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washparkhorn

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Posts posted by washparkhorn

  1. 9 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

    Mr. "Rule of Law" is advocating that we ignore the laws and let the people decide.

    We wouldn't want the people to decide if there needs to be FISA reform. FFS, lean in and work in all areas to improve this nation. Especially when your solution is guaranteed to fail. Make the argument, but broaden the lines of attack. If it helps shape the electorate, more power to you. But we don't them to be lulled into thinking a conviction will occur. It's won't. Best to have multiple fronts, no?

    And, btw, the Senate, the Judiciary, and the Electoral College are some of the bulwarks put in place to guard against the "Tyranny of the Majority." 

  2. Just now, Brothahorn said:

    So you just gone blatantly disrespect Casino Jizzle? Be lucky he dead or you would have problems.

    My son reminded me that Nipsey must be added to that list as well. 

  3. 5 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

    There's something else that this would apply to also.  Something really prescient.  I can't quite put my finger on it though.

    Focus, please. Not all issues are partisan or about the current occupant of the White House. 

     

  4. 9 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

    One should probably question the point of the NYT piece as well. 

    Point of order:  I am a NYT subscriber.  (Digital only, no crossword or food, in case anyone doubts my motives.)

    I think the point was we have long had concerns about the secrecy of the FISA process and how much it depended on honesty to the FISA court. Regardless of Page, the findings raise doubts whether others (e.g., Muslims) caught up in FISA have been treated fairly. That is a big issue that goes to the foundation of this nation. When the Patriot Act passed, there were warnings this would happen and denials that it ever could happen. Well it did. So time to start over. 

    • Like 1
  5. 2 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

    The only FISA "reform" any Republicans will ever approve of is to leave current rules in place and just replace everyone in federal law enforcement with personnel who will only investigate brown people.

    And 2020 can change that equation.

  6. 4 minutes ago, Captainant said:

    You're nearly two decades late to being worried about that my dude. It's funny though how all the trump supporters only started caring about this as an issue once it affected their god-emperor.

    You have no idea what you are talking about. 

  7. 4 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

    The House just reauthorized the Patriot Act. There will not be any serious consequences or reforms. 

    Say a prayer for the average Joe Schmos caught up in FISA. I hope the election of 2020 makes it more of a priority to revamp the process to ensure equal protection and due process. 

  8. 5 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

    You need to get it through your extraordinarily thick skull that people can take a higher perspective on the situation, considering current statutes, and come away with a different viewpoint.  But no, you'll never do that.

    Well the experts disagree with you - from the same article you read by NYT Savage:

     

    Quote

    His exposé left some former officials who generally defend government surveillance practices aghast.

    “These errors are bad,” said David Kris, an expert in FISA who oversaw the Justice Department’s National Security Division in the Obama administration. “If the broader audit of FISA applications reveals a systematic pattern of errors of this sort that plagued this one, then I would expect very serious consequences and reforms.”

     

     

  9. The IG report has primarily been interpreted through a Trump lens. But if we shelve politics for a moment and focus on surveillance policy & civil liberties issues, what it revealed about the FBI's national-security wiretapping powers is devastating. - The author Charlie Savage. 

    What are you missing JJ?

  10. The Church Committee - http://csweb.brookings.edu/content/research/essays/2014/big-snoop.html

    Watergate shocked the American public and spurred many of its representatives in Congress to demand an investigation into the past activities of both organizations as well as the NSA and others. The result was the creation of two congressional committees in 1975, chaired by Frank Church (D-ID) in the Senate and Otis Pike (D-N.Y.) in the House of Representatives.

    Their hearings exposed secret, arguably illegal wiretapping, bugging, and harassment of American citizens, including Supreme Court justices, reporters, and government officials, all in the name of collecting intelligence about threats to national security. The most notorious case, first exposed in the 1960s and fully documented by the Church Committee, was the wiretapping of Martin Luther King, Jr. by the NSA and by the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover, who believed him to be part of a Communist conspiracy.

    Too much power unchecked and the FISA Court hamstrung. 

    • Like 1
  11. Charlie Savage of the NYT on the FISA issue:

    While clearing the F.B.I. of acting out of political bias, the Justice Department’s independent inspector general,

    Michael E. Horowitz, and his team uncovered a staggeringly dysfunctional and error-ridden process in how the F.B.I. went about obtaining and renewing court permission under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, to wiretap Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser.

    “The litany of problems with the Carter Page surveillance applications demonstrates how the secrecy shrouding the government’s one-sided FISA approval process breeds abuse,” said Hina Shamsi, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project. “The concerns the inspector general identifies apply to intrusive investigations of others, including especially Muslims, and far better safeguards against abuse are necessary.”

    Congress enacted FISA in 1978 to regulate domestic surveillance for national-security investigations — monitoring suspected spies and terrorists, as opposed to ordinary criminals. Investigators must persuade a judge on a special court that a target is probably an agent of a foreign power. In 2018, there were 1,833 targets of such orders, including 232 Americans.

    Most of those targets never learn that their privacy has been invaded, but some are sent to prison on the basis of evidence derived from the surveillance. And unlike in ordinary criminal wiretap cases, defendants are not permitted to see what investigators told the court about them to obtain permission to eavesdrop on their calls and emails.

    Civil libertarians for years have called the surveillance court a rubber stamp because it only rarely rejects wiretap applications. Out of 1,080 requests by the government in 2018, for example, government records showed that the court fully denied only one.

    Defenders of the system have argued that the low rejection rate stems in part from how well the Justice Department self-polices and avoids presenting the court with requests that fall short of the legal standard. They have also stressed that officials obey a heightened duty to be candid and provide any mitigating evidence that might undercut their request.

    But the inspector general found major errors, material omissions and unsupported statements about Mr. Page in the materials that went to the court. F.B.I. agents cherry-picked the evidence, telling the Justice Department information that made Mr. Page look suspicious and omitting material that cut the other way, and the department passed that misleading portrait onto the court. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/we-just-got-a-rare-look-at-national-security-surveillance-it-was-ugly/ar-AAK1QRS

    It is time to convene a Church Commission to look at intelligence agency misdeeds again. 

    • Like 1
    • Fuck You 1
  12. 4 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

    There ya go Anastasis.  Can we drop this now?

    giphy.gif

    Well, . . . no. A properly functioning Congress should reconsider reform of FISA procedures. Earlier efforts were blocked by blockheads screaming "national security." Now that we have the national security apparatus clearly abusing the process, it is time to apply the brakes. The good news with that is you might actually have a President willing to sign a bill that reforms the process. Or not. 

    • Like 1
  13. To Anastasis' concern, the FBI will be audited on their FISA abuse.

    Thankfully, the ACLU is able to walk and chew gum at the same time:

    "When the Justice Department's Inspector General finds significant concerns regarding flawed surveillance applications concerning the president's campaign advisors, it is clear that this regime lacks basic safeguards and is in need of serious reform. While the report found that there wasn't an improper purpose or initiation of the investigation, it also found significant problems that are alarming from a civil liberties perspective. For instance, the litany of problems with the Carter Page surveillance applications demonstrates how the secrecy shrouding the government's one-sided FISA approval process breeds abuse. The concerns the Inspector General identifies apply to intrusive investigations of others, including especially Muslims, and far better safeguards against abuse are necessary.

    The system requires fundamental reforms, and Congress can start by providing defendants subjected to FISA surveillance the opportunity to review the government's secret submissions. The FBI must also adopt higher standards for investigations involving constitutionally protected sensitive activities, such as political campaigns."

    It's good to see that the ACLU's strong concerns about unwarranted surveillance are not affected by their opinions about who is affected. 

    https://reason.com/2019/12/10/the-fbi-will-be-audited-to-see-how-frequently-they-screw-up-other-fisa-warrants/

    • Like 1
  14. You have probably already digested Jonathan Hari's, "Chasing the Scream."  If not, here is the nutshell: 

     

    Quote

     

    What if everything you think you know about addiction is wrong? One of Johann Hari’s earliest memories is of trying to wake up one of his relatives and not be able to. As he grew older, he realized he had addiction in his family. Confused, unable to know what to do, he set out on a three-year, 30,000-mile journey to discover what really causes addiction – and what really solves it. He uncovered a range of remarkable human stories – of how the war on drugs began with Billie Holiday, the great jazz singer, being stalked and killed by a racist policeman; of the scientist who discovered the surprising key to addiction; and of the countries that ended their war on drugs – with extraordinary results.

    This is the story of a life-changing journey that showed the world the opposite of addiction is connection.  http://chasingthescream.com

     


    And to your list of people to talk to, you should seek out a chronic pain patient who needs pain medication and has difficulty getting the medication because of addicts who abuse the medication. They are caught in the middle of the hysterical war on opiates and the addicts who abuse the medications they need so dearly. They are the hidden victims in the clash between addicts and drug warriors. Many are choosing suicide rather than unending pain. 

    Congratulations on your sobriety. 

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