpus except in certain extreme circumstances which do not apply.
The sixth amendment guarantees the right to a speedy trial. It makes it clear that this applies to everybody, not just citizens.
Overall, the constitution is quite clear in the few areas where it talks about citizens as opposed to all people, and this is not one of them.
Questions?