Journalist's phone records used in investigations. - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

shakran · 05-15-2006, 06:10 PM

http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/...knowledge.html

Quote:

Originally Posted by ABC News

FBI Acknowledges: Journalists Phone Records are Fair Game

May 15, 2006 7:18 PM

Brian Ross and Richard Esposito Report:

The FBI acknowledged late Monday that it is increasingly seeking reporters' phone records in leak investigations.

"It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration," said a senior federal official.

The acknowledgement followed our blotter item that ABC News reporters had been warned by a federal source that the government knew who we were calling.

The official said our blotter item was wrong to suggest that ABC News phone calls were being "tracked."

"Think of it more as backtracking," said a senior federal official.

But FBI officials did not deny that phone records of ABC News, the New York Times and the Washington Post had been sought as part of a investigation of leaks at the CIA.

In a statement, the FBI press office said its leak investigations begin with the examination of government phone records.

"The FBI will take logical investigative steps to determine if a criminal act was committed by a government employee by the unauthorized release of classified information," the statement said.

Officials say that means that phone records of reporters will be sought if government records are not sufficient.

Officials say the FBI makes extensive use of a new provision of the Patriot Act which allows agents to seek information with what are called National Security Letters (NSL).

The NSLs are a version of an administrative subpoena and are not signed by a judge. Under the law, a phone company receiving a NSL for phone records must provide them and may not divulge to the customer that the records have been given to the government.

It's pretty obvious that as a journalist I'm going to have a decidedly dim view of this.

But I was curious as to what you guys think. Is this even remotely acceptible?

trickyy · 05-15-2006, 06:44 PM

i'm beginning to wonder what isn't acceptible anymore.
what happened to the te'rists? people were upset when the patriot act was applied to drug traffickers, now they are using provisions on journalists. what was that ashcroft quote about accessing library records? something like "you don't think we'd ever do THAT, do you?"

Rekna · 05-15-2006, 06:46 PM

This is why the government having numbers of who they are tracking with their programs is wrong. Pretty soon they will look for people who are gambling, people that have dissetent views, people who have differing political views. Once a system is in place that can easily be abused without anyone finding out it WILL be abused. Absolute power currupts absolutly. This is why the founding fathers put so many checks on the governments power. Some of you defend the errosion of these checks in favor of "current saftey" but what about the our saftey in the future?

ps. Please try not to get this thread closed like the last, there is definatly a lot to be discussed on this topic but when we have petty bickering we get nothing done and the thread gets closed.

Rekna · 05-15-2006, 06:48 PM

I think this case is a perfect example of the slippery slope people have been saying doesn't happen. At first people were saying how this administrations actions only effected terrorists, then it was only terrorists and criminals, now it is journalists, terrorists, and criminals. Soon buisness owners, activists, ect will be on the list.

host · 05-15-2006, 07:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shakran

http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/...knowledge.html

It's pretty obvious that as a journalist I'm going to have a decidedly dim view of this.

But I was curious as to what you guys think. Is this even remotely acceptible?

Yes...it's totally acceptable if you support the people who are in power now, using their data collection and processing capabilities to intimidate and keep tabs on all of us. This discourages investigative reporting, legal and formerly appropriate dissent, and an even playing field for other lawful activity....like being an opposing political candidate.

The temptation to use these illegally and questionably gained telephone numbers to "set up" or blackmail anyone who is offensive to the authorities, or to gain business intelligence regarding not yet disclosed "deals" is probably already happening.

In the following post, I'll provide the skeptics with a model of how this works:

host · 05-15-2006, 07:34 PM

I am mulling over changing my TFP I.D. to my real name here, and posting my address, too....just for my own protection. I suspect that the more visible you are, the more the PTB will hesitate to detain you...when their agenda inevitably reaches that stage.........

Okay...here is the model and the explanation....check my links at the bottom.
They started with Kevin Bacon, and I stopped when the links reached Dustin Hoffman.....Just check the interaction list of each actor....and imagine those are the phone numbers that their phone bills reveal that they've called....

Quote:

http://www.slate.com/id/2141801/
explainer
How the NSA Does "Social Network Analysis"
It's like the Kevin Bacon game.
By Alexander Dryer
Posted Monday, May 15, 2006, at 6:33 PM ET

Last Thursday, USA Today reported that the NSA has been collecting the phone records of millions of Americans. The agency is apparently using "data mining" techniques to scour these records for connections between terrorists. According to an intelligence official interviewed by USA Today, the NSA is analyzing this data using "social network analysis." What's social network analysis?

A technique to map and study the relationships between people or groups. The basic concept of the social network is familiar to anyone who has used Friendster or played Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Social network analysis formalizes this parlor game, using details about the network to interpret the role of each person or group.

In a basic analysis, people are seen as "nodes" and the relationships between them are "links." By studying the links—in the case of the NSA program, telephone calls—it's possible to determine the importance (or "centrality") of each node.

There are several ways to determine which members of a network are important. The most straightforward technique is to figure out a member's "degree," or the number of direct connections he has to other members of the network. With groups that are decentralized and complex, like terrorist cells, other measures of centrality are important as well. Network analysts also study the "betweenness" and the "closeness" of members. A member with relatively few direct connections could still be important because he serves as a connector between two large groups. A member might also be important because his links, direct and indirect, put him closest to all other members of the group (i.e., he has to go through fewer intermediaries to reach other members than anyone else).

Network analyst Valdis Krebs set out to prove after 9/11 that networks could help uncover terrorist cells. Working from publicly available information, Krebs showed that all 19 hijackers were within two connections of the al-Qaida members the CIA knew about in early 2000. Krebs' network map also showed that Mohamed Atta was a central figure. It's not clear whether such analysis could have been performed in advance, when researchers wouldn't have been certain which links were significant connections to another terrorist and which were casual connections to an acquaintance. (There is also controversy surrounding reports that a U.S. military unit called Able Danger used network analysis to identify Mohamed Atta before 9/11.)

There are two schools of thought on whether large data sets—like the NSA's database of phone records—help or hinder network analysis. One group argues that adding lots of innocuous data (the phone calls of ordinary Americans) will cloud the picture, and that it's better to construct a network by looking only at calls made to and from known terrorists. Another group maintains that large data sets are useful in establishing a "baseline" of normal behavior.

Social network analysis has been used in many areas besides terrorist surveillance. Google's PageRank system is based on network theory and the concept of "centrality." Doctors use network analysis to track the spread of HIV. And some academics have applied network theory to Enron's e-mail records in an attempt to understand relationships within the company.

Quote:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/oracle/how.html
How the Oracle of Bacon Works
Every couple of weeks the Oracle downloads several database files from one of the Internet Movie Database's FTP sites containing around 800,000 actors and actresses, around 375,000 movies, and around 70,000 aliases. The Oracle builds a big map of actors and movies and stores it in a 60 MB database.

There is a database server running at all times that stores the 60 MB database file in memory. The server handles three different types of requests:

* Find the link from Actor A to Actor B.
* How good a "center" is a given actor?
* Who are all the people with an Actor A number of N?

There are several CGI programs -- one for each of the above types of queries -- that run on the UVA Computer Science department web server, which all connect to the database server using TCP..

rainheart · 05-15-2006, 10:14 PM

More importantly, this kind of snooping of phone records can have dire implications for institutions like the CIA.

If someone working with the CIA can see clear abuses and wants to blow the whistle, he or she will have a very slim chance of getting away with it without being exposed.

stevo · 05-16-2006, 04:47 AM

Host, you've already muddled the issue shakran brought up. The 2 have nothing to do with eachother, other than the commonality of phone numbers. They are 2 seperate programs.

From what I've read from what shakran posted it looks like the FBI is investigating government employees that have leaked classified information (its obvious to me this is a national security issue and fits under the Patriot Act, but perhaps not to all). An investigation of a leak at the CIA will inevitably lead to journalists, since they are the other end of the leak. I didn't read anything that said the FBI was targeting journalists, it appeared to me that their records could be looked over to help find the source of the leak.

Now I suppose its possible journalists could be targeted with this, but its also against the law to knowingly publish classified information if publishing that information is a threat to national security. But at this time it doesn't look like thats whats going on.

If we want to keep this thread open, we shouldn't muck it up with issues that have nothing to do with it.

ubertuber · 05-16-2006, 05:42 AM

Genuine confusion here.

Does this have anything to do with the NSA wiretapping thing? It doesn't look like it from the article. If stevo's right and this thing with journalists is just part of the leak investigation (and, as the article says, "phone records of ABC News, the New York Times and the Washington Post had been sought") then there's nothing that unusual here other than journalists claiming that the freedom of the press extends to covering up illegal activities. And THAT discussion probably should have come up in our 1st amendment thread.

Does anyone see this as more than a parallel issue to the wiretapping stuff?

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 05:42 AM

I wonder how long until lawyers are being scruitinized under the guise of "finding criminal associates of their clients"

ubertuber · 05-16-2006, 05:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

I wonder how long until lawyers are being scruitinized under the guise of "finding criminal associates of their clients"

Probably a while, since the courts have actually recognized an attorney-client priviledge. I'm not an expert, but I don't think there has been a similar pattern of support for journalists.

roachboy · 05-16-2006, 06:11 AM

the nsa surveillance program and the fbi surveillance of journalists are linked logically and contextually: taken together they provide a more comprehensive image of both the extent/nature of these surveillance programs (and the bizarre claims concerning legality that have been coming from the administration) and their motives. for example, taking thse programs together provides an index of the very broad interpretation of the notion of "enemy" that this administration has developed--separating them would not. from 9/11/2011, this administration has consistently conflated dissent and "the enemy"---the reverse of this is that the administration also conflates the "national interest" with its particular political objectives. under this kind of logic, the administration has launched programs that track phone records for huge swatches of the population (nsa), the activities of antiwar groups and the activities of journalists who may or may not be suspected of passing along leaked information.

if you chose to look at these programs through the legal frameworks that should (but in this case do not) shape them (except perhaps at the level of claims concernign their legality), you could split them apart: but i would see this as a political judgement being routed through a particular dimension of the situation to the exclusion of others that would have to be argued for. i do not see this as a smple empirical question.

pan6467 · 05-16-2006, 06:19 AM

I think this has A LOT to do with the NSA wiretaps. Didn't Bush state that "NO DOMESTC CALLS" were being surveilled, that this was only about catching the terrorists?

And yet, we keep turning blind eyes, making excuses or saying there is nothing we can do...... what will it take.

For the love of God we are being violated and having all we hold dear torn from us and all people are doing is complaining, making excuses, turning blind eyes and saying we can't change anything.

We need the press to be able to hold their sources confidential so that their sources are not scared to come forth....... HOWEVER, we also need to hold the press accountable that the sources they use and the stories they break are factual.

What this OP shows is that the sources are now being compromised, that the bullshit about "No domestic calls" being monitored was a BOLDFACED LIE and that whether we want to believe it or not, sources to the press will now be ever more reluctant to ccome forth and feel the freedom to speak out.

This has to end, regardless of yourr politics if you can't see this is wrong and that the government is overstepping any and all it's boundaries and their duty to be held accountable to the people...... then perhaps instead of accusing those who speak out as being the communists and the weirdos and the ones who hate and wish to destroy this country.... you need look into the mirror and see the true person wanting to destroy this country, our freedoms and our ability to hold government accountable.

For some, it's blind hatred of the other political side and thus a blind following, for others it is their belief that as long as they play the game and do not make waves they will be ok...... both are sadly having their fears and greed used against them. Because when opposition dies, those in power begin to feast on their own and then it will be too late.

These things (our rights taken away) will keep snowballing and unless we stop them while we are able to, once they get big enough, we don't stand a chance.

Because without a free press, without sources being able to tell their story and remain anonymous and safe..... we will never again have the tools to hold government accountable.

stevo · 05-16-2006, 06:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pan6467

I
What this OP shows is that the sources are now being compromised, that the bullshit about "No domestic calls" being monitored was a BOLDFACED LIE and that whether we want to believe it or not, sources to the press will now be ever more reluctant to ccome forth and feel the freedom to speak out.

"No domestic calls" monitored means there is no active listening going on, unlike calls that were to and from alqaeda members outside the united states. No domestic calls monitored doesn't mean the FBI can't examine records after the fact.

pan6467 · 05-16-2006, 06:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

"No domestic calls" monitored means there is no active listening going on, unlike calls that were to and from alqaeda members outside the united states. No domestic calls monitored doesn't mean the FBI can't examine records after the fact.

Your point? What it appears you are saying is domestic calls are being still being surveilled but held until something happens, then they can be used as evidence. So either way you spin it, it's a lie, DOMESTIC CALLS are being monitored and Bush lied to the people so that they wouldn't step up and say he was abusing his powers...... which he is obviously doing because he had to lie about it.

So then you are okay with the fact that JOURNALISTS are now being compromised and listened to? That their sources now are no longer safe to call them?

Where does Stevo draw the line on this type of surveillence?

When does Stevo say this administration has overstepped the line and abused their power?

What has to happen for Stevo to start saying, "Mr. Bush, you can't do this?"

When is enough, enough for Stevo?

stevo · 05-16-2006, 06:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pan6467

Your point? What it appears you are saying is domestic calls are being still being surveilled but held until something happens, then they can be used as evidence. So either way you spin it, it's a lie, DOMESTIC CALLS are being monitored and Bush lied to the people so that they wouldn't step up and say he was abusing his powers...... which he is obviously doing because he had to lie about it.

So then you are okay with the fact that JOURNALISTS are now being compromised and listened to? That their sources now are no longer safe to call them?

Where does Stevo draw the line on this type of surveillence?

When does Stevo say this administration has overstepped the line and abused their power?

What has to happen for Stevo to start saying, "Mr. Bush, you can't do this?"

When is enough, enough for Stevo?

please point out to me where any facet of our government is listening to calls placed to journalists. Please. I may have missed something.

You're reading it all worng. the calls aren't "surveilled and held" the records of the calls are being reviewed after the fact. You know, like the record the phone company uses to bill you. the same record. Is the phone company spying on you now?

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 07:09 AM

Stevo they don't need to be listening to be monitoring. Checking the records of who they are calling and when they are calling is monitoring and you need a warrant for that.

pan6467 · 05-16-2006, 07:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

please point out to me where any facet of our government is listening to calls placed to journalists. Please. I may have missed something.

You're reading it all worng. the calls aren't "surveilled and held" the records of the calls are being reviewed after the fact. You know, like the record the phone company uses to bill you. the same record. Is the phone company spying on you now?

Ok.... so they aren't listening to the journalists calls, they are just waiting for the story to come out, get the source, make examples out of him and send a message to anyone else who thought of coming forth.....

No matter how you choose to spin it, it's seriously wrong and abuse of power.

You never answered the questions...... how far does the Bush administration have to go before Stevo says enough?

BTW the sarcasm and personal attack in your last paragraph was truly unnecessary.

stevo · 05-16-2006, 07:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pan6467

Ok.... so they aren't listening to the journalists calls, they are just waiting for the story to come out, get the source, make examples out of him and send a message to anyone else who thought of coming forth.....

No matter how you choose to spin it, it's seriously wrong and abuse of power.

You never answered the questions...... how far does the Bush administration have to go before Stevo says enough?

BTW the sarcasm and personal attack in your last paragraph was truly unnecessary.

I don't even know how to communicate with you, pan. If you think thats a personal attack I don't know what to say. Just relax a bit.

How far does he have to go? pretty far, seeing how I haven't jumped ship yet. I think if the bush administration forced me to be a vegetarian I would probably stop supporting it.

Charlatan · 05-16-2006, 07:52 AM

I think if you check, this information can be collected from their own offices, i.e. calls going to and from govenment buildings.

If they are looking for govenment leaks, that would be where I would look as well.

The article clearly states that they are looking first through the government records and second at the journalist's records, if the investigation leads them there.

There is nothing especially sinister here. This is how investigation are supposed to proceed. One thing leads to another.

Nowhere does it say they are actively collecting or monitoring journalist's records.

Phone records are available, as Stevo pointed out (without attack, sarcasm, etc.) from the phone company. It takes very little to for the authorities to get these records.

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 08:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

I
Phone records are available, as Stevo pointed out (without attack, sarcasm, etc.) from the phone company. It takes very little to for the authorities to get these records.

If by very little you mean a warrant. By law the government needs a warrent to attain this information and right now they are not getting one.

stevo · 05-16-2006, 08:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

If by very little you mean a warrant. By law the government needs a warrent to attain this information and right now they are not getting one.

According to the article, under a provision of the patriot act, all that is needed is a NSL, not a warrant signed by a judge. If there are gripes over this they should be taken up with your senators and congressmen who passed this law. Looks to me like bush is following the law.

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 08:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

According to the article, under a provision of the patriot act, all that is needed is a NSL, not a warrant signed by a judge. If there are gripes over this they should be taken up with your senators and congressmen who passed this law. Looks to me like bush is following the law.

which provision overrides the communications act? Which provision overrides the constitution?

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 08:37 AM

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

stevo · 05-16-2006, 08:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

which provision overrides the communications act? Which provision overrides the constitution?

I believe section 505.

Quote:

(Sec. 505) Allows the FBI to request telephone toll and transactional records, financial records, and consumer reports in any investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities only if the investigation is not conducted solely on the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

I'm sure there are a number of judges that would find the FBI's use of phone records legally falls under here.

ubertuber · 05-16-2006, 08:59 AM

Maybe the similarity is in the attitude the government is displaying towards these phone records.

They way I'm reading the article, it looks like the FBI is requesting phone records from the phone company after they determine that there may be information there that is pertinent to an investigation. They're not searching this supposed database that the NSA is keeping. It's two different things. The questionable aspect is that they can use NSLs rather than warrents - but that is clearly in accordance with the Patriot Act. Now it would really be something to see the how that would fare against the 4th Amendment at the Supreme Court level!

But really - if the FBI is investigating a crime and they know that a journalist has had contact with the perpetrator, it only seems responsible to me to get their hands on those phone records. This just leads me back to where I started, which is wondering how much of the journalist-source priviledge is fact and how much is fiction...

stevo · 05-16-2006, 09:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I don't think this has anything to do with the 4th amendment. A record of your phone calls that is property of the phone company doesn't fall anywhere in the 4th amendment. Its not your property, so you have no claim to keep it from being searched. We had another thread about this last week.

Charlatan · 05-16-2006, 09:16 AM

I agree with Stevo on this.

Post 9/11 and before the Patriot Act came about, there were already computer databases being created that could crunch information about us. Private companies already have a lot of information about us that is available to the public for a small fee. It didn't take long for people to start buying these databases and combining the information on them to create very large databases that can spit out very precise information about you. These services are being sold to the government.

Now, the idea is that is used to look for patterns that suggest "terrorist" or "illegal activity". Apparently it works.

You should also know that it is 100% legal to do this.

All they are doing is collecting the public information and putting it all together.

This is the future. Get used to it.

reconmike · 05-16-2006, 09:27 AM

Im sorry but where were all you people who are yelling Bush lied!!! this is illegal!!!! when Slick Willie Clinton was using Echelon system to do the same thing?
Were you all up in arms this much?

I highly doubt it.
But it being Bush doing it NOW it is illegal, give me a break.

And you better talk nice about the Prez and his people on the phone cause you never know who is listening, they might just come and git ya and take you to gitmo.

shakran · 05-16-2006, 11:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

Im sorry but where were all you people who are yelling Bush lied!!! this is illegal!!!! when Slick Willie Clinton was using Echelon system to do the same thing?
Were you all up in arms this much?

It wasn't illegal then.

Quote:

I highly doubt it.

It wasn't illegal then.

Quote:

But it being Bush doing it NOW it is illegal, give me a break.

It wasn't illegal then.

host · 05-16-2006, 11:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

Im sorry but where were all you people who are yelling Bush lied!!! this is illegal!!!! when Slick Willie Clinton was using Echelon system to do the same thing?
Were you all up in arms this much?

I highly doubt it.
But it being Bush doing it NOW it is illegal, give me a break.

And you better talk nice about the Prez and his people on the phone cause you never know who is listening, they might just come and git ya and take you to gitmo.

reconmike...here is a good decription of the changes over the last five years:

Quote:

http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t...cid=1106569462
America The Fearful
New York Times, The (NY)
May 15, 2006
Author: BOB HERBERT

In the dark days of the Depression, Franklin Roosevelt counseled Americans to avoid fear. George W. Bush is his polar opposite. The public's fear is this president's most potent political asset. Perhaps his only asset.

Mr. Bush wants ordinary Americans to remain in a perpetual state of fear -- so terrified, in fact, that they will not object to the steady erosion of their rights and liberties, and will not notice the many ways in which their fear is being manipulated to feed an unconscionable expansion of presidential power.
If voters can be kept frightened enough of terrorism, they might even overlook the monumental incompetence of one of the worst administrations the nation has ever known.

Four marines drowned Thursday when their 60-ton tank rolled off a bridge and sank in a canal about 50 miles west of Baghdad. Three American soldiers in Iraq were killed by roadside bombs the same day. But those tragic and wholly unnecessary deaths were not the big news. The big news was the latest leak of yet another presidential power grab: the administration's collection of the telephone records of tens of millions of American citizens.

The Bush crowd, which gets together each morning to participate in a highly secret ritual of formalized ineptitude, is trying to get its creepy hands on all the telephone records of everybody in the entire country. It supposedly wants these records, which contain crucial documentation of calls for Chinese takeout in Terre Haute, Ind., and birthday greetings to Grandma in Talladega, Ala., to help in the search for Osama bin Laden.

Hey, the president has made it clear that when Al Qaeda is calling, he wants to be listening, and you never know where that lead may turn up.

The problem (besides the fact that the president has been as effective hunting bin Laden as Dick Cheney was in hunting quail) is that in its fearmongering and power-grabbing the Bush administration has trampled all over the Constitution, the democratic process and the hallowed American tradition of government checks and balances.

Short of having them taken away from us, there is probably no way to fully appreciate the wonder and the glory of our rights and liberties here in the United States, including the right to privacy.

The Constitution and the elaborate system of checks and balances were meant to protect us against the possibility of a clownish gang of small men and women amassing excessive power and behaving like tyrants or kings. But the normal safeguards have not been working since the Bush crowd came to power, starting with the hijacked presidential election in 2000.

After the Sept. 11 attacks, all bets were off. John Kennedy once said, "The United States, as the world knows, will never start a war." But George W. Bush, employing an outrageous propaganda campaign ("Shock and awe," "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud"), started an utterly pointless war in Iraq that he still doesn't know how to win or how to end.

If you listen to the Bush version of reality, the president is all powerful. In that version, we are fighting a war against terrorism, which is a war that will never end. And as long as we are at war (forever), there is no limit to the war-fighting powers the president can claim as commander in chief.

So we've kidnapped people and sent them off to be tortured in the extraordinary rendition program; and we've incarcerated people at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere without trial or even the right to know the charges against them; and we're allowing the C.I.A. to operate super-secret prisons where God-knows-what-all is going on; and we're listening in on the phone calls and reading the e-mail of innocent Americans without warrants; and on and on and on.

The Bushies will tell you that it is dangerous and even against the law to inquire into these nefarious activities. We just have to trust the king.

Well, I give you fair warning. This is a road map to totalitarianism. Hallmarks of totalitarian regimes have always included an excessive reliance on secrecy, the deliberate stoking of fear in the general population, a preference for military rather than diplomatic solutions in foreign policy, the promotion of blind patriotism, the denial of human rights, the curtailment of the rule of law, hostility to a free press and the systematic invasion of the privacy of ordinary people.

There are not enough pretty words in all the world to cover up the damage that George W. Bush has done to his country. If the United States could look at itself in a mirror, it would be both alarmed and ashamed at what it saw.

The above description is a good explanation of the POTUS's speech last night, and it explains why these contradictions exist. It explains why there were no DHS "Color Coded" terror alerts aftet the 2004 election, and plenty before that election:

Quote:

http://public.cq.com/public/20060515...onalguard.html
CQ HOMELAND SECURITY – BORDER SECURITY
May 15, 2006 – 8:21 p.m.
DHS Does About-Face In Backing Use of National Guard to Seal Border
By Patrick Yoest, CQ Staff

In December of 2005, Fox News talking head Bill O’Reilly floated an unlikely — even brash — idea to the Homeland Security secretary to seal off the porous southwest border.

“Why don’t you put the National Guard on the border to back up the border patrol and stop the bleeding, and then start to increase the Border Patrol, the high-tech and all of that?” O’Reilly asked.

Michael Chertoff, in those relatively calmer days before mass pro-immigration rallies, heated immigration reform politics in the Senate and cellar-dwelling opinion polls for President Bush, dismissed the idea out of hand.

“Well, the National Guard is really, first of all, not trained for that mission,” Chertoff told O’Reilly. “I mean, the fact of the matter is the border is a special place. There are special challenges that are faced there.”

Chertoff added that that it would take a huge amount of National Guard troops, that they would need new training. But couldn’t the National Guard pull it off, O’Reilly asked?

“I think it would be a horribly over-expensive and very difficult way to manage this problem,” Chertoff said. “Unless you would be prepared to leave those people in the National Guard day and night for month after month after month, you would eventually have to come to grips with the challenge in a more comprehensive way......

and this, today.....

Quote:

Is Border Plan Solid? Just Ask The Officials
By Justin Rood - May 16, 2006, 3:10 PM

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and a clutch of top officials gave a press briefing today on President Bush's new National Guard-infused border security program. Hilarity ensues:

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, if I've understood everything I've heard, you don't yet know what missions the 6,000 National Guardsmen will do, you don't know who is going to pay for them, you don't know what the rules of engagement will be for them, you don't know what size units there will be or how long -- whether they'll be two-week or six-month deployments, and you don't really know exactly which equipment they're going to have. So my question is, how long have you been working on this?

SECRETARY CHERTOFF: I guess that's what they call a loaded question. And I guess you haven't understood what we've said, so I'm going to try to make it really clear.....Read the rest...there is no "plan"!

Here is how the above ties in with this forum topic:

Quote:

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/..._id=1002503334
FBI Denies Routinely Tracking Reporters' Calls
Published: May 16, 2006 10:50 AM ET
........Carter said a report published on ABC News' Web site left a misleading impression that authorities are tracking reporters' calls in an effort to root out confidential sources. The ABC story said the government, in an effort to trace leaks, was "tracking the phone numbers" that reporters call.

"Where the records of a private person are sought, they may only be obtained through established legal process," Carter said.

The FBI can seek warrants and subpoenas from judges and grand juries, either through traditional courts or a secret court established for espionage and terrorism investigations. The bureau also has the power to seek subscribers' telephone and Internet records without approval of a judge or grand jury in espionage and terrorism cases by issuing a National Security Letter.

Here is the prior reporting that makes having a POTUS, who is "all hat, no cattle", when it comes to everything not related to advancing the set up and abuse of the apparatus that defines a Police State....

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...501366_pf.html
The FBI's Secret Scrutiny
In Hunt for Terrorists, Bureau Examines Records of Ordinary Americans

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 6, 2005; A01

.........The Connecticut case affords a rare glimpse of an exponentially growing practice of domestic surveillance under the USA Patriot Act, which marked its fourth anniversary on Oct. 26. "National security letters," created in the 1970s for espionage and terrorism investigations, originated as narrow exceptions in consumer privacy law, enabling the FBI to review in secret the customer records of suspected foreign agents. The Patriot Act, and Bush administration guidelines for its use, transformed those letters by permitting clandestine scrutiny of U.S. residents and visitors who are not alleged to be terrorists or spies.

The FBI now issues more than 30,000 national security letters a year, according to government sources, a hundredfold increase over historic norms. The letters -- one of which can be used to sweep up the records of many people -- are extending the bureau's reach as never before into the telephone calls, correspondence and financial lives of ordinary Americans.

Issued by FBI field supervisors, national security letters do not need the imprimatur of a prosecutor, grand jury or judge. They receive no review after the fact by the Justice Department or Congress. The executive branch maintains only statistics, which are incomplete and confined to classified reports. The Bush administration defeated legislation and a lawsuit to require a public accounting, and has offered no example in which the use of a national security letter helped disrupt a terrorist plot............

........The Justice Department tried to conceal the existence of the first and only other known lawsuit against a national security letter, also brought by the ACLU's Jaffer and Ann Beeson. Government lawyers opposed its entry into the public docket of a New York federal judge. They have since tried to censor nearly all the contents of the exhibits and briefs. They asked the judge, for example, to black out every line of the affidavit that describes the delivery of the national security letter to a New York Internet company, including, "I am a Special Agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation ('FBI')."

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero, in a ruling that is under appeal, held that the law authorizing national security letters violates the First and Fourth Amendments...........

.....In the executive branch, no FBI or Justice Department official audits the use of national security letters to assess whether they are appropriately targeted, lawfully applied or contribute important facts to an investigation.

Justice Department officials noted frequently this year that Inspector General Glenn A. Fine reports twice a year on abuses of the Patriot Act and has yet to substantiate any complaint. (One investigation is pending.) Fine advertises his role, but there is a puzzle built into the mandate. Under what scenario could a person protest a search of his personal records if he is never notified?

"We do rely upon complaints coming in," Fine said in House testimony in May. He added: "To the extent that people do not know of anything happening to them, there is an issue about whether they can complain. So, I think that's a legitimate question."

No oversight...the "letters" are isssued in secrecy....compared to the DOJ guidelines of how to proceed with investigations involving members of the press:

Quote:

http://www.washingtonwatchdog.org/do...t50.html#50.10
§50.10 Policy with regard to the issuance of subpoenas to members of the news media, subpoenas for telephone toll rec&chyph;ords of members of the news media, and the interrogation, indictment, or arrest of, members of the news media.

Because freedom of the press can be no broader than the freedom of reporters to investigate and report the news, the prosecutorial power of the government should not be used in such a way that it impairs a reporter's responsibility to cover as broadly as possible controversial public issues. This policy statement is thus intended to provide protection for the news media from forms of compulsory process, whether civil or criminal, which might impair the news gathering function. In balancing the concern that the Department of Justice has for the work of the news media and the Department's obligation to the fair administration of justice, the following guidelines shall be adhered to by all members of the Department in all cases:.....

I am sorry, but I cannot trust these extraordinary new powers and abuses in the hands of an executive branch that has shown itself to be a untrustworthy as this one has.....

dksuddeth · 05-16-2006, 12:57 PM

It does seem to me that since the late 80's, we've gone quickly downhill in removing important portions of the bill of rights

Rekna · 05-16-2006, 01:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

I believe section 505.
(Sec. 505) Allows the FBI to request telephone toll and transactional records, financial records, and consumer reports in any investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities only if the investigation is not conducted solely on the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

So now all ordinary citizens are considered part of a terrorism investagation? Sounds a bit big brotherish to me.

rainheart · 05-16-2006, 06:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

Im sorry but where were all you people who are yelling Bush lied!!! this is illegal!!!! when Slick Willie Clinton was using Echelon system to do the same thing?

I wasn't too politically inclined in those times but rest assured I would most likely have personally disagreed with using Echelon as well.

But the entire notion that one who disagrees with Bush is thus necessarily aligned with the Democrats is highly fallacious. I believe a government with 3 or more relatively equal parties with competing ideas is much better than a "bipartisanship"; a bipartisanship which has more or less disempowered the public from persuing a reasonable and affable democratic society. The evidence is in that people argue against republicans to make democrats out of them, and people vote for the opposing party because they dislike what the party that is currently in power represents- not because people believe in what the opposition represents.

Anyhow that's really a tangent that probably deserves it's own topic, I don't mean to threadjack.

Charlatan · 05-17-2006, 04:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

So now all ordinary citizens are considered part of a terrorism investagation? Sounds a bit big brotherish to me.

If you are referring to the NSA wire tapping, that is another issue and another thread.

They may be thematically linked, as some have suggested, but legally, the FBI appears to be working within the bounds of the law.

If you don't like the Patriot Act, whinging about it here isn't going to do very much. Start working to elect people who will change the law.

The article above indicateds that the FBI is not targeting *all* journalists, just those that part of their investigation into leaks. The reason this is news is that it involves journalists and it is journalists that write the news.

Rekna · 05-17-2006, 05:30 AM

Charlatan i'm refering to the database of phone numbers that they are using that they obtained with an NSL. They are in essence placing every person in America as a suspected terrorist and monitoring their behavior... what ever happend to probably cause?

stevo · 05-17-2006, 05:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

So now all ordinary citizens are considered part of a terrorism investagation? Sounds a bit big brotherish to me.

Quote:

...to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities

Sec 505 of the patriot act does not require someone to be suspected of terrorist activities. Don't you think passing on classified information unauthorized and in secret can fall under clandestine intelligence activities. I'm sure the FBI's lawyers do, and I'm sure plenty of judges do too.

shakran · 05-17-2006, 06:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

Sec 505 of the patriot act does not require someone to be suspected of terrorist activities. Don't you think passing on classified information unauthorized and in secret can fall under clandestine intelligence activities. I'm sure the FBI's lawyers do, and I'm sure plenty of judges do too.

I think that Rekna's point is that the PA was purportedly passed to help law enforcement fight terrorism. It is now being used in ways which violate the prinicpals this country has held in high esteem for more than 200 years.

The terrorists ARE attacking our way of life, and we're helping them by dissolving that way of life in the name of protecting it. Burning the village in order to save it is a logical fallacy. It is similarly not logical to usurp basic human rights in order to supposedly protect basic human rights.

It is a basic human right to be able to travel and communicate without government spying on our every activity. Just because we are doing nothing wrong does not mean that government has the right to come in and snoop.

I can see these investigations of journalist's phone records easilly being abused. Think of the following scenario:

The CIA suspects that Agent X is communicating with a journalist. They get the journalist's phone records and discover that, while Agent X has not called the journalist, the journalist has been talking with another source who, while not breaking any confidentiality laws, is known to be very critical of the CIA. The CIA decides they don't want information like that in the press, so they put intense pressure on the source to clam up - the source that they wouldn't even know about if they hadn't been snooping into the journalist's phone records.

A democracy requires an open government, and it requires journalism to keep that government open. Any action by the government to try and stop that openness is an attempt to reign in democracy.

Is that something we really want?

stevo · 05-17-2006, 06:33 AM

But I could make the arguement that in the midst of a war, passing on classified information with the intention of getting that information published in the public domain, is a threat to national security. In the middle of a war, letting everyone, including our enemies know our tactics and methods that are being used to find them can be very dangerous. So if you want to look at it as just for fighting terrorism, well it still is, in a less direct, but just as important sort of way.

shakran · 05-17-2006, 06:42 AM

1) It's a nebulous war in which, btw, the commander in chief has declared "major combat operations" to be over. By your argument as long as we keep up the "war on terror" charade, the government has extraordinarilly expanded powers. What incentive do they have to end the war? Ever?

2) the article says nothing about leaks that directly effect the operations of the war. These leaks are often about policy, not procedure or tactics.

3) To give one agency the power to investigate and subpoena is far too much power in the hands of one agency. We're allowing them to be the investigators AND the judge. There's a reason checks and balances exist, and it's to prevent abuses by government that are made possible with events such as this.

05-15-2006, 06:44 PM	#2 (permalink)
trickyy ►	i'm beginning to wonder what isn't acceptible anymore. what happened to the te'rists? people were upset when the patriot act was applied to drug traffickers, now they are using provisions on journalists. what was that ashcroft quote about accessing library records? something like "you don't think we'd ever do THAT, do you?" Last edited by trickyy; 05-15-2006 at 06:45 PM.. Reason: typo

05-16-2006, 04:47 AM	#8 (permalink)
stevo Rail Baron Location: Tallyfla	Host, you've already muddled the issue shakran brought up. The 2 have nothing to do with eachother, other than the commonality of phone numbers. They are 2 seperate programs. From what I've read from what shakran posted it looks like the FBI is investigating government employees that have leaked classified information (its obvious to me this is a national security issue and fits under the Patriot Act, but perhaps not to all). An investigation of a leak at the CIA will inevitably lead to journalists, since they are the other end of the leak. I didn't read anything that said the FBI was targeting journalists, it appeared to me that their records could be looked over to help find the source of the leak. Now I suppose its possible journalists could be targeted with this, but its also against the law to knowingly publish classified information if publishing that information is a threat to national security. But at this time it doesn't look like thats whats going on. If we want to keep this thread open, we shouldn't muck it up with issues that have nothing to do with it. __________________ "If I am such a genius why am I drunk, lost in the desert, with a bullet in my ass?" -Otto Mannkusser

05-16-2006, 05:42 AM	#9 (permalink)
ubertuber spudly Location: Ellay	Genuine confusion here. Does this have anything to do with the NSA wiretapping thing? It doesn't look like it from the article. If stevo's right and this thing with journalists is just part of the leak investigation (and, as the article says, "phone records of ABC News, the New York Times and the Washington Post had been sought") then there's nothing that unusual here other than journalists claiming that the freedom of the press extends to covering up illegal activities. And THAT discussion probably should have come up in our 1st amendment thread. Does anyone see this as more than a parallel issue to the wiretapping stuff? __________________ Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

05-16-2006, 06:11 AM	#12 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	the nsa surveillance program and the fbi surveillance of journalists are linked logically and contextually: taken together they provide a more comprehensive image of both the extent/nature of these surveillance programs (and the bizarre claims concerning legality that have been coming from the administration) and their motives. for example, taking thse programs together provides an index of the very broad interpretation of the notion of "enemy" that this administration has developed--separating them would not. from 9/11/2011, this administration has consistently conflated dissent and "the enemy"---the reverse of this is that the administration also conflates the "national interest" with its particular political objectives. under this kind of logic, the administration has launched programs that track phone records for huge swatches of the population (nsa), the activities of antiwar groups and the activities of journalists who may or may not be suspected of passing along leaked information. if you chose to look at these programs through the legal frameworks that should (but in this case do not) shape them (except perhaps at the level of claims concernign their legality), you could split them apart: but i would see this as a political judgement being routed through a particular dimension of the situation to the exclusion of others that would have to be argued for. i do not see this as a smple empirical question. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-16-2006, 06:19 AM	#13 (permalink)
pan6467 Lennonite Priest Location: Mansfield, Ohio USA	I think this has A LOT to do with the NSA wiretaps. Didn't Bush state that "NO DOMESTC CALLS" were being surveilled, that this was only about catching the terrorists? And yet, we keep turning blind eyes, making excuses or saying there is nothing we can do...... what will it take. For the love of God we are being violated and having all we hold dear torn from us and all people are doing is complaining, making excuses, turning blind eyes and saying we can't change anything. We need the press to be able to hold their sources confidential so that their sources are not scared to come forth....... HOWEVER, we also need to hold the press accountable that the sources they use and the stories they break are factual. What this OP shows is that the sources are now being compromised, that the bullshit about "No domestic calls" being monitored was a BOLDFACED LIE and that whether we want to believe it or not, sources to the press will now be ever more reluctant to ccome forth and feel the freedom to speak out. This has to end, regardless of yourr politics if you can't see this is wrong and that the government is overstepping any and all it's boundaries and their duty to be held accountable to the people...... then perhaps instead of accusing those who speak out as being the communists and the weirdos and the ones who hate and wish to destroy this country.... you need look into the mirror and see the true person wanting to destroy this country, our freedoms and our ability to hold government accountable. For some, it's blind hatred of the other political side and thus a blind following, for others it is their belief that as long as they play the game and do not make waves they will be ok...... both are sadly having their fears and greed used against them. Because when opposition dies, those in power begin to feast on their own and then it will be too late. These things (our rights taken away) will keep snowballing and unless we stop them while we are able to, once they get big enough, we don't stand a chance. Because without a free press, without sources being able to tell their story and remain anonymous and safe..... we will never again have the tools to hold government accountable. __________________ I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?" Last edited by pan6467; 05-16-2006 at 06:25 AM..

05-15-2006, 06:46 PM	#3 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	This is why the government having numbers of who they are tracking with their programs is wrong. Pretty soon they will look for people who are gambling, people that have dissetent views, people who have differing political views. Once a system is in place that can easily be abused without anyone finding out it WILL be abused. Absolute power currupts absolutly. This is why the founding fathers put so many checks on the governments power. Some of you defend the errosion of these checks in favor of "current saftey" but what about the our saftey in the future? ps. Please try not to get this thread closed like the last, there is definatly a lot to be discussed on this topic but when we have petty bickering we get nothing done and the thread gets closed.

05-15-2006, 06:48 PM	#4 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	I think this case is a perfect example of the slippery slope people have been saying doesn't happen. At first people were saying how this administrations actions only effected terrorists, then it was only terrorists and criminals, now it is journalists, terrorists, and criminals. Soon buisness owners, activists, ect will be on the list.

05-15-2006, 10:14 PM	#7 (permalink)
rainheart Psycho	More importantly, this kind of snooping of phone records can have dire implications for institutions like the CIA. If someone working with the CIA can see clear abuses and wants to blow the whistle, he or she will have a very slim chance of getting away with it without being exposed.

05-16-2006, 05:42 AM	#10 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	I wonder how long until lawyers are being scruitinized under the guise of "finding criminal associates of their clients"

05-16-2006, 07:09 AM	#17 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	Stevo they don't need to be listening to be monitoring. Checking the records of who they are calling and when they are calling is monitoring and you need a warrant for that.

05-16-2006, 07:52 AM	#20 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	I think if you check, this information can be collected from their own offices, i.e. calls going to and from govenment buildings. If they are looking for govenment leaks, that would be where I would look as well. The article clearly states that they are looking first through the government records and second at the journalist's records, if the investigation leads them there. There is nothing especially sinister here. This is how investigation are supposed to proceed. One thing leads to another. Nowhere does it say they are actively collecting or monitoring journalist's records. Phone records are available, as Stevo pointed out (without attack, sarcasm, etc.) from the phone company. It takes very little to for the authorities to get these records. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

05-16-2006, 08:37 AM	#24 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	Amendment IV The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

05-16-2006, 08:59 AM	#26 (permalink)
ubertuber spudly Location: Ellay	Maybe the similarity is in the attitude the government is displaying towards these phone records. They way I'm reading the article, it looks like the FBI is requesting phone records from the phone company after they determine that there may be information there that is pertinent to an investigation. They're not searching this supposed database that the NSA is keeping. It's two different things. The questionable aspect is that they can use NSLs rather than warrents - but that is clearly in accordance with the Patriot Act. Now it would really be something to see the how that would fare against the 4th Amendment at the Supreme Court level! But really - if the FBI is investigating a crime and they know that a journalist has had contact with the perpetrator, it only seems responsible to me to get their hands on those phone records. This just leads me back to where I started, which is wondering how much of the journalist-source priviledge is fact and how much is fiction... __________________ Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

05-16-2006, 09:16 AM	#28 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	I agree with Stevo on this. Post 9/11 and before the Patriot Act came about, there were already computer databases being created that could crunch information about us. Private companies already have a lot of information about us that is available to the public for a small fee. It didn't take long for people to start buying these databases and combining the information on them to create very large databases that can spit out very precise information about you. These services are being sold to the government. Now, the idea is that is used to look for patterns that suggest "terrorist" or "illegal activity". Apparently it works. You should also know that it is 100% legal to do this. All they are doing is collecting the public information and putting it all together. This is the future. Get used to it. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

05-16-2006, 09:27 AM	#29 (permalink)
reconmike Thank You Jesus Location: Twilight Zone	Im sorry but where were all you people who are yelling Bush lied!!! this is illegal!!!! when Slick Willie Clinton was using Echelon system to do the same thing? Were you all up in arms this much? I highly doubt it. But it being Bush doing it NOW it is illegal, give me a break. And you better talk nice about the Prez and his people on the phone cause you never know who is listening, they might just come and git ya and take you to gitmo. __________________ Where is Darwin when ya need him?

05-16-2006, 12:57 PM	#32 (permalink)
dksuddeth Junkie Location: bedford, tx	It does seem to me that since the late 80's, we've gone quickly downhill in removing important portions of the bill of rights __________________ "no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

05-17-2006, 05:30 AM	#36 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	Charlatan i'm refering to the database of phone numbers that they are using that they obtained with an NSL. They are in essence placing every person in America as a suspected terrorist and monitoring their behavior... what ever happend to probably cause?

05-17-2006, 06:33 AM	#39 (permalink)
stevo Rail Baron Location: Tallyfla	But I could make the arguement that in the midst of a war, passing on classified information with the intention of getting that information published in the public domain, is a threat to national security. In the middle of a war, letting everyone, including our enemies know our tactics and methods that are being used to find them can be very dangerous. So if you want to look at it as just for fighting terrorism, well it still is, in a less direct, but just as important sort of way. __________________ "If I am such a genius why am I drunk, lost in the desert, with a bullet in my ass?" -Otto Mannkusser

05-17-2006, 06:42 AM	#40 (permalink)
shakran Tone.	1) It's a nebulous war in which, btw, the commander in chief has declared "major combat operations" to be over. By your argument as long as we keep up the "war on terror" charade, the government has extraordinarilly expanded powers. What incentive do they have to end the war? Ever? 2) the article says nothing about leaks that directly effect the operations of the war. These leaks are often about policy, not procedure or tactics. 3) To give one agency the power to investigate and subpoena is far too much power in the hands of one agency. We're allowing them to be the investigators AND the judge. There's a reason checks and balances exist, and it's to prevent abuses by government that are made possible with events such as this.