Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances are against “The President’s Warrantless Domestic Spying Program” (their words) as well as the most egregious provisions of the grossly misnamed “Patriot” Act. Members include the American Conservative Union, Americans for Tax Reform, American Policy Center, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Free Congress Foundation, Libertarian Party, Gun Owners of America, and the Second Amendment Foundation.
In the Boehner v. McDermott case the Court didn’t say the recording of the conversation didn’t violate federal law. The court only found that McDermott could not be found liable under the Federal Wiretap Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2511(1)(c) and (d) et seq “use and disclosure” prohibition, primarily because McDermott did not act unlawfully when he obtained the illegally recorded tape from the Florida couple, and because the tape was of public importance. The fact that recording the conversation violated federal law was stipulated in the case and the court never said the recording was legal.
The Justice Dept filed charges against John and Alice Martin for recording that call. The Martins were charged with violating federal Communications Privacy Act and agreed to plead guilty and cooperate with investigation into how recording wound up in hands of a reporter.
Neither the Boehner case nor the Bartnicki case made it legal to violate the Federal Wiretap Act, the Communications Privacy Act or the Fourth Amendment. Bush’s insistence that the corporations get immunity makes it clear that he knows they violated the law when they cooperated with the illegal demands of the spy agencies. People and agencies who did nothing wrong don’t need immunity.
I have no problem being in agreement with American Conservative Union, Americans for Tax Reform, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Free Congress Foundation, Gun Owners of America, and the Second Amendment Foundation against Bush. I sure as hell trust those groups more than him, especially when it comes to protecting the Bill of Rights.
Bush lost all credibility on that score when he signed the McCain/Finegold attack on the First Amendment, which he acknowledged while campaigning that as president he had an duty to veto.
James Madison’s warning is especially relevant to the situation we are in today. He said: “The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home. If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”
A more modern admonition comes from Justice Charles Evans Hughes writing in 1934. “Emergency does not create power. Emergency does not increase granted power or remove or diminish the restrictions imposed upon power granted or reserved. The Constitution was adopted in a period of grave emergency. Its grants of power to the federal government and its limitations of the power of the government were determined in the light of emergency, and they are not altered by emergency.”
We should also heed Justice Louis D. Brandeis wise admonition: “Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent.”
In the not too distant past, most Americans valued freedom and liberty more than life. That isn’t the case today.
I was in a hotel the night before the start of the Guns Rights Policy Conference when Bush gave his speech announcing creation of the Dept. of Homeland Security and calling for legislation that became the grossly misnamed “Patriot” Act. I watched the speech in the bar.
There was a WWII veterans’ reunion in the hotel at the time and sever of those guys were also in the bar. At one point one of the veterans said we were watching the start of the rapid erosion of our freedoms. A young guy said something about the president had to keep us safe even if we had to give up some freedoms.
One old veteran jumped up and waived a hand with three fingers missing at the young man and said: “I didn’t leave my fingers in France and my brother didn’t die in Italy to keep your sorry ass safe. We did it to keep you FREE!”
I cheered the old man and picked up his bar tab. He understands what America is all about. Unfortunately, except for a young man also there for the GRPC, the people preferring safety to freedom were all younger than 50 and only us older guys preferred freedom to perceived safety. I’m sorry for my grandchildren. They will never know what it is like to live in a free country because we are not leaving them one.