read it...

We're 106% compatible.

I think that was you, anyway.

hmn. clinton commits a felony (perjory) while in office but everyone loves him so he gets a pass.



bush supposedly violated the constitution? i'm pretty sure that's against the law. and pretty easy to demonstrate.



so you'd think the losers at impeachbush.com (aka denny hastert for prez?) would have done a better job making an argument.



blah. you don't like him. we get it. but come on. just cuz you don't like him doesn't mean he's evil. (this is the same mistake the republicans made with clinton)


what, were his tax cuts not progressive enough for you?

(yes, they were progressive tax cuts by the definition of the term, i believe)

oh, i almost forgot



flame on!




(it's been a while)





(ps. i'm in boston now and you still owe me $5)

Re:

You've yet to justify interrogating american citizens while denying them their constitutional right to an attorney. Or trying them while denying them their constitutional right to a public trial.

oh, all that stuff went to court and was ruled constitutional. what more do you want?

Re:

I would have assumed that someone so patriotic as you would actually, you know, care about your freedom of expression, freedom of the press, etc. I guess I should just stop assuming things, eh?

i don't feel that my freedom to speak has been in anyway abridged.


geez




but yes. if it were i might be alarmed.

Re:

What will it take before you are alarmed? Does it have to happen to you personally?

"it?"


you mean like i'm dissing bush and some SS guy tackles me?



please be specific

Re:

What will have to happen before you are alarmed?

um. something alarming.


please tell me what's going on that i should be so alarmed about. one example is enough, really. what rights have i lost?

Did you read my response at all?
Well, here are a few more examples.

• Have you heard of the RAVE Act?
  "Given [the] broad language [of the law], anyone who organizes or rents space for an event where drug use takes place could face criminal charges." [Source & more information]
  It was already used to shut down a benefit concert intended to raise money for a political campaign.
  
  
• Speaking of laws being misused against political opponents of the administration, did you notice that one of the first public cases the Department of Homeland Security got involved in was against the Texas Democratic party?
  
  
• Are you a student? Since 1974, Federal law protected the privacy of your educational records. The USA PATRIOT Act has given federal agents access to your student records, and the school will be forbidden to tell you that anybody even asked.
  
  
• Ever check anything slightly questionable out of the library? Until the USA PATRIOT Act, your library records were kept strictly confidential. Now, although libraries and booksellers are fighting it, the USA PATRIOT Act gives the government the ability to look at those records as well, and again, the library would be forbidden to tell you.
  
  
• Homeland security departments have been removing (formerly)public information about hazardous materials in the communities. Wanna know what chemicals the factory in town might be spewing? You can't any more. No more cases like Erin Brockovich or "A Civil Action" once they're through.
  
  
• An American citizen named Mike Hawash has been in jail since March. He hasn't been charged with any crime or accused of doing anything wrong. Instead, the government has said he's a flight risk and needed as a witness in some other case -- but they won't release any more info about why he's in custody and won't free him. If the government can do it to one citizen, what makes you safe from a similar treatment?
  
  
• TODAY, the government is trying to deny a criminal defendant the right to call a witness he says may exonerate him. Not only is the government refusing this request, but they're saying that if they don't get their way, they'll remove him from the criminal justice system and put him in a military tribunal, where he'll have even fewer rights to defend himself.
  
  
• How about this tidbit: According to the General Accounting Office and independent investigations, three-fourths of terrorism cases filed by the Justice Department since 9/11 have had nothing to do with terrorism.
  And the USA PATRIOT Act redefines terrorism to include trying to influence a governmental policy and terrorist activity includes "providing [organizations] with material support" (such as donating money to an umbrella organization).
  
  
• Oh yeah, and immigration officials arrested one foreign student after their computers mistakenly showed she had dropped out, and other foreign students were arrested by the INS because their courseloads were too light.
  

Should I go on?

I can document any or all of these with pointers to objective news sources if you want more information, but I'd prefer to get some response from you to one of my posts before I bother.

Re:

Yeah. What she said.

One of my favorite quotes:

"[She] is one of the secret masters of the world: a librarian. They control information. Don't ever piss one off."
                    -- Spider Robinson

Aw heck, just found one more case worth mentioning.

The latest Village Voice has an article titled A Lifetime in Limbo: Why the 'Dirty Bomber' Case Threatens Everyone's Rights.

Entirely worth reading, but one excerpt:

When Steven Brill, author of After: How America Confronted the September 12 Era, asked "one of Ashcroft's closest aides" shortly after Padilla's detention what insurance an American had against secret arrest and imprisonment, the aide replied, "Well, I guess his family could speak out if he's missing, and if that creates a political furor, then the President would be accountable at the next election."

Isn't that a comforting thought.

[Georgetown law professor David] Cole says everyone has a stake in the enemy combatant question. "The authority of the executive branch to go out and unilaterally pick up any U.S. person anywhere in the world and lock him up without any forum in which the person could assert his innocence—that ought to be a frightening prospect for any of us," he says.

Again, even if you trust Bush and Ashcroft to act responsibly, imagine a president you don't like getting into office.
Are you alarmed yet?

well, the RAVE act is nto part of the PATRIOT act and is being pushed by a democratic senator, not by Bush. (i forget which one. schumer maybe?)


if the texas thing turns out to be true then yes, it's a misapplication of resources, but come on, there's hardly anything scary about it. and keep in mind the democrats DID break the law in a very clear-cut way


my understanding was that hawash was finally charged and from what i heard the charges were fairly serious



as for the rest of the stuff, no i'm not concerned. i really don't feel that any of those things affects my rights in a worrisome way and while obviously they shouldn't be necessary in an ideal world, we DID recently have 3,000 americans killed in a single day and the government has a responsibility to prevent something like that from ever happening again.

well, the RAVE act is nto part of the PATRIOT act...
I never said it was; more wrongs have been done than just that one law.
...and is being pushed by...
The RAVE Act has already passed and has been made into law.

if the texas thing turns out to be true then yes, it's a misapplication of resources
The Texas thing is true. One of the police officers involved gave a sworn deposition that he called in the Department of Homeland Security.
The Texas blogger Off the Kuff has been following the story since the beginning and has some of the best coverage I've seen.

keep in mind the democrats DID break the law
What law did they break? I haven't heard anything in the news that they were charged with any crimes.

They broke the rules of the Texas legislature by intentionally missing the quorum call (but then again, the Texas GOP have done this before -- House Speaker Tom Craddick was one of 30 members of the Texas House who disappeared during the 1971 legislative session.)

Republicans also accused the Democrats of violating open meetings laws, but the DA's office "determined no violation had occurred"
In other words, unless you can point me to something else, the Democrats did not break any laws. Meanwhile, the Texas GOP did break the law, by illegally destroying their documents.

as for the rest of the stuff, no i'm not concerned. i really don't feel that any of those things affects my rights in a worrisome way
Well then, I hope you enjoy your piece of mind and never have cause to regret it. I'm reminded uncomfortably of the famous quote by Martin Niemoeller:

First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me

we DID recently have 3,000 americans killed in a single day and the government has a responsibility to prevent something like that from ever happening again.
Two final comments, then:
1) How effective are these changes really in stopping terror? The USA PATRIOT Act was a wishlist of things that law enforcement officials have been asking for for years. Most of the provisions have nothing to do with anything the 9/11 terrorists did and wouldn't've been any help in stopping them.
2) Benjamin Franklin once said: "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security."

i made a secret and sacred pact with myself that if you replied with that "first they came for the communists" business i'd stop talking to you. so some final words! (and also, you shoudl read teh SEVEN POEMS I JSUT WROTE AND POSTED ON MY LIVEJOURNAL!!!)




anyway, second page of the boston globe says the government busted (convicted) a sleeper cell in detroit


so let me just say: I AM GLAD THAT FIRST THEY CAME FOR THE TERRORISTS

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I hate to admit it, but I am tired of that quote. However though, you should know that you can't both stop talking to someone and get the last word. Anyway, seven poems? Alex, you're going soft!

and a poem on veganism after i wake up!



i'm not making this up, i saw a version of that poem that started with "first they came for the terrorists" and i was like "um, shouldn't "they" come for the terrorists?

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You'd think so. But no, first "they" came for the Texan democrats.

so let me just say: I AM GLAD THAT FIRST THEY CAME FOR THE TERRORISTS
And once again, you're wrong. First they came for the immigrants and aliens living in our country.
And, according to a recent government investigation:

More than 760 illegal immigrants were imprisoned in the weeks and months after the attacks, as authorities traced thousands of leads and sought to prevent a follow-up attack. Most of those people have been deported, and none have been charged as terrorists.

Yes, some of those people overstayed their visas, but in most cases that was their only crime. And does that justify to you the brutality and inhumane treatment that was inflicted on them?

i'm pretty sure that's not true.


and even if it were, COME ON DUDE, THEY"RE ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS


which is to say that they're breaking the law and deportation isn't the most horrible thing.



bah

Denial isn't just a river in Egypt

i'm pretty sure that's not true
Well, you're wrong. The paragraph I quoted is almost verbatim from this New York Times article. Read it and weep.

deportation isn't the most horrible thing.
You're right it's not.
That's why civil libertarians are so horrified by the abuses that the United States Inspector General discovered. Quoting from the official summary by the Justice Department:

• evidence indicates a pattern of physical and verbal abuse by some correctional officers
• certain conditions of confinement at the MDC were unduly harsh

The full governmental report goes into more detail:

• [An] officer interviewed by the OIG told us that he witnessed officers "slam" inmates against walls and stated this was a common practice before the MDC began videotaping the detainees.
• an officer bent his finger back until it touched his wrist
• officers repeatedly twisted his arm, which was in a cast, and finger, which was healing from a recent operation.
• they were forcefully pulled out of the vehicle and slammed against walls. One detainee further alleged that his handcuffs were painfully tight around his wrists and that MDC officers repeatedly stepped on the chain between his ankle cuffs. Another detainee alleged officers dragged him by his handcuffs and twisted his wrist every time they moved him. All three detainees alleged that officers verbally abused them with racial slurs and threats like "you will feel pain"

I'm not going into the verbal abuse, since I can tell that you don't care about other people, but sleep deprivation techniques and other forms of psychological torture were used against them.

And everything I've said has been a verifiable fact that you can read from the links I posted.

Sorry about cluttering up your journal like this, Copperpoint, but it's just so stupid of him to lie about such things when the facts are so readily available.

Do you have any idea what statements Clinton made that were perjurious? Surely you can point to something specific that he said.

After you thought about that for a while, read this essay I wrote which details exactly what charges he was actually impeached for.
Do those really rise to the level of this administration saying "We know where [WMDs] are" to justify a war which has killed over 200 U.S. soldiers even though we still haven't found any evidence?
Who was hurt by Clinton's lies? Who was hurt by Bush's?

As for the rest of it, did you read http://www.warblogging.com/archives/000635.php? Are you okay with the things he describes happening in this country. Even if you don't believe all of them, pretend for a moment and ask yourself whether you could be... satisfied... living in a country that did these things. Do any of them cross the line or do you approve of them all?

And even if you think the expanded powers given to Ashcroft and Bush are okay because they can handle them, imagine President Hillary Clinton having a database with detailed information on everybody in America and the ability to declare anybody or any group a "terrorist organization" and put them under secret investigations. Alternately, they could decide you're a material witness to another case they're investigating and imprison you indefinitely as a possible flight risk (no need for a lawyer, no need for bail -- you're not on trial for anything after all!)

Would you like living in a country like that? I don't.