Bush & Repubs Used "Bogus" Terror Threat To Expand FISA

[kpete]

Republicans pushed 'bogus' terror threat to expand FISA, lawmaker says Nick Juliano
Published: Wednesday September 19, 2007

Republicans and the Bush administration used a 'bogus' terror threat that raised specific fears of an attack on the Capitol to scare lawmakers into adopting a dramatic temporary expansion of the government's spy powers last month, a former top intelligence committee Democrat said Wednesday.

Congress agreed to give President Bush and the nation's intelligence agencies extra authority to spy on Americans just hours before lawmakers left for a month-long recess in August. In the legislative session's final week, news emerged of an impending plot by foreign terrorists to attack the US Capitol, and Republicans pointed to the reports as justification to expand the administration's powers.

"That specific intelligence claim, it turned out, was bogus; the intelligence agencies knew that," Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) said at a forum on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act organized by the Center for American Progress in Washington. However, lawmakers did not learn of the claim's unreliability until "the day" they approved the FISA expansion, she said.

more at:
http://rawstory.com//news/2007/Republicans_pushed_bogus_terror_threat_to_0919.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. "Terror" will be used again and again and again as the impetus to

take away one constitutional protection at a time until we're living under a dictatorship.

----------

When the Constitution was ratified in Philadelphia, a woman stopped Benjamin Franklin and asked him what kind of government the colonies would now have. He answered, "A republic, if you can keep it."

[Beetwasher]

2. Gee, Ya Think?

n/t

[spirald]

3. Terrorism by proxy

The use of threats of violence as a tool to advance a political agenda is terrorism, especially when those threats originate from those seeking that political agenda, even if the threat is purported to come from elsewhere.

This sounds like a classic protection racket- "You better hire us to provide security, or something bad might happen to your family".

Those who participated in propagating this bogus threat should be charged with making terrorist threats or charged under RICO for extortion and fraud. This kind of behavior by government officials cannot be legal.

[L. Coyote]

4. What does "Code Blue" mean? That the Reds are getting flushed down the tubes!

Just one more reason to pull the Blue handle, to flush the Lying Rs away for good.

[TwilightGardener]

5. Well of course. And the Dems fell for it. Suckers, again.

[robinlynne]

8. know what, I'm tempted to stop believing they "fell for it". Yesterday there was a post

here about the right wing of the Dem party and their strategy, and it made sense to me. I think Feinstein and the others are not cowards or ignorant, as they seem, but are actually doing this on purpose.
They all went to school. they cannot be as stupid as they act.

[htuttle]

12. There comes a point where we find ourselves with a choice

Either our Congresspersons are just too stupid to have the job that they do, or they're complicit in what they're doing. I don't see a third possibility anymore.

[smoogatz]

13. Either way, they're complicit.

Either they're a bunch of quivering, terrified jellyfish, so frightened and gullible that Bush is able to trick them again and again, OR they genuinely think that Bush should have the powers of a dictator. I'm not sure which answer is more disturbing.

[robinlynne]

6. Now why is it, we get it and Feinstein doesn't? And, as I recall, lying to congress is a

crime, whether or not you are under oath. How about jail time for the person who did it. (We know exactly who that was...)

[Zodiak]

9. Chertoff and his gut feeling?

Or the Bushler himself?

Or the guy who served as a liason between Bush and Congress (the Intelligence Director, right?)?

Which one?

[robinlynne]

14. The intelligence director. I called Feinstein's office that day and asked WHY

she voted against the FISa courts. The answer was She had a meeting with McConnell, in person, and he convinced her it was necessary. Now, surprise, McConnells words were lies. (There was a coming doomsday, and if the Dems didn't authorize surveillance sans warrant, it was going to be their fault when the US fell apart during their vacation...)

[Hydra]

7. And the Dems were provided a perfect excuse for caving

Since the Repubs do this about every week to take the heat off their scandals or to push legislation, why are they not being brought to task for doing so?

[redqueen]

10. So how many times is that the Dems have oh-so-naively fallen

for the lies?

*sigh*

[Vincardog]

11. Charlie Brown NEVER TRUST LUCY she will never hold that football.

[Disturbed]

15. Extortion.

It's the "What if" concept. What if you don't do what we want & something terrible happens? Who will get the blame?

[Solly Mack]

16. I need a head shaking smilie

[mousewoman]

17. somebody wake me up - nightmare is happening again

This is a great discussion, well-documented, that manages to make sense of the whole mess - http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/ Do see this movie, if you ain't yet. The whole shebang, in a nutshell.

[Solly Mack]

19. Hi, mouse. Thanks for the link!

[donkeyotay]

18. So, they terrorized us, again.

Section 802 of the USA PATRIOT Act (Pub. L. No. 107-52) expanded the definition of terrorism to cover ""domestic,"" as opposed to international, terrorism. A person engages in domestic terrorism if they do an act ""dangerous to human life"" that is a violation of the criminal laws of a state or the United States, if the act appears to be intended to: (i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping. Additionally, the acts have to occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States and if they do not, may be regarded as international terrorism.

http://www.aclu.org/natsec/emergpowers/14444leg20021206.html

[chill_wind]

20. It's illegal. It's criminal. It's fascist evil. And Congress will do EXACTLY WHAT about it?

NOTHING. Nothing, nothing, nothing! It's not like Congress hasn't lovingly allowed themselves "to be lied" to repeatedly on virtually every intelligence report and war-time matter-- hell everything under the sun-- that's come out for seven years now.

Didn't know "until the very day"--- oh bullsh%t. We should dig up all the mega-threads on DU from that week. I believe EXTORTION was the EXACT word I used, more than once.

And it wasn't just the ratcheting imminent threat rhetoric used by Bush himself that week, to underscore his demands he had Homeland Security visibly beefing up and STAGING a police presence all over Capitol Hill, according to reports at TPM at the time.

BUT, but-- but Bush threatened to keep them indoors over recess. Couldn't have that!

Plenty of lawyers in Congress. If I can read the Constitution regarding their duties and can understand the meaning of Separation of Powers, so can they. The Unitary Pathological Executive should be impeached, indicted and imprisoned for his long reign of misconduct--- and THEY should all be dis-barred and permanently evicted from DC for failing to do it.

PARASITES, all.

[donkeyotay]

21. I feel your pain. Yet, we have both parties saying they can't hear us.

we tried to tell them, and once again, the looney left was right and the reasonable, centrist, realist, complicits were wrong. Impeach already.

[chill_wind]

22. Man!

Can I still kick this? I'm kicking it!