Nice moving target there. Oh.. it doesn't matter if it is illegal or not because I'll passive aggressively go back to being wildly aggressive about how illegal it is.I have not asked any questions on the legality, in a technical sense, of Obama's actions. My issue is whether or not Obama, legally or otherwise, violated the principles of separation of powers, and abused his power by failing to execute the laws faithfully. As I pointed out earlier, many a fine dictatorship's actions in history has been as "legal" as Obama's flirtations with autocracy.
This is good too. "Pretty crafty of you offering evidence to support the position the decisions aren't illegal. But I don't need to address it because in the end, it is all illegal."Providing the hand crafted justification from Holder's Dept of Justice is interesting - as are some other legal commentaries I have read. After doing so, I remain ambivalent on the question. I also do not care - the issue is did Obama use his power justly and in the interests of the law. The answer is no.
I have not asked any questions on the legality, in a technical sense, of Obama's actions.
This is true. You haven't asked any questions about the legality of the Obama's executive order. You've out and out claimed they were illegal and immoral and worthy of a death sentence.
My issue is whether or not Obama, legally or otherwise, violated the principles of separation of powers, and abused his power by failing to execute the laws faithfully. As I pointed out earlier, many a fine dictatorship's actions in history has been as "legal" as Obama's flirtations with autocracy.
Providing the hand crafted justification from Holder's Dept of Justice is interesting - as are some other legal commentaries I have read. After doing so, I remain ambivalent on the question. I also do not care - the issue is did Obama use his power justly and in the interests of the law. The answer is no.
Yes, you don't care so much you've said he deserves to be murdered.
Nah, I'm making the assumption that you're posting like a homicidal, racist idiot whose brain has finally snapped.
Nah, I'm making the assumption that you're posting like a homicidal, racist idiot whose brain has finally snapped.
Sorry, you can't ignore the limits of Democracy without expecting a reaction. At some point, someone will take the law into their own hands and pursue violent resistance.
Sorry, you can't ignore the limits of Democracy without expecting a reaction. At some point, someone will take the law into their own hands and pursue violent resistance.
Over what must we fight violently?
That some people we don't know can stay?
Why should I react violently to this?
Especially when none of these people are the real enemy.
In any event, you have to understand how deeply divisive and polarizing Obama's actions have been. And now his action(s) has violated the American democratic traditions, and such violations of the norms has been increasingly intense
In December 2005, the New York Times reported the National Security Agency was tapping into telephone calls of Americans without a warrant, in violation of federal statutes and the Constitution.
In the years since 9/11, our government has illegally kidnapped, detained and tortured numerous prisoners. The government continues to claim that it has the power to designate anyone, including Americans as "enemy combatants" without charge.
The FBI's Investigative Data Warehouse, as an example, has grown to over 560 million records. Over and above the invasion of privacy represented by any one specific program, a combination of new technologies, expanded government powers and expanded private-sector data collection efforts is creating a new "surveillance society" that is unlike anything Americans have seen before.
Since then, the Justice Department's Inspector General found that the FBI has issued hundreds of thousands of national security letters, a majority against U.S. persons, and many without any connection to terrorism at all. In September 2007, the ACLU won a landmark victory when a judge struck down the national security letter provision of the Patriot Act because part of the statute violated both the First Amendment and the separation of powers doctrine.
The Bush administration has been one of the most secretive and nontransparent in our history. The Freedom of Information Act has been weakened , the administration has led a campaign of reclassification and increased secrecy by federal agencies (including the expansion of a catch-all category of "sensitive but unclassified"), and has made sweeping claims of "state secrets" to stymie judicial review of many of its policies that infringe on civil liberties
The 2005 Real ID Act, rammed through Congress by being attached to a unrelated, "must pass" bill, lays the foundation for a national ID card and makes it more difficult for persecuted people to seek asylum.
Since 9/11 the number of similar watch lists has mushroomed to about 720,000 names, all with mysterious or ill-defined criteria for how names are placed on the lists, and with little recourse for innocent travelers seeking to be taken off them.
Government agencies — including the FBI and the Department of Defense — have conducted their own spying on innocent and law-abiding Americans. Through the Freedom of Information Act, the ACLU learnedthe FBI had been consistently monitoring peaceful groups such Quakers, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Greenpeace, the Arab American Anti-Defamation Committee and, indeed, the ACLU itself.
Most of those detained as material witnesses were never treated as witnesses to the crimes of 9/11, and though they were detained so that their testimony could be secured, in many cases, no effort was made to secure their testimony. The government has apologized for wrongfully detaining 13 people as material witnesses. Some were imprisoned for more than six months and one actually spent more than a year behind bars.
The ACLU has filed a lawsuit challenging this ideological exclusion, charging that it is being used to prevent United States citizens and residents from hearing speech protected by the First Amendment. Additionally, government policies and practices have hampered academic freedom and scientific inquiry since 9/11, creating a system where science has come under siege. The government has moved to overclassify information and has engaged in outright censorship and prescreening of scientific articles before publication.
Over what must we fight violently?
That some people we don't know can stay?
Why should I react violently to this?
Especially when none of these people are the real enemy.
It depends on how far a people (or some people) can be pushed without doing something that is suicidal. When a government has repressed the liberty and safety of its citizens over decades of usurpations, it has been death by a thousand cuts and at some point someone will make a violent stand. They usually do so because they are convinced that all non-violent means will not prevent the trajectory of the nation, in this case a march to an omniscient State.
In any event, you have to understand how deeply divisive and polarizing Obama's actions have been. And now his action(s) has violated the American democratic traditions, and such violations of the norms has been increasingly intense.
It was not so long ago that Obama campaigned against the imperial Presidency, criticizing George Bush for his avoidance of Congress. He promised to roll back the excesses in National Security law, assassinations, repression of leakers, and conducting wars without Congressional approval. And more recently, he has repeatedly stated that he could not, and should not, do WHAT he has just DONE.
It is offensive to the conscious of much of America to see a President break his oath, to abuse his power in a way never contemplated (even by himself) - the intentional refusal to execute a major law of Congress in good faith. No one could believe a President would simple make 1/2 of all illegals "legal" - the anti-democratic effrontery is stunning. And, in principal, it now means any President can simply refuse to execute any federal law that harms a demographic group or special interest that he/she chooses.
To the contrary, there’s no indication that the still-active warrantless wiretapping program—which includes a warrantless dragnet on millions of innocent Americans’ communications—has significantly changed from the day Obama took office. With regard to the FISA Amendments Act, the Obama Administration has actively opposed all proposed safeguards in Congress. All the while, his Administration has been even more aggressive than President Bush in trying to prevent warrantless wiretapping victims from having their day in court and has continued building the massive national security infrastructure needed to support it.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...one-strikes-to-kill-Americans-on-US-soil.htmlBarack Obama 'has authority to use drone strikes to kill Americans on US soil'
President Barack Obama has the authority to use an unmanned drone strike to kill US citizens on American soil, his attorney general has said.
Sovereign Immunity
In addition, in both Jewel and other cases, the government has raised extremely technical legal arguments that the cases must be dismissed because it has “sovereign immunity.” In Al-Haramain v. Obama, a case where the government was caught red-handed illegally wiretapping attorneys, the Obama Administration was even able to convince the Ninth Circuit to dismiss the case because, according to the court, only government individuals can be sued, not the agencies that actually did the spying.
ACLU: Obama Worse Than Bush On Civil Liberty Issues
By Jim Heath
Friday June 14, 2013 12:19 PM
Hi, folks. I'm a newbie here and am impressed favorably by the level of discussion.
I've been politically active since 1972 in environmental causes and used to occasionally vote Republican. I even ran once in a Repub primary. When Reagan invited the xians into the Party, I resolved to not vote Repub again until they leave. They haven't left. If the Greens ever start running candidates in local races I might register with them.
Best wishes.
