Re: Federal judge rules in favor of Osama Bin Laden

Jon Beaver wrote:
On Fri, 18 Aug 2006 13:11:57 GMT, Ken Smith <forget@xxxxxx> wrote:
Jon Beaver wrote:
On 17 Aug 2006 19:32:10 -0700, wcrapkin@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
Trent wrote:


"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude than
the animating contest of freedom, - go from us in peace. We ask not your
counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your
chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our
countrymen!"

"The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil constitution, are
worth defending against all hazards: And it is our duty to defend them
against all attacks."

Samuel Adams (not the beer)

Sam Adams didn't have to deal with islamic terrorists bent on
destroying this country at all costs. last weeks foiled attacks prove
how determined these monsters remain in perpetuating mass murder.
sometimes the price of safety is not to give up civil liberties but to
curttail some of those rights in the ultimate protection of life.
this judge is basically saying that the government has no right to
attempt to intercept terrorist communications, which is the sole
purpose of this program, not to eavesdrop on the personal conversations
of ordinary citizens. With 3000 people dead due to a vicious attack
on civilian territory do you really think that our founding fathers
would not understand nor even expect us to defend ourselves as strongly
as the terrorists plot to blow us up? If the government is forced to
comply with this judges order we will loose a valuable tool in keeping
up with potential terrorists. What the ACLU consistently fails to
recognize is that the most important civil right is the right to life
and all their efforts to currtail the president from fighting this war
practically gurarantee that people will die.

Your arguments are interesting, but not new. In the late 1700s there
was a war fought over these arguments. Your side lost.

Unfortunately, the issue has resurfaced ... and their side appears to be on the verge of winning. Government officials are completely immune for their wholesale abuse of our fundamental human rights (which have become mere liberties), and we have no residual expectation that we can rely on the courts to protect us.

But then again, Thomas Jefferson predicted this....

Sure. The current administration has an army. That doesn't make them
right.

It certainly does in your eyes, when it serves your purpose. It's the (neo-con Republican lawyer/radio host) Hugh Hewitt Rule of Law: Whatever works in my favor is a Good Thing.

I'm struggling in vain to find any legally valid explanation for the notion that a state court of general jurisdiction cannot hear a federal civil rights case filed by a resident of that state, wherein every act complained in occurred in the same state. Tumey v. Ohio and Claflin v. Houseman are no longer good law, not to mention Carey v. Piphus and Marbury v. Madison. With those cores gone, the Twin Towers of American jurisprudence can no longer support their own weight.

But if I can't even persuade the Bar as to the danger the practice of issuing unpublished opinions presents, I have little hope of persuading the masses. It was the practical wisdom of Neimoller: "What happens to others is Not Your Problem."

If they don't come for you, Jon, they'll come for your children....

But it does make us have to go through the trouble of voting
them out, including democrats who appease them.

DieBold, With a Vengenance. (Always vote on paper ballots. Insist.)

My God! The legal analysis is simple:

Legal analysis only applies in those jurisdictions where the rule of law exists ... and as academics have been increasingly observing as of late, America has effectively abandoned the English common law. Stare decisis has been transmogrified into stare deceased.

The Constitution says no unreasonable searches and seizures and no
warrants without showing of probable cause. This has been repeatedly
interpreted to mean that any warrantless search or seizure is
presumptively unreasonable.

Precedent means stark raving nothing in this country, Jon! To be more precise, a judge will only follow precedent when it takes them precisely where they want to go. You know that as well as I do, and have admitted as much. Think family court.

Now, suppose Mr. X, a Pakistani in Pakistan, makes a call to Mr. Y, a
U. S. citizen in Ohio. The NSA does not have to have a warrant to
eavesdrop, on Mr. X's call. But they hear Mr. Y saying suspicious
things in that call, so they now want to eavesdrop on all calls
initiated by Mr. Y from Ohio. Under the Constitution, they may
eavesdrop on Mr. Y if they have a warrant or if there are exigent
circumstances -- danger of irreparable harm before a warrant can be
obtained. In order to get a warrant, they have to convince a judge on
the record that what they heard Mr. Y say amounted to probable cause
of dangerous or criminal activity. They also have to comply with any
laws passed by Congress, and those laws have to comply with the
Constitution. The only "inherent authority" the president has is not
"authority" at all, but merely the practical necessity of having to
have someone make an initial determination of exigency so imminent
that a judge can't make it in time. And I think the Supreme Court has
made it clear that 9/11 did not create a "blank check" in the form of
a permanent state of "exigency."

I don't dispute your analysis in theory. I question the premise upon which it rests -- that precedent actually matters! -- because I know at first hand that it is increasingly untenable.

Our practical problem is to have a Congress with the balls to
investigate to determine how much of the NSA program is listening to
Mr. X and how much of it is listening to Mr. Y.

Agree?

This country doesn't even have a functioning *Bar* any more, Jon. We need courage from either Congress or the courts -- and failing that, we may need a citizenry prepared to take Jefferson's admonition seriously. Whatever the eventual remedy, we need a fix and we need it yesterday.

Even now, you can hear the Zionist talking heads on right-wing radio (e.g., Michael "Savage" Weiner, Dennis Prager, et al.) screaming aloud for "Four More Wars." The same *exact* rhetoric they used on Saddam is now being directed toward Adolf Ahmedinejad. Unfortuantely, Mel Gibson had a point. "Islamofascism?!?" There is nothing *fascist* about the Islamist movement. The pro-Israel lobby tells our leaders to jump, and they say, "How high?"

[Note: Not all Jews are Zionist; some even see Zionism as dangerous.]

Someone has to stop this train of war before it engulfs us all.

.