Posted on 12/17/2005 10:12:01 AM PST by iPod Shuffle
Eavesdropping Program Netted Local Man
Dec 16, 2005, 02:35 PM
Reported by Kurt Ludlow
A former Columbus truck driver linked to Al-Qaeda was nabbed as part of a secret operation that's now out of the bag. The government spied on him and hundreds of other Americans without warrants.
It was a front page New York Times article that divulged for the first time that the National Security Agency spied on Americans, monitoring international phone calls and emails of hundreds of people including a Columbus man.
Columbus truck driver Iyman Farris pled guilty in 2003 to helping Al-Qaeda plan terrorist attacks in the US, and is was an admission that stunned his ex wife.
Geneva Bowling says, "It's still hard for me to believe that he did."
Two years later, Bowling knows that Faris was caught after agents monitored the couple's phone without a court order. She told the Associated Press, "If you're asking me if I think that's fair, I think it is."
Constitutional lawyer Benson Wolman says there's a reason court orders are required before the government can listen in on you; there must be probable cause you've done something wrong.
"While most of us aren't going to be victims of wiretap or eavesdrop, it's important to now that if the government can do it to the worst of us, it can do it to the best of us," says Wolman.
Supporters of the secret wiretapping order say desperate times since 9-11 call for desperate measures.
"In the perfect world we would just continue with laws as they were prior to 9-11 and we are unable to combat with due diligence and continue to face this new challenge. The fact is we can't do that," says one supporter.
A lot of lawmakers say they're troubled by this sort of domestic spying. The Senate has promised to hold hearings on it.
The treasonous scumbag Dems are upset that this program has nabbed a few of their supporters. Too bad.
You've gone too far this time, and the Prez is spitting nails and is going to finally fight back.
""While most of us aren't going to be victims of wiretap or eavesdrop, it's important to now that if the government can do it to the worst of us, it can do it to the best of us," says Wolman."
Maybe I'm alone here but I always assume somebody could be listening and I don't say things I would not want to be overheard.
I am a little concerned that the Patriot act has been used against organized crime but if there is no more mission creep than that then we'll be all right.
FYI. This is what the rats allied with al Qaeda are so upset about. The system worked.
Pretty funny that even the wife of one of the terrorists netted by this thinks it's fair-- but the democrats don't.
What is amazing to me beside the anti Americans in Congress and the MSM upset about actions like the one below are the so called conservatives on Free Republic who are using this bs to hack up GW again.
"Columbus truck driver Iyman Farris pled guilty in 2003 to helping Al-Qaeda plan terrorist attacks in the US, and is was an admission that stunned his ex wife.
"Geneva Bowling says, "It's still hard for me to believe that he did."
"Two years later, Bowling knows that Faris was caught after agents monitored the couple's phone without a court order. She told the Associated Press, "If you're asking me if I think that's fair, I think it is."
The question is, did they spy on him or spy on a foreign national terrorist from another country that led to him?
BTTT
Anything going out over the information conduits can be overheard by the Witcheta lineman.
More people need to see this - to see that the program was successful.
BTTT
" Anything going out over the information conduits can be overheard by the Witcheta lineman."
Yep and it's worse than that on the internet.
I suspect FR is being monitored.
The sooner we learn that, the sooner this war will be over, it is after all, a war of and on intelligence (in more ways than one!).
Internet keeps its own records. Data mining is an ultramodern technical tool that an intelligence agency would naturally employ. Now that even telephone, TV and radio are going digital, it would require a deliberate effort to avoid keeping content records. If the NYT is worried about a focus on a few hundred individuals, they are missing the big picture.
Will the Dems support the Patriot Act if it is amended such that all terrorists caught by wiretapping can still vote for them?
With the ability to monitor EVERYTHING, it might become more difficult to monitor specific individual targets. Information overload.
" I suspect FR is being monitored."
I'm sure FR is monitored - that in itself is not a problem but it is important that we not let congress pass a law that would define FR in such a way that free expression is not allowed here - like saying it's not "press."
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