2,176 Secret Warrants Issued in 2006

[ProfJohn]

For the life of me I will never know why Bush didn't use this court from the start. Would have saved a lot of pain in the ass BS from the Libs.
link

A secret court approved all but one of the government's requests last year to search or eavesdrop on suspected terrorists and spies, according to Justice Department data released Tuesday.
In all, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court signed off on 2,176 warrants targeting people in the United States believed to be linked to international terror organizations or spies. The record number is more than twice as many as were issued in 2000, the last full year before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

One application was denied in part, and 73 required changes before being approved.

The disclosure was mandated as part of the renewal of the Patriot Act, the administration's sweeping anti-terror law. It was released as a Senate intelligence panel examined changes to the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that could let the government more easily monitor homegrown terrorists.

But in its three-page public report, sent to Senate and House leaders, the Justice Department said it could not yet provide data on how many times the FBI secretly sought telephone, Internet and banking records about U.S. citizens and residents without court approval.

The department is still compiling those numbers amid an internal investigation of the FBI's improper?and in some cases illegal?use of so-called national security letters. The letters are administrative subpoenas that do not require a judge's approval.

A March audit by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine concluded that some FBI agents had demanded personal data without official authorization, and improperly obtained telephone records in non-emergency circumstances. It also found that the FBI for three years underreported to Congress how often it used national security letters to ask businesses to turn over customer data.

Assistant Attorney General Richard Hertling said the FBI would give Congress updated numbers for 2007, and corrected data for last year, when it finishes "taking steps to correct the identified deficiencies in its tracking of NSLs."

In 2005, the FBI reported issuing national security letters on 3,501 citizens and legal residents.

The FISA court also approved 43 warrants to let investigators examine business records of suspected terrorists and spies. It changed four of the applications before approving them, but did not deny any, according to the Justice report.

 

[Rainsford]

It seems pretty obvious to me why Bush would want to skirt the FISA court. The FISA court is almost notorious for singing nearly anything the government puts in front of them, and as ProfJohn has pointed out, using the FISA court would have avoided issues from those pesky people unreasonably demanding that you follow the law. It would seem to be win/win, it shouldn't interfere with national security, yet it has the benefits of protecting civil liberties at the same time. It's almost as if a very smart group of people created it to deal with just such a situation... :roll:

So, why would Bush want to ignore the court? It seems to me that the only real reason would be because he wanted to do things even the very permissive court wouldn't allow, like wiretapping random folks for the crime of being Muslim, or wiretapping huge groups of "suspicious" people, or exactly the kind of things the FISA court was created to prevent. I can't see another reasonable explanation, and since Bush has yet to provide one, I'm not sure what to think...

 

[ProfJohn]

Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

You have a better explanation?

I haven't seen a better explanation in any of your posts yet.

 

[UberNeuman]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

Why are you so willing to dismiss any oversight..

 

[ProfJohn]

Originally posted by: UberNeuman

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

Why are you so willing to dismiss any oversight..

Go read the first line of the OP and get back with me.
Bush was stupid for not going this route in the first place. All he did was give the Democrats a stick to hit him over the head with.

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

I don't buy that argument. Of course that's what they're going to say NOW, but FISA clearly says Bush was wrong...the only alternative is that FISA is unconstitutional, which has not been very well argued at all, much less proven in a court of law.

 

[CallMeJoe]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.
Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

Bush avoided the courts because his administration thinks it is above such petty considerations as "the Rule of Law". They bypassed the courts - who would have approved any legitimate investigation in a timely manner - because he's "the Decider" and can do whatever he decides to do. Courts be damned, Congress be damned, all that matters is what King George and his minions want.

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

YOu are right. Bush should be allowed to explain this himself at his impeachment hearings.

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: Rainsford

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

I don't buy that argument. Of course that's what they're going to say NOW, but FISA clearly says Bush was wrong...the only alternative is that FISA is unconstitutional, which has not been very well argued at all, much less proven in a court of law.

The FISA courts won't rubber stamp your taps when you're tapping everyone by scrutinizing all voice and data traffic and scanning it for keywords. Even Bush isn't stupid enough to believe they'd sign off on that.

 

[Mxylplyx]

Originally posted by: dmcowen674

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

You have a better explanation?

I haven't seen a better explanation in any of your posts yet.

Yes, because yours are so insightful....

 

[ayabe]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: Rainsford

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
Rain, I think Bush avoided the court because they though that they didn?t need the courts permission to do the wire taps they were doing.

Why do you guys look at everything they do and try to find the worst possible explanation for it?

I don't buy that argument. Of course that's what they're going to say NOW, but FISA clearly says Bush was wrong...the only alternative is that FISA is unconstitutional, which has not been very well argued at all, much less proven in a court of law.

The FISA courts won't rubber stamp your taps when you're tapping everyone by scrutinizing all voice and data traffic and scanning it for keywords. Even Bush isn't stupid enough to believe they'd sign off on that.

+1 :thumbsup:

This is exactly what is occurring

 

[imported_Shivetya]

A secret court approved all

I just cannot get past the words secret and court.

Sorry, just isn't in me.

 

[jman19]

Originally posted by: ProfJohn
For the life of me I will never know why Bush didn't use this court from the start. Would have saved a lot of pain in the ass BS from the Libs.

Yeah, that pain in the ass BS like making sure our constitutional rights aren't being trampled. You are the biggest partisan shill on these boards, ProfJohn, and that is saying a lot.

 

[fskimospy]

I don't think his wiretaps had much of anything to do with what he could and couldn't wiretap as the FISA court was already pretty much a rubber stamp. I personally believe he did it for a similar reason as he has done a bunch of other things in his presidency, to reassert executive power. If you notice he has pushed executive power far far beyond any president in recent history, and is continually trying to push for more. Laws like FISA he views as unreasonable checks on the executive and he's trying to set precedent for ignoring them.

 

[Strk]

I sometimes wonder if he didn't use it because they didn't think people would be so willing to pass it. You have to remember Congress (Republicans really) shot down Clinton's attempt to expand wiretapping after Oklahoma.