The Continuing Decline Of Western Civilization

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Don't get too hopeful, it's still the xmas season

The Senate voted against cloture today on the renewal version of the Patriot Act, 52-47 for (you need 60 votes for cloture, which ends debate). A few people crossed of party lines, both ways, which is always interesting on bills about National Security. There was apparently a lot of brandishing of the NYT article on the NSA, and several people said it had moved them to vote against the bill. What does this actually mean? For one thing, it means that Senator Feingold is able to filibuster the bill if he so wishes. What's actually going to happen? Well, as long as the Administration believes that they don't need congressional authority to authorize searches on Americans, it may not mean anything at all.

And it's always nice when a paper name-drops itself.

posted by tcdowc - 4:28 pm - 12.16.05

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Alright, fine, have it your way

My favorite thing about this is the headline, which doesn't exactly match the contents. "President Relents, Backs Torture Ban" As the Washington Post article makes clear, the only reason Bush 'backed' the torture ban was because the votes were veto-proof. The ban says that we will adhere to US Army Code on interrogation, and the Administration isn't too worried about it. After all, they can just rewrite the rules.

posted by tcdowc - 4:16 pm - 12.16.05

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There are spooks in the wires

UPDATE: Of course, hilzoy has written a nice concise post which brings up another, more important note. This is against the law. It explicitly contravenes the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which means the the President, who could have easily followed the law, decided he couldn't be bothered. It's worse that what Nixon did.

Everybody should go and check out the NewYorkTimes report on the secretly expanded eavesdropping powers of the NSA. The NSA traditionally (after Watergate) only spys on foreigners overseas. But Bush signed a secret executive order in 2002 that allowed them to eavesdrop on whomever they wish, provided that the communications were crossing national borders. Details are a little sketchy, the Times says its omitted info for reasons of national security, and that they sat on the story for a year after the Bush Administration asked them not to go forward with it, so you only get a little sideways glance at what's actually been going on. But I think this might be the choice quote:

Several national security officials say the powers granted the N.S.A. by President Bush go far beyond the expanded counterterrorism powers granted by Congress under the USA Patriot Act, which is up for renewal.

[I'll have something up on what's going on with the Patriot Act in the Senate in a bit.] The Administration's response to this was the following:

Bush administration officials argue that the civil liberties concerns are unfounded, and they say pointedly that the Patriot Act has not freed the N.S.A. to target Americans.

Of course we learn that this is because the Administration doesn't think it needs congressional approval to spy on Americans, which it is clearly doing.

Several officials said the eavesdropping program had helped uncover a plot by Iyman Faris, an Ohio trucker and naturalized citizen who pleaded guilty in 2003 to supporting Al Qaeda by planning to bring down the Brooklyn Bridge with blowtorches.

The FBI makes clear in the article that the NSA wiretap was done without a FISA warrant. All of which leads to a couple of questions. First, seriously, bring down the Brooklyn Bridge with blowtorches? If they think that will work, I'll just sell them the damn thing. It should be noted that the FBI was conducting survailance of Faris under a FISA warrant at the time, and that no NSA information was used to bring the court case against him (officials were worried that the information would get the case thrown out due to being an illegal search). Second, who exactly does the Administration consider to be an American citizen? 'When they came for the immigrants and Muslims, I did nothing, because I wasn't an immigrant or a Muslim.'

posted by tcdowc - 3:54 pm - 12.16.05

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Common ground

I don't often agree with people on the right side of the spectrum, but Sebastion at Obsidian Wings has a thoughtful post up about the Cory Maye case (beyond the rather obvious things about racism and the right to defend yourself) that suggests that the responsibility for the officer's death lies primarily with the police. Not for doing anything illegal, but because the officer's death was caused by his shoddy police work and lax behavior at the scene. It's a fairly well-reasoned piece, you should go read it.

posted by tcdowc - 10:37 pm - 12.15.05

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So boring...

The worst thing about the 'Transit Strike' (c) is that it renders my MetroCard's holiday bonus useless. Oh, the humanity!

posted by tcdowc - 9:16 pm - 12.15.05

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What I want for xmas

Via Arstechnica. Honda has released version 2.0 of their humanoid robot, Asimo. This is the place you want to go, because there you will see movies that demonstrate the improved mobility and general awesomeness of Asimo. Totally fucking sweet.

posted by tcdowc - 10:59 pm - 12.14.05

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Will Pinter replace Chomsky when the old man goes?

This is real late, but Josh pointed it out to me and I thought I should put it up here. It being a link to the text of Harold Pinter's Nobel Lecture and a short excerpt:

Everyone knows what happened in the Soviet Union and throughout Eastern Europe during the post-war period: the systematic brutality, the widespread atrocities, the ruthless suppression of independent thought. All this has been fully documented and verified.

But my contention here is that the US crimes in the same period have only been superficially recorded, let alone documented, let alone acknowledged, let alone recognised as crimes at all. I believe this must be addressed and that the truth has considerable bearing on where the world stands now. Although constrained, to a certain extent, by the existence of the Soviet Union, the United States' actions throughout the world made it clear that it had concluded it had carte blanche to do what it liked.

posted by tcdowc - 6:48 pm - 12.14.05

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