9-11 Families Pan NSA Snooping

[sabra]

http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/powerplays/archives/002287.php

9-11 Families Pan NSA Snooping


President Bush has defended his decision to allow the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on phone calls connected to the United States by saying September 11 showed that the government needed to collect more information to prevent attack. But on Wednesday one group of 9-11 families members, September 11 Advocates, disagreed.
"Our government intercepted two al Qaeda communications, during routine monitoring, on September 10, 2001—'tomorrow is zero hour' and 'the match begins tomorrow,' " the group said in a statement. Those messages weren't interpreted until it was too late. "It was certainly not any FISA court issue that delayed such translation. Rather, the delay was ostensibly due to NSA's overwhelming workload created by its voluminous influx of information that needed to be translated and analyzed on a daily basis."

Plus, says the group, the existing FISA law gives the president the right to order eavesdropping on someone for three full days before he has to go to the secret court to get an order. "Moreover, in a time of war, the President is given a full fifteen days to retroactively ask for such a warrant," the statement reads. "Thus, why is there any need for the President to circumvent the law?"

According to the 2004 report to Congress on secret warrant requests to the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court, "The Court did not deny in whole or part any application submitted by the government in 2004," when there were 1,758 requests. In the three previous years, the court saw 3,888 requests for FISA warrants. It denied four and modified two. The government appealed the modifications, and it won on both appeals. Even before September 11, the court wasn't exactly a tough hurdle: In 2000, it approved 1,003 applications, modified one, and denied zero.

[Christa]

1. Excellent post

recommended.

[EVDebs]

2. Plus after plenty of notice and an Aug 6, 2001 PDB only 33 Air Marshals

were 'on the job' that day. Today there are reportedly 'thousands'.

Bush could have done something prior to 9-11 but didn't. That PNAC 'New Pearl Harbor' and all...

The 'Jersey Girls' know the score, love you gals !

Also, check the post on Abramoff's hijackers casino cruise

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x47526

along with this one

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2017967&mesg_id=2018773

[sabra]

3. thanks for the links.

peace.

[EVDebs]

4. No fly list stops another 'terrorist'-- Author of Bush's Brain

No, I'm not making this up

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x57129

[savemefromdumbya]

5. Who is checking the background checkers?

why is there a need for a president to circumvent the law? Very fishy. Who is checking these background checkers?

[EVDebs]

6. The excuse I'm hearing from the DOJ Dept of Justification is...

the terrorists are exploiting our freedoms, therefore we have to exploit them too. The WH advisor the other day who mentioned Sun Tzu (the Art of War) said something along those lines:

Sun Tzu and the Art of Spying
by Noah Leavitt, AlterNet. Posted January 5, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/rights/30394/

Embedded in this article is further insight on Sun Tzu's thinking on warfare which the Bush administration appears to be taking too far,

""Deception must be ongoing, and unpredictable: "Even though you are competent, appear to be incompetent. Though effective, appear to be ineffective.""

The incompetence and ineffectiveness of this administration is breathtaking. They REALLY are winning. The incompetence and ineffectiveness just gets better and better each and every day. I can hardly stand it. Truly in their puzzle palace of mirrors they have made Black equal White and 2 + 2 = Whatever.

They have taken Stalin and Churchill's admonishion about truth, 'In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies', to the extreme.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Joseph_Stalin (also attributed to Churchill, who probably stole it from...!)

They are making the entire American populace akin to Henry David Thoreau, who said
""Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison""

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/h/henrydavid135750.html

Look on the bright side, we'll all get three squares a day and a nice orange jumpsuit to wear in a tropical prison ! Just like the dittoheads keep telling us, that too is a lie: see Operations Cable Splicer and Garden Plot, the prisons are in some cold outtatheway places.

[savemefromdumbya]

11. ah but

W and Cheney will look fabulous in those orange jumpsuits. Condi will wear blue? though (no high heel boots allowed!

[Amonester]

7. K & R. Thanks!

Courageous People Know The Truth.

Hope To Hear Their (criminal) employees' Answer With The Truth.

Won't Happen.

The Only Alternative Is To Fire & To Prosecute them (for all their crimes).

Kick.

[NoAmericanTaliban]

8. 9/11 Commission - attack could have been avoided..

by applying the existing laws on the book. Patriot Act & NSA spying is overkill & to suggest that they would have prevented 9/11 are false. Had * read the memo ,while he was on vacation, about Bin Ladin attacking the US & acted on it this attack could have been prevented.

[sabra]

9. it's really that easy, but RW won't allow te public to believe that....

[EVDebs]

10. A Houston 4 yr old made the No Fly List !

Houston 4 yr old makes the No Fly List

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=57129&mesg_id=59918

The incompetence and ineffectiveness that are all part of Bush's Sun Tzu War Strategery are working to perfection ! The real terrorists will think we're nothing but incompetent boobs who will self-destruct anyway !

I feel safer knowing the NSA, TSA, and the BSA (Boy Scouts of America, who are at least 'prepared') are out there looking out for me. Gives new meaning to 'leave well enough alone', don't you think ?