Court Rules Warrantless Wiretaps Unconstitutional (1 Viewer)

[pantagrapher]

Federal judge orders end to wiretap program

Says governments listening in without warrant is unconstitutional

DETROIT - A federal judge ruled Thursday that the government's warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered an immediate halt to it.

U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit became the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's program, which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of journalists, scholars and lawyers who say the program has made it difficult for them to do their jobs.

The government argued that the program is well within the president's authority, but said proving that would require revealing state secrets.

The ACLU said the state-secrets argument was irrelevant because the Bush administration already had publicly revealed enough information about the program for Taylor to rule.

LINK

 

[culdeus]

So when do they finally decide to release or charge the people held in GITMO?

 

[Winston Smith]

I'll be interested to read the opinion.

 

[John Mamula]

 

[pantagrapher]

I'll be interested to read the opinion.

There's a link to it on this page.

 

[Comb-Over Charlie]

And the terrorist win again.

 

[SofaKings]

Just makes the gov't's job that much harder.

 

[dickey moe]

Looking forward to an eventual Supreme Court ruling.

 

[pantagrapher]

Just makes the gov't's job that much harder.

Awwww. Poor wittle government.

 

[pantagrapher]

And the terrorist win again.

What delicious irony! Our Constitution is the best friend they've got.

 

[Comb-Over Charlie]

And the terrorist win again.

What delicious irony! Our Constitution is the best friend they've got.

These liberal activist judges are gonna be the death of this country.

 

[Bottomfeeder Sports]

Just makes the gov't's job that much harder.

Which is the whole point of our divided government.

 

[larry_boy_44]

$10 says this judge is wiretapped for the rest of his life just because they can...

 

[dickey moe]

Detroit Free Press Article on the Judge

Judge could alter war on terror

Taylor is to rule soon in spying case

August 7, 2006

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BY DAVID ASHENFELTER

FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

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U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, 73, is expected to rule any day now on the legality of the U.S. government's domestic spying program. (AMY LEANG/Detroit Free Press)

Anna Diggs Taylor

*

Job: U.S. district judge, Detroit

Age: 73

Background: In 1979, she became the first black woman to be appointed as a federal district judge in Michigan. Before that, she was a lawyer, civil-rights worker, county and federal prosecutor and City of Detroit lawyer.

Family: She has two adult children and is married to S. Martin Taylor, former director of the Michigan Department of Labor and former vice president of Detroit Edison. He also is a University of Michigan regent.

News: Taylor is expected to decide soon whether the Bush administration's domestic spying program is unconstitutional.

David Ashenfelter

Contact DAVID ASHENFELTER at 313-223-4490 or ashenf@freepress.com.

Anna Diggs Taylor never planned to become a federal judge.

But opportunity knocked.

She never intended to become the first black woman to serve as chief judge of the U.S. District Court in eastern Michigan.

But she accepted out of a sense of historic duty.

Most of the accomplishments of her 49-year legal career, Taylor said, resulted from good luck and heeding the advice of her junior high school English teacher -- work hard, get good grades and the doors of opportunity will open.

Even for a black woman in the segregated 1940s and '50s.

Now, the 73-year-old matronly judge who has spent her career shunning the spotlight is back in the media glare.

Any day now, she's expected to rule on the American Civil Liberties Union's request to strike down the Bush administration's controversial domestic spying program. The ruling could affect the civil rights of millions of Americans and alter the course of the administration's war on terror.

Although Taylor is a liberal with Democratic roots and defended civil-rights workers in the South in the 1960s, people who know her say she will follow the law -- not her politics -- in deciding the case.

"She'll rule based on what the law requires, not on what people perceive her biases to be," Southfield lawyer Harold Pope III said last week. Pope is a former president of the National Bar Association, a prominent black lawyers' group.

Pope said Taylor, a former City of Detroit staff attorney who defended Mayor Coleman Young's efforts to integrate city government in the mid-1970s, ruled against Pope and Detroit in 1993, declaring unconstitutional a program that reserved municipal contracts for minority vendors.

"She's not going to let anything stand in the way of a proper analysis of the law and the facts," Pope said.

Taylor couldn't comment on the National Security Agency case because of judicial canon. Neither would the lawyers in the case.

The ACLU sued the NSA in January, calling unconstitutional its program of intercepting international phone calls and e-mails of suspected Al Qaeda members without obtaining search warrants first. The suit says the program has hampered journalists, scholars, lawyers and others trying to speak to sources overseas.

Justice Department lawyers say the program is vital and legal -- created after Congress authorized the Bush administration to combat terrorism following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. They want Taylor to dismiss the suit, saying the case cannot proceed without divulging state secrets.

Although four other suits challenge the legality of the NSA program, the Detroit case is the farthest along.

The administration wants all of the cases, along with about 20 lawsuits filed against telecommunication companies suspected of giving phone records to the NSA, transferred to Washington. The ACLU hopes Taylor will rule before that happens.

Taylor was born Anna Katherine Johnston in 1932 in Washington, D.C. Her father was treasurer of Howard University. Her mother was a homemaker and a business teacher.

After the ninth grade, Taylor's parents sent her to Northfield School for Girls in East Northfield, Mass. -- one of the few prep schools that accepted black students -- to groom her for a career.

Although being separated from her family was difficult, Taylor credits the school with broadening her horizons and preparing her for the prestigious Barnard College at Columbia University in New York, where she earned a degree in economics in 1954.

Three years later, she received a law degree from Yale. She attended on a scholarship and was one of only five women in her graduating class.

Unable to get a job as a lawyer at New York or Washington, D.C., law firms -- a near impossibility for black people, especially women, in the 1950s -- Taylor turned to the Solicitor's Office of the U.S. Department of Labor. She became a lawyer there with the help of J. Ernest Wilkins, then assistant secretary of labor and the first black person appointed to a subcabinet post. He also was a friend of her father's.

"I'd be unemployed today if it hadn't been for that man," Taylor said in a 1984 interview with the Michigan Bar Journal.

In Washington, Taylor met Charles Diggs Jr., son of a wealthy Detroit mortician and a rising star in Congress.

They married in 1960 and moved to Detroit.

The following year, she became a Wayne County assistant prosecutor.

In 1964, five months after the birth of the first of her two children, Taylor went to Mississippi to defend civil-rights workers who were jailed for registering black people to vote.

The day Taylor arrived, three workers -- James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner -- disappeared near Philadelphia, Miss.

Taylor, her brother, another law student and Detroit lawyer George Crockett Jr., who eventually became a Michigan congressman, drove to the Neshoba County Courthouse to inquire about the missing men.

Sheriff Lawrence Rainey Jr., who was implicated and later acquitted in the men's deaths, was less than helpful, Taylor recalled. As Taylor and the group walked back to their car, they were menaced by a crowd of angry white people who shouted racial slurs at them.

"We were afraid we were going to be killed," Taylor said.

In 1966, Taylor became an assistant U.S. attorney in Detroit, but left the following year to manage her husband's Detroit congressional office.

In 1970, she went into private practice.

During the next five years, she and Diggs divorced. She also campaigned for Coleman Young, helping him become Detroit's first black mayor.

In 1975, Young asked her to become a staff lawyer to defend his programs to integrate city government.

A year later, she married S. Martin Taylor, then director of the Michigan Employment Security Commission.

In 1979, three years after she campaigned for Jimmy Carter's presidential bid, Carter rewarded Taylor with a lifetime appointment to U.S. District Court in Detroit.

Taylor was the first black female federal district judge in the U.S. 6th Circuit, comprising Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee.

In the years that followed, she presided over high-profile cases and made some waves.

In 1984, she sentenced Ronald Ebens to 25 years in prison for beating 27-year-old Vincent Chin to death with a baseball bat outside a Highland Park bar. Ebens, a laid-off autoworker, was angry about Japanese car imports. Chin was a Chinese American.

An appeals court overturned the verdict and Ebens was acquitted at retrial.

"The entire experience was a wrenching one from start to finish," Taylor said later.

In 1984, Taylor banned nativity scenes on municipal property in Birmingham and Dearborn in ACLU lawsuits.

The same year, she publicly rebuked then-Chief Judge John Feikens for racially insensitive remarks about the ability of Young and other black leaders to run city government. They later became friends.

In 1998, a year after Taylor became chief judge, Judge Bernard Friedman blasted her for her role in an effort to have a suit challenging the University of Michigan's use of race in its law school's admission policies assigned to another judge who was handling a similar case. Taylor's husband is a U-M regent.

Lawyers say Taylor is fair, pleasant and dignified, yet in firm control of her courtroom.

"She is smart as hell," one lawyer told the 2006 Almanac of the Federal Judiciary.

In January 1999, Taylor went on senior status, continuing with a smaller caseload.

On Friday, she will be inducted into the National Bar Association Hall of Fame during its conference in Detroit.

Legal experts wouldn't predict how Taylor might rule in the NSA case.

But even if Taylor harpoons the spying program, experts said, the decision likely would be overturned by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

"Given the composition of the 6th Circuit and its previous rulings in related areas, it seems more likely to favor national security over civil liberties if that issue is squarely presented," said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia. "And that's what this case is all about."

What a surprise.

 

[dickey moe]

Just makes the gov't's job that much harder.

Which is the whole point of our divided government.

Yeah, we should make things as easy as possible for those who want to blow us up.

 

[pantagrapher]

What a surprise.

Surprised that a liberal judge would uphold traditionally conservative values?

 

[dickey moe]

Detroit Free Press Article on the Judge

What a surprise.

Surprised that a liberal judge would uphold traditionally conservative values?

Not surprised that a liberal judge would make a judgment that weakens our government's ability to combat terrorism.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

For people who have read the opinion, was this struck down soley for the "warrantless" part, and if so, did she give any indication of what the minimum level of judicial oversight would have to be for this to pass constitutional muster?

 

[trader jake]

Why is this ruling bad...explain to me why the gov't can't get a warrant if they rightfully want to wiretap somebody again?

 

[IvanKaramazov]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy.

It seems odd that this decision would hinge on these factors, as opposed to the 4th amendment.

 

[pantagrapher]

What a surprise.

Surprised that a liberal judge would uphold traditionally conservative values?

Not surprised that a liberal judge would make a judgment that weakens our government's ability to combat terrorism.

Isn't it crazy? It's almost as if they want the terrorists to win.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

I'm reading it now. It's a very well written opinion.

The Fed won on the data mining stuff, but lost on the program's constitutionality. I'm in the standing section now.

I think the "mistakes" if you want to pick any in the holding are going to be found here. The connection the judge is making to get standing for the plaintiff's seems weak to me, and if the Fed takes this to the USSC, this is where so far I think they will hammer it.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

On page 22 she takes a shot at Bush:

his actions blatently disregaurd the Bill of Rights.

Sorry, Judge. Many a President have. Just look at the FISA court. This is, quite frankly, political dicta.

 

[dickey moe]

What a surprise.

Surprised that a liberal judge would uphold traditionally conservative values?

Not surprised that a liberal judge would make a judgment that weakens our government's ability to combat terrorism.

Isn't it crazy? It's almost as if they want the terrorists to win.

Isn't it crazy? Decisions like this are making it that much easier.

 

[larry_boy_44]

Why is this ruling bad...explain to me why the gov't can't get a warrant if they rightfully want to wiretap somebody again?

what do they do when they have to wiretap someone for something that they can't disclose to anyone who is a judge due to it being some sort of government secret???

 

[trader jake]

I think the "mistakes" if you want to pick any in the holding are going to be found here. The connection the judge is making to get standing for the plaintiff's seems weak to me, and if the Fed takes this to the USSC, this is where so far I think they will hammer it.

:whoosh:

 

[Yankee23Fan]

She's using Hamdi again to beat the administration down again. I swear, the idiots that came up with the definition of enemy combatent for this administration need to be shot. And Rumsfeld still needs to resign over that. I knew that case was going to cause more "trouble" down the road for executive power in war.

 

[pantagrapher]

Why is this ruling bad...explain to me why the gov't can't get a warrant if they rightfully want to wiretap somebody again?

what do they do when they have to wiretap someone for something that they can't disclose to anyone who is a judge due to it being some sort of government secret???

I guess at that point we'll just have to surrender to terror.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

Ok.

The second part of the holding is a mixture of some political rhetoric and that kind of stuff.

The meat of the case is this:

The fed (morons that they are after Hamdi) argued that not only is the program constitutional, but that FISA may be unconstitutional if they lose this case and fi that happens the entire state secret doctrine gets destroyed; because of that mixed with the nature of the war, it is likely that the President may be able to avoid the 1st and 4th amendments; and the general grant of a declaration of war by the congress for the War on Terror wasn't specific enough to grant the power the fed said they had.

The arguments the federal government in the recent cases have been awful.

 

[pantagrapher]

What a surprise.

Surprised that a liberal judge would uphold traditionally conservative values?

Not surprised that a liberal judge would make a judgment that weakens our government's ability to combat terrorism.

Isn't it crazy? It's almost as if they want the terrorists to win.

Isn't it crazy? Decisions like this are making it that much easier.

I know right? Liberal judges must have a death wish.

 

[pantagrapher]

Ok.The second part of the holding is a mixture of some political rhetoric and that kind of stuff.The meat of the case is this:The fed (morons that they are after Hamdi) argued that not only is the program constitutional, but that FISA may be unconstitutional if they lose this case and fi that happens the entire state secret doctrine gets destroyed; because of that mixed with the nature of the war, it is likely that the President may be able to avoid the 1st and 4th amendments; and the general grant of a declaration of war by the congress for the War on Terror wasn't specific enough to grant the power the fed said they had.The arguments the federal government in the recent cases have been awful.

Actually, Alberto Gonzalez has said admitted the authority to use force thing was not in fact a declaration of war.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

Ok.The second part of the holding is a mixture of some political rhetoric and that kind of stuff.The meat of the case is this:The fed (morons that they are after Hamdi) argued that not only is the program constitutional, but that FISA may be unconstitutional if they lose this case and fi that happens the entire state secret doctrine gets destroyed; because of that mixed with the nature of the war, it is likely that the President may be able to avoid the 1st and 4th amendments; and the general grant of a declaration of war by the congress for the War on Terror wasn't specific enough to grant the power the fed said they had.The arguments the federal government in the recent cases have been awful.

Actually, Alberto Gonzalez has said admitted the authority to use force thing was not in fact a declaration of war.

Well, if he is the moron who helped to write the arguments of the fed it wouldn't surprise me.

 

[pantagrapher]

Ok.The second part of the holding is a mixture of some political rhetoric and that kind of stuff.The meat of the case is this:The fed (morons that they are after Hamdi) argued that not only is the program constitutional, but that FISA may be unconstitutional if they lose this case and fi that happens the entire state secret doctrine gets destroyed; because of that mixed with the nature of the war, it is likely that the President may be able to avoid the 1st and 4th amendments; and the general grant of a declaration of war by the congress for the War on Terror wasn't specific enough to grant the power the fed said they had.The arguments the federal government in the recent cases have been awful.

Actually, Alberto Gonzalez has said admitted the authority to use force thing was not in fact a declaration of war.

Well, if he is the moron who helped to write the arguments of the fed it wouldn't surprise me.

It was not one of Alberto's better moments:

Feinstein: "About FISA, you say that the President has the authority to wiretap Americans without warrants due to his war powers under Article 2, correct?"Gonzo: "Yes."Feinstein: "And I got a letter from your associate saying that the President could act because Congress had not set up a statute. Well, that's not true. The FISA law clearly says that the President can eavesdrop without warrants for 15 days after a declaration of war."Gonzo: "Yes, but we didn't have a declaration of war, only an authorization to use military force, so we couldn't work with that provision."Feinstein: "So you're saying that the AUMF does not amount to a declaration of war?"Gonzo: "Obviously they are different."Feinstein: "So if the AUMF is not a declaration of war, the president shouldn't have WAR powers!"

Burn.

 

[Poppa]

Slowly but surely the Administration's house of cards is falling.

 

[pantagrapher]

Glenn Greewald breaks it down.

 

[wildbill]

Federal judge orders end to wiretap program

Says governments listening in without warrant is unconstitutional

DETROIT - A federal judge ruled Thursday that the government's warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered an immediate halt to it.

U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit became the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's program, which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of journalists, scholars and lawyers who say the program has made it difficult for them to do their jobs.

The government argued that the program is well within the president's authority, but said proving that would require revealing state secrets.

The ACLU said the state-secrets argument was irrelevant because the Bush administration already had publicly revealed enough information about the program for Taylor to rule.

LINK

I'd be interested in hearing how listening in on international calls to suspected terrorists makes it difficult for journalist, scholars and lawyers to do their jobs.

 

[trader jake]

I'd be interested in hearing how listening in on international calls to suspected terrorists makes it difficult for journalist, scholars and lawyers to do their jobs.

If they are "suspected terrorists" getting a wiretap warrant should not be difficult.

 

[wildbill]

Detroit Free Press Article on the Judge

In 1979, three years after she campaigned for Jimmy Carter's presidential bid, Carter rewarded Taylor with a lifetime appointment to U.S. District Court in Detroit.

Given Carter's recent statements about the Bush administration and the War on Terror, he certainly nominated a judge who agrees with him.

 

[wildbill]

She's using Hamdi again to beat the administration down again. I swear, the idiots that came up with the definition of enemy combatent for this administration need to be shot. And Rumsfeld still needs to resign over that. I knew that case was going to cause more "trouble" down the road for executive power in war.

I appreciate your input on thise, but can you explain Hamdi and the definition of enemy combatent, please?

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I'd be interested in hearing how listening in on international calls to suspected terrorists makes it difficult for journalist, scholars and lawyers to do their jobs.

If they are "suspected terrorists" getting a wiretap warrant should not be difficult.

Why would that make it any easier for journalists, scholars, and lawyers to do their jobs? They still wouldn't know whether the people they were talking to were being wiretapped.

 

[Genedoc]

And the terrorist win again.

What delicious irony! Our Constitution is the best friend they've got.

These liberal activist judges are gonna be the death of this country.

My sources tell me it's more likely to be the lemmings who follow our government down any path it leads us, right ot wrong, who are going to be the death of the country.Thanks for playing, though. Don't forget to pick up your complementary parting gifts from AE on the way out the door.

 

[pantagrapher]

Detroit Free Press Article on the Judge

In 1979, three years after she campaigned for Jimmy Carter's presidential bid, Carter rewarded Taylor with a lifetime appointment to U.S. District Court in Detroit.

Given Carter's recent statements about the Bush administration and the War on Terror, he certainly nominated a judge who agrees with him.

He must be some kind of soothsayer!

 

[Bottomfeeder Sports]

Given Carter's recent statements about the Bush administration and the War on Terror, he certainly nominated a judge who agrees with him.

Someone who would principally follow the law of the land and uphold the Constitution?

 

[Viva Tequila]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy

Please please please will someone tell me where in the heck in the U.S. Constitution it says that there is a Right to PrivacyWhere do they make this crap up?

It's like we can make tender out any thing we want all over again. Instead of following the constitution:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

 

[pantagrapher]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy

Please please please will someone tell me where in the heck in the U.S. Constitution it says that there is a Right to PrivacyWhere do they make this crap up?

It's like we can make tender out any thing we want all over again. Instead of following the constitution:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

I think she's probably referring to the Bill of Rights, Amendment 4:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

But I'm with you on this one. Sine when is the Bill of Rights non-negotiable? Especially when we're dealing with terrorists who want to kill us to death. It's insane the level of freedom we put up with around here.

 

[Genedoc]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy

Please please please will someone tell me where in the heck in the U.S. Constitution it says that there is a Right to PrivacyWhere do they make this crap up?

It's like we can make tender out any thing we want all over again. Instead of following the constitution:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

Ahem - you are aware that the Constitutionality of a position depends on 200+ years of court cases in addition to the original document, right? Please tell me you know this. As for where the right to privacy is, you can find you answer here.

HTH.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy

Please please please will someone tell me where in the heck in the U.S. Constitution it says that there is a Right to PrivacyWhere do they make this crap up?

The Constitution cannot exist without a Right to Privacy. You asking the equivelent question of, "prove to me the Constitution was written in English."Just look. It's right in front of you.

 

[Bottomfeeder Sports]

which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy

Please please please will someone tell me where in the heck in the U.S. Constitution it says that there is a Right to PrivacyWhere do they make this crap up?

It's like we can make tender out any thing we want all over again. Instead of following the constitution:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

Griswold v. ConnecticutDecision

The foregoing cases suggest that specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance. See Poe v. Ullman, 367 U.S. 497, 516-522 (dissenting opinion). Various guarantees create zones of privacy. The right of association contained in the penumbra of the First Amendment is one, as we have seen. The Third Amendment, in its prohibition against the quartering of soldiers "in any house" in time of peace without the consent of the owner, is another facet of that privacy. The Fourth Amendment explicitly affirms the "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures." The Fifth Amendment, in its Self-Incrimination Clause, enables the citizen to create a zone of privacy which government may not force him to surrender to his detriment. The Ninth Amendment provides: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

The Fourth and Fifth Amendments were described in Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 630, as protection against all governmental invasions "of the sanctity of a man's home and the privacies of life."

We recently referred [p485] in Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 656, to the Fourth Amendment as creating a "right to privacy, no less important than any other right carefully an particularly reserved to the people." See Beaney, The Constitutional Right to Privacy, 1962 Sup.Ct.Rev. 212; Griswold, The Right to be Let Alone, 55 Nw.U.L.Rev. 216 (1960).We have had many controversies over these penumbral rights of "privacy and repose." See, e.g., Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U.S. 622, 626, 644; Public Utilities Comm'n v. Pollak, 343 U.S. 451; Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167; Lanza v. New York, 370 U.S. 139; Frank v. Maryland, 359 U.S. 360; Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541. These cases bear witness that the right of privacy which presses for recognition here is a legitimate one.

 

[fightingchick]

She's using Hamdi again to beat the administration down again. I swear, the idiots that came up with the definition of enemy combatent for this administration need to be shot. And Rumsfeld still needs to resign over that. I knew that case was going to cause more "trouble" down the road for executive power in war.

I appreciate your input on thise, but can you explain Hamdi and the definition of enemy combatent, please?

Bump...I'd like to know more about what you think the Fed's mistage was in thier definition of enemy combatents. I haven't heard that as an issue.

 

[Yankee23Fan]

She's using Hamdi again to beat the administration down again. I swear, the idiots that came up with the definition of enemy combatent for this administration need to be shot. And Rumsfeld still needs to resign over that. I knew that case was going to cause more "trouble" down the road for executive power in war.

I appreciate your input on thise, but can you explain Hamdi and the definition of enemy combatent, please?

Bump...I'd like to know more about what you think the Fed's mistage was in thier definition of enemy combatents. I haven't heard that as an issue.

I wrote a huge thread on it somewhere. I may have been purged.The current administration defined enemy combatent too broad, and in doing so left it pretty much open to anyone who they define as one, period. It was way way too broad under any law or FISA holding, and because of it their actions are being ripped apart. All they needed to do was use the same definition previously used, and they would have been fine.But they pooched it from the outset and it's going to set back the war making powers a little as the congress and the courts try to catch up.