Rep. Jane Harman Focus In Yet Another Warrantless Wiretap Scandal 312
Many different sources are talking about the latest scandal surrounding the warrantless wiretapping program. Incriminating evidence against California rep. Jane Harman was apparently captured some time ago on a legal NSA wiretap. However, Attorney General Gonzales supposedly intervened to drop the case against her because (and this is where the irony meter explodes) Bush officials wanted her to be able to publicly defend the warrantless wiretap program. "Jane Harman, in the wake of the NSA scandal, became probably the most crucial defender of the Bush warrantless eavesdropping program, using her status as 'the ranking Democratic on the House intelligence committee' to repeatedly praise the NSA program as 'essential to US national security' and 'both necessary and legal.'"
Stop communicating (Score:5, Funny)
Good idea! (Score:5, Funny)
I'll tell everyone I know!
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We should boycott all non-encrypted forms of communication.
And twitter.
Re:Stop communicating (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Stop communicating (Score:4, Funny)
Treason (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Treason (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Treason (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Parent is NOT trolling..... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Parent is NOT trolling..... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Treason (Score:5, Informative)
From the US Constitution Article III Section 3: "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort."
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:beat me to it (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe some people consider those that threaten our liberties to be our enemies... Seems reasonable to me.
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Maybe some people consider those that threaten our liberties to be our enemies...
So... most federal and many state agencies are treasonous?
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In which case the American people themselves are guilty of "treason." Seriously, could the government have gotten away with things like warrantless wiretapping without the public's silence and implicit consent?
Re:beat me to it (Score:5, Interesting)
If the terrorists wish to disrupt our society, do something nasty towards that end, and the politicians then disrupt things far more than the terrorists in response, they have in that sense given aid to an enemy of the United States.
Given that the Constitution is the law of the land and the foundation of the federal government's right to exist at all, someone who deliberately attempts to subvert it becomes an enemy of the United States. Note that that in no way would apply to someone who attempts to follow the appropriate and well defined procedures to alter the Constitution.
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Re:Treason (Score:5, Insightful)
You're spot on target. This wasn't treason, it was standard political quid pro quo. Admittedly, it's sometimes hard to tell the two apart....
Dems may call it treason because she turned her back on the party line. But that's personal. IANAL, but to me, this looks like obstruction, maybe tampering with evidence. Not treason.
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Ben-Ami Kadish [go.com]
Long list of incidents here. [whatreallyhappened.com]
Re:Treason (Score:5, Informative)
I don't remember very many prominent Democrats opposing the NSA's illegal spying program. In fact many prominent Democrats were in favor. I remember a lengthy and uncompromising campaign against these kind of things by Chris Dodd (D-CT), but I also remember that Harry Reid (D-NV) decided to ignore the hold that Dodd placed on the FISA Amendments Act of 2008. Ignoring holds placed by Senators is not generally done. And then a lot of Democrats voted to end debate on the amendments to the act. I think you're giving the Democratic party too much credit for opposing the lawlessness of the Bush administration. They don't oppose lawlessness per se.
Re:Treason (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously, many of the things the public blamed Bush for are the actions of Congress, which has been under Democratic control for several years.
If by "several" you mean two. The Republican party took control of Congress in the 1994 election (I think, maybe it was 1996), and kept it until the 2006 election. The Republican-controlled Congress started the vast majority of the actions that we've been complaining about. Unfortunately, the Democrat-controlled Congress hasn't undone nearly as much of it as we had hoped they would.
Re:Treason (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, many of the things the public blamed Bush for are the actions of Congress, which has been under Democratic control for several years. CNN isnt going to report that though, its not favorable to their agenda.
It's not favorable to CNN's agenda, but not for the reason you imply. CNN may lean more left than Fox (though that's not saying much), but what makes news has almost nothing to do with political slant. It's all about ratings, eyeballs, "buzz", and ultimately, advertising dollars.
Reporting the truth, that the Democrats and Republicans acted together to get us into this mess (name your mess, they worked together on it), isn't flashy. It doesn't grab headlines like the Pirates of the Carribean, I mean Somalia. It doesn't turn on the tears like the latest suburban child-killing mom. It doesn't generate tempest-in-a-teapot "controversy" like Lou Dobbs' latest proclamations on border security.
Neither CNN, Fox, nor any of the rest of the corporate media shills will report on what's going on, because they think we're too dumb. And in fact, they have a vested interest in keeping us dumb -- smart people make poor consumers of advertising.
And we're getting screwed by both major parties. It's better now than it was for the previous eight years, but putting on a condom doesn't make it any less a rape. That's why I still couldn't bring myself to vote for a D or an R -- I voted for Cynthia McKinney [wikipedia.org] (even though in Texas, I had to write in her name).
Re:Treason (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, many of the things the public blamed Bush for are the actions of Congress
Sorry, but most of the things Bush is blamed for Bush started and Congress later enabled. For instance, consider warrantless wiretapping, which the major issue Bush wanted Harman to help with. Bush was breaking the FISA law for years, when the news broke, Congress first did nothing, and then passed a law retroactively making it 1) legal and 2) impossible to prosecute.
Also, consider the Iraq war. Bush used manufactured intelligence to justify the war, but Congress did nothing; they even cheerleaded for it.
All this is not to say that Congress has no culpability, because they do. But Congress was Republican for most of the Bush years. To say, in the context of this conversation that many of the things blamed on Bush should be blamed on Democrats, who have only been in power for two years? That's way off. You are the one with the obvious agenda.
That said, none of them deserve to keep their jobs. I can't believe people still identify with Republicans or Democrats these days.
Re:Treason (Score:4, Insightful)
You're spot on target. This wasn't treason, it was standard political quid pro quo. Admittedly, it's sometimes hard to tell the two apart....
Dems may call it treason because she turned her back on the party line. But that's personal. IANAL, but to me, this looks like obstruction, maybe tampering with evidence. Not treason.
Are you sure about that? Doing AIPAC's bidding directly puts the US in conflict with the people we get a large portion of our oil from. There's nothing in the Constitution that says the US is supposed to be the welfare provider for the entire world. I find it curious that we'll have conservatives who rail against welfare to American citizens but are more than happy to send the money overseas. I know that this is a liberal who just got caught here but the liberal platform isn't anti-welfare which is what makes the conservative stance hypocritical. What part of giving handouts to Israel serves America's interests? This does nothing to enhance America's security. If we are talking about humanitarian concerns, giving no-strings-attached aid to Israel just makes it more certain the Palestinians will take it in the shorts.
This scandal is going to get the neo-nazis out in droves hooting and hollering about the evil joo's controlling the gubmint. Ignore them. I'm pissed about AIPAC but I'd be just as pissed if we had the Irish PAC leading the government around by the nose and demanding concessions to Ireland and asking us to take sides in the Troubles.
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I find it curious that we'll have conservatives who rail against welfare to American citizens but are more than happy to send the money overseas.
I am sorry, but I really take offense to this comment. I am a conservative and all of my family and friends are conservative, and none of us are against welfare. We all believe that safety nets are needed because sometimes bad things do happen to people. If I had to guess, you are taking a few quotes from some fringe conservatives and sweeping the rest under the same brush.
What we don't like is the current welfare system that does not encourage people to get off the welfare system. The current system is bro
Re:Treason (Score:4, Informative)
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No, actually it's not. The Constitution very carefully defines treason. Giving aid and comfort to our ENEMIES is treason. Doing so to our allies isn't.
Is it sufficient reason to kick her out of the House? Yep. Send her to prison? Yep.
But you won't send her to prison on treason charges. Any shyster can get you off on those charges, with just a copy of the Constitution....
They are not allies in reality (Score:5, Insightful)
Since when has false flag specialist Israel really been the US ally, as opposed to treating the US as her bitch, because of traitors like this cretin in the article and other traitors in big business, big media, and big finance and big government? They sure as hell ARE traitors. Just because they claim they aren't doesn't make it so once you look at the real data.
Why the hell should we be supporting a racist apartheid nation? I never supported racist south africa, and nor do I support Israel, they have been a plague and have put the world at peril for nuclear confrontation for decades now, all so that some European settlers can claim land that isn't theirs. If they had a beef with Germany over their particular holocaust, which is just ONE OF MANY that happened during the war, why the hell didn't we demand Germany give up some territory for some new zionist nation? The Germans are the biggest hypocrites out there now about this. Their old biblical claim to "greater zion" is pure hogwash, freaking fantasy land and I can't believe anyone on this forum falls for it.
Here's just a few references to get you started on some sorely neglected education that you need about those false "allies" who are really the biggest threat to the security of the US, USS Liberty attack [gtr5.com]-this is called levying war, get it? and don't believe the official dual nation coverup story, listen to the actual survivors and dudes who lived through it. And go ahead and google "9-11, dancing Israelis"-for more levying war, and "khazars" for a little more in depth historical background of what lying toads they are. Shrewd yes, technologically capable, yes, smart yes, but also lying sneaky deceitful skunks and jerks.
People who put the interests of some other nation over their own ARE traitors, fullstop. If they claim to be US citizens but work for another nation-traitors. That includes Israel-firsters, including those loony brainwashed flat earth snake handling Xians who are dreaming of Armageddon and some huge conflagration to bring about the Rapture, and just the normal economic traitors, then those jerk off big businessmen who are China-firsters, and so on.
Traitors. You can't have it both ways, either loyal to your own nation first, or you are a traitor and a liar and a hypocrite.
Israel, history of false flag operations [google.com]
Ouch (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:Treason (Score:5, Informative)
http://static.cqpolitics.com/harman-3098436-page1.html [cqpolitics.com]
Is this even remotely suprising? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Getting rid of some inconvenient wiretap can't be far harder.
Might as well get rid of the wiretapper, while they're at it.
And the person who was tapped, too.
Problem solved.
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And who double-taps the wiretap-tapper's double-tapper?
A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:5, Interesting)
If nothing else, this Jane Harmon scandal is going to continue to undermine the USA's credibility as an "impartial" mediator in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Regardless of what Jane Harmon may have done, it's rather shocking that AIPAC has enough pull in congress to be able to hold out committee chairmanships as bribes.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:5, Insightful)
Only to those of you recently clued in on Israel's stranglehold over US politics.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:4, Insightful)
They didn't "hold out" seats as bribes. They just offered to lobby Pelosi to give her the seat. With her experience she might have gotten it anyway - she was probably best qualified.
She can't very well hope to explain the entire conversation away, though. Any time you end a phone call with "this conversation never happened" it's hard to play innocent after the fact.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:4, Informative)
They just offered to lobby Pelosi to give her the seat.
For definitions of "lobby" that include large "campaign contributions".
It would be a substantial understatement to say that an offer from some random guy on the street to "lobby" on Jane Harman's behalf would be enough to convince Jan Harman to intervene in a federal investigation. Clearly, AIPAC (and probably Jane Harman) thought that an offer to "lobby" was a major incentive. That is, either AIPAC was under the delusion that they have major pull in congress or AIPAC actually does have major pull in congress.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:5, Informative)
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:5, Interesting)
Largely in an effort to force God's hand and induce the Rapture, so all the Jews can be converted or die horrible deaths. Not that this invalidates your point, you are quite accurate, but the background helps to explain why this is true.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:4, Insightful)
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It looks from the circumstances like Bush and Gonzales more or less bought her support by promising not to prosecute. It really says something about how appalling Gonzalez was that he not only made Ashcroft look sane but now even out of office he is continuing to make Ashcroft look better just by comparison.
For all his quirks (like early-morning prayer sessions and covering up statues), Ashcroft was one of the better AGs we've had in recent years. Gonzo was more on the other side of of the scale. But ci
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:5, Funny)
The only one I can think of off the top of my head is "Cold Cash" Jefferson from New Orleans.
I object to this scurrilous and unfounded attack on the good name of a fine representative from a great city and a great state. They called him William "Dollar Bill" Jefferson.
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That was a one time aberration and should not reflect on his character as a whole. The money was in the freezer only because the cupboard was already stuffed full, and there was no time to get to the storage container or make a flight to Grand Cayman.
Re:A Setback for Israeli-Palestinian Peace Efforts (Score:4, Interesting)
Bush was, in general, very reluctant to prosecute Democratic politicians because he was afraid people would assume the prosecutions were partisan in nature.
I don't think he gave a shit whether people thought he was being partisan - his administration's conduct certainly shows that they did pretty much whatever they wanted. Anyway, only Democrats can be called partisan, didn't you get the memo?
No, as I have said for several years, the only reasonable explanation for the total surrender of the Democrats in Congress to Bush's policies is that they were and are being blackmailed. Turning reality around and asking why Bush was "reluctant to prosecute Democratic politicians" is the kind of mindfuck that would make Karl Rove proud. The Democrats weren't being set up for selective prosecution only because they were being sufficiently grovelingly servile to their spying, blackmailing controllers.
Couldn't prosecute. (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course this sort of thing goes on all the time.
But there's a less sinister explanation for why Gonzalez didn't prosecute - the wiretap capturing Harman's conversation was illegal. Can't prosecute someone with an illegal wiretap.
Irony alert on many levels.
Re:Couldn't prosecute. (Score:5, Informative)
The point is that this was NOT illegal. Agents were investigating foreign operatives using warrentless wiretapping. They caught the foreign operatives bribing a congresswoman. The Bush administration declined to press charges because said congresswoman supported warrantless wiretapping.
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It was illegal. I don't like their chances of having used that wiretap in court. They can certainly use illegal wiretaps to gather intelligence. Legally actionable material? Doubtful.
Re:Couldn't prosecute. (Score:5, Informative)
Who says it was illegal? We may WISH it were illegal, we may get it declared illegal, it may in fact be unconstitutional, but the fact is, the agents performed what was at the time a LEGAL warrantless wiretap against foreign agents and happened to catch them bribing a congresswoman. They tapped FOREIGN AGENTS IN ISRAEL. There is no US law against tapping foreign phone lines.
not quite right (Score:3, Interesting)
The article doesn't say very clearly where the wiretapped subjects were, but there's this:
From that it sounds like the tapping was entirely domestic, in terms of where the phone lines were located.
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Good point, but wherever the foreign agents were located, wherever they were tapped, our guys got a legal warrant from the FISA court to tap them. I personally think FISA is unconstitutional, but it is, for now, legal.
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They were investigating the foreign operatives. They caught them bribing a congresswoman. That can not possibly fall outside the scope of their investigation.
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In fact, that literally is the scope of their investigation.
That is pretty much the sole reason to counter-spy on 'friendly' spies. I mean, they're not running around blowing up our nuclear power plants or assassinating people.
No, 'friendly' spies are running around collecting influence by doing favors, and creating people in powerful positions beholden to them. That's all they do, have a network of people.
Of course, people seem resistant to make the next logical connection here: Was the fact they happen
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There have been many reasonable accusations for why the Bush warrantless wiretapping was illegal (for gathering any amount of intelligence against American citizens). You can't make a bare assertion (or implication) that it was legal because a determination of supposed legality was made by a branch of the government. The Executive branch likely wasn't duly authorized to endorse such activities by fiat.
If a
The wiretap was COURT APPROVED (Score:5, Informative)
In this case, the underlying article reports that: "What is new is that Harman is said to have been picked up on a court-approved NSA tap directed at alleged Israel covert action operations in Washington." Key words are "court-approved."
The Fourth Amendment states that:
Once the executive branch has convinced a judge that probably cause exists, and the judge has issued the warrant, there is nothing preventing the executive branch from using that information in court.
Now there is a real question as to whether wire tapping a member of congress (who herself was not under investigation) is a good idea, but that's not really the issue. I'm actually somewhat sad to hear about this as Jane Harmon is/was a very competent and thoughtful member of congress -- particularly on port security issues.
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There is nothing legally wrong with wiretapping so long as the wiretap is approved by the judicial branch of government.
Fixed that for you. A seal of approval by the government doesn't change whether something is morally wrong or right.
Wiretap Legal, Extortion Not (Score:3, Insightful)
While I've never agreed with the legal theories that allow most wiretapping, the courts have, and this wiretap was approved by a court.
However, dropping prosecution in return for the Congresscritter actively supporting their political agenda strikes me as somewhere on the spectrum between extortion and at least partisan favoritism.
retroactive FISA (Score:5, Informative)
As I understand it they went to FISA to get a retroactive warrant. A nice little provision of the law.
Re:Couldn't prosecute. (Score:4, Insightful)
Basically it is potentially a government sanctioned blackmail scenario. A kind of quid-pro-quo, "you support our legislation and we will not release what we know about you"...please explain how it is not illegal?
Re:Couldn't prosecute. (Score:5, Insightful)
The argument is that while the wiretap may have been legal, using it to subvert the independence of Congress was not - they can prosecute or not, but they can't legally blackmail. This argument calls into question all sorts of things prosecutors do every day, but there is additional reason for questioning the methods in this case since they either effect the control of a Congresswoman by the Executive or allow her control by a foreign power or both.
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It's a moot point whether it was a legal or illegal wiretap. Either way corruption abounds.
If it was a legal wiretap, burying the evidence is corrupt.
If it was an illegal wiretap, using the illegitimate evidence to blackmail the representative is wrong.
So either way Gonzalez is wrong.
Luckily there's enough corruption all around to make it a non-issue.
Really the only thing that needs fixing is the person that reported this story. But I'm sure that's an issue that will be resolved quickly.
Re:Couldn't prosecute. (Score:4, Informative)
RTFS ...
evidence against California rep Jane Harman was apparently captured some time ago on a legal NSA wiretap
LEGAL, as in, they used the existing FISA law passed by Congress in 1978. Not the Bush administration's made-up law.
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the wiretap capturing Harman's conversation was illegal.
But Roberto and Yoo said it was legal. Bush maintained it was legal. Either it's legal or not. So instead of admitting they're wiretapping Americans, so much better to just blackmail the ones you need something from.
American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington.
So now we know the Israelis are lobbying for favors, that's nothing new. What's news to me is how effective they are. They're ab
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The article mentions attaining a FISA application
Then-CIA Director Porter J. Goss reviewed the Harman transcript and signed off on the Justice Departmentâ(TM)s FISA application ...
I believe that makes this a legal wiretap under the 1978 FISA law.
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So what's the crime here? (Score:2, Insightful)
Is it that Bush blackmailed a Congressman to do his political bidding? As much as I find it detestable, district attorneys do this all the time.
Re:So what's the crime here? (Score:5, Informative)
no, in fact TFA says that's not the implication at all. Harman has been a long-time supporter of the warrantless wiretapping program.
The (newly revealed) crime is Antonio Gonzalez using his authority to halt a criminal investigation into a key political ally of the Bush administration.
The original crime is Harman offering a quid-pro-quo with a foreign agent. Which, by the way, was captured on a legally requested wiretap.
Translation: (Score:2, Funny)
We got that bitch over a barrel, yo! She gonna do *everything* we tell her ass to do!
THIS is the problem (Score:5, Insightful)
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The spirit of bipartisanship (Score:3, Insightful)
Both parties working together to do shitty stuff. Yay.
"Irony" is so overused (Score:4, Insightful)
The "irony-makes-head-asplode dept." is funny, but inaccurate.
Irony is when something is the opposite of what you would expect.
Hypocrisy, lies, and hardball intimidation tactics are *exactly* what we would expect from proponents of warrantless wiretapping.
This situation contains no irony. Just corruption. We might say, though, that "Ironically, the new administration was elected in hopes of restoring honor to the Justice Department."
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Irony: A US representative was captured on an illegal wiretap doing illegal things. She then added her support to illegal wiretapping. She couldn't have been prosecuted anyway because the wiretap on her was probably illegal.
If you don't see Irony here, you're not trying hard enough.
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I'm not sure either way. Since it was performed by the NSA, I assumed it was done without a court order. Has any government collected wiretapping data been used in a US court which was not collected via a court order?
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Not in front of any judge worth a.... oh never mind.
-Steve
Re:"Irony" is so overused (Score:4, Insightful)
This makes it even more ironic - the Bush administration declined to prosecute what was likely a serious crime, based on a legal wiretap - so that they could more effectively pursue illegal wiretaps.
Long, Proud Tradition (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder how well Robert Mueller pulls off a sun dress...
Not warrantless. (Score:5, Insightful)
DoJ had a warrant, apparently it was part of the AIPAC investigation.
No, the fishy part is that the Bush admin apparently blackmailed her into supporting the warrantless program.
Also, you have the Executive branch doing that ot a member of the Legislative.
This could get really interesting...
Re:Not warrantless. (Score:4, Informative)
No, the fishy part is that the Bush admin apparently blackmailed her into supporting the warrantless program.
No, the fishy part is that the Bush administration blocked the prosecution of one of their allies. Her comment to the foreign agent, "this conversation never happened," was fishy too.
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And the surrounding context is great (Score:4, Informative)
If Harman was a republican (Score:2, Insightful)
You can bet it would have been pointed out in the title of the summary and 10 more times in the summary.
Jane Harman (D - CA) (Score:2, Insightful)
There, somebody posted the usu
Re:Jane Harman (D - CA) (Score:5, Insightful)
How hard is it to put the D after her name?
Why would you want to do that? You'll just perpetuate the myth that it actually matters.
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Actually, the Parent has a point. Whenever a (R) does something, the press makes it VERY clear, often repeating party affiliation several times within the article. And when it is a (D), they may never actually mention it.
Pay attention to how politicians are labeled in news articles and you'll see this trend. Good (D), Bad (R). No bad (D), no good (R).
And I'm not even an (R), and I can see the bias.
Re:Jane Harman (D - CA) (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, the press makes party affiliation very clear... perhaps in a way they don't mean to.
When an (R) does something wrong as you note you cant(R) see(R) their(R) name(R) in(R) print(R) without(R) that(R) (R) right after their name.
On the other hand, when a politician has done something wrong and no party affiliation is mentioned they're a (D), never an (R) or an (I).
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your google-fu is weak old man it too me 20 and I'm on a 28.8 modem.
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10 seconds using carrier-pigeons. I win.
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As others point out, you should learn how to read the summary if you want to complain.
Mods, do your job correctly.
corruption and blackmail, not irony (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason we don't want to have warrantless wiretapping is not for people like you and me; it's for this: if the government can listen in on the opposition, it can blackmail them to fall in line politically. So, this case isn't "ironic", it's what you expect to happen when warrantless wiretaps are tolerated, and it's a really bad sign.
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Sounds like politics as usual (Score:2)
One person blackmails another, who blackmails another, who blackmails another, and so on and so forth...
was it warrantless? (Score:2)
Hey, I called it (Score:3, Informative)
I am rather pleased with myself for correctly parsing this story in 2006 [hongpong.com]. It was clear to some at the time what was really going on.
"In sum total: The FBI has the evidence already. The shape of spy scandals to get exposed depends on who runs the Intelligence committees, and Reyes seems like the only good choice" etc.