What appellate panel are you talking about....the actual 4th Circuit panel in Truong or another court that was discussing Truong in its opinion? It's not entirely clear from what you've posted. If you're talking about Truong, itself, it's clear from the decision that it had nothing to do with the FISA. In fact, a footnote in the decision even mentions the newly enacted FISA as an aside and comments on the proper interaction between the executive and legislative (as opposed to judicial) branches in developing a legislative scheme for surveillance of foreign agents. If you're talking about In re Sealed Case (310 F.3d 717)....you do realize that the FIS Court of Review in that case specifically stated that Truong dealt with the 4th Amendment and was NOT an FISA-related case. Moreover, warrantless searches were not even at issue in that case. Rather, the focus in that decision was whether or not under the FISA the government had to demonstrate that its primary purpose in conducting surveillance of a foreign agent was NOT for the purpose of a criminal prosecution. Again, you need to be more specific as to which court was supposedly rejecting "my position on Truong."
If he'd included some unwarranted megalomaniac assertions of intellectual superiority, I'd have had to conclude that Keller got a sockpuppet. It would be interesting to do a controlled experiment where, say, Bill Clinton did exactly what Bush is doing to see how many microseconds it would take the Kool Aid Brigade to start howling "Impeach the dictator!".
Here's In re: Sealed Case (No. 02-001): http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/terrorism/fisa111802opn.pdf It's complicated, but the crux of the Court of Review opinion is thatFISA says you should have a federal warrant before tapping the line of a US citizens if involved in international terrorism but that neither the Constitution nor FISA itsellf require the warrant. The adminstration's position, in other words, was upheld. Also before there was any FISA, the Supreme court in the Keith case deliberately held open the possibility of a 4th ammendment exception in cases of foreign intelligence collection through surveillance. As far as Truong, the court affirmed the legality of unwarranted surveillance in foreign intelligence gathering. It's quite clear. And more importantly it's what we should do to combat real threats. Let me ask you, exactly what argument are you making here about the legality of the surveillance in question? That it's illegal? That the office of the President cannot authorize wiretaps in cases of international terrorists without a warrant? I'm not sure where you're going with this.
Clinton, Carter. Sh!t - when their backs are REALLY up against it (like every week since Katrina) they even invoke F.D.fvckingR.! I actually heard some azzhat on Fox tonight say "well, FDR would've spied on Japanese communications if he could've." Like your mother told you as a kid - you get caught spying illegally on your fellow countrymen, don't blame your little brother.
No experiment needed. Clinton did exactly this in 1994. To quote deputy attorney general Jamie Gorelnick before Senate Intelligence (which is an oxymoron): The Department of Justice believes, and the case law supports, that the President has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes and that the President may, as has been done, delegate this authority to the Attorney General." "It is important to understand that the rules and methodology for criminal searches are inconsistent with the collection of foreign intelligence and would unduly frustrate the president in carrying out his foreign intelligence responsibilities." This came after they discovered Aldridge Ames was a spy by using an unwarranted search. Ames did untold damage to our national security and was said the be responsible for the deaths of many US intel agents and sources. Nobody cared because they saw the merit of the argument. Sorry but you're dead wrong. This is purely a Bush-hatred driven bit of nonsense.
I'd like Bush more if he just said..."im spying, i dont care and what you gonna do about it?" instead he just says "im making america safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer safer.....uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" id also like him more if i wasnt threatened castration for saying 'happy holidays' to people
Oh and I don't know who Keller is but he doesn't have to be a megalomaniac to assert intellectual superiority on this thread, sub-moron is plenty.
How stupid of Ames' lawyers not to bring this up. I wonder why they didn't. One would almost be led to conclude that spies fall under a different classification than ordinary citizens, and that FISA says something to that effect. http://thinkprogress.org/2005/12/21/york-clinging/ In 1994, the FISA did not cover physical searches. She was explaining what the President’s authority was in the absence of any congressional statute. She wasn’t arguing that the President had the authority to ignore FISA. In 1995, with President Clinton’s signature, FISA was amended to include physical searches. That law prohibited warrantless domestic physical searches. No one in the Clinton administration, including Gorelick, ever argued that the administration could ignore the law, before or after it was amended. /the more you know
Bill Clinton signed an Executive Order authorizing the warrantless electronic surveillance of American citizens? For reals?
"Any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order...Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so..." President ********ing Bush, 20 April, 2004.
You don't need to link In Re Sealed Case for me as I get Westlaw for free....and fwiw, I don't find the case to be very complicated. Perhaps you're not intentionally trying to be patronizing with that statement but it comes off that way. Based on your previous comments in this thread, I'm assuming you have a legal background and have posed my comments accordingly. Please provide me that same courtesy. Also your reading of Keith is a bit broad, don't you think? Keith and its progeny discussed an exception to the warrant requirement of the 4th Amendment....not an exception to the 4th Amendment in its entirety. That's a significant distinction....and one that Truong specifically addresses when it calls for the application of a "reasonableness" review to be applied to even warrantless surveillance. As for where I'm going with all of this....... I think (In re Sealed Case) notwithstanding, this is a rather complicated issue and not as easily glossed over as the administration is trying to suggest. If that were not true, why are so many conservative legal scholars treading so lightly right now....some even questioning outright the legality of the surveillance. For instance, Judge Posner wrote an op-ed piece just the other day in which he discusses the problems with the FISA and how gaps in the act have lead to this current problem with the administration taking extraordinary measures. He argues that the act should be amended to deal with the current situation involving surveillance much more widespread than just concerning "foreign operatives." Now, of course that begs the question....why would someone like Richard Posner be writing such opinions if he thought the executive's inherent power under Article II made this whole surveillance plan perfectly legal? Bruce Fein, a former deputy attorney general in the Reagan administration has made similar comments. Such concern exhibited by even the conservative legal community belies the notion that this whole matter is cut and dried. As for my own views.....they're still developing the more I read on the issue, but I can say that, IMHO, some dicta toward the end of an opinion issued by a special court, does not provide the final say on whether the executive can wield such widespread surveillance power unchecked.....especially when pitted against specific Congressional legislation on the issue. Cases like Youngstown and others would seem to support that position. Additionally, given the 4th Amendment reasonableness requirements for such surveillance, coupled with the widespread mixed bag of foreign and domestic surveillance that this plan seems to have entailed, I think there are important constitutional questions that have yet to be answered.
Well, Loney and Yossarian got my back on this already. OK, you're actually adding some substance along with your distortions so you can't be Karl. I'm voting you're someone Karl brought in for backup since he can't ever beat us in an argumuent. Hmmm... Then again, maybe this is Karl and he just Googled some talking points. At any rate, the usual Reep dodge of "But... but... but... Clinton did it too!" as if Bush can aspire to no better than being a particularly inept version of Slick Willie doesn't stick here. And it's nice to see so many conservatives finally dropping their "small government" masks in order to fall all over themselves supporting the idea that the POTUS should have unlimited, dictatorial power to invade their privacy. At least the crypto-totalitarians are now being lured from their hidey-holes into the light of day.
Come on, draw a conclusion for us, Constitutional or not? Do it! do it! (evil whisper) PS. How u get Westlaw for free??