POLL: Is Ashcroft going too far?

[NogginBoink]

Ashcroft seems to be a popular topic of discussion on these boards, and you all know what I think about him... but no one's created a poll about him so I thought I would.

Basically, the question is: is Ashcroft going too far?

 

[Harvey]

Everything Ashcroft has done since he's been in office smells like he's trying to gut the Constitution and make the U.S. an ultra-right wing dictatorship. The man is a dangerous lunatic with an agenda that scares the hell out of me. :|

 

[NogginBoink]

Funny you used those words-- I just emailed my Congresspeople with an email whose subject line is (verbatim): "Ashcroft scares the hell out of me."

 

[eplebnista]

Is Attorney General John Ashcroft going too far in his actions in the "war on terrorism?"

Yes

 

[Lucky]

anyone see the story in USAtoday (today) about how the secret terrorism court that approves (secret) warrants and such declined to allow the justic department expanded powers it wants? it said that they had abused its power previously in dozens of cases and gotten warrants only by providing false information to the court.

we have a government that already shows a pattern of deceit and lies in the past and now we want to make it easier for them? i dont think so.

 

[Lucky]

Here's a link for that story

 

[ElFenix]

say no to asscroft.

 

[Chaotic42]

Yes. We're losing our freedoms left and right.

 

[mithrandir2001]

I hated Reno, but I think I'd like her back. Asscroft is dangerous and too radical to be a real American.

 

[Xenon14]

Here's another link.

I had a huge argument with my friend over the Patriot Act. Basically I stated that the government gets too much power and completely bypasses Balance of Powers by assigning "blank warrants" which do not require approval of the courts. He on the other hand "trusts" our government in making the right decisions. He's also naive babbling fool (who, mind you, is an immigrant from Russia ( a country who utilized their "best judgement" onto the people...i think it was called Communism.)).

 

[Deleted member 4644]

Originally posted by: Harvey
Everything Ashcroft has done since he's been in office smells like he's trying to gut the Constitution and make the U.S. an ultra-right wing dictatorship. The man is a dangerous lunatic with an agenda that scares the hell out of me. :|

 

[Miramonti]

Originally posted by: Harvey
Everything Ashcroft has done since he's been in office smells like he's trying to gut the Constitution and make the U.S. an ultra-right wing dictatorship. The man is a dangerous lunatic with an agenda that scares the hell out of me. :|

 

[diskop]

Originally posted by: Harvey
Everything Ashcroft has done since he's been in office smells like he's trying to gut the Constitution and make the U.S. an ultra-right wing dictatorship. The man is a dangerous lunatic with an agenda that scares the hell out of me. :|

 

[Jfur]

I don't think most of his decisions are making us safer from terror, but I do believe that our civil liberties are being drained away and that we are being held at bay by our fears about new terrorist acts. We may wake up soon with a new and more pervasive kind of terror: no freedom.

 

[Bulk Beef]

I think a lot of people agree with Harvey.

Ashcroft is a dickhead.

 

[Tominator]

Although I am worried greatly over the supposed 'loss of freedom,' Ashcroft is just feeling out the extent of the law and what the limitations are. He will abide by the courts unlike the previous administration.

We will see no Waco or Ruby Ridge. No outlandish efforts to deport someone. I won't even mention the driving from business of some 20,000 FFL holders who were completely legal until Reno's interpretation of the law drove them from business.

Where were you guys when Clinton was denying rights left and left?

 

[Lucky]

what specific instances are you referring to? What specific rights?

 

[XMan]

Originally posted by: Lucky
what specific instances are you referring to? What specific rights?

Cut and paste of my own post from "secret spy court smacks down Ashcroft proposals"

Same article, from the LA Times:

Text


Quote

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


. . .

The problem became so severe that the court convened a special session in November 2000 to consider "the troubling number of inaccurate FBI affidavits," and one agent was barred from appearing before the FISA court to present warrant requests, the court said.

Justice Department officials have been investigating the false claims by FBI officials for more than a year, but "how these misrepresentations occurred remains unexplained to the court," wrote U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth, then the presiding judge of the FISA court, in the May 17 opinion.

. . .

Justice Department officials also stressed that the 75 cases cited in the May ruling occurred before President Bush took office, and said that the problems were corrected by a succession of legal reforms within the department over the last two years.

They cited a speech given last year in which Lamberth credited Ashcroft for ensuring that all FISA applications were "well scrubbed" and free of inaccuracies that had plagued earlier applications. "The process is working," Lamberth said in the speech.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Perspective is everything, ain't it?

 

[Tominator]

Originally posted by: Lucky
what specific instances are you referring to? What specific rights?

Can you read?

 

[Lucky]

Originally posted by: Tominator

Originally posted by: Lucky
what specific instances are you referring to? What specific rights?

Can you read?

Yes, you referred to Waco and ruby ridge, two instances which garnered great attention but which in reality afffected virtually no one in the general public. Elian should have been deported anyways. I'm not familiar with your last comment but I dont see what specific right was violated.

 

[glenn1]

Is Ashcroft going too far?

Ashcroft is a political appointee. That means, like all political appointees, he doesn't take a piss without getting permission from his boss. If you dislike what Ashcroft is doing, the blame properly should be shifted to President Bush. If he wanted Ashcroft to cool out, he wouldn't even need to say so directly, all he would have to do is just barely imply it, and Ashcroft would turn soft and cuddly as a kitten.

 

[Lucky]

Originally posted by: glenn1

Is Ashcroft going too far?

Ashcroft is a political appointee. That means, like all political appointees, he doesn't take a piss without getting permission from his boss. If you dislike what Ashcroft is doing, the blame properly should be shifted to President Bush. If he wanted Ashcroft to cool out, he wouldn't even need to say so directly, all he would have to do is just barely imply it, and Ashcroft would turn soft and cuddly as a kitten.

Perhaps, but to attack bush here inevitably draws the "gore lost, get over it" comment as you are assumed to be a leftist democrat.

 

[Tominator]

Originally posted by: Lucky

Originally posted by: Tominator

Originally posted by: Lucky
what specific instances are you referring to? What specific rights?

Can you read?

Yes, you referred to Waco and ruby ridge, two instances which garnered great attention but which in reality afffected virtually no one in the general public. Elian should have been deported anyways. I'm not familiar with your last comment but I dont see what specific right was violated.

Oh? So until you are affected directly it does not matter what the government does....the perfect Liberal arises..
:Q

 

[Lucky]

Nice try. Not gonna work, im not even a liberal!

I'm saying that you giving two situations where the government went amok are incomparable to what this administration has done (and wants to do).

 

[datalink7]

Originally posted by: Harvey
Everything Ashcroft has done since he's been in office smells like he's trying to gut the Constitution and make the U.S. an ultra-right wing dictatorship. The man is a dangerous lunatic with an agenda that scares the hell out of me. :|