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Glenn Greenwald - Various items: NSA stories around the world
Various items: NSA stories around the world
Revelations continue to produce outcomes on multiple levels in numerous countries around the world
Glenn Greenwald
theguardian.com, Monday 23 September 2013 09.32 EDT
...
(5) There has long been a glaring contradiction at the heart of the case for the NSA made by its apologists (the most devoted of whom, as of January 20, 2009, are Democrats). They insist that the NSA's spying activities are legal and constitutional (even though a 2011 FISA court opinion - released only in the wake of the last three months of scandal - found the opposite). But the real contradiction is that there have been almost no rulings on the legality or constitutionality of these spying laws and the activities conducted under them because the Obama DOJ - exactly like the Bush DOJ before it - repeatedly raised claims of standing and secrecy to prevent any such adjudication (the Obama DOJ relied on the five right-wing Supreme Court justices to win that argument earlier this year and prevent any constitutional or legal challenge to their domestic surveillance program).
Yet now, as the Hill reports, those arguments used by the DOJ to prevent judicial rulings are being gutted by all of the revelations in the wake of Snowden-enabled reporting. The Hill article quotes the ACLU's Alex Abdo as follows:
Does anyone disagree with that? Is there anyone who thinks things were better pre-Snowden when the DOJ could successfully block legal challenges to the US government's spying activities by invoking secrecy and standing claims?
...
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/23/various-items-nsa-india-belgium
Revelations continue to produce outcomes on multiple levels in numerous countries around the world
Glenn Greenwald
theguardian.com, Monday 23 September 2013 09.32 EDT
...
(5) There has long been a glaring contradiction at the heart of the case for the NSA made by its apologists (the most devoted of whom, as of January 20, 2009, are Democrats). They insist that the NSA's spying activities are legal and constitutional (even though a 2011 FISA court opinion - released only in the wake of the last three months of scandal - found the opposite). But the real contradiction is that there have been almost no rulings on the legality or constitutionality of these spying laws and the activities conducted under them because the Obama DOJ - exactly like the Bush DOJ before it - repeatedly raised claims of standing and secrecy to prevent any such adjudication (the Obama DOJ relied on the five right-wing Supreme Court justices to win that argument earlier this year and prevent any constitutional or legal challenge to their domestic surveillance program).
Yet now, as the Hill reports, those arguments used by the DOJ to prevent judicial rulings are being gutted by all of the revelations in the wake of Snowden-enabled reporting. The Hill article quotes the ACLU's Alex Abdo as follows:
"For years, the government has shielded its surveillance practices from judicial review through excessive secrecy. And now that that secrecy has been lifted to some degree, we now know precisely who is being surveilled in some of the dragnet policies of the NSA, and those people can now challenge those policies. . . . . No matter what you think of the lawfulness of these programs, I think everyone should think their legitimacy or illegitimacy is better debated in public and decided by a court."
Does anyone disagree with that? Is there anyone who thinks things were better pre-Snowden when the DOJ could successfully block legal challenges to the US government's spying activities by invoking secrecy and standing claims?
...
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/23/various-items-nsa-india-belgium
7 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
I expect those that do will be here shortly.
