Bush Ordered NSA Warrantless Spying Before 9/11

[smoogatz]

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011306Z.shtml

Which means that his "9/11 made it necessary" rationale is just more bullshit, as we all suspected. It also means that he has one less excuse for not preventing 9/11, and turns Cheney's assertion that "if we'd had this power before 9/11, we might have prevented it" on its head. They had it, they used it--apparently to spy on their domestic enemies--and they did nothing to prevent 9/11. Someone, please--Republican or Democrat, DUer or Freeper--give me one good reason the American people shouldn't demand that Bush, Cheney, Condie, Rummy, Wolfie et al be impeached, convicted and imprisoned!

[stepnw1f]

1. Impeach them!!!!! (nt)

[RC]

2. They are so damn guilty we should be able to skip the trial.

Just stuff them into pumpkin suits and ship them to the Hague.

[saltpoint]

3. I get a strong visual here of Uncle Dick hovering over Junior

and in that corporate-smooth, gutteral, soulless voice of his instructing Dubya to sign the papers.

"But what are these papers, Uncle Dick?"

"Just sign 'em, ok?"

And the witless fool goes ahead and writes his name on the orders.

I still say they cheated in 2004 and the Supreme Court helped them cheat in 2000.

[0007]

8. The people have the power put junior away.

The declassified report says that the "Director of the National Security Agency is obligated by law to keep Congress fully and currently formed of intelligence activities." But that didn't happen. When news of the NSA's clandestine domestic spying operation, which President Bush said he had authorized in 2002, was uncovered last month by the New York Times, Democratic and Republican members of Congress appeared outraged, claiming that they were never informed of the covert surveillance operation. It's unclear whether the executive order signed by Bush removes the NSA Director from his duty to brief members of Congress about the agency's intelligence gathering programs.

Eavesdropping on Americans required intelligence officials to obtain a surveillance warrant from a special court and show probable cause that the person they wanted to monitor was communicating with suspected terrorists overseas. But Bush said that the process for obtaining such warrants under the 1978 Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act was, at times, "cumbersome."

[saltpoint]

9. They do indeed and I am of the deepest heart and mind that

impeachment be undertaken as it is genuinely called for.

The Bush administration has been an almost complete disaster. Time to hear the people's voice.

[0007]

14. The bush administration has been a complete disaster.

[HeatherDawn]

4. Great Link

Not suprising at all. As for why Bush continued this NSA program without obtaining a warrant from the rubber stamp secret court is obvious...they are not spying on AN American they are spying on ALL Americans.

Plugging super computers into the switches, monitoring emails and internet traffic, make call pattern databases, etc.

I am sure THEY watch us even as we post on this and other websites.

[Old and In the Way]

5. Kicked - No excuse for not knowing about the 9/11 plans.

LIHOP or MIHOP.


"Life would be easier if this was a unitarianship...as long as I am Executive Unitary."

[JerseygirlCT]

6. kick nt

[RufusEarl]

7. NSA before 9/11

I just finished reading the truthout post and I'm in the middle of the James Risen book, and the thing that keeps popping up in all these publications is "legal authority". Now that Bush has Alito, I'm afraid he'll get his legal authority.

I wish someone would explain to me how we stop this guy, he's got all three branches of the government and the MSM. I would like to think that our elected officials would stand up and protect our rights, but it's becoming obvious after the Alito hearing they have lost their ability " like they ever had any" to stand up to this admin.

[Sammy Pepys]

10. ummm....

The National Security Agency advised President Bush in early 2001 that it had been eavesdropping on Americans during the course of its work monitoring suspected terrorists and foreigners believed to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a declassified document.

Doesn't this mean they had been doing it before Bush?

[smoogatz]

11. Read the rest, Sammy.

"What had long been understood to be protocol in the event that the NSA spied on average Americans was that the agency would black out the identities of those individuals or immediately destroy the information.

"But according to people who worked at the NSA as encryption specialists during this time, that's not what happened. On orders from Defense Department officials and President Bush, the agency kept a running list of the names of Americans in its system and made it readily available to a number of senior officials in the Bush administration, these sources said, which in essence meant the NSA was conducting a covert domestic surveillance operation in violation of the law."

Nothing like forming false conclusions based on a mis-reading of the first paragraph.

[ddeclue]

12. For everything else there's supposed to be FISA...

Doug D.

[ddeclue]

13. NSA Wireless... Can they hear you now?

Doug D.
Orlando, FL