Time for Bush to turn over his papers re. Spying on Americans

by Rep Louise Slaughter, Thu Dec 22, 2005 at 04:54:21 PM EST

Please only recommend this diary if you think others should see the information I'm posting.

Minutes ago, I submitted a resolution (H. Res. 644) of inquiry in the House requesting the President and directing the Attorney General to turn over to the House of Representatives documents relating to the authorization of this secret spying program on American citizens. One of the main talking points justifying this domestic spying is that my Democratic colleagues in Congress knew about this double super secret program and didn't object to it.

Well ... I think it is time for them to prove that claim. Like I said before at this point we are all sort of numb to an administration who really has no credibility left. They need to come clean and show us - LMS

By the way, thanks to all of you for all the feedback and comments on my last post when I urged you to ssign my petition to hold Hearings in the House demanding answers on Bush's spying on American citizens. Believe me we are going over all of your comments and feedback.  If you haven't signed my petition yet, please join thousands of other Americans who have signed it already, by going here.

Anyways, here is the text of the resolution (H.RES. 644) I submitted this afternoon:
RESOLUTION

Requesting the President and directing the Attorney General to transmit to the House of Representatives not later than 14 days after the date of the adoption of this resolution documents in the possession of those officials relating to the authorization of electronic surveillance of citizens of the United States without court approved warrants.

Resolved, That the President is requested and the Attorney General is directed to transmit to the House of Representatives not later than 14 days after the date of the adoption of this resolution all documents in the possession of the President and the Attorney General relating to the authorization of electronic surveillance of United States persons (as such terms are defined in section 101 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1801)) conducted without warrants approved by a court of the United States and any instructions for handling such documents, including--

(1) all records setting forth or discussing policies, procedures, or guidelines regarding the authorization by the President or other officials of the Federal Government of electronic surveillance of United States persons without court approved warrants;

(2) all records pertaining to the Constitutional prohibition on unreasonable searches as it relates to the authority to conduct electronic surveillance of United States persons with out a court approved warrant;

(3) all records pertaining to the authority to conduct electronic surveillance of United States persons without court approved warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978;

(4) all records relating to the authorization of electronic surveillance of United States persons by an official of the Federal Government other than the President without a court approved warrant;

(5) all records of communication between the President or other officials of the Federal Government and Congress, or a member or committee of Congress, pertaining to the authorization of electronic surveillance of United States persons without court approved warrants;

(6) all records indicating or discussing the number of United States persons for which electronic surveillance was authorized without a court approved warrant;

(7) all records indicating or discussing the number of citizens of the United States for which electronic surveillance was authorized without a court approved warrant;

8) all records indicating or discussing the budget or cost of carrying out electronic surveillance of United States persons without court approved warrants; and

(9) all records indicating or discussing the number of staff involved in the authorization or execution of electronic surveillance of United States persons without court approved warrants.
Thank you again for making me feel so welcome to this community.  Keep up the good fight. Happy Holidays to y'all


Tags: (all tags)

Display:
Permalink :: 1 Comment :: Post a Comment


Asking Nixon to turn over the Watergate Tapes (none / 0)

This action is tantamount to asking Nixon to turn over the Watergate tapes. Although President bush is exactly 1 point away from nixon's unpopularity polls, not even Bush will do this.

Can the resolution be amended to instruct either the executive or the NSA under the precept of breaking the FISA rules, to provide the information?

And bear in mind, this information should remain classified, I am not saying we should give it to the public.

I am saying that at least a council or judiciary somewhere have the right to review and decide if the breach of FISA rules were , as under Nixon, a criminal offense.

I agree that Bush stating the presidency is inherently allowed to spy on Americans and meddle with their affairs - is laughable.

I disagree that the specific resolution, as worded, can really do anything more than a political stunt. Bush will laugh off this thing, even if it passed - and simply ignore it.

My recommendations.

  1. Blanket the target of the res., amended s.t. the "feeds" are intercepted and can become part of the record. e.g. the credit reporting agencies are probably part of it, go in under FCRA and request information on whether or not they were required to feed the NSA. etc. (note: under CALEA/RAVEN they have technology that does this, so this may mean that you will need to ascribe to the special judiciary guest accounts that the NSA would otherwise have.. the exact details are a bit tricky but can be worked out)

  2.  Make sure the res. doesn't then turn the secret data out to the public, Al Qaeda would love to know how America wants to profile their sleeper cells.  (they do exist!)  

  3. Construct a bipartisan judiciary council review that carefully dissects the information, and provides a report as to the publication of any excerpts or to examine if they are part of criminal activity

  4. Extend the scope of the resolution to the special prosecutor investigation conducted on Karl Rove - it is evident that he and several others in the administration had played a part in constructing the policy that the Executive can oversee the operations of intelligence operatives without check or balance, destroying them as they see fit without respect for their work against the actual enemy. Rove will have played several key roles in the construction of the policy and will be the person most likely to have abused it ( as well as, of course, the person most likely to have carefully covered his tracks - as an aside - the GOP has noted that the current administration is known for its political campaigning, but inability to get real policy change - Rove has turned the presidency of the United States into one long political campaign and is a major hindrance to the proper operation of the office - he is guilty of high treason and will undoubtedly have misused his control and non FISA-oversight actions to manipulate the press, pressure reporters, and other "misdemeanor" activities). Note that the congress of the United States has been unable to establish whether the special prosecutor has been able to tie the 100 missing documents from Cheney's office , or any other such matter involving intel, to the obstruction of justice felony indictment against senior member Scooter Libby - simply because the special prosecution refuses to share any information with congress about it. This may in fact be one and the same issue..

  5. The integrity of the data once collected is important - the resolution should look into what safeguards and best practices were used to maintain the integrity of the data acquired without FISA oversight. This should be made public - the public should know that any data collected is not possible to be tampered with or doctored. For an administration that doctored Intelligence such as that whole "Smoking gun becomes a mushroom cloud" initiative to market (again, see karl rove, et. al) a new policy of "preemptive self defence" we should be careful to note that whatever data is gained may in fact have been tampered with under secret wrap.  IF they have no such practice, and it is found out, then we must assume that tampering did occur.

  6. Finally, the resolution  should be tied to the Patriot act. Properly speaking, it already is - but it should explore the actions and activities of the patriot act (which has been used to investigate strippers in Las Vegas, and Dope Dealers in the Pac Northwest) - and their ability to surveil without oversight.

Speaking to the last and most important point, the patriot act has some great innovations. Data sharing and interdepartmental data interoperability is a huge innovation that will save the government millions of dollars per year. The fact that the FBI had ongoing investigations against the sleeper that attacked us during 911 and there was a wall between them and the CIA, the fact that the Dept. of Immigration issued the visas to the 911 hijackers post-mortem, these are all things that the patriot act does a little bit to correct. But not unlike the "can spam" act, it doesn't do enough. And it is in and of itself an over the top response that falls in line with what Osama Bin Laden wanted to do, anyway - which is to disrupt the American way of life, and to make us attack ourselves. This is not unlike the ancient myth of Otis and Ephialtes.

So the provisions of the Patriot Act that relate to this type of policy may in fact outnumber the good it does. I would argue that this sort of thing need be coordinated with the now national response to the patriot act that clearly states we're not interested in trading our constitution for a response to anyone doing anything. Old Ironsides will take this broadside and bounce it right back.

President Bush himself , the year before he took office, played host to the Taliban and invited them as a special guest of the state of Texas.

This is the same set of policy makers that created safe havens for Osama Bin Laden and the real members of Al Qaeda, those whose focus is to behave secretly, and ascribe to themselves the view that they can do whatever they like.

Two peas in a pod. Destroy the root.

by turnerbroadcasting on Fri Dec 23, 2005 at 10:00:25 AM EST


You are not logged in.

In order to post a comment, you must be logged in. If you have a member account, please log in to comment.

If not, you can make an account right here. It's quick and free.

Login
Username:

Password: