Following his scripted dog and pony show with a gaggle of stage prop children, the imperial president on Wednesday signed a number of “executive actions” he claims will reduce “gun violence” (the actions do not cover violence committed with hammers and clubs which outpace violence committed with rifles).
The list includes an effort to turn doctors into stool pigeons for the state and encourages them to ask patients if they have guns at home and then ascertain if they are a threat to society. Mental health “professionals” will be obliged to rat out patients who might be suffering from paranoid delusions. So much for doctor-patient confidentiality.
Expect more on “gun safety” and mental illness as Obamacare come fully online. It will be used to take the firearms of citizens who will be designated mentally ill much the same way veterans who suffer from PTSD are now having their guns confiscated.
It is no mistake the feds are conflating “gun safety” and mental illness. In the not too distant future, the government will classify gun ownership as a “safety” issue that threatens family members and society as a whole. The establishment media is already attempting to portray the so-called “gun culture” as a form of collective mental illness requiring “common sense” (as mandated by the state). It is also actively and aggressively demonizing advocates of the Second Amendment as “nutjobs” who need hospitalization.
Here is the full laundry list of “actions” Obama plans to take without consulting Congress or the American people:
1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.
2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.
3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.
4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.
5. Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.
6. Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.
7. Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.
8. Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).
9. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.
10. Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.
11. Nominate an ATF director.
12. Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper
training for active shooter situations.
13. Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.
14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.
15. Direct the Attorney General to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies.
16. Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.
17. Release a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.
18. Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.
19. Develop model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.
20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.
21. Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.
22. Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.
23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.
This is a clear representation that the United States’ ELECTED officials care nothing for the Constitution and what it stands for. They are most likely embarrassed or ashamed of their stance on these relevant issues due to pay-offs, blackmail, insider stock trading, and their central banking ‘handlers’ that motivate them to stay silent on these most important issues. For them, it is easier to bury their heads in the sand, and pretend that this doesn’t require their input nor action. -Max Maverick, DCMX Editor
In what was supposed to be a symbolic gesture of the enduring greatness of the US Constitution, and the rights it outlines for all Americans, the House read the entire document out aloud on the chamber floor yesterday. However, the symbolism backfired somewhat when only a fraction of representatives bothered to show up.
In the midst of the Obama administration’s ongoing efforts to eviscerate the Second Amendment by executive order, it was extremely telling that so few members of the House took the time to show their respect for the Constitution.
The document was divided into 120 sections, with GOP House leaders believing that at least that many members would show up to each read a section.
When all was said and done, however, only 74 members attended. The Washington Times notes that the House ran out of Democrats before they even got past Article IV, which is less than halfway through the document.
Just 25 Democrats valued the idea enough to turn up for the reading, while a meager 49 Republicans attended. This meant that each reader had to take two or three sections.
The entire reading took around 66 minutes.
During the Preamble to the reading, Virginia Republican Bob Goodlatte, who organised the event, stated “We also hope that this will demonstrate to the American people that the House of Representatives is dedicated to the Constitution and the system it establishes for limited government and the protection of individual liberty.”
When two Democrats shuffled in as the final reader was speaking, Goodlatte attempted to put a brave face on the situation, stating “We ran out of Constitution before we ran out of readers,”.
The Times also notes that Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi seemed embarrassed that so few Democrats showed up, at one point she “gestured with a shrug to the nearly empty chamber”. Her Republican counterpart, Speaker of the House John Boehner was initially present but left before the end of the reading and did not take part.
The Second Amendment was read by Rep. Kevin Yoder, R-Kan., who also read the First and Third Amendments.
This was only the second time that the Constitution has been read in its entirety, without sections that were amended after the document was ratified in September 1787.
The first occasion was just two years ago, when 137 lawmakers attended.
It is to be expected that some members cannot always be present on the House floor, but with 435 representatives having sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution, it is pitiful, and a very telling sign of the times, that only around one sixth cared enough to participate in reading out the founding document.
And Congress’ Rich Get Richer
Net Worth of Lawmakers Up 25 Percent in Two Years, Analysis Demonstrates
Members of Congress had a collective net worth of more than $2 billion in 2010, a nearly 25 percent increase over the 2008 total, according to a Roll Call analysis of Members’ financial disclosure forms.
Nearly 90 percent of that increase is concentrated in the 50 richest Members of Congress.
Two years ago, Roll Call found that the minimum net worth of House Members was slightly more than $1 billion; Senators had a combined minimum worth of $651 million for a Congressional total of $1.65 billion. Roll Call calculates minimum net worth by adding the minimum values of all reported assets and subtracting the minimum values of all reported liabilities.
According to financial disclosure forms filed by Members of Congress this year, the minimum net worth in the House has jumped to $1.26 billion, and Senate net worth has climbed to at least $784 million, for a Congressional total of $2.04 billion.
These wealth totals vastly underestimate the actual net worth of Members of Congress because they are based on an accounting system that does not include homes and other non-income-generating property, which is likely to tally hundreds of millions of uncounted dollars. In addition, Roll Call’s tally is based on the minimum values of assets reported by Members on their annual financial disclosure forms; the true values of those assets may be much higher.
While wealth overall is scattered fairly evenly between the two parties, there is an interesting divide in the two chambers. Democrats hold about 80 percent of the wealth in the Senate; Republicans control about 78 percent of the wealth in the House.
And as protesters around the country decry the supposed consolidation of wealth in America, the trend can be seen starkly in Congress, a comparison suggested by American Enterprise Institute visiting scholar Mark Perry. The 50 richest Members of Congress accounted for 78 percent of the net worth in the institution in 2008 ($1.29 billion of the $1.65 billion total); by 2010 the share of the 50 richest had risen to 80 percent ($1.63 billion of the $2.04 billion total). The pie of Congressional wealth got bigger, and the richest Members are getting a bigger slice.
But there is still plenty to go around. Overall, 219 Members of Congress reported having assets worth more than $1 million last year; subtracting the minimum value of their liabilities brings the total number of millionaires in Congress down to 196 — again not counting any value on their homes or other non-income-producing property. If one were to assume that every Member of Congress has $200,000 worth of equity in real estate, the total number of millionaires would rise to 220 Members, just more than 40 percent of the Congress.
As with the general U.S. population, a few exceedingly wealthy people skew the averages for the rest of the membership. But still, by almost any measure, the average Member of Congress is far wealthier than the average U.S. household.
For example, dividing the total wealth of Congress by the number of Members creates a mean (average) net worth for each Member of about $3.8 million (excluding non-income-producing property such as personal residences). By comparison, for the rest of the country, based on statistics released by the Federal Reserve, average household net worth is around $500,000 this year (including personal residences), according to David Rosnick, an economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
But a handful of Members of Congress are worth tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars — the richest Member of Congress this year, Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), is worth a minimum of $294 million, meaning that McCaul’s own wealth has the effect of raising the average of every Member of Congress by about $500,000.
So a better number for comparison is the median, the number where half the group is above and half the group is below. For Congress, the median net worth in 2010 was about $513,000. For regular households, the Federal Reserve Board pegged that number at about $120,000 in 2008, and that number this year is probably around $100,000, Rosnick said.
While it is hard to make an exact comparison between Congress and the rest of the nation, what is clear is lawmakers “are all a lot richer than anything you would call a typical American,” Rosnick said.
And Congress appears to be getting richer faster than the rest of the nation. Citing Federal Reserve data, Rosnick said, “From the end of 2008 to end of 2010, aggregate household worth increased
12 percent.” That is about half the increase Congress achieved during the same time period.
The cautionary note in any Congressional wealth analysis is that significant changes in apparent wealth of Members do not necessarily represent an actual change in net worth.
For example, Rep. Darrell Issa reported this year that his 2010 assets were worth at least $295 million, nearly double what they were the year before. The reason for the change appears to be in part because the California Republican moved some properties from a single account into separate accounts. An account that Issa had listed as having a minimum value of $50 million in 2009 dropped to a minimum value of $25 million in 2010, but he added 11 accounts with a minimum combined value of $38.2 million. Even if none of the actual account (or property) values increased, the minimum value of those assets on paper rises by $13.2 million, or more than 25 percent.
Alan Ziobrowski, a professor of real estate at Georgia State University, has produced studies of Congressional investment patterns indicating that lawmakers in both chambers tend to fare better in their investment portfolios than the average American, in part because “[t]here is no doubt in my mind that they are trading in some way on information that is there.”
But he also points out that the Membership of Congress has turned over since 2008, making it difficult to compare wealth over time. “You’ve got different people,” he said.
In the aftermath of the 2010 elections that swept Republicans to power, about 20 percent of the Members included in the 2010 survey were not included in the 2008 survey.
DH: Wait, this sounds way, way over the top. Are you telling me… [Interrupts]
RB: [Over talk/Unintelligible] …know who was selected or elected twice now. You know who his associates are. And you are saying this is way over the top? Don’t forget what Ayers said – you talked to Larry Grathwohl. This guy is a revolutionary. He does not want to transform our country in the traditional sense. He will destroy it. And he’s not working alone. He’s not working for himself, either. He has his handlers. So don’t think this is going to be a walk in the park, with some type of attempt to rescue the country. Cloward-Piven. Alinsky. Marx. All rolled into one. And he won’t need the rest of his four years to do it.
DH: I need you to be clear. Let’s go back again, I mean, to those who speak out about what’s happening.
RB: [Edit note: Obviously irritated] How much clearer do you want it? The Second Amendment will be gone, along with the first, at least practically or operationally. The Constitution will be gone, suspended, at least in an operational sense. Maybe they won’t actually say that they are suspending it, but will do it. Like saying the sky is purple when it’s actually blue. How many people will look a the sky and say yeah, it’s purple? They see what they want to see.
So the DHS, working with other law enforcement organizations, especially the TSA as it stands right now, will oversee the confiscation of assault weapons, which includes all semi-automatic weapons following a period of so-called amnesty. It also includes shotguns that hold multiple rounds, or have pistol grips. They will go after the high capacity magazines, anything over, say 5 rounds.
They will also go after the ammunition, especially at the manufacturer’s level. They will require a special license for certain weapons, and make it impossible to own anything. More draconian than England. This is a global thing too. Want to hunt? What gives you the right to hunt their animals? Sound strange? I hope so, but they believe they own the animals. Do you understand now, how sick and twisted this is? Their mentality?
The obvious intent is to disarm American citizens. They will say that we’ll still be able to defend ourselves and go hunting, but even that will be severely regulated. This is the part that they are still working out, though. While the plans were made years ago, there is some argument over the exact details. I know that Napalitano, even with her support of the agenda, would like to see this take place outside of an E.O. [Executive Order] in favor of legislative action and even with UN involvement.
DH: But UN involvement would still require legislative approval.
RB: Yes, but your still thinking normal – in normal terms. Stop thinking about a normal situation. The country is divided, which is exactly where Obama wants us to be. We are as ideologically divided as we were during the Civil War and that rift is growing every day. Add in a crisis – and economic crisis – where ATM and EBT cards will stop working. Where bank accounts will contain nothing but air. They are anticipating a revolution and a civil war rolled into one (emphasis added by this author).
Imagine when talk show hosts or Bloggers or some other malcontent gets on the air or starts writing about the injustice of it all, and about how Obama is the anti-Christ or something. They will outlaw such talk or writing as inciting the situation – they will make it illegal by saying that it is causing people to die. The Republicans will go along with everything as it’s – we have – a one party system. Two parties is an illusion. It’s all so surreal to talk about but you see where this is headed, right?
DH: Well, what about the lists?
RB: Back to that again, okay. Why do you think the NSA has surveillance of all communications? To identify and stop terrorism? Okay, to be fair, that is part of it, but not the main reason. The federal agencies have identified people who present a danger to them and their agendas. I don’t know if they are color coded like you mentioned, red blue purple or peach mango or whatever, but they exist. In fact, each agency has their own. You know, why is it so [deleted] hard for people to get their heads around the existence of lists with names of people who pose a threat to their plans? The media made a big deal about Nixon’s enemies list and everyone nodded and said yeah, that [deleted], but today? They’ve been around for years and years.
DH: I think it’s because of the nature of the lists today. What do they plan to do with their enemies?
RB: Go back to what Ayers said when, in the late 60’s? 70’s? I forget. Anyway, he was serious. But to some extent, the same thing that happened before. They – the people on some of these lists – are under surveillance, or at least some, and when necessary, some are approached and made an offer. Others, well, they can be made to undergo certain training. Let’s call it sensitivity training, except on a much different level. Others, most that are the most visible and mainstream are safe for the most part. And do you want to know why? It’s because they are in the pockets of the very people we are talking about, but they might or might not know it. Corporate sponsorship – follow the money. You know the drill. You saw it happen before, with the birth certificate.
It’s people that are just under the national radar but are effective. They have to worry. Those who have been publicly marginalized already but continue to talk or write or post, they are in trouble. It’s people who won’t sell out, who think that they can make a difference. Those are the people who have to worry.
Think about recent deaths that everybody believes were natural or suicides. Were they? People are too busy working their [butts] off to put food on the table to give a damn about some guy somewhere who vapor locks because of too many doughnuts and coffee and late nights. And it seems plausible enough to happen. This time, when everything collapses, do you think they will care if it is a bullet or a heart attack that takes out the opposition? [Deleted] no.
DH: That’s disturbing. Do you… [interrupts]
RB: Think about the Oklahoma City bombing in ’95. Remember how Clinton blamed that on talk radio, or at least in part. Take what happened then and put it in context of today. Then multiply the damnation by 100, and you will begin to understand where this is going. People like Rush and Hannity have a narrow focus of political theater. They’ll still be up and running during all of this to allow for the appearance of normal. Stay within the script, comrade.
But as far as the others, they have certain plans. And these plans are becoming more transparent. They are getting bolder. They are pushing lies, and the bigger the lie, the easier it is to sell to the people. They will even try to sell a sense of normalcy as things go absolutely crazy and break down. It will be surreal. And some will believe it, think that it’s only happening in certain places, and we can draw everything back once the dust settles. But when it does, this place will not be the same.
DH: Will there be resistance within the ranks of law enforcement? You know, will some say they won’t go along with the plan, like the Oath Keepers?
RB: Absolutely. But they will not only be outnumbered, but outgunned – literally. The whole objective is to bring in outside forces to deal with the civil unrest that will happen in America. And where does their allegiance lie? Certainly not to Sheriff Bob. Or you or me.
During all of this, and you’ve got to remember that the dollar collapse is a big part of this, our country is going to have to be redone. I’ve seen – personally – a map of North America without borders. Done this year. The number 2015 was written across the top, and I believe that was meant as a year. Along with this map – in the same area where this was – was another map showing the United States cut up into sectors. I’m not talking about what people have seen on the internet, but something entirely different. Zones. And a big star on the city of Denver.
Sound like conspiracy stuff on the Internet? Yup. But maybe they were right. It sure looks that way. It will read that way if you decide to write about this. Good luck with that. Anyway, the country seemed to be split into sectors, but not the kind shown on the internet. Different.
DH: What is the context of that?
RB: Across the bottom of this was written economic sectors. It looked like a work in progress, so I can’t tell you any more than that. From the context I think it has to do with the collapse of the dollar.
DH: Why would DHS have this? I mean, it seems almost contrived, doesn’t it?
RB: Not really, when you consider the bigger picture. But wait before we go off into that part. I need to tell you about Obamacare, you know, the new health care coming up. It plays a big part – a huge [deleted] part in the immediate reshaping of things.
DH: How so?
RB: It creates a mechanism of centralized control over people. That’s the intent of this monster of a bill, not affordable health care. And it will be used to identify gun owners. Think your health records are private? Have you been to the doctor lately? Asked about owning a gun? Why do you think they ask, do you think they care about your safety? Say yes to owning a gun and your information is shared with another agency, and ultimately, you will be identified as a security risk. The records will be matched with other agencies.
You think that they are simply relying on gun registration forms? This is part of data collection that people don’t get. Oh, and don’t even think about getting a script for some mood enhancement drug and being able to own a gun.
Ayers and Dohrn are having the times of their lives seeing things they’ve worked for all of their adult lives actually coming to pass. Oh, before I forget, look at the recent White House visitor logs.
DH: Why? Where did that come from?
RB: Unless they are redacted, you will see the influence of Ayers. Right now. The Weather Underground has been reborn. So has their agenda.
DH: Eugenics? Population control?
RB: Yup. And re-education camps. But trust me, you write about this, you’ll be called a kook. It’s up to you, it’s your reputation, not mine. And speaking about that, you do know that this crew is using the internet to ruin people, right? They are paying people to infiltrate discussion sites and forums to call people like you idiots. Show me the proof they say. Why doesn’t you source come forward? If he knows so much, why not go to Fox or the media? To them, if it’s not broadcast on CNN, it’s not real. Well, they’ve got it backwards. Very little on the news is real. The stock market, the economy, the last presidential polls, very little is real.
But this crew is really internet savvy. They’ve got a lot of people they pay to divert issues on forums, to mock people, to marginalize them. They know what they’re doing. People think they’ll take sites down – hack them. Why do that when they are more effective to infiltrate the discussion? Think about the birth certificate, I mean the eligibility problem of Obama. Perfect example.
DH: How soon do you see things taking place?
RB: They already are in motion. If you’re looking for a date I can’t tell you. Remember, the objectives are the same, but plans, well, they adapt. They exploit. Watch how this fiscal cliff thing plays out. This is the run-up to the next beg economic event. I can’t give you a date. I can tell you to watch things this spring. Start with the inauguration and go from there. Watch the metals, when they dip. It will be a good indication that things are about to happen. I got that little tidbit from my friend at [REDACTED].
NOTE: At this point, my contact asked me to reserve further disclosures until after the inauguration.
“Cloud Democracy”: Could Russia’s opposition movement radically change how democracy works?
The Nordic country announced Tuesday that two-thirds of voters are backing a draft constitution based on comments from social media.
Iceland is creating a new, crowdsourced constitution in the wake of the country’s banking crisis and citizen protests, and government officials garnered feedback from users on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr to shape it.
The document, which went up for a non-binding vote on Saturday, was created by a panel of 25 citizens who compiled 3,600 comments and 370 suggestions from social media over the past year. Six questions appeared on the referendum, and the first two asked whether Icelanders want to adopt the user-generated constitution.
Nearly half of Iceland’s 235,000 eligible voters took part in the referendum, with 66 percent of those voting in favor. GigaOM said it makes sense that the Internet-backed option would have the most support.
“Give the people a chance to feed into the drafting, taking advantage of the internet’s convenience and low barriers, and they’ll stand behind the result,” wrote GigaOM’s David Meyer in a detailed analysis of the results.
Although the parliament is ultimately responsible for ratifying a new constitution, supporters hope the two thirds-backed constitution will be hard to ignore.
“This is a very clear conclusion for parliament,” said Thorolfur Matthiasson, an economist at the University of Iceland, to Reuters. “The majority of voters want changes in all the topics asked about in the vote.”
One of the major topics up for discussion was giving the government greater control of natural resources, including fish and geothermal energy, which are currently controlled by a handful of the island’s wealthy “sea baron” families.
It’s estimated that 320,000 Icelanders—two-thirds of Iceland’s population—are on Facebook, which was used to broadcast the 25-member panel’s weekly meetings. The gatherings aired live on Facebook so interested citizens could offer suggestions and debate along with the panel.
Parliament now has to decide if they want to turn the crowdsourced constitution into a reality. Whether they settle on this document, or a different one, something must be finalized prior to next spring’s elections.
Former New York Times reporter Kurt Eichenwald’s new book, published last week, provides yet more details about how the the NSA’s unconstitutional warrantless wiretapping program came about, and confirms that even top Bush Administration lawyers felt there was a “strong argument” that the program violated the law. “Officials might be slammed for violating the Fourth Amendment as a result of having listened in on calls to people inside the country and collecting so much personal data,” Eichenwald wrote, and “in the future, others may question the legality” of their actions.
Yet even today, eleven years later, the government continues to claim that no court can judge the program’s legality. In the next month, the government will argue—in EFF’s case in federal district court and ACLU’s case in the Supreme Court—that courts must dismiss the legal challenges without ever coming to a ruling on the merits.
Eichenwald’s book, 500 Days: Secrets and Lies in the Terror Wars, describes how the NSA’s illegal program—what he calls “the most dramatic expansion of NSA’s power and authority in the agency’s 49 year history”— was devised just days after 9/11 to disregard requirements in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Instead of getting individualized warrants to monitor Americans communicating overseas, the Bush administration unilaterally gave the NSA the power to sweep up millions of emails and phone calls into a database for analysis without court approval:
Connections between a suspect e-mail address and others—accounts that both sent and received messages there, whether in the United States or not—would be examined. At that point, a more detailed level of analysis would be applied creating something of a ripple effect. The suspect e-mail address would lead to a second, the second to the accounts it contacted.
In other words, the NSA was given the green light to warrantlessly spy of Americans communications on American soil—a power that was illegal under FISA. And the government—instead of finding probable cause for surveillance like the Constitution requires—started using a burden of proof akin to the game Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon.
Eichenwald’s reporting, focused on the immediate aftermath of 9/11, unfortunately overlooks the NSA’s longstanding desire to live “on the network” reflected in its presentations to the incoming Bush Administration officials in December, 2000. The idea that the NSA only came up with this idea after 9/11 isn’t really accurate.1 But regardless, Eichenwald’s reporting makes clear that Bush administration officials were terrified that this program would become public.
Of course, after several years, much of the NSA’s program did become public when the New York Times exposed its existence in their 2005 Pulitzer Prize winning investigation. Virtually every major news organization in the US subsequently reported on the NSA and its mass spying programs, which led to congressional investigations and a multitude of lawsuits—two which will be argued in the coming month.
In EFF’s lawsuit, in addition to a mountain of public information including many governmental admissions, the court will see evidence from AT&T whistleblower Mark Klein showing blueprints and photographs of the NSA’s secret room in AT&T’s facility in San Francisco. Three more NSA whistleblowers, including William Binney a former high ranking official involved with the program during its infancy, also submitted affidavits laying out how the NSA illegally spied on Americans in the aftermath of 9/11.
Despite this all of this, the government recently filed a motion in the Northern District of California invoking the controversial “state secrets” privilege. Essentially, the government argues that—even if all of the allegations are true—the case should be dismissed entirely because admitting or denying any fact would potentially endanger national security, even in the face of the government’s own craftily wordsmithed “denials” before Congress and elsewhere.
In the ACLU’s case going before the Supreme Court this term, a group of journalists, lawyers, and human rights activists has sued over surveillance conducted after the passage of the FISA Amendments Act (FAA). The FAA was passed in 2008 and formalized some of the admitted portions of NSA’s program, allowing emails and phone calls to and from from overseas to continue to be acquired without a warrant. The government only needs one general court order to target large groups of people—even entire countries—communicating to Americans for an entire year.
The plaintiffs, given that their professions, regularly talk to people who are almost certainly spied on. They argue that surveillance of them without warrants renders the statute unconstitutional. But the government contends the case must be dismissed on “standing” grounds because the plaintiffs can’t prove with certainty they have been surveilled, because, in a perfectly circular argument, the government won’t “admit” they have been surveilled, as if public admissions by the government is the only way to prove illegal wiretapping.
As the ACLU writes, “The government theory of standing would render real injuries nonjusticiable and insulate the government’s surveillance activities from meaningful judicial review.” The same can be said of the ‘state secrets’ privilege in EFF’s case. The government is contending they can use government secrecy as a sword to terminate judicial accountability. It doesn’t matter how much evidence is in the public domain, just by telling the Court that the information implicates “national security,” they can wall off entire subject matters from judicial oversight, effectively hiding illegality, unconstitutionality along with embarrassing or overreaching acts by NSA spooks and others.
Eichenwald is just the latest in a long line of journalists to discuss and organize details about the NSA’s unconstitutional program. At this point the American people are well aware of the NSA’s actions – only the courts have been kept in the dark. And if the courts go along with blinding themselves, the government will have been given a license to violate the law and constitution long into the future.
Find Out If You Are Doing Things Which Might Be Considered Suspicious
There have been so many anti-terrorism laws passed since 9/11 that it is hard to keep up on what kinds of things might get one on a “list” of suspected bad guys.
We’ve prepared this quick checklist so you can see if you might be doing something which might get hassled.
The following actions may get an American citizen living on U.S. soil labeled as a “suspected terrorist” today:
The Obama administration is battling to restore a controversial provision of a new federal law that it admits could have been used to arrest and detain citizens indefinitely – even if their actions were protected by the First Amendment.
A federal judge this week made permanent an injunction against enforcement of Section 1021 of the most recent National Defense Authorization Act, which was declared unconstitutional.
The Obama administration then took only hours to file an appeal of the order from U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest, and attorneys also asked her to halt enforcement of her order.
In her order, Forrest wrote, “The government put forth the qualified position that plaintiffs’ particular activities, as described at the hearing, if described accurately, if they were independent, and without more, would not subject plaintiffs to military detention under Section 1021.”
But she continued, “The government did not – and does not – generally agree or anywhere argue that activities protected by the First Amendment could not subject an individual to indefinite military detention under Section 1021.”
The case was brought last January by a number of writers and reporters, led by New York Times reporter Christopher Hedges. The journalists contend the controversial section allows for detention of citizens and residents taken into custody in the U.S. on “suspicion of providing substantial support” to anyone engaged in hostilities against the U.S.
The lawsuit alleges the law is vague and could be read to authorize the arrest and detention of people whose speech or associations are protected by the First Amendment. They wonder whether interviewing a member of al-Qaida would be considered “substantial support.”
“Here, the stakes get no higher: indefinite military detention – potential detention during a war on terrorism that is not expected to end in the foreseeable future, if ever. The Constitution requires specificity – and that specificity is absent from Section 1021,” the judge wrote.
“It most definitely tells us something about their intent,” he told WND.
He cited Obama’s signing statement, when the bill was made law, that he would not use the provision allowing detention of American citizens without probable cause in military facilities.
“Just because someone says something doesn’t mean they’re not lying,” he said.
Bloomberg reports the Obama administration also is asking Forrest for a stay of the ruling that found the law violates the First, Fifth and 14th Amendments.
The judge expressed dissatisfaction with what one observer described as the arrogance of the Department of Justice in the case.
Forrest asked the government to define the legal term, noting the importance of how they apply to reporting and other duties.
“The court repeatedly asked the government whether those particular past activities could subject plaintiffs to indefinite military detention; the government refused to answer,” she wrote.
“The Constitution places affirmative limits on the power of the executive to act, and these limits apply in times of peace as well as times of war,” she wrote.
She said the law “impermissibly impinges on guaranteed First Amendment rights and lacks sufficient definitional structure and protection to meet the requirements of due process.”
“This court rejects the government’s suggestion that American citizens can be placed in military detention indefinitely, for acts they could not predict might subject them to detention, and have as their sole remedy a habeas petition adjudicated by a single decision-maker (a judge versus a jury), by a ‘preponderance of the evidence’ standard,” she wrote.
“That scenario dispenses with a number of guaranteed rights,” she said.
The Obama administration already has described those who hold a pro-life position or support third-party presidential candidates or the Second Amendment fit the profile of a domestic terrorist.
Obama stated when he put his signature to the legislative plan that his administration “will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens.”
Virginia already has passed a law that states it would not cooperate with such detentions, and several local jurisdictions have done the same. Arizona, Rhode Island, Maryland, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Washington also have considered similar legislation.
The case was brought on behalf of Christopher Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Jennifer Bolen, Noam Chomsky, Alex O’Brien, Kai Warg All, Brigitta Jonsottir and the group U.S. Day of Rage. Many of the plaintiffs are authors or reporters who stated that the threat of indefinite detention by the U.S. military already had altered their activities.
Constitutional expert Herb Titus filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the sponsor of the Virginia law, Delegate Bob Marshall and others.
Titus, an attorney with William J. Olson, P.C., told WND the judge’s first decision to grant a preliminary injunction halting enforcement of paragraph 1021 “affirms the constitutional position taken by Delegate Marshall is correct.”
The impact is that “the statute does not have sufficient constitutional guidelines to govern the discretion of the president in making a decision whether to hold someone in indefinite military detention,” Titus said.
The judge had noted that the law doesn’t have a requirement that there be any knowledge that an act is prohibited before a detention. The judge also said the law is vague, and she appeared to be disturbed that the administration lawyers refused to answer her questions.
Titus said the judge’s conclusions underscore “the arrogance of the current regime, in that they will not answer questions that they ought to answer to a judge because they don’t think they have to.”
The brief was filed on behalf of Marshall and other individuals and organizations, including the United States Justice Foundation, Downsize DC Foundation, Institute on the Constitution, Gun Owners of America, Western Center for Journalism, the Tenth Amendment Center and Pastor Chuck Baldwin.
Marshall’s HB1160 passed the Virginia House of Delegates by a vote of 87-7 and the Virginia Senate 36-1. Since the vote was on changes recommended by Gov. Bob McDonnell, it was scheduled to take effect without further vote.
Marshall then wrote leaders in state legislatures around the country suggesting similar votes in their states.
Marshall’s letter noted Virginia was the first state in the nation to refuse cooperation “with federal authorities who, acting under the authority of section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 (NDAA), could arrest and detain American citizens suspected of aiding terrorists without probable cause, without the right to know the charges against them, and without the procedural rights guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.”
He told lawmakers, “While we would hope that the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives would be vigilant to protect the constitutional rights of American citizens, even when addressing the problem of international terrorism, those efforts in Congress failed at the end of last year, and President Obama signed NDAA into law on December 31, 2011.”
Endorsing Marshall’s plan was the Japanese American Citizens League, which cited the detention of tens of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II on no authorization other than the president’s signature.
The Obama administration continues to argue the law allows for detention without legal due process only those who “substantially supported” terror groups such as al-Qaida or “associated forces.” But the plaintiffs note that the law does not define those terms.
Instead, they point to the law’s provision that such individuals may be detained “without trial until the end of the hostilities.”
Obama attorneys said the new law simply affirms what already was precedent under the Authorization for Use of Military Force, which was adopted in the dust of the 9/11 terror attacks.
But plaintiffs wrote, “Nowhere does the AUMF convey to the executive the power to detain any person – citizen or otherwise – who ‘substantially supported’ al-Qaida or the Taliban or their associate forces, as section 1021 of the NDAA now provides.”
“No case has ever recognized the government’s contention that the AUMF authorized the detention of noncombatants. … Neither case law nor the actual text of the AUMF supports the government’s contention that such detention power already existed.”
I’m submitting my story because I feel it’s one a lot of people need to hear. I have been getting some negative feedback on CopBlock’s Facebook page from the cops that visit it, so here we go. I was a member of the united states marine corps for 14 years, I joined in 1996 and […]
Report describes investigation of abusive UMass Lowell officer
This article was cross-posted at Massachusetts Cop Block In October of last year, UMass Lowell student Brendan Brown was threatened by a campus police officer for video-recording a group of police officers who were responding to a fight that had taken place outside an apartment. Brown was approached by UMass Lowell Police Officer Noberto Melendez […]
Buy a Ladies shirt, 50% of proceeds go to Ademo’s legal defense
If you’ve been following Copblock closely, you know that Ademo has (ridiculously) been charged with felony wiretapping, while merely seeking to place pressure upon police for their lack of accountability. For more details, please read more here. He will require substantial funds for a defense, particularly if he chooses to seek counsel (which I have […]
Actually yes, ignorance of the law is an excuse
There are countless laws. Literally. Maybe not in the mathematical sense – it is technically possible to count the laws in existence, but based on a colloquial and general use of the term “countless” it is not really feasible for someone to count every law. Just this year, 40,000 laws were passed and are set […]
Reconstructing Leviathan: Academics Outline Harm of Growing Security State
There is no (direct) total war but rather the never ending ‘wars’ on crime, terrorism, illegal immigrants and anti-social behaviour. There is no formal abolition of civil rights, just their hollowing out. In short, there is a need for a new politics of law and order. The old problematic of how to perfect and refine […]
This post is an update to “Just Say “NO!!” 4th & 14th Amendments.” These are links about Peter Cloutier violating my civil rights on January 18, 2012 in Augusta Maine. The first link is the raw mp3 of the violation. The second link is the raw mp3 of my meeting with the internal investigator, Sgt. […]
One of the most common statements I hear about CopBlocking (monitoring the police) is, “we don’t have enough people.” If that is the case where you live, considering moving to the Shire (aka New Hampshire). Liberty minded folks are moving here daily to live better lives, one where the government isn’t always sticking its nose in […]
On 07/02/11 I crossed from Nogales, Mexico into Nogales, AZ and when I did I, as usual, I refused to answer questions unrelated to a legally required customs and citizenship declaration. The result was my being manhandled into the back room, yelled at, threatened, arrested, handcuffed, and placed in a cell. I remained in the […]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDU5rvYNfGo (Sorry, the first part is pretty shaky) I was dropping off a rental car 1/19/11 in Denver. There are thousands of rental cars in a section of Denver airport. This thug in a blacked out unmarked pickup was targeting visitors and tourists dropping off rental cars. The roads around the area are quite confusing […]
Liberty activist Adam Kokesh was in New Hampshire covering the primaries when he was confronted and assaulted by a Gingrich security guard. After catching this on film and attempting to report the assault, the police said they “don’t care” and only after multiple requests did they even agree to “take down information,” while still refusing […]
Patrol Officer Peter Cloutier of Augusta, Maine Police Department knowingly, willfully, and intentionally violated my civil and common law rights as guaranteed by the 4th and 14th Amendments, as well as criminally trespassing on my private home through the use of intimidation, force, coercion and threat of kidnapping and bodily injury. After Officer Cloutier and […]
This story takes place when I was still a teenager. At the time I worked at the local Pizza Hut. I had just left work, literally having just turned out of the parking lot, when the lights and sirens of a police car appear behind me. I diligently pulled over and waited for the officer […]
By Ian Freeman, blogger at FreeKeene.com: Back in 2010, on a visit to the NH Attorney Genital’s office, we met “investigator” Dick Tracy. More recently, Copblock’s Ademo and I were in the area so we dropped in again with some more questions, this time meeting “investigator” James Brown. Neither man was interested in speaking on the record and […]
