A Note On Wire-Tapping
I must begin this rant by stating the obvious - both North America and Europe are in constant threat mode due to terrorist plans and activities operating both inside and outside their regions. It would take only an a fool to undermine democratic efforts at thwarting such measures. But SURPRISE SURPIRSE the leak on Bush's authorized wire-tapping program has occured, and because of it, serious implications are now realities.
First and foremost, it's been recognized that the U.S. has prevented at least 12 major al-Qaeda terrorist attacks in its great country since September 11, and the majority of these cases were solved by successful eavesdropping on telephone calls and email messages from terrorist cells both nationally and abroad. As well, thousands of leads into smaller plots have been uncovered, and are currently being monitored and followed by FBI and CIA authorities as we speak. The magnitude of the next terrorist attack hitting America or Europe cannot possibly be
understood by the common individual. In 2002, a man by the name of Jose Padilla, an Illinois gang-member turned Muslim, was speaking on a regular basis with top al-Qaeda commanders in organizing plans to detonate a radioactive dirty bomb in a major U.S. city. Had it not been for the surveillance and quick action of the CIA, it is presumed that casualties in the hundreds of thousands would have been the result.Now ask yourself this question: why is it such a bad thing that Bush secretly supported such a program? The media seems to be the first to bash the American President, when they themselves were the focus of one of the twelve potential attacks. It boggles my mind to read about how peaved the "majority" of Americans are about this incognitive plan when it has been put in place for their general safety. Would these people have been equally upset had such a program been in place before 9/11, possibly preventing it? I don't think that our society in general understands the extent of this war; it is not just against a country or a region, but also about political and moral ideologies. I would personally prefer to lose just a few of my civil liberties if it meant keeping me safe.
This measure was a secret program and exposing it to the world did nothing but help our enemies. Those responsible for releasing such private information should be jailed for essentially co-conspiring with terrorists. I think there is a serious lack of importance placed on how serious the situation truly is. President Bush was 110% correct in his decision to institute such a program, and I would urge him to continue such measures, in addition to creating more.
As a citizen who enjoys my personal and social freedoms, I believe that the government has every right to continue spying/eavesdropping on conversations and messages being communicated both within this country as well as internationally. Hats off to Bush who had the decency and common sense to take another positive step in the war against terror, whether his naysayers liked it or not.
- Josh Bower
posted by Josh at 11:03 a.m.
11 Comments:
I think that Bush needs to take whatever measures possible. He can't be POLITE about his war on Terrorism. The terrorists are sure using everything at their disposal. Why not the President?
pst Big Brother
As most of society would believe that this is an invasion of privacy, but how do you tell people that this is for their safety and well being? Are they suppose to tell all of the american citizens "My fellow americans, I your president will be tapping your phone lines because hey I have nothing else better to do." No this is for protection. When will people understand this. I do! Do you?
Any private citizen who doesn't want the government to listen in on conversations that could involve the death of thousands of people, has something to hide. Bush doesn't want to know where you keep your mad money, he's targeting known dissidents. Why do the bleeding-heart liberals always speak out against an entire issue, instead of the specific concern. I don't think citizens should even know about what the secret service, et al, is doing to keep the peace. It's not our business, and it tips off the terrorists. Stuff like this should be on a need-to-know basis, and only for those who have clearance in these matters.
mb
I agree. This sort of information should be classified, and because this information leaked out, terrorists are now aware of what the government is doing.
"Any private citizen who doesn't want the government to listen in on conversations that could involve the death of thousands of people, has something to hide."
Wow. As a private citizen with nothing to hide, should I be okay with police searching my home without a warrent? Should I be okay with illegal search and seizure? Should I be okay with the FBI following me? As long as I know I have nothing to hide? Laws are there to protect the innocent just as much as to punish the guilty.
I completely understand the case for and desire for and even the need for wire taps. I really do. What I don't understand is why they couldn't be instituted through legal means? Including the law which allows for immediate tapping with retroactive permission. No one's has explained to me why that wasn't sufficient.
Anonymous,
I think to compare wiretapping with search and seizure/shadowing/etc is unrealistic. Unlike what you mentioned, wiretapping doesn't affect your life unless they catch you doing something illegal. There's no ransacked house to clean up afterwords, and there's no fear of being followed. It is as simple as the government listening into a phone conversation or email, and either pursuing more due to a lead, or ending the connection.
I think that most government activities should be kept hush-hush, because there's classified information we shouldn't hear about. To pass wiretapping through the legal system would just mean alerting terrorists who follow American legislation and terror bills/patriotic acts to see what they're up against. The same way we as citizens shouldn't be told about offensives in Iraq before they happen - because it would jeopardize the safety of troops carrying it out - we shouldn't have access to privy information that in turn hurts the American War on Terror.
Like stated before, the government doesn't care what you did last weekend, and they don't care what you spoke to your grandmother about today. What they do care about is knowning who Farouq is conspiring with when he calls or emails someone in Iraq.
Bottom Line - if you don't like the fact that we lose some of our liberties to protect us from future attacks, then don't complain when terror hits our shores in the future.
-Josh
Question for "Anonymous 7:17pm". If this article was never even published, how would you know that the government is tapping your phone line?. Oh man, they could be doing it right now, and you want to know something...They are doing it for your protection against terrorists!
Hi,
I'm "Anonymous 7:17pm" and my name's Darius, I don't know whay I didn't say that
originally.
To "Anonymous 9:52pm", I'm not comforted by the fact that the government could be doing things to me that I don't know about. I don't know how to support the argument that it's okay to violate someone's rights as long as they don't know you're doing it.
Josh - I think the comparisons I made are realistic because I don't believe innocent people should be treated like suspects whether it "interferes" with their daily life or not. I do see where you're coming from on a number of points. Though I'm not interested in letting the government listen to my calls, even granted that they don't care what I'm talking about. But we disagree on that - fine.
I also completely agree that there is classified information that shouldn't be published... which in this case, is exactly why we have the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. From my understanding, FISA was passed in 1978 to create a secret court, made up of judges who develop national security expertise, to allow surveillance without a warrent or probable cause of criminality. An excellent look at FISA is here: http://www.eff.org/Censorship/Terrorism_militias/fisa_faq.html
Through FISA, the Bush Administration has obtained thousands of warrants since 9/11. In 2004, there were 1,758 applications for secret surveillance and none were denied. They have used the FISA Court thousands of times, but at the same time they assert that FISA is an “old law” or “out of date” and they can’t comply with it. The Administration has said that it ignored FISA because it takes too long to get a warrant under that law. But in an emergency, where the Attorney General believes that surveillance must begin before a court order can be obtained, FISA permits the wiretap to be executed immediately as long as the government goes to the court within 72 hours.
Our knowledge of FISA doesn't give anything away to terrorists - although how many people knew about FISA before this? - because terrorists are smart enough to know that wires get tapped.
So, my problem isn't wiretapping. It's illegal wiretapping. Especially when there are equivalent legal methods in place. Which, it seems to me, have been circumvented without many in our government's knowledge. It smells to me like completely unchecked power, and forgive me if I don't trust any of our presidents with that. There are legal ways to do what the President wants to do - the point I was making before is that no one has explained to me why he had to break the law. I'm not a big fan of any President breaking the law. It feels like one more step down an already slippery slope.
Now, believe me, I don't blindly stand by the founders, but I think there's a lot to be said for Franklin's quote: "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security." And I think the right to privacy as granted by the Fourth Amendment is fairly essential.
I sincerely resent the idea that if I disagree about this, I can't "complain" if we get hit. I'd like to think I wouldn't "complain" at all, rather I'd look at the situation and where we might improve our security. But... if we get hit because the government didn't wiretap someone they suspected, then shame on the government because they have FISA. If we get hit because the government didn't wiretap me... then, yeah, I'll take the heat for that.
Sorry this ended up being so long.
Darius
Hey Darius,
I hear your point about FISA and respect it, however your response has somewhat contradicted your initial position. If all that matters to you in terms of wiretapping or not is a piece of paper, then I'm going to have to call you out on that. If the gov't can pretty much automatically get one, then im also going to have to call you out on that as well. What you've basically stated is that so long as the government follows automatic protocol (in which a legal OK will be granted almost regardless), then your ethics have changed. What you've also said is that 'the means should define the ends'. In such a War on Terror, I have to push the fact that, no, 'the ends absolutely defines the means'. Whichever method it takes to get reach our desired outcome, this is more important than babbling over some automatic court document. In the future I believe the US gov't will take these internal legal matters more seriously (which they should), however I think the continued criticism and accusations are needless, continuing to hurt the democratic image in this war.
-Josh
Hi,
I see why that would seem contradictory - and perhaps was. It's not just the piece of paper - it's also the ability to follow our own laws. And that "piece of paper" is what assures the check on the executive branch. And a very loose check at that which is what makes it ever stranger and more disconcerting to me that it's not done. With FISA, there is at least some sense that the people wiretapped have reason to be and there's some sense that wiretapping Americans won't go needlessly rampant - there is at the very least a post-dated check on it. It's not even that I necessarily think anyone's been needlessly wiretapped, but I find it extremely troubling that the Administration set up a system where that could easily happen without anyone's knowledge - including the other branches of government.
I respect the thinking that leads to the ends justifying any means, I just don't agree with it. Saying "Just do whatever you need to do" gives the government exactly the kind of power that we're set up not to let them have. It's also, I think, even more dangerous when we're granting illegal war-time allowances for a war that may not have a defineable end. I hope they take these legal mater more seriously in the future, though I also think this is the democratic image. When we torture people in the name of stopping the torturers, when we censor our citizens in order to bring freedom of speech to Iraq, when our questionably elected officials are the ones establishing free elections, I think we hurt the democratic image. The ability to say that we think the government is doing something wrong should be exactly the kind of thing that other country's want democracy for.
That went a little ways off topic, eh? And potentially opened up many cans of worms that aren't the point... But typing that made me think that my concern over the wiretapping is tied strongly to my concern over many other issues with the administration. I've tried not to be blindly anti-administration and I do stand by my points - which have refined through this discussion and hopefully aren't so contradictory - but I think perhaps I would not be so vocal about it had it not been one in a long line or had I had some trust in the administration before this story broke... I wonder if that's a good thing?...
Darius
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