Posted on 12/26/2005 7:50:26 AM PST by harpu
Just over a week ago, the New York Times revealed the shocking news that the Bush administration has been spying on the international communications of suspected terrorists, thus setting off a rippling artificial scandal in the Times private reflecting pool, the increasingly stagnant mainstream media.
Not to be outdone, U.S. News and World Report put on its water wings Friday and tried to create a splash of it own, by reporting that the same renegade Bush administration has been monitoring radiation levels in the public air -- without a warrant! Gasp! The power-mad Bushies have done this in a diabolical attempt to get early warning of terrorists preparing to use a nuclear or dirty bomb against an American city. According to the story, this program is fraught with all sorts of subtle privacy issues.
Obviously, such warantless radiation monitoring creates a searing civil rights crisis for the average American, who now must live in fear, knowing that his private high-energy photon emissions, personal beta-particle broadcasts, or even his confidential radionuclide wafting could be subject to detection by the crass and intrusive thugs of the federal government.
I mean, when you don’t have the right to leak radiation into the communal air from a clandestine nuclear bomb, what rights do you have really? Clearly, Bush is Hitler, but worse.
Let us examine what this “far-reaching” and “controversial” program of “questioned” legality entails. A technician in a vehicle drives around Washington, D.C., or another high-risk city, and samples the air with a little device. If the air is not radioactive, he drives somewhere else. Disturbing!
The technician never kicks in a door, or even knocks on one, but he does -- from a publicly-accessible area -- sample the air. SHOCKING!
All this raises very important privacy issues, such as: What if the air was radioactive for a perfectly harmless reason? Wouldn’t detecting this radiation violate the privacy of the person contaminating the air for this harmless reason? You can see what a slippery slope this becomes really quickly.
Am I kidding here? The article quotes Georgetown University professor David Cole, a “constitutional law expert,” on this legal conundrum: "They don't need a warrant to drive onto the property -- the issue isn't where they are, but whether they're using a tactic to intrude on privacy. It seems to me that they are, and that they would need a warrant or probable cause."
Professor Cole did not explain, however, how exactly the right to privacy would cover the emission of harmful, illegal radioactive material into the common air. If ever there were a narrowly focused and non-intrusive search, monitoring the air for radiation would seem to be it. Name for me one legal personal activity for which such monitoring would violate the expectation of privacy, or what harm would likely result.
The reason many searches are regulated by constitutional law is they can impose a significant burden upon the searched, and the search can reveal much more than its target. For example, having a policeman search your body cavities or rifle through your personal possessions is potentially unpleasant and demeaning and could lead to the revelation of personal information unrelated to any legal investigation. But what can measuring roadside radiation levels reveal -- other than your possession of materials causing unusual roadside radiation levels?
Radiation monitoring cannot detect whether you look at goat porn on the Internet, belong to the ACLU, voted for Ross Perot, cheat on your spouse, or secretly prefer catsup to ketchup. It cannot read your thoughts or fumble through your underwear drawer. It can do only one thing: determine if you have a significant source of radiation in your possession, which I believe is both illegal and not healthy for children and other living things. And it can do this one limited thing as an unnoticed drive-by service. So you don’t even have to lose any personal time or face social stigma.
But exposing this alleged “invasion of privacy” is what U.S. News has been reduced to in its eager quest for a Bush-bashing warrantless search “scandal.” For political expediency and a desire to ape the New York Times, the 4th Amendment’s guarantee against “unreasonable search and seizure” has now been morphed into a guarantee against any search for Cesium. You know, because high-level gamma emissions might be part of someone’s protected political speech.
The degree to which the mainstream media’s hatred of President Bush has pushed it into a state of logical incoherence is simply amazing. But even more amazing is that this incoherence is not lessened even by the basic human desire to protect innocent people’s lives. “Exposing” the government’s radiation monitoring program in such detail will not help the public fend off any real assault on our liberties. Neither does it contribute to any significant political debate. It won’t even harm Bush politically. All it does is inform our terrorist enemies what measures we have taken to catch them before they can harm us, and allow them to attempt more effective countermeasures.
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"The New York Times" is not some monolithic faceless alien oracle.
It is run by this man Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and his cadre of socialist crook propagandists from NYC's 42nd st.
Sulzberger is an enemy of the state and should be surveilled and brought up on charges of sedition.
OFFICERS
Chairman Emeritus: Arthur Ochs "Punch" Sulzberger, age 71, $1,397,200 pay
(prior to title change)
Chairman; Publisher, The New York Times: Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr., age
46, $960,200 pay (prior to promotion)
VC and SVP: Michael Golden, age 48
President and CEO: Russell T. Lewis, age 50, $882,235 pay (prior to promotion)
SVP Operations and Acting CFO: John M. O'Brien, age 54
SVP and Deputy COO: David L. Gorham, $796,000 pay
SVP Broadcasting, Real Estate, and Corporate Communications: Katharine
P. Darrow, age 53
SVP Corporate Development, New Ventures, and Electronic Businesses: Leonard
P. Forman, age 51
SVP Human Resources: Donald S. Schneider, age 50
SVP and General Counsel: Solomon B. Watson IV, age 52
Chairman and CEO, Globe Newspaper Co.: William O. Taylor, age 64, $789,653
pay
President, Magazine Group: James W. FitzGerald, age 58
President and Publisher, The Boston Globe: Benjamin B. Taylor, age 49
President, Regional Newspaper Group: James C. Weeks, age 54
VP, Secretary, and Corporate Counsel: Laura J. Corwin, age 52
VP Forest Products, Health, Safety, and Environmental Affairs; President
and General Manager, Forest Products Group: Stephen Golden, age 50
VP and Project Administrator: Donna C. Miele
VP Human Resources, The New York Times: Dennis L. Stern, age 50
VP and Corporate Controller: Stuart Stoller, age 41
LOCATION
Headquarters: 229 W. 43rd St., New York, NY 10036
Web Site: http://www.nytimes.com
Phone: 212-556-1234
Fax: 212-556-4011
The New York Times Company publishes newspapers in Alabama, California,
Florida, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, and South
Carolina.
PRODUCTS/SERVICES
1997 1997
Sales Operating Income
$ mil. % of total $ mil. % of total
Newspapers &
information services 2,557 89 434 -
Magazines 165 6 28 -
Broadcasting 144 5 39 -
Adjustments - - (46) -
Total 2,866 100 455 -
Selected Daily Newspapers
"The Boston Globe"
"The Daily Comet" (Thibodaux, LA)
"The Dispatch" (Lexington, NC)
"The Gainesville Sun" (Florida)
"International Herald Tribune" (50%, with the Washington Post Co.; Paris)
"The Ledger" (Lakeland, FL)
"The New York Times"
"The Press Democrat" (Santa Rosa, CA)
"Santa Barbara News-Press" (California)
"Spartanburg Herald-Journal" (South Carolina)
"Star-Banner" (Ocala, FL)
"The Tuscaloosa News" (Alabama)
"Wilmington Morning Star" (North Carolina)
Selected Information Services
The New York Times Electronic Media Co.
The New York Times Index (print, microform, CD-ROM)
The New York Times News Service (650 newspaper and magazine customers)
The New York Times Syndication Sales Corp.
TimesFax (fax-, satellite-, and PC-delivered "Times" summary)
Magazines
"Golf Digest"
"Golf Shop Operations"
"Golf World"
Broadcasting
KFOR-TV, Oklahoma City
KFSM-TV, Fort Smith, AR
WHNT-TV, Huntsville, AL
WHO-TV, Des Moines, IA
WNEP-TV, Scranton, PA
WQAD-TV, Moline, IL
WQEW (AM), New York City
WQXR (FM), New York City
WREG-TV, Memphis
WTKR-TV, Norfolk, VA
Forest Products
Donohue Malbaie Inc. (49%, Canada)
Madison Paper Industries (partnership, Maine)
This is the face of the enemy within.
His name is Donald Newhouse, billionaire democrat and managing director of the Associated Press, a leftist propaganda organ committed to undermining the GOP at any cost, including the security of the nation.
I was very disappointed that no traitors were frogmarched out of their homes over the weekend. The leaking of Top Secret information for political purposes is a huge national security issue. It must stop NOW!
umm it's 43rd street.
42nd Street was cleaned up once already.
I love this post! It's one of the most deliciously accurate satires I've ever enjoyed.
The drum talk all along the river basin is how evil Bush is and what a mess he got us into when he allowed those hijackers to fly into the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. Now he can't persue them without the courts permission. Yeah Right. He is doing his job and doing it well. Watch the hand wringing wretchedness if a plot succeeds on his watch. Oh Woe Woe Woe! How did it happen? Why did the FBI and the CIA fail to detect these obviously evil and malcontented before the horrible events took place.
How about adding the word "homosexual" after "crook?"
Which one is "Pinchy?" (Michael Savage calls him Pinchy; I think it's Jr.)
Isn't that the point? The Democrats and the MSM are hoping to aid the terrorists so they can blow up something for which both can then blame Bush and the Republicans for not stopping the attack because their polling has told them that they must do something to level the playing field in regard to national security in order to regain their power.
Cole look like a real main stream patriot...NOT.
This is especially delicious. The enviro-whackos have been screaming for decades about the dangers of nuclear technology and the threats posed by radiation releases into the air. So here we have the the federal government monitoring for these dangerous emissions and the radical kook leftists, allies of the anti-capitalist enviros, are going nuts. The cognitive dissonance must be giving them all migraines. Don't you just love the intellectual bankruptcy of the left and its "logical incoherence"?
I think Rush calls someone "Pinch" but I don't know to whom he is actually referring.
His neighbor does have a right to privacy after all.
L
Ping... humor
dasterly GW ping
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