The US Senate on Friday reauthorized the warrantless wiretapping program started under President George W. Bush by a 73 to 23 vote, easily evading the several amendments proposed to check its dangerous surveillance powers.
The FISA Amendments Act of 2008 authorized broad, warrantless surveillance of Americans’ international communications, checked only by a secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that doesn’t make it’s activities and procedures available to the public.
Even though the government has acknowledged that the secretive program has exceeded its legal limits, violating Americans’ Fourth Amendment constitutional rights, the Obama administration has aggressively pushed for its full renewal.
When the law was passed in 2008 it amended the Bush administration’s initial program and broadened powers for domestic surveillance. President Obama was a presidential candidate at the time, and warned that, while he was voting for its passage, it “does not resolve all of the concerns that we have about President Bush’s abuse of executive power.”
However, as President Obama has fully embraced the unchecked executive powers and secretive surveillance capabilities built into the FISA Amendment. And the controversy that the bill conjured in 2008 is contrasted with the subdued acceptance of it in 2012.
“The Bush administration’s program of warrantless wiretapping, once considered a radical threat to the Fourth Amendment, has become institutionalized for another five years,” said Michelle Richardson, the ACLU’s legislative counsel.
Several tame amendment were proposed by Senators Ron Wyden, Rand Paul, and Jeff Merkely to try and rein in the surveillance program. But they were all rejected, and the Obama administration has refused to release any further information about it.
“The only thing the public really knows about it so far,” writes Julian Sanchez, a policy scholar at the Cato Institute, “is that it was almost immediately misused, resulting in ‘significant and systemic’ overcollection of Americans’ purely domestic communications. Subsequent reporting revealed that the improperly ‘overcollected’ communications could number in the millions, and included former president Clinton’s private e-mails. So naturally, the Senate is charging ahead toward the renewal of these sweeping powers without hearings or debate.”
As the American for Civil Liberties Union has explained, the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper says “it isn’t even ‘reasonably possible’ to estimate how many Americans are swept up in the NSA’s expansive dragnet.”
The Obama administration, as is usual in cases where they disregard the Constitution, promises this mass surveillance comes with strong safeguards and accountability. In reality, the war on terrorism is continuing to be used to justify major infringements on the civil liberties of Americans.
FOR THE PEOPLE,BY THE PEOPLE ,OF THE PEOPLE, ALL THESE BASIC DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES ARE FADING AWAY FROM THE MAIN STREAM POLITICAL SPHERE. NOW A DAYS MORE POLITICIANS ARE BECOMING LIKE NAZIS, THEY ARE ESTABLISHING NAZI's IDEOLOGY IN THE DEMOCRATIC WAYS. WE WERE PROUD TO LOOK AT THE "STAUE OF LIBERTY " IN NEW YORK AND IT WAS A SYMBOL OF FREEDOM AND JUSTICE AND NOW WHAT IS THE PLIGHT OF THE LAW ABIDING CITIZENS.i HAVE THE FEELING THAT THE "THE INTELLIGENTIA" THE FBI AND THE CIA ARE AGAIN RESORT ING TO THE OLD TACTICS OF "BRAIN CONTROL" WHICH WAS OUTLAWED SEVERAL YEARS BACK TO SQEEZE THE 'THE THINKING' OUT OF THE LAW ABIDING CITIZENS.
LET THE COLD WAR ERA RISE AGAIN.THAT WILL BALANCE THE WORLD POWER. THOSE WHO STUDY HISTORY KNOW THAT IN BOTH WORLD WARS AMERICA AND RUSSIA WERE ALLIES AND THEY BOTH KNOW HOW MUCH DESTRUCTION THEY CAN INFLICT ON HUMAN BEINGS IF THEY ARE ON THE OPPOSITE SIDE. THEN WHY WORRY. STOP TORTURING LAW ABIDING CITIZENS.
"…once considered a radical threat to the Fourth Amendment, has become institutionalized…"
And that is the way it is done now. And the American people (and I suspect other countries also – tho I don't know) sit mainly idly back and allow it to happen. Why? Could be they believe the BS they're being fed to justify it…or maybe it's out of fear – part of the lie. Or maybe they agree with the unlimited power being granted to the government. There are many who rail against the government's intrusiveness in our lives but there also seems to be many who want the government to have this power – to protect them…or they're making a profit from the expansion of Big Brother… None of it is good. My fear is that there are not enough who 1. are paying attention and 2. don't really give a crapolla.
In the end, we will regret the lack of concern on Everyman's part and the lack of accountability on the government's part. But, that's just this old Curmudgeon's opinion…
Huray! Who didn't know all the civil libertarians (the left) would the right thing and keep us safe 🙂
This spying doesn't mean that the elites running our government "care" about you and want to know all about you – actually they don't give a s–t about you. All they want to keep tabs on is whether you are a threat to their sweet little deal or not. Start talking about getting rid of them and they will turn up the volume – start talking about going hungry or losing your home or not knowing how long your job will be there and they will switch channels.