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Bush Administration Criticizes Federal Judge For Banning Warrantless Wiretapping

November 18, 2006 3:38 p.m. EST



Linda Young - All Headline News Staff Writer

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - In an ongoing turf war, the president said on Friday that an August judicial decision outlawing his warrantless wiretapping program was wrong.

Pres. George W. Bush said that U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor was mistaken to interpret the U.S. Constitution as banning his warrantless wiretapping program. On Thursday, he ordered the Justice Department to appeal the ruling.

"Those who herald this decision simply do not understand the nature of the world in which we live," Bush told reporters at his presidential retreat in Camp David, MD, Fox news reported.

In her ruling, Taylor said she struck down the warrantless surveillance program because it violated the rights of free speech, privacy and the constitutional separation of powers, CNN reported.

"It was never the intent of the framers to give the President such unfettered control, particularly where his actions blatantly disregard the parameters clearly enumerated in the Bill of Rights," she wrote. "The three separate branches of government were developed as a check and balance for one another."

Taylor ordered the National Security Agency's warrantless electronic communications monitoring program within the United States stopped. Under that program, the NSA interceps some telephone calls and e-mails if at least one person is outside the U.S. and it is suspected that one of the two parties might be linked to terrorism.

Bush had instituted the program after 9/11.

But Bush was not the only official in the nation's executive branch who chose this week to critisize the August ruling from the judicial branch of government. Vice President Dick Cheney and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales also criticized the decision.

Sometimes freedom sucks.





Too bad. I'd rather have terrorist-ridden freedom than gov't-controlled security.

Accountable;463761 wrote: Sometimes freedom sucks.





Too bad. I'd rather have terrorist-ridden freedom than gov't-controlled security.


I have to agree. We have checks and balance's in this country for a reason.

Diuretic;463782 wrote: As I understand it, the approved process is both efficient and secure. That being so I have to wonder why the executive would seek to circumvent constitutional safeguards.
Because 'efficient and secure' sometimes disregards freedom and rights, which do and should take priority here.

Diuretic;463825 wrote: It's the bedevilling question isn't it?



As I understand it though there is a process in place which allows the fed govt to approach a court and ask for a wiretap warrant in complete secrecy but with the court safeguarding the rights of the parties.



I understand that the process is quite quick. That was my point about "efficiency".



Now if that's the case then why would the executive seek to avoid the legal process?



Rhetorical question I know.
I don't think it's rhetorical at all, and I would like an answer. Why indeed would they not want to follow established procedure, unless there is an underhanded motive?

You should not have to worry about people listening to your private conversations without them having to go to court and show just cause.

Anything other than that and we are in a george orwell book, or sliding into communism.

Watch out, you never know, this Thread may be tapped also! :wah:

LOL!

Honestly. How can you justify what appears to be random profiling?

Stumbled acroos this and it seemed rather apposite.

LOUIS BRANDEIS:

"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government purposes are beneficent...The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning, but without understanding." -- Justice Louis Brandeis, 1928


Don't know who he is but i assume he was american from the title.

Here's what I got:

superspyomatic wrote: arnold layne secretly smokes clove cigarettes with a limp wrist.