Posted on 08/17/2006 9:49:00 AM PDT by neverdem
Associated Press
Government's warrantless spying found to violate free speech, privacy rights
DETROIT -- A federal judge ruled today that the government's warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered an immediate halt to it.
U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit became the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's program, which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of journalists, scholars and lawyers who say the program has made it difficult for them to do their jobs. They believe many of their overseas contacts are likely targets of the program, which involves secretly taping conversations between people in the U.S. and people in other countries.
The government argued that the program is well within the president's authority, but said proving that would require revealing state secrets.
(Excerpt) Read more at baltimoresun.com ...
:)
CNN covered it - and even Jeffrey Toobin was saying that this decision doesn't mean much.
but again, this is a good opportunity for the white house political operation. this is a winning issue for our side, and Tony Snow should be out there trash talking the ACLU and liberal judges.
Waiting a few days for a warrant review is absurd. By the time the warrant is issued the rest of the network may realize the phone has been captured and bug out. There is a procedure to start monitoring in anticipation of getting a warrant which brings us to the next problem: The amount of information required to get such a warrant. The FISA applications have been described by people familiar with them as being more than an inch thick of paper. You capture a terrorist's cell phone and what? Start an army of lawyers killing trees? What's the FISA court going to do with tens of thousands of applications? Rubber-stamp them? Then we've negated the whole purpose of having the court "review" them.
It's simple: In wartime you monitor the enemy's communications. You don't stop because some of the enemy have made it ashore.
The Detroit Free Press runs a lengthy and interesting profile on Taylor playing up the importance of her decision before coming to this rather anticlimactic conclusion:
But even if Taylor harpoons the spying program, experts said, the decision likely would be overturned by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.
"Given the composition of the 6th Circuit and its previous rulings in related areas, it seems more likely to favor national security over civil liberties if that issue is squarely presented," said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia. "And that's what this case is all about."
a warrant against who? you don't know who you want to tap in advance.
Strawman argument
Those who are making phone calls to jihadis and suspected jihadis world-wide (you know, the people who want to destroy our nation and its freedoms?), should be subjected to having their phone calls to the enemy monitored.
I agree, show cause, get a warrent do the job.
The USA has operative around the world monitoring communications all day, every day.
This information is, and always should be used to acquire permission for wiretaps within the USA.
This lefty activist was born in 1932, which means she's now 74. Time for her to be put out to pasture. (And way past time for Jimmah to piously exit the world scene.) She can collect her hefty taxpayer-funded federal pension, but she can't work to destroy us from the bench.
you can tune into any episode of COPS, and see more actual civil rights violations then monitoring of FOREIGN telephone calls - which are unprotected in any case.
Yeah, adults in the appeals courts or the SCOTUS will throw this out for sure.
Toobin is an excellent political writer. I've read a few of his books.
You obviously are totally ignorant of the issues and must therefore be a RAT!!
It's a difficult issue. We don't want to give a president like Clinton unlimited power to wiretap us, but we also don't want to stop the NSA from gathering crucial intelligence in the WOT.
Well, President Rodham may find getting a warrant just too much bother.
Perhaps I could argue I had a "right" to open a bank account anonymously or a "right" to take pictures of the GW Bridge. Seems to me these inconveniences are being traded off in favor of my right not to be killed by the enemy.
You just made WhiteGuy's argument for him. The argument for going to FISA is to limit the power of Bill/Hill types of presidents.
>>>>There's been lots of talk about losing our civil rights but no one has been able to name one.
Healthy People 2010
Lets see ya interpertate sharia beeeyatch!
Subtle. Very subtle. I figured you were either hanging yourself on your own ignorance, or you were a remarkably deadpan writer.
That post from yesterday is still on my list to read.
But, right here, COULD what you told me about RICO be done here?
Could RICO be used to charge this judge with Treason or something?
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