US Tactics On Terrorism: Have We Gone Too Far?

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Ummm... none of this makes any sense....

1. Yes Kerry DIDN'T say our troops were terrorists, Its a typical conservative spin on his ACTUAL comment. Try to twist all you want, the free thinking world knows better.

2. That is true. I don't get where you pull terrorism is a myth out of that, your lack of intelligence insults me, your supposed to be college educated.

3. I don't know anything about pol-pot, and don't give a ****, as it has nothing to do with the current situation. From what I have read in other posts, you are refering to this Chomsky guy or whatever, sorry, I never watched/read/listened/etc to him.

So.... You just proved that the typical Liberal response is to be honest about what someone said, instead of spinning it into something else for your own political gain. Hrm. This tells me alot about conservatives. For one, they are extremely dishonest.

Like Grocho Marx said: "Who are you going to believe me or your own two eyes?" Or in this case your own two ears?

 

[Caine]

Like Grocho Marx said: "Who are you going to believe me or your own two eyes?" Or in this case your own two ears?

Believe what you want, the rest of the free thinking world knows better.

 

[cnredd]

Yes, it IS a cause for alarm. I'm sorry, the President is supposed to enforce the law, AND FOLLOW IT!
Just because he is the president, that doesn't give him permission to be above the law. Just look at Clinton. He didn't follow the law and got busted, and he only got his dick sucked and lied about it.

A) He didn't get busted in the legal sense, as you cross your fingers and wish GWB to be...

B) Clinton wasn't just lying...he was lying to a Grand freakin' Jury...

AND it wasn't even anything to do with national interests...it was having to do with him gettin' his personal ass out of a sling...

Get back to me when GWB lies before a Grand Jury...Until then, any accusations, and according to your honorable and just James Bamford, an apparent conviction already:roll: , is nothing more than speculation and wishful thinking...But nothing set in reality...

No mention of the Senators that already knew about it?....Having a problem confronting that issue????...

Nope I would NOT defend him on that stance, why are you ASSuming? Keep your assumptions to yourself.

A hypothesis is not an assumption...what you've written has caused me to believe otherwise...

First, you say the President is wrong because he did NOT follow the law...

But then you threw out the analogy of the man beating his wife on the courthouse steps legally based on what the law says...

This leads me to believe one of two scenarios...

1) IF you believe the man was man was correct because the law said so, then you are in defense of him and you do not believe he should've been prosecuted...all based on something that the current laws do not take into consideration...

2) IF you DO NOT believe that the man was correct, then you agree that there are laws out there that are outdated and unjust...making it OK to override it...

The rest of your post is retarded, as I have already confessed all law breaking occurences to the Investigators who conducted my Interview for the Police Department.

Nice try, but you actually have to know something about someone before you throw out retarded accusations.

And thus, the debate ends...

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Believe what you want, the rest of the free thinking world knows better.

You think you're free thinking when in reality you are the puppet of the liberal establishment. It's impossible for me to understand how no matter the amount of evidence to the contrary you won't believe your own two ears.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. The truth has been kept from the depth of their minds by masters who rule them with lies. They feed them on falsehoods till wrong looks like right in their eyes.
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

 

[Caine]

You think you're free thinking when in reality you are the puppet of the liberal establishment. It's impossible for me to understand how no matter the amount of evidence to the contrary you won't believe your own two ears.

I hear what I hear, I don't hear something and turn it into something else. You've already shown that you have the ability to twist someone's comments into something they aren't, You've done it with Kerry and you've done it with me.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. The truth has been kept from the depth of their minds by masters who rule them with lies. They feed them on falsehoods till wrong looks like right in their eyes.
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

So what if he said this. Does this make him right? I don't hardly think so.
I don't care if its a quote from George Washington or GOD himself.
Your junk quotes mean nothing to me.

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

I hear what I hear, I don't hear something and turn it into something else. You've already shown that you have the ability to twist someone's comments into something they aren't, You've done it with Kerry and you've done it with me.



So what if he said this. Does this make him right? I don't hardly think so.
I don't care if its a quote from George Washington or GOD himself.
Your junk quotes mean nothing to me.

I have twisted nothing I have shown what you and Mr. Kerry have said put you on the defensive and now you attack the messenger for having the sheer audacity to question the words of they who are above critism, do what they say not as they do, agree with what they said because they said it, liberal elitests.

A thousand pardons my lord I forgot myself for a moment I was under the impression that I had the freedom of speech in a Democracy not controlled by a liberal socialist authoritarian autocracy.

 

[Caine]

I have twisted nothing I have shown what you and Mr. Kerry have said put you on the defensive and now you attack the messenger for having the sheer audacity to question the words of they who are above critism, do what they say not as they do, agree with what they said because they said it, liberal elitests.

Because what I and Mr. Kerry have said are not what you have turned them into. How do you not understand this?
I guess if someone were to say, "I do not like President Bush." You would mistake them for someone who hates Bush? Of course when put on the spot you will deny this, but you have done it.
No, nobody is above criticism. If you are not intelligent enough to realize the true meaning in someone's statement, maybe you are not in the position to analyze someone else's comments.

A thousand pardons my lord

Damn Right.. Go on...

I forgot myself for a moment I was under the impression that I had the freedom of speech in a Democracy not controlled by a liberal socialist authoritarian autocracy.

You do have freedom of speech. Doesn't mean your useless Quotes bring anything to the debate.

 

[oldreliable67]

Caine,

Reiterating a part of a post from another thread...

There is no part of the FISA process that allows acting quickly, in real "real time", not just sort-of real time, if you will. If you read FISA, you'll find that even the "do it and then you have 72 hours to get the court order" provisions require fairly extensive AG and supervisory approvals, a process that can take a day or two in and of itself. The only way to act immediately, in true "real time" is to have a procedure in place that allows immediate exploitation of intelligence when the capture/obtaining of that intelligence meets certain criteria. Those criteria haven't been made publicly available, for obvious reasons, but it doesn't take much to imagine that they would include phone numbers or email addresses captured in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan (or any scene of terrorists activity). Those phone numbers or email addresses might or might not be 'owned' by a 'US person' as defined by FISA, but one end of the communications chain must be outside the US. In the operational context, that is important, yes, but it is also secondary to gaining as much information as possible as to the identity, location, and knowledge of recent communications that the terrorist activity or terrorist who was formerly in possession of that phone number or email address might have had with whomever is on the other end of that phone number/email. Certainly, these phone numbers/emails are time sensitive, their intelligence value can decay rapidly, sometimes within minutes and hours.

FISA just doesn't work adequately in these circumstances, consequently procedures were designed that did work and, importantly, were designed so as to be within the law.

 

[Caine]

Caine,

Reiterating a part of a post from another thread...

There is no part of the FISA process that allows acting quickly, in real "real time", not just sort-of real time, if you will. If you read FISA, you'll find that even the "do it and then you have 72 hours to get the court order" provisions require fairly extensive AG and supervisory approvals, a process that can take a day or two in and of itself. The only way to act immediately, in true "real time" is to have a procedure in place that allows immediate exploitation of intelligence when the capture/obtaining of that intelligence meets certain criteria. Those criteria haven't been made publicly available, for obvious reasons, but it doesn't take much to imagine that they would include phone numbers or email addresses captured in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan (or any scene of terrorists activity). Those phone numbers or email addresses might or might not be 'owned' by a 'US person' as defined by FISA, but one end of the communications chain must be outside the US. In the operational context, that is important, yes, but it is also secondary to gaining as much information as possible as to the identity, location, and knowledge of recent communications that the terrorist activity or terrorist who was formerly in possession of that phone number or email address might have had with whomever is on the other end of that phone number/email. Certainly, these phone numbers/emails are time sensitive, their intelligence value can decay rapidly, sometimes within minutes and hours.

FISA just doesn't work adequately in these circumstances, consequently procedures were designed that did work and, importantly, were designed so as to be within the law.

THIS IS WHY YOU GO TO CONGRESS, EXPLAIN THE PROBLEM, AND ASK THEM TO ALLOW FOR THIS SORT OF THING WIHTOUT BREAKING THE DAMNED LAW.

Thats what congress is there for. All he had to do was ask.

 

[oldreliable67]

THIS IS WHY YOU GO TO CONGRESS, EXPLAIN THE PROBLEM, AND ASK THEM TO ALLOW FOR THIS SORT OF THING WIHTOUT BREAKING THE DAMNED LAW.

Thats what congress is there for. All he had to do was ask.

According to the legal opinions provided to him by the Justice Dept, he didn't need to go to Congress again. Previous authorizations, along with the precedents cited by the AG, gave him sufficient authority to act as he did.

 

[CaliNORML]

Doing a bit more investigation on my own to help me sort out this issue, I rented and watched the Documentary "Unconstitional" by Director Nonny de la Peña and Executive Producer Robert Greenwald with my son who is thinking of joining the Armed Forces. WEBLINK


What a horror flick. When elected officials say that appointed Federal officials not subject to the vote of the people are going way to far, whom do we trust? Those subject to our power of the peoples vote? Or those appointed by an administration to carry out a President's agenda?

I also did not know that across the US hundereds of communities have overturned their CIVIL officers right to respond to such requests by non elected entities such as the FBI, INS, and CIA to the responsibility to the elected leaders who have refused to carry out such a blatant overrunning of individual rights.

Horray to all those city counsels who stood up and decided amongst themselves that this is too far and as Americans will not carry out these acts upon thier citizens.

KMS

P.S. My son is thinking twice about his carrer due to the nature of this film. He stated, "Mom I could not do that to another person, cause they will do it to me if I am in that position." Thank God I raised a critical thinker

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Doing a bit more investigation on my own to help me sort out this issue, I rented and watched the Documentary "Unconstitional" by Director Nonny de la Peña and Executive Producer Robert Greenwald with my son who is thinking of joining the Armed Forces. WEBLINK


What a horror flick. When elected officials say that appointed Federal officials not subject to the vote of the people are going way to far, whom do we trust? Those subject to our power of the peoples vote? Or those appointed by an administration to carry out a President's agenda?

I also did not know that across the US hundereds of communities have overturned their CIVIL officers right to respond to such requests by non elected entities such as the FBI, INS, and CIA to the responsibility to the elected leaders who have refused to carry out such a blatant overrunning of individual rights.

Horray to all those city counsels who stood up and decided amongst themselves that this is too far and as Americans will not carry out these acts upon thier citizens.

KMS

P.S. My son is thinking twice about his carrer due to the nature of this film. He stated, "Mom I could not do that to another person, cause they will do it to me if I am in that position." Thank God I raised a critical thinker

Well perhaps you should also tell your son that Mr. Greenwald is an anti-capitalist, left-wing socialist propagandist in the same vein as our good friends Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky.

 

[CaliNORML]

Why are they so bad? Are these journalists only an arguement?

Michael Moores asking Congressmen to ask their children to serve in the war was the fastest I have ever seen any government official move , and they ask for my son when they are unwilling to consider sending their own?

Not only ask for his life, but to treat humans the way they were treated in Cuba and other black bases he knows exist from ROTC training for 4 years? He is too good an American Boy to consider that as being honorable.


KMS

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Lol, like I said who among the people elected him? And can we vote him out?

So what are you saying that the president shouldn't have the power to appoint officials? It's called a representative Democracy the presidential appointees have to be confirmed by the Senate. We elect the Senate and the President and as such we grant them the power to appoint and confirm appointees to non-elected office. The only elected politicians who are saying we went to far are doing it for their own partisan political reasons and putting those reasons above national security and the safety of the U.S. populace. That I think is the true horror flick. Ever watch C-SPAN? Truth is stranger than fiction.

 

[CaliNORML]

Actually we watch the BBC and PBS as they are not as politically geared to portray the President in a favorable manner.

KMS

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Actually we watch the BBC and PBS as they are not as politically geared to portray the President in a favorable manner.

KMS

No they're politically geared to do the opposite, Ho ho!

 

[CaliNORML]

PBS recently hired an Ombudsman to handle that sort of allegation. Now you can address those sort of issues, can the others say the same?

KMS

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

PBS recently hired an Ombudsman to handle that sort of allegation. Now you can address those sort of issues, can the others say the same?

KMS

Ya PBS is hiring someone to deal with the bias at PBS, Ho ho!

That's like ENRON exec's hiring someone to deal with corruption at ENRON, Ho ho!

 

[CaliNORML]

Well, the act of even considering there may be bias goes futher in my mind than the act of totaly ignoring the fact it may exist.

Taking the steps to prevent or even question their own actions is more than many others will ever consider. Cleaning up their own back yard is better than pointing out someone elses mess.

As such I do trust them more, and see more horror on the BBC (the most trusted news organization worldwide) and PBS than channels such as CNN ever showed me around the world. A view out of the American bubble on the rest of the world is how my family considers it's news sources.

For if we never look outside ourselves, we will never understand how the rest of the globe views us or our actions.

KMS

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Well, the act of even considering there may be bias goes futher in my mind than the act of totaly ignoring the fact it may exist.

Taking the steps to prevent or even question their own actions is more than many others will ever consider. Cleaning up their own back yard is better than pointing out someone elses mess.

As such I do trust them more, and see more horror on the BBC (the most trusted news organization worldwide) and PBS than channels such as CNN ever showed me around the world. A view out of the American bubble on the rest of the world is how my family considers it's news sources.

For if we never look outside ourselves, we will never understand how the rest of the globe views us or our actions.

KMS

(the most trusted news organization worldwide) as long as you don't live in the U.S., Hee-haw!

Just as Al-Jazeera is the most trusted News Network in the Middle East, Al-la!

 

[CaliNORML]

Just curious have you ever seen the film that started all of this? Or are you just against it without first hand evidence? Your opinion based on who they called a Presidential non-patriot?

KMS

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Just curious have you ever seen the film that started all of this? Or are you just against it without first hand evidence? Your opinion based on who they called a Presidential non-patriot?

KMS

No I read up on the executive producer Mr. Greenwald and what he's all about. He's a left wing socialist who hates capitalism and conservatives, what do you think he would make a pro-Bush documentary? Ho ho!

 

[Trajan Octavian Titus]

Tilting at the Right, Leaning to the Left
Robert Greenwald's 'Outfoxed' Has Its Own Slant on Balance
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 11, 2004; Page D01


Robert Greenwald, an admirer of Michael Moore, is trying to give Fox News Channel the kind of cinematic spanking that Moore just delivered to President Bush in "Fahrenheit 9/11."



"Fox is not a conservative network, it's a Republican network," and its fair-and-balanced slogan is "ridiculous," the Los Angeles director says in explaining why he sought funding from two liberal groups -- and took out a loan -- to make the documentary "Outfoxed."

But Greenwald, whose last movie was "Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War," makes no effort at fairness or balance himself. Not only did he avoid contacting Fox, and indulge in some misleading editing, but the film also features a parade of the network's liberal detractors -- including Al Franken, Vermont Rep. Bernie Sanders, the group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting and out-of-the-closet liberal columnist Walter Cronkite.

Greenwald does score points with a handful of memos from a top Fox executive that appear to suggest tilting the news on such subjects as Iraq and the Sept. 11 investigation, and in interviews with a few former Fox staffers and contributors -- three of whom are off-screen and anonymous, their voices distorted.

But many of their allegations are hard to assess because they involve orders, or attitudes, by an unnamed "they" at Rupert Murdoch's network.

Greenwald says he didn't ask Fox for interviews because "there was every reason to expect that not only would they say no but they would take steps to legally shut me down." He admits he's taking a risk by using lots of Fox footage without permission.

"They're a network," Greenwald says. "They don't lack opportunities to tell their story. . . . I'm hardly Goliath taking on David."

Unlike "Fahrenheit 9/11," Greenwald's movie, which debuts Tuesday in New York, is not likely to play at the local multiplex. The $300,000 film, partly financed by the liberal organizations MoveOn.org and the Center for American Progress, will be shown at 2,000 house parties around the country, and a $9.95 DVD is being sold online. Greenwald hopes to generate enough buzz to make it into some smaller theaters.

The movie focuses on daily editorial notes to the Fox News staff from Senior Vice President for News John Moody, who wrote in March about the 9/11 commission hearings: "This is not 'what did he know and when did he know it' stuff. Do not turn this into Watergate."

In an April memo on Iraq coverage, Moody wrote: "Do not fall into the easy trap of mourning the loss of US lives and asking out loud why are we there?" Two days earlier, during U.S. military operations in Fallujah, Moody said: "It won't be long before some people start to decry the use of 'excessive force.' We won't be among that group."

And in a May 2003 note on President Bush's judicial nominees, Moody wrote that some were "being held up because of their POSSIBLE, not demonstrated, views on one issue -- abortion. This should be a trademark issue for FNC today and in the days to come."

In an interview with The Post, Moody rejects "the implication that I'm controlling the news coverage," saying of his 1,200 employees: "People are free to call me or message me and say, 'I think you're off base.' Sometimes I take the advice, sometimes I don't."

On Iraq, Moody says his point was that "casualties are part of war" and should not be overplayed. That's a separate issue, he says, from "the political question we debate all the time -- should we be there?

"The insurgents were and are using every possible method they could and can to cause American casualties. Then you have those who say U.S. troops are doing terrible things to these poor Iraqi people. Well, it's a war."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41604-2004Jul10.html

 

[CaliNORML]

Funny it was not in the way it was presented that scared me, I expect a bit of bias thats almost unavoidable. The testimony of those who were victims, Americans born and raised such as myself, I found most compelling in changing my minds view.

And the Photos that changed my child's mind were worth a thousand words.

KMS

 

[Crispy]

Too much stringency infringes on our civil liberties, yet not enough stringency invites homeland terrorism. Either way, the citizens are going to be unhappy. How do you propose to solve this bizarre conundrum?

You know Tashah, I don't think there's anything to solve. We've seen time and again, in many nations and cultures, the conflicts of Security vs civil liberties, economic development vs social reform, Isolationaism vs Internationalism and, different Nations adjust the interpretation of the laws (or lack thereof) that balance these interests based on the circumstances before them. What's more important is that the poitical, economic and beauracratic elements of the nation are sufficiently stable and provide for sufficient elasticity to respond to the demands of the time while maintaining a balanced social stability. Through our culture of dialogue and civil debate we along with all of the civilized nations of the world have established that means by which we can endure these elastic changes without allowing our system to crumble in on themselves.

It isn't so much that we can and should endeavor to strike the "perfect balance" per se, but instead we should endeavor to understand that such conflicts and beliefs on both sides of the arguments are inevitable and necessary in order to maintain a stable nation and society. Moreover there will ultimately be changes in the interpretation of our ideals and our laws that necessarily respond to our times and we as a people must accept them even in our disagreement and debate about them. We'll see another Clinton-esque era in coming years as we'll see another Bush-esque era when the time and situation demand it and interests one way or the other will be compromised in order to meet the demands of those times. Each person's happiness naturally isn't going to be dictated by these compromises alone but instead through the quantification of all of the elements of their circumstances that contribute to their happiness in total of which these factors are only a part. And of course there will be some who consume themselves with these issues alone, those who represent the extremes of ideologies in our society and will suffer the most psychologically and emotionally from such turns of events which is only inevitable.

If we take a position where we can agree to disagree about the many decisions of our times on the grounds that nothing is certain and no course of action is necessarily the "most" right course of action but a means to an end based on the zietgeist of the time, and couple that with a view of our accomplishments as civilized societies that have established such elastic equilibrium in our polictical, economic, beauracratic and social structures so much that none of our interests will be compomised to the degree that say, violent rebellion is the only course, than I think we'll continue to maintain the "total" happiness that we endeavor to achieve.

I tend to agree with much that our government has done in the past years as obviously many don't, but I certainly don't look at the measures taken by my government as permanent and why should I? There's more evidence to the contrary so why invest myself so much in the moment to the degree that my emotions and particular ideological beliefs outweigh my common sense in knowing that my and others beliefs and ideologies aren't being wholesale compromised but being subjected to the extremes of a period in history.