Re: The New York Times at War With America

On Sun, 02 Jul 2006 18:13:25 -0700, El Castor
<anyonethere@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Rumpelstiltskin <PleaseDoNotReplyByEmail@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sun, 02 Jul 2006 14:36:38 -0700, El Castor
<anyonethere@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Rumpelstiltskin <PleaseDoNotReplyByEmail@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sun, 02 Jul 2006 12:08:52 -0400, Thumper <jaylsmith@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:


Of course I can but the last time I proved something to you it was
ignored by you. I told you then to feel free to disprove anything I
say but I won't be run around by you again. You Republicans are
really all alike.



One of the tougher things for me to learn about Usenet, babe
in the woods that I am, was that many people are not sincere
or at all friendly, and will run you around as much as they can
just for the hell of it.

I don't "run Thumper around"! When I make a claim of fact I back it up
with a link. Thumper seldom does. No link is the lazy way out, it
relieves the poster of the necessity of being precise, and makes it
more difficult for those who are interested in his post to get to the
bottom of what he is claiming. For instance, he says that "a law"
passed in 1978 requires that the "government give notification to
those investigated within 48 hours of investigating anyone". Well what
law? He should substantiate his claims.

When I made the claim that what the government was doing was legal, I
didn't just say, "Richard Clarke says it's legal", I posted a quote
and a link. Here it is -- again.

"The International Economic Emergency Powers Act, passed in 1977,
provides the president with enormous authority over financial
transactions by America's enemies. International initiatives against
money laundering have been under way for a decade, and have been aimed
not only at terrorists but also at drug cartels, corrupt foreign
officials and a host of criminal organizations. These initiatives,
combined with treaties and international agreements, should leave no
one with any presumption of privacy when moving money electronically
between countries. Indeed, since 2001, banks have been obliged to
report even transactions entirely within the United States if there is
reason to believe illegal activity is involved. Thus we find the
privacy and illegality arguments wildly overblown."
http://www.amhersttimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2031&Itemid=27

Here is Chuck Schumer on the same subject:
"Senator Charles Schumer of New York issued a statement essentially
supporting the program, saying, ?Allowing law enforcement to examine
bank records in order to stop the flow of money to terrorists makes a
lot of sense, and this program appears to allow for just that.?"
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/jun2006/time-j28.shtml

And Richard Clarke, again:
"Monitoring international bank transfers, especially with the
knowledge of the bank consortium that owns the network, is legal and
unobjectionable."
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/4016726.html


I haven't looked at the links, since I was only commenting to
Thumper on people running me around in general, not to your
particular hassle with him at the moment which I haven't been
following closely. Sorry, I guess I shouldn't have jumped in with
a general comment that looked like it had particular reference
to whatever had been going on in the thread.

The Amherst Times link (and the others) seem on their face
to say that the Bush administration was being ridiculous (or
merely political because of upcoming elections) when it
attacked the NY Times recently. That doesn't seem to be the
side you would have wanted to be on - I would have thought
you'd be supporting the administration attacking the NY
Times.

I do not support the administration's position -- which seems to be to
let this slide. I believe, at the very least, that the leaker
(probably a Dem congressman or staffer) should grow old in prison.


Of course the government watches big money transactions,
whether it says so or not, but for the sake of argument, let's
suppose the government might not. Then:

You can't have it both ways. Either it's a secret or
it's not a secret. Al Qaeda is not short on lawyers. If there's
authorization that a newspaper knows to print, it's silly to
think Al Qaeda wouldn't know that, and a contrivance to
jump on the Times for printing it. If there's no authorization,
then there would be something new here, and the supposed
authorization you produced would have to be missing
something.



As
for the quotes, I was concerned with the legality issue, so as long as
my particular need was satisfied (quotes from left wingers), the more
left wing the site, the better. I was delighted to be able to use the
World Socialist Web Site. The people I'm arguing with would have to
take that as pure gospel. What did you expect? Rush-Limbaugh.com?

"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of what he was never reasoned into."
Jonathan Swift

 
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom: it is the
argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves" -- Wm. Pitt the Younger
.

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