On Trusting Obama’s Administration
Eric Holder had his off the record meeting yesterday with those news organizations willing to submit to an “off the record” requirement, ensuring no tough questions would be asked and that a message would emerge that Holder cares deeply:
Holder and aides “completely endorsed the president’s statement that reporters should not be at legal risk for doing their job,” said Martin Baron, The Washington Post’s executive editor, who was among the participants. “They acknowledged the need for changes in their own guidelines and the need to have a more rigorous internal review.”
Trust him! Meanwhile, maybe the IRS targeted conservatives for audits as well as closer scrutiny of tax-exempt status.
If I had to place a percentage on my confidence level that this happened, it would be somewhere in the high 90s. There is already rampant evidence of questionable audits. All we need is the admission.
reporters should not be at legal risk for doing their job
Translated means, “As long as the press is doing their job covering for us and attacking the enemy, they should be at no risk…
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 5/31/2013 @ 7:20 amof course, that means things would change if we lost power.”
I made the mistake of reading the Politico reportage of this (yes, I know, no links to bullies). That same line jumped out at me, and the overall rather ‘accepting’ tone of the Politico article made me cringe.
Reporters already *are not* at legal risk for doing their job, per the Constitution and the law. Stating they’ll “review” guidelines” etc. is basically an admission that they were operating outside the law the first time around.
That’s the only reason I can think of he wanted the meeting off the record: its basically an admission of guilt that could have been used against him.
rtrski (c69273) — 5/31/2013 @ 7:30 ami fully trust Ear Leader’s regime.
i’m sure that our would be tin pot dictator is a fascist that will break any law, ignore any duty and routinely breech his oath of office any time it suits him.
redc1c4 (403dff) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:00 amLet’s not underestimate how badly media liberals want to believe the current line that Obama and Holder are deeply chagrined about how all of this has transpired and that they will move heaven and earth to see that changes are made to prevent it from ever happening again. I fear at the end off the day that this will be treated in the same manner as the Clinton fund-raising scandals 16 years ago; despite the dirty hands of the administration, they will be given credit for demanding reform of the rules that they so egregiously violated, and no one important will ever be held accountable.
JVW (23867e) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:18 amI totally trust Holder to investigate Holder. He might should charge himself with perjury.
I have said all along that the IRS is the tip of the iceberg. Look at the systemic targeting of individuals.
JD (b63a52) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:19 amIOW, “the next time somebody tries to leak potentially classified info to you, call us first and check to see if it’s okay.”
Icy (e4801a) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:33 amthis is one of the silliest most maladroit amateurish displays of american neofascist tendencies I have seen in all my days
happyfeet (8ce051) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:40 amFunny how the right is trying to go after Holder for illegal surveillance of reporters, but hasn’t minded surveillance of everyone else for years and years.
It’s like a bunch of 5 year olds chasing the soccer ball all over the field with no strategy for the game. Is it right to say the Rosen story is the first time you all piped up about government surveillance going too far? When this soccer ball was dropped in front of you, you went chasing it, forgetting that the 4th Amendment was blown apart by the Patriot Act long ago?
Is it fair to say you all supported Bush’s surveillance programs? Were you happy when the NSA requested and got your personal data from all of the telecoms in violation of the law? You were fine when the FISA law scandal required several updates (after-the-fact) because the White House was bypassing warrants?
I assume you all approved when Clinton made a deal with the British to listen for us on calls involving Americans overseas conversations to circumvent the Constitution?
I assume you all give Bush a pass for saying we never wiretap without first getting a warrant?
I assume you all are proud of the way we used illegal bugs to spy on UN diplomats in NYC ahead of the UNSC vote on invading Iraq?
Did you guys care when Condi Rice was caught spying on human rights groups? When tax money was squandered infiltrating anti-war groups? How about when tens of thousands of national security letters were issued improperly, did that cause anyone to raise an eyebrow?
Perhaps you only care when it relates to news gathering? Like leakers telling the press crimes and cover ups have been committed? Well I guess it depends on what party the reporter’s boss likes best. Because the right never stood up for Wikileaks and was far less interested in the AP spying scandal than the Rosen scandal.
But now that you’ve finally caught up, now that you have Holder in your sights, will you be making an even-handed consistent, principled Constitutional argument that no one should have their privacy violated by the government, admitting Bush broke the law too, or will you just be trying to say Holder’s spying on the AP was somehow lesser than spying on Rosen to accuse him of conspiracy?
It’s never too late to do the right thing….
Mahalia Cab (742ef3) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:50 amMeanwhile there are some interesting items in this graphic of who went to the White House and how often.
Not only did the IRS Commisioner go over 150 times, but the next two runner-up were Rebecca Blank, who oversaw the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and Thomas Perez who ran the Civil Rights division of the Justice Department and decided which state voting rules would be allowed to change.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:08 amI move that Mahalia Cab change handles to ‘Mahalia TL;DR’.
luagha (788720) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:11 amSo mc, you equate tapping domestic phones of reporters with tapping overseas calls to the likes of al Qaeda? Or are you just trying to be obtuse?
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:12 am“Funny how the right is trying to go after Holder for illegal surveillance of reporters, but hasn’t minded surveillance of everyone else for years and years.”
Mahalia – There you go again with your false comparisons. Can you ever make a comment on the current administration without resorting to your favorite transparently false, but look over here “squirrel”, device?
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:12 am“8.Funny how the right is trying to go after Holder for illegal surveillance of reporters, but hasn’t minded surveillance of everyone else for years and years.”
“The Right”, my dear Mahalia, is not trying to go after anybody. The Right is trying to do the right thing. You said it’s never too late, right? And who the hell are you to tell us on the right whether we minded or didn’t mind surveillance of everyone else? I, for one mind very damn much.
Now you can get your panties in a bunch about Bush, Clinton or the Teapot Dome Scandle for all I care but CURRENTLY Holder and the rest of the corruptocrats are breaking the law. This is not history, it’s current events. You do realize these criminals are in power don’t you? Do try to keep focused.
Or are you justifying this because somebody else did something?
Hoagie (3259ab) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:22 amHow about the more accurate “Mahalia, Lying Sack O’ Crap”?
Rob Crawford (e6f27f) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:26 amCan anyone imagine what would have happened if Cindy Sheehan and Code Pink had been audited by the IRS?
Rob Crawford (e6f27f) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:27 amWait a second . . . Cindy Sheehan and Code Pink actually earn money?
Icy (e4801a) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:44 amMahalia, a lot of people on the left, including your president and his administration, have “never stood up for Wikileaks”.
Icy (e4801a) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:56 amMahalia’s tedious comments alleging hypocrisy would be more readable if Mahalia didn’t assume so many things to be fact that are merely incorrect assumptions created out of an uninformed mind–Mahalia’s. This blanket “you people” tic is not skillful persuasion and has gotten quite old and tiresome.
elissa (07b801) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:58 amThis week’s federal government Friday info dump:
Icy (e4801a) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:04 amMedicare’s giant hospital trust will be exhausted in 2026, while Social Security will exhaust its trust fund in 2033.
— Great news for my generation, as I will be 61 in 2026 and 68 in 2033.
I don’t think the “Oh, look, a kitty” defense is going to work this time.
rochf (f3fbb0) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:06 amComment by rtrski (c69273) — 5/31/2013 @ 7:30 am
Reporters already *are not* at legal risk for doing their job, per the Constitution and the law.
I think Scooter Libby thought they were, and he leid to protect Judith Miller, who had asked him to try to find out the answer to a question (why was Joe Wilson selected to go to Niger? The answer Libby got back, which was not the truth, was that he was recommended by his wife.)
That’s the only reason I can think of he wanted the meeting off the record: its basically an admission of guilt that could have been used against him.
No, I could think of another reason.
Maybe he was going to say a certain intelligence agency had threatened to cut off co-operation if the leaker wasn’t found. He could not let that get out in public, or that certain intelligence agency would be very angry, or pretend to be.
Now did he say that?
The New York Times has a report on the “off the record” meeting, which they didn’t participate in, and says this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/31/us/politics/holder-may-rein-in-prosecutors-on-leaks.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Changes in technlogy is, I think, a reference to e-mail.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:23 amObama and Holder are going to get away with all this. We can however make them punchlines and embarrassments forever.
Can anyone explain what the hell Obama could possibly have been doing during the afternoon/eveneing of Septmeber 11, 2012 as his ambassador was being murdered in real time? We have no expalantion atll, not where he was nor who he was with nor what he was doing. No President of any party would be so uninvolved, so derelict. it’s shocking, and under nromal circumatances impeachable. That will not happen, but the point has to be amdea gain and again. When the 3AM call came, Obama didn’t weven bother to answer it much less do anything. The idea that the military repsonse wouldn’t have arrived in time is a crock, unless Al Qeada gave The One their schedule and itinerary for their Benghazi attack. That he then proceeded to concoct and perpetuate the vidoe fraud merely calls more attention to the fact that The President of the United States of America was AWOL.
Bugg (ba4ca9) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:28 amYour last quoted paragraph (SF, #21) is doubly entertaining considering that Holder is the one who approved the subpoena request, which specifically went to 3 different judges in an attempt to avoid ‘advance notice’ to the subject, therefore at the top of the review cycle for said subpeona, but somehow failed to remember he’d had any involvement in all the above when questioned by congress.
Sure, ‘more rigorous procedures’ are going to prevent that. I wonder if any of the dunderheads attending pushed back at that.
As for the concept of an intellegence agency indicating they’d stop cooperating unless the leaker was found, I’ve seen absolutely no commentary from the meeting to that effect. And the obvious parry to that tack in the meeting would be “so…you had a similar investigation about the Stuxnet leaks because of similar agency concerns….right?”
rtrski (336865) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:33 amI feel dirty.
WaPo (be0117) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:41 amSure, Bugg, Obama was in the WH Situation Room and it was his decision to issue the stand down order. His accomplices can’t admit he was there or they’d also have to admit Obama gave the order to betray those brave Americans fighting for their lives.
ropelight (f90ff6) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:41 amWell there’s always case law and that Constitution thingy.
Patricia (be0117) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:42 amMeanwhile, among the news orgs that refused to knuckle under, CNN stays knuckle-headed.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/05/31/investing/dividend-yield-stocks/index.html?iid=Lead
S&P declines as Treasury yields climb at ZIRP and Fed buying everything means “Economy recovering”.
Hell, if the SMOD hit Atlanta we’d wouldn’t hear ‘economy recovering’ only because they’re all dead.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:09 am18. “Tedious”
‘lissa modeling generosity among the racist horde.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:13 am“Trust Obama”
While he pushes on a string.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-05-31/and-away-least-something-going-straight
Met the IRS commish weekly or 60 times while not attending Job Council once. Thats no pivot, thats travelling.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:19 amEd Meese is laughing his ass off.
mojo (0583bf) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:23 amThe real irony here is that liberal idiots in the mass media (BIRM) are so out to lunch they actually would not be able to see any issues with the media agreeing to an “off the record” confab with the Attorney General of the United States regarding a major scandal and then dutifully regurgitating the desired talking points, like the partisan sheeple they are. You’d have to explain to them the various layers of absurdity and irony. Then they’d reflexively contest you or as their collective ADHD kicked in and they’d tune you out. Leftism is a mental disorder, not an ideology.
Regarding the Obama admin., what’s really surprising is that they haven’t gone more overtly corrupt and Machiavellian. These are after all Chicago thug politicos. Alas, there’s still plenty of time for them to get in touch with their inner Brave New World. By Jan. 2017 if not much sooner we literally will have devolved into a banana republic.
William Scalia (4fc30a) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:36 amMahalia Cab, your logical fallacy today is “tu quoque.” I am pleased to inform you that children commonly commit this logical fallacy. So quit playing on the keyboard unless you have adult supervision.
Naturally you aren’t even capable of committing a logical fallacy without screwing it up. Because of course no one has ever done what the Obama administration has done. So even at the level of writing a decent example of the fallacy of appeal to hypocrisy you fail.
One rarely meets an individual who is both incredibly stupid and stubbornly insistent on demonstrating it to the world. I suppose congratulations are in order.
And Elephant Stone, I denounce you for suggesting Mahalia Cab is a whore because of her opinions and comments. How dare you suggest that the very things that we are aware of that makes someone as inherently unlikeable as Mahalia Cab could possibly make a living as a whore. You really need to take that back.
On another front, the Obama administration is now officially beyond parody.
http://washingtonexaminer.com/washington-post-the-justice-department-has-allowed-us-to-say-ag-holder-supports-press-freedom/article/2530898
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 5/31/2013 @ 11:51 amgoddam liars, the whole lot of ’em. The fact that they’re not called out on their lies by liberals en masse highlights the dishonesty and malevolence of the left.
Colonel Haiku (a04464) — 5/31/2013 @ 12:26 pmSteve,
Friend, I accept my denouncement. I feel badly about inferring that Mahalia Cab accepts money for physical relations. After careful consideration, I realize she likely does it for free…you know, because she loathes capitalism, and she loves fairness. Or whatever.
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 5/31/2013 @ 12:33 pm“The first news media meeting was off the record, and The New York Times was among several organizations that were invited but did not attend because it objected to that condition”
Sammy – They had to hold it off the record because if it was on the record, reporters writing about the laughter over the BS Holder was spewing would have been too embarrassing.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/31/2013 @ 12:49 pmES, that’s just more horrible speculation about Ms./Mr. Cab! You have no basis to speculate she engages in sex for free. If she/he/it isn’t compelled to pay or barter for it I’m positive at the very least considerable begging is involved.
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 5/31/2013 @ 12:57 pmSteve, on the other hand, Mahalia may just have decided that voting twice for Obama, who in turn screws the entire country, is her vicarious way of engaging in relations.
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 5/31/2013 @ 1:06 pmMedicare’s giant hospital trust will be exhausted in 2026, while Social Security will exhaust its trust fund in 2033.
There’s no reason to believe these projections are correct, or even close. They change from year to year.
Social Security is actually in not too bad shape. The 2033 projection is based on historically low rates of economic growth. If it ran out benefits would suddenly drop by about 25%.
Medicare is in worse toruble, but anything havcing to do with medical expenses is in trouble. Something will have to give before 2026.
The worst thing is freezing what it pays out and reduciung quality. It is necessary to inject some kind of price competition into this.
– Great news for my generation, as I will be 61 in 2026 and 68 in 2033.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/31/2013 @ 1:42 pmThat last line belongs to Icy.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/31/2013 @ 1:42 pmComment by Bugg (ba4ca9) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:28 am
Can anyone explain what the hell Obama could possibly have been doing during the afternoon/evening of Septmeber 11, 2012 as his ambassador was being murdered in real time?
Politics.
He also spent an hour talking to Israeli Prime Minsiter Benjamin Netanyahu, but that was about Iran’s nuclear weapons program. Not the crisis of the moment. He may have gone to sleep, also. He had to get up early for his trip to Las Vegas for a fundraiser.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/31/2013 @ 1:47 pmSammy, he also talked to Hillary! at 10:00pm. That is the only phone conversation with any of his department secretaries after he was informed of the attack in Benghazi. Following the phone call Hillary! released the press statement implicating the video for the violence.
So President Tiger Beat was busy getting his administration’s lies straight. Too busy with that to even phone the Libyan PM and remind him of his obligation per the Vienna Convention to protect US diplomats and facilities and ask him what he was doing to help.
Steve57 (9b1cdb) — 5/31/2013 @ 2:17 pmyes Hillary too and he didn’t seem to want to be kept updated much.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/31/2013 @ 2:44 pm“There’s no reason to believe these projections are correct, or even close.”
Sammy – Is there any reason to believe they predict the demise of either Medicaid or Social Security sooner than it will actually occur based upon what we know now?
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/31/2013 @ 3:11 pmAre you high?
Rob Crawford (e6f27f) — 5/31/2013 @ 3:25 pmIf I had to place a percentage on my confidence level that this happened, it would be somewhere in the high 90s. There is already rampant evidence of questionable audits. All we need is the admission.
Holder: “Oh, but we would never use the IRS and other government agencies like that, Mr. Patterico.”
Patterico: “They have a saying in Chicago…’Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.'”
===================
Cut and dried – that’s exactly what they are doing.
(Thanks to WikiQuotes for the paraphrased quote. An exercise for the student for where it’s from.)
Bill M (e0a4e5) — 5/31/2013 @ 3:30 pmhttp://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/05/breaking-obama-irs-scandal-widens-conservative-activists-and-businesses-targeted-too/
narciso (3fec35) — 5/31/2013 @ 3:55 pm44. Sam’s so myopic he can’t see the lockbox has no bottom.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 5:03 pmRIP Sammy Finkelman
Colonel Haiku (df03b7) — 5/31/2013 @ 5:07 pmAnd Urkel, “Did I do that?”, figures he’s going to skate.
So much for taking the House in 2014. The rest of your Presentency will be devoted to “Squirrel!”
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 5:07 pm#32 Steve57
Yes! Glad you referenced that Washington Examiner headline.
It’s *PRICELESS* .
A_Nonny_Mouse (381ec6) — 5/31/2013 @ 7:33 pmSocial Security is actually in not too bad shape.
Loath as I am to admit it, but Sammy is right on that one, at least as compared to Medicare, which has the equivalent of pancreatic cancer.
The problems of Social Security are manageable and require at most indexing the start of benefits to increased life expectancy. There are other, non-actuarial problems, such as it being a bad deal for most everyone after the baby boomers and a continuing piggy bank for politicians, but assuming the government doesn’t default on the “trust” fund, the actuarial problems are manageable.
Medicare, however, is ****ed.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:04 pmUrkel studied at the feet of the best:
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-genius-of-democrat-leadership.html
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:15 pmeven the less likely prospect is not reassuring;
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/349853/lois-lerner-defense-mark-steyn
narciso (3fec35) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:15 pm51. When the Federal government starts defaulting on everything, not just the mess at HQ near the front, we can proudly say “It wasn’t ’cause of Soc. Sec., we just didn’t have the revenue to provide services and pay the bills.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:20 pmNot that market volatility can be relied on to predict Monday’s prices, the last week is following Japan’s lead:
Stock market drifting down by fits and starts, bonds drifting up. Why? The Fed has a whiff of ‘core inflation’ in the nostrils while growth is absent and unaccounted.
The day is approaching when the Fed loses money on its ‘investment’, all out FX wars rage and government cannot afford to meet its promises, any of them.
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:31 pmCompared to a severed head, a couple of missing legs is nothing!!!
Gus (694db4) — 5/31/2013 @ 8:55 pmSocial Security is THEORETICALLY not a severed head YET.
In other news, California has published its Obamacare plans, benefits and costs.
It is far worse than even I expected.
We all knew that there would be subsidies for poorer people, but what we were not told was that they would get much better plans than working people could afford. The average, unsubsidized worker is offered a set of mediocre health plans (PDF) that really don’t measure up to what they could get now, for less. This “silver” plan, which features high co-pays and $6400 per-person deductible, costs a 45-year-old $332/month if they do not qualify for a subsidy, which is about the cost a 55-year-old would pay on the private market today for the same crappy coverage.
The kicker, though is this: a 60-year-old making $15K a year pays $45 for the “silver” plan — but their silver plan includes all the benefits of the normal platinum plan (no deductible, token co-pays, $ brand medicines, etc). Details here (PDF).
No mention by the state folks of what the more generous plans cost working folks. Probably because you won’t be able to aafford them.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:21 pmthat’s $5 brand name medicines.
Kevin M (bf8ad7) — 5/31/2013 @ 9:22 pmI assume you all approved when Clinton made a deal with the British to listen for us on calls involving Americans overseas conversations to circumvent the Constitution?
You must be an ultra-liberal to think that Bill Clinton somehow is non-liberal enough to want to include him in a list of Republicans like Bush, and that in your mind Clinton therefore must have triggered sympathy among conservatives. The sleaziness of Clinton never sat well with non-squishy rightist people.
Mark (aa8ab9) — 5/31/2013 @ 10:24 pmThe game is over. Yes, it will be years in denouement before its truly dead and a second Constitutional Congress is called, but its death may be heralded with certainty.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/05/31/The-Grounding-of-Big-Government
gary gulrud (dd7d4e) — 6/1/2013 @ 5:26 amWe’re through the looking glass people;
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/us/politics/goals-to-fulfill-and-foes-to-foil-keep-holder-going.html?hp&_r=1&
narciso (3fec35) — 6/2/2013 @ 10:08 am“…you equate tapping domestic phones of reporters with tapping overseas calls to the likes of al Qaeda? Or are you just trying to be obtuse?”
Kevin M, you know some reporters speak directly to the enemy. They are supposed to be neutral. Did you know that half a dozen lefty journalists were suing Obama over this in a Supreme Court battle over the NDAA fight already to prevent from being designated as “associating with” terrorists and losing rights and freedoms simply by interviewing them?
To answer your question you can’t have it both ways – the 4th Amendment is clear, so if a citizen makes a call, it shouldn’t be tapped without a warrant. If al Qaeda is involved, why wouldn’t they be able to get a warrant (retroactive, if necessary) and why would YOU want this law to change without first ratifying a Constitutional amendment that said so?
Are you saying the 4th Amendment is trumped by the war on terror? It’s like you are admitting bin Laden scared you and changed your views on the Bill of Rights.
daley, I’m listening but don’t get the squirrel references. If you can disprove something I said with evidence do so, but generalities make it seem like you can’t.
To Hoagie, excusing illegal Bush era surveillance is exactly what emboldened the current administration, and they should have every right to expect to get away with it too, because the right DEFENDED Bush’s spying and let him skate. So you guys made this bed – if you denounce illegal spying evenhandedly, you can talk with credibility, but it would mean you have to admit Bush broke the law in front of all these rabid right wingers.
Are you about principle or just a partisan? Please tell me the extent that you “mind” surveillance of us all – are you in favor of the Patriot Act? The collection of emails? Infiltration of activist groups on taxpayer money? Watch lists? Do tell….
Icy, you made the grievous error of assuming Obama is “my” President, so I need to ask you what I said that gave you that impression, so we can all see where your mistake originated. I’ve said many times he should be impeached immediately for high crimes and misdemeanors. You also make a more basic mistake when you say Obama is “on the left” – you surely mean TO YOUR left, but the REAL left has been criticizing him for years, and exactly for things like persecuting Wikileaks, consistent with the same principles they criticized Bush, Clinton and Reagan for.
This thread is simply exposing of the partisan hackery on the right, as we wait to see anyone denounce Bush for illegal wiretaps like they are now crying about Holder. Illegal is illegal – unless you are a Patterico fan. Then, it depends on your party affiliation.
To elissa, I deliberately say “you people” as a direct challenge to tease out and see who in this entire site believes Holder’s wiretapping is equivalent in it’s unconstitutionality with Bush’s. Hoagie is flirting with making an admission above, and has said I was way off base for suggesting “you guys” condone warrantless wiretapping. Hoagie, in fact, is claiming you all “mind” surveillance “of everyone” which would surely light up a controversy, because at least one of “you people” is saying it’s okay to tap phonecalls if we’re looking for terrorists. So which is it?
Steve57, is your argument really “no one has done what Obama has done”? If you mean surveil reporters, you might be wrong because Bush’s NSA program actually collects the communications of EVERYONE. But I was specifically comparing Obama’s warrantless wiretaps to Bush’s – you are saying they are different, but inadvertently, you raised an interesting point – we don’t even know who Bush wiretapped in the NSA/FISA scandal do we? The courts quashed it because the plaintiffs had no standing – but the courts ironically would not unseal who was tapped – so do we know whether reporters were spied on? If so, how do you know?
I also hope you and Elephant read this thread back in a few years, and see that joking about me being a whore (and now a slut) for my blog comments was something that is widely, widely condemned on the wrong side of history. I don’t know if you have wives, sisters or daughters, and can imagine them being called sluts over political diagreements, but you definitely have mothers. If your mom knows you call total strangers whores and sluts, just because you disagree with them in a Constitutional debate, they raised you backwards. You should remain civil and make better arguments – the inability to do this shows.
Elephant, you made a factual error when you said I voted twice for Obama. Can you show what gave you that misconception, others might learn from your mistake.
And finally, watch this demonstration by Mark. I said: “I assume you all approved when Clinton made a deal with the British to listen for us on calls involving Americans overseas conversations to circumvent the Constitution?”
And Mark said:
“You must be an ultra-liberal to think that Bill Clinton somehow is non-liberal enough to want to include him in a list of Republicans like Bush, and that in your mind Clinton therefore must have triggered sympathy among conservatives. The sleaziness of Clinton never sat well with non-squishy rightist people.”
I only included Clinton in that list because he conducted unconstitutional surveillance. If you have a principle, such as believing in the 4th Amendment, political party does not come in to play in laying blame and stating relevant history. But isn’t it AMAZING to see Mark’s analysis.. He actually thinks I should editorialize who to “include in a list” of people to criticize over wireless surveillance – he expected me to!
Is this not PROOF of the thinking in this site, devoid of principle and only looking through partisan lenses?
Mahalia Cab (acff04) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:26 pmMahalia Cab, you remain utterly ignorant.
As an example, you write: “…the 4th Amendment is clear, so if a citizen makes a call, it shouldn’t be tapped without a warrant. ”
The Fourth Amendment makes no such thing “clear”. Go read it someday. It is judicial interpretation of the Fourth Amendment and statutory enactments that cover the privacy of telephone communications.
Even more ignorant are your rantings about the PATRIOT Act – as you’ve no clue whatsoever about what that act actually contains.
SPQR (cde90f) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:31 pmIs this not PROOF of the thinking in this site, devoid of principle and only looking through partisan lenses?
It’s proof you need an editor. And a sense of irony.
Birdbath (716828) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:39 pmMahalia is a fiscal conservative. Lol
JD (b63a52) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:41 pmMahalia Cab has to prove her love of the Constitution by defending the President who is trampling on it.
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:43 pmMahalia wrote,
“Elephant, you made a factual error when you said I voted twice for Obama. Can you show what gave you that misconception, others might learn from your mistake.”
————
Ok, so you’re admitting you voted more than twice for Obama ? We knew you guys were stuffing the ballot box this past November.
Elephant Stone (6a6f37) — 6/3/2013 @ 2:46 pmIn red states, that sort of malfeasance is actually against the law.
Elephant Stone – She is admitting that uber-leftist Teh One, is not leftist enough for fiscal conservative lol Mahalia.
JD (b63a52) — 6/3/2013 @ 3:20 pm(lol)
peedoffamerican (ee1de0) — 6/13/2013 @ 8:35 pm(LOL)
peedoffamerican (ee1de0) — 6/13/2013 @ 8:35 pm(LOL)
😆
peedoffamerican (ee1de0) — 6/13/2013 @ 8:36 pm