# The truth is slowly trickling out



## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006 ... shtml?s=ic

and the main stream media ignores it, what a surprise


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

Bob that source could not be any more biased. I will bet my boots that the information there is contrived.


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## Bore.224 (Mar 23, 2005)

MT You bet, that source may not have any merit at all. However that never stopped the main stream media before!!


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## racer66 (Oct 6, 2003)

March 15, 2006, 7:41 a.m.
It's Legal
The solid legal basis for the administration's surveillance program.

EDITOR'S NOTE: On Monday, when Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold introduced a resolution to censure President Bush, he said, "When the President of the United States breaks the law, he must be held accountable." Bush, Feingold continued, "authorized an illegal program to spy on American citizens on American soil and then misled the Congress and the public about the existence and the legality of that program." Although few Democrats have joined Feingold's call for censure, nearly all of them agree with Feingold's contention that the surveillance program is illegal. But the president's adversaries overlook the solid legal basis for the administration's actions outlined in Byron York's recent article on a little-known court decision in a matter called In re: Sealed Case. Here is York's story, from the February 27 issue of National Review.

In early September 2002, just before the first anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, a group of lawyers gathered in a heavily protected, windowless room in the Department of Justice building in Washington. There were three federal appeals-court judges, Laurence Silberman, Edward Leavy, and Ralph Guy. There was Theodore Olson, the U.S. solicitor general. There was Larry Thompson, the deputy attorney general. And there was John Yoo, the Justice official who had closely studied questions of war powers and presidential authority. Rounding out the group were a few other department staffers, one official from the FBI, and David Addington, Vice President Cheney's top lawyer.

The purpose of the meeting was to argue a case whose details remain so classified that they are known by only a few people, but whose outcome, a decision known as In re: Sealed Case, has become one of the key documents in the hottest argument in Washington today: the fight over what President Bush calls the "terrorist surveillance" of persons with known al-Qaeda connections, and what the president's opponents call "domestic spying."

The three judges made up what is known as the FISA Court of Review. It was created in 1978 by the now-famous Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The act required that the president go to the so-called FISA Court to seek a warrant for surveillance in top-secret foreign-intelligence cases. For any disputed decisions that might arise, Congress also created the Court of Review, a sort of super-secret appeals court.

But in all the years between 1978 and 2002, there had never been occasion for the Court of Review to actually meet. Not until Sealed Case, and the three-way collision between the executive, legislative, and judicial branches that it involved. Today, a look at the circumstances of the case provides not only an insight into the administration's rationale for the secret, warrantless surveillance program but also important clues to the mystery of how the whole thing got started in the first place.

The conflict began with the passage of the Patriot Act in October 2001. The act tore down the "wall" that had arisen in the Justice Department that blocked intelligence officials and criminal investigators from working together and sharing information. That wall had been cemented by a set of internal department guidelines written in 1995, in which then-attorney general Janet Reno outlined the department's constricted surveillance procedures.

The Patriot Act was designed to fix that problem. But a month after the act was passed, when the Justice Department submitted surveillance requests to the FISA Court under the new, looser standards passed by Congress, the FISA Court in effect rejected the Patriot Act, and instead reaffirmed the old 1995 Clinton-era standard.

A standoff ensued. In early 2002, the Justice Department adopted new surveillance procedures based on the Patriot Act. In March 2002, the department informed the FISA Court that it would use those new standards in surveillance applications. In May, the FISA Court said, in effect, not so fast, and ordered modifications in the procedures. Among other things, the FISA Court ordered that "law enforcement officials shall not make recommendations to intelligence officials concerning the initiation, operation, continuation or expansion of FISA searches or surveillances" - a reasonable facsimile of the old wall. The FISA Court also ordered that the Justice Department include certain staffers in all surveillance debates, an order that quickly became known in the Justice Department as the "chaperone requirement."

The Justice Department resisted, and in July 2002 filed a surveillance application - the details are still a secret - using its new procedures, without the FISA Court's mandated changes. The Court approved the application but insisted that the modifications be made according to the court's dictates. And then, in August, the FISA Court took the extraordinary step of making its decision public, accusing the Justice Department of habitually misrepresenting evidence and misleading the court. That's when the department decided to take the matter to the Court of Review, leading to the September 2002 session in that secure room in department headquarters.

"We're here today," Theodore Olson said as the secret In re: Sealed Case court argument began, "because the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court's May 17th order . . . has perpetuated a serious and increasingly destructive barrier which has hamstrung the president and his subordinates" in their work to protect "the United States and its citizens from attack and from international terrorism." The FISA Court's ruling, Olson continued, was "inexplicable."

Olson and the judges went back and forth over the history of the wall. Nobody really knew how it first came into being; the judges later said its origin was "shrouded in historical mist." They went over what Congress intended when it passed the Patriot Act. And they went over the question of whether the FISA Court had the power to tell the president how to conduct investigations.

The answer was no, Olson said. "To the extent that the FISA Court is purporting to reorganize the executive branch, the so-called chaperone function, I don't think Congress could constitutionally tell the executive or the attorney general that he could not talk to this subordinate without involving that subordinate," Olson told the judges, "and I certainly don't think the court can do so."

The entire session lasted just a few hours, and the Justice Department waited for the Court of Review's ruling. When it came, in November 2002, it was a slam-dunk win for the government.

In its opinion, the Court of Review said the FISA Court had, in effect, attempted to unilaterally impose the old 1995 rules. "In doing so, the FISA Court erred," the ruling read. "It did not provide any constitutional basis for its action - we think there is none - and misconstrued the main statutory provision on which it relied." The FISA Court, according to the ruling, "refus[ed] to consider the legal significance of the Patriot Act's crucial amendments" and "may well have exceeded the constitutional bounds" governing the courts by asserting "authority to govern the internal organization and investigative procedures of the Department of Justice."

And then the Court of Review did one more thing, something that has repercussions in today's surveillance controversy. Not only could the FISA Court not tell the president how do to his work, the Court of Review said, but the president also had the "inherent authority" under the Constitution to conduct needed surveillance without obtaining any warrant - from the FISA Court or anyone else. Referring to an earlier case, known as Truong, which dealt with surveillance before FISA was passed, the Court of Review wrote: "The Truong court, as did all the other courts to have decided the issue, held that the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information. . . . We take for granted that the President does have that authority and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the President's constitutional power."

It was a clear and sweeping statement of executive authority. And what was most likely not known to the Court of Review at the time was that the administration had, in 2002, started a program in which it did exactly what the Court of Review said it had the power to do: order the surveillance of some international communications without a warrant.

Read today, In re: Sealed Case does more than simply outline the president's authority. It also puts the administration's warrantless-surveillance decision in some context. What was going on at the time the president made the decision to go ahead with the surveillance? Well, first Congress passed the Patriot Act, giving the administration new powers. Then the FISA Court refused to recognize those powers and attempted to impose outdated restrictions on the administration. Then the White House, faced with the FISA Court's opposition - and with what administration officials believed were some inherent weaknesses in the FISA law - began to bypass the FISA Court in some cases. And then, in In re: Sealed Case, the administration received irrefutable legal support for its actions.

After the decision was handed down, the American Civil Liberties Union, which had submitted a brief in support of the FISA Court's actions restricting the administration, asked the Supreme Court to review In re: Sealed Case. The justices declined to take any action. That is not the same as the Court's upholding the ruling, but it does mean that the justices looked at the decision and chose not to intervene.

Today, the opinion stands as a bedrock statement of presidential power. And ironically, it came from a case that was not about whether the president had overstepped his bounds, but about whether the courts had overstepped their bounds. The Court of Review ruled strongly in favor of the president, and the Supreme Court declined to reconsider that decision. Reading the opinion, it's no wonder that George W. Bush has so strongly defended the surveillance program. If the FISA Court of Review is right, he has the Constitution on his side


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## racer66 (Oct 6, 2003)

May 17, 2004

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A roadside bomb containing sarin exploded after it was discovered by U.S. soldiers in Iraq, releasing a "small quantity" of the deadly nerve agent but causing no casualties, a U.S. military spokesman said Monday.

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said at a briefing in Baghdad that the bomb exploded "a couple of days ago" in the Iraqi capital and resulted in "very small dispersal" of the nerve agent.

"The Iraqi Survey Group confirmed today that a 155-millimeter artillery round containing sarin nerve agent had been found," said Kimmitt, the chief military spokesman in Iraq. "The round had been rigged as an IED (improvised explosive device) which was discovered by a U.S. force convoy.

"A detonation occurred before the IED could be rendered inoperable," he said.

U.S. soldiers who later transported the round did experience symptoms consistent with low-level nerve agent exposure, said a U.S. official speaking on the condition of anonymity. But in this case, it appears two components in the shell, which are designed to combine and create deadly sarin, did not mix upon detonation, the official said.

U.S. officials said Monday they are concerned that other sarin-filled munitions may still exist in Iraq - and may not be well marked. They're also concerned that, because Saddam's government never declared that any sarin or sarin-filled shells still remained the discovery of the sarin shell as significant, the U.S. official said.


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

It appears that almost EVERYTHING MT post is FALSE


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## racer66 (Oct 6, 2003)

The Impeachment Agenda 
Russ Feingold reveals what many Democrats really want.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

Republicans are denouncing Senator Russ Feingold's proposal to "censure" President Bush for his warrantless wiretaps on al Qaeda, but we'd like to congratulate the Wisconsin Democrat on his candor. He's had the courage to put on the table what Democrats are all but certain to do if they win either the House or Senate in November.

In fact, our guess is that censure would be the least of it. The real debate in Democratic circles would be whether to pass articles of impeachment. Whether such an inevitable attempt succeeds would depend on Mr. Bush's approval rating, and especially on whether Democrats could use their subpoena power as committee chairs to conjure up something they could flog to a receptive media as an "impeachable" offense. But everyone should understand that censure and impeachment are important--and so far the only--parts of the left's agenda for the next Congress.

And not just the loony left either, though it's getting harder to distinguish them from the mainstream variety. Mr. Feingold is hardly some Internet crank. He's a third-term Senator from a swing state who has all but announced his intention to run for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008. He was the first major Democrat to call for the U.S. to withdraw from Iraq, and half his party was soon demanding the same.
*As a legal matter, Mr. Feingold's censure proposal is preposterous. The National Security Agency wiretaps were disclosed to Congressional leaders, including Democrats, from the start. The lead FISA court judges were also informed, and the Attorney General and Justice lawyers have monitored the wiretaps all along. Despite a media drumbeat about "illegal domestic eavesdropping," Mr. Bush's spirited defense of the program since news of it leaked has swung public opinion in support*.

But as a political matter, the Wisconsin Senator knows exactly what he's doing. He knows that anti-Bush pathology runs so deep among many Democrats that they really do think they're living in some new dictatorship. Liberal journals solemnly debate impeachment, and political-action groups have formed to promote it. One of our leading left-wing newspapers recently compared Mr. Bush to J. Edgar Hoover and Richard Nixon, as if there were even a speck of evidence that this White House is wiretapping its political enemies.

When the fever gets this hot in supposedly mainstream forums, Mr. Feingold is right to conclude that the facts behind any censure or impeachment motion won't really matter. All that will count is the politics, which means it will come down to a question of votes in Congress. And several leading Democrats have already raised the "impeachment" card.

California Senator Barbara Boxer loudly wrote four legal scholars late last year asking if the NSA wiretaps were impeachable. John Conyers, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, has introduced a resolution calling for the creation of a "select committee to investigate the administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and countenancing torture, retaliating against critics, and to make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment."

In other words, everything that Mr. Bush has been accused of during the last five years, no matter how Orwellian or thoroughly refuted, will be trotted out again and used as impeachment fodder. And lest you think this could never happen, Judiciary is the House committee through which any formal impeachment resolution would be introduced and proceed. As the country heads toward 2008 and a Democratic nomination fight, John Kerry and Hillary Rodham Clinton would be hard-pressed to avoid going along with Mr. Feingold, Al Gore, and others feeding the bile of the censure/impeach brigades.
Which brings us back to Mr. Feingold's public service in floating his "censure" gambit now. He's doing voters a favor by telling them before November's election just how Democrats intend to treat a wartime President if they take power.

Not only do they want to block his policies, they also plan to rebuke and embarrass him in front of the world and America's enemies. And they want to do so not because there is a smidgen of evidence that he's abused his office or lied under oath, but because they think he's been too energetic in using his powers to defend America. By all means, let's have this impeachment debate before the election, so voters can know what's really at stake


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## Matt Jones (Mar 6, 2002)

I have a question for you guys...

Since we know that Bin Laden had well established ties to Saudi Arabia, how come not only did we not invade them, but that they are still our "allies?"


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

The Saudis are rotten also but there is no evidence they were trying to devlop WMD's. The fear was that they WMDs would be given to terrorists to use in the US.

Your correct though, much of the Islamic jihadist movement is out of Saudi supported madrassa's.


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

> The Saudis are rotten also but there is no evidence they were trying to devlop WMD's. The fear was that they WMDs would be given to terrorists to use in the US.


Truth be told there was weak evidence at best that Saddam was trying to produce WMDs. Evidence that would normally have been dismissed as unreliable was taken as gospel because there was a push to attack Iraq from the beginning of this administration.

The focus has gone from the war on terror to the war on Iraq, and we are opening ourselves up to another attack in the process. If this administration actually cared about fighting terror more than they did keeping the oil flowing we would have gone into Iran, Saudia Arabia, Uzbekistan, and the rest of the nations that harbor and support terrorists.


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

Matt, Bin Laden was actually born in Saudi Arabia and has been actively trying to overthrow that countries leadership (Crown Prince) for years. The Saudis stripped him of his citizenship and ran him out of the country a long time ago. That's why he was in Afghanistan. His family still lives and operates/owns businesses in Saudi Arabia but have publicly denounced Bin Laden and his activities


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## mr.trooper (Aug 3, 2004)

Bore.224 said:


> MT You bet, that source may not have any merit at all. However that never stopped the main stream media before!!


Dang those Liberals! :idiot:


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

MT


> Truth be told there was weak evidence at best that Saddam was trying to produce WMDs. Evidence that would normally have been dismissed as unreliable was taken as gospel because there was a push to attack Iraq from the beginning of this administration.


the whole point of this thread is that the evidence of a Saddam link with Bin Laden and the existance of WMDs is coming out, evidence that the anti war left in the media have been ignoring due to their hatred of Bush and their anger about the 2000 election results. Their persona ajenda is more important to them than the security of this country, so much so that they distort the picture in Iraq almost every day.

And sadly young gullible ( and some not so young also I admit) cannot get past their anger about the election results to see the truth. In my opinion eventually though GWB will be vindicated on this issue. Time will tell. If I'm correct ( I am) I will take delight pointing it out.


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

Bob the only truths that have been coming out do not link Saddam to Osama directly. They did not have a significant relationship. You cannot justify this war no matter how much you would like to.


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

Militant_Tiger said:


> Bob the only truths that have been coming out do not link Saddam to Osama directly. They did not have a significant relationship. You cannot justify this war no matter how much you would like to.


That doesn't work for everyone; just repeating something over and over to try to get others to believe what your saying :eyeroll: 
There is overwhelming evidence to the contrary!


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

"In a few days, you will all witness something that can only be considered very beautiful against the Coalition forces. That, I assure you."

"we managed to chop off their rotten heads"

"There are only two American tanks in the city."

"We are winning!"

That's what the Iraqis kept telling their people and we see how true that was!


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

> That doesn't work for everyone; just repeating something over and over to try to get others to believe what your saying
> There is overwhelming evidence to the contrary!


There is NO solid evidence to the contrary, hence why it is now accepted by most of the country and most reasonable people that Saddam did not possess WMDs.


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

That doesn't work for everyone; just repeating something over and over to try to get others to believe what your saying 
There is overwhelming evidence to the contrary!


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

ABBK all evidence that you have posted or given the thumbs up to has been found to be dated, wrong, and or irrelevant.


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

MT you are really not well informed enough to discuss these issues. Saddam not only had WMDs he used them and killed thousands with them


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

The Germans had WMDs as well, in World War One. We already went after Saddam once for his attack on the Kurds (among other things). You can't use old justifications to fight a new war.


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

Militant_Tiger said:


> ABBK all evidence that you have posted or given the thumbs up to has been found to be dated, wrong, and or irrelevant.


Believe what you want; exposing you and your SPIN is too EZ.
Please at least challange me a little. :beer:


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

MT.
Discussing anything with you is pointless, your mind is closed.

Ignorance is impossible to cure from the outside.


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

Evidently you believe about 60 percent of the country to be ignorant as well. The moronic majority.


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

You don't know what you are talking about so its boring. Don't be so blinded with partisanship.

60% is a very low number for an estimate of the politically ignorant in this country. If 60% of the peopl really knew what the hell was going on we would be hunting congressmen with pitbull dogs.

Why don't you read about these topics instead of believeing the BS in any poll.


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

I follow the news quite earnestly. I get my news from more moderate sources like MSNBC, CNN and CSPAN, but I follow organizations like Fox News all the same to ensure that I get a balanced view. My mind is open to the point where I check these threads expecting to find solid evidence that will change my mind. I have seen no such evidence thus far.


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## hill billy (Jan 10, 2006)

Open your damn eyes, the media has you brain washed man.


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

MT,
I am not trying to be demeaning I'm serious about your need to forget the partisan rhetoric and dig a little deeper for facts, its a hard thing to teach yourself to do, comments like no wmds and no link to Osama are just not true based on recent revelations, and common sense. That part of the world is seething with rage against their own govts and the west for supporting them ( we do it for our oil supply) and terrorism has a lot of available support with their populations

I also believe its true you won't get facts from main stream media its not moderate by any stretch, its blatently biased. All media is, thats why you really have to read to figure this stuff out.

I'll admit the evidence is slowly coming out and I too wonder why they don't seem to put more effort in gtting the evidence out to gain more support for the war.

My gut feeings are that it will pour out right before the 06 elections, there is so much potential political benefit from timing the presentation of evidence of the collusion that occured between Osama and Saddam.

Apparently there are just tons of unread files and tapes that are really revealing. And they and Iraqi key military personell are telling about the links. It will be interesting, to see how it develops.

You do a good job for a kid your age :beer: just don't believe any BS you hear from media, conservative or liberal. They both have a political ajenda and neither can be trusted without your own best attempt to verify what they say. Fortunately you live in a time where information is literally a mouse click away.

I wish I had that benefit available to me as a kid.

If you want to be liberal thats fine just try to base your responses on facts so you can make agood argument, all media distorts and all media tells the truth, the trick is figureing out which is which.

I have trouble with it also.


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## Alaskan Brown Bear Killer (Feb 22, 2005)

> Most of America agrees with what the President did.
> Most Americans see this as what it really is, a politically "gotcha",no matter what the cost, get President Bush.


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## racer66 (Oct 6, 2003)

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp ... 1002235060


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## Plainsman (Jul 30, 2003)

Militant_Tiger said:


> I follow the news quite earnestly. I get my news from more moderate sources like MSNBC, CNN and CSPAN, but I follow organizations like Fox News all the same to ensure that I get a balanced view. My mind is open to the point where I check these threads expecting to find solid evidence that will change my mind. I have seen no such evidence thus far.


The only person you are fooling MT is yourself. You have done a good job of that, but I don't think you have convinced a single person on this site that didn't agree with you already.


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

Plainsman if overwhelming facts didn't change your mind, I wouldn't expect that I would be able to either.


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