US House Rejects Telecom Amnesty 614
The US House has just approved a new bill that rejects the retroactive immunity to telecommunication businesses and denies most of the new powers for the US President to spy on citizens without a warrant. "As impressive as the House vote itself was, more impressive still was the floor debate which preceded it. I can't recall ever watching a debate on the floor of either House of Congress that I found even remotely impressive -- until today. One Democrat after the next -- of all stripes -- delivered impassioned, defiant speeches in defense of the rule of law, oversight on presidential eavesdropping, and safeguards on government spying. They swatted away the GOP's fear-mongering claims with the dismissive contempt such tactics deserve, rejecting the principle that has predominated political debate in this country since 9/11: that the threat of the Terrorists means we must live under the rule of an omnipotent President and a dismantled constitutional framework."
Yay (Score:2, Interesting)
Separation of powers is a good thing; the more conflict between the White House and Capitol Hill, the less the rights and incomes of the American citizenry will be eroded.
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:5, Interesting)
At that time, it wasn't unreasonable to believe the president. Of course, now that we know he lied, he should be tossed out, perferable on the last day in office, so he still gets it noted in the history books, but Cheney has no time to do anything else.
hmm, or maybe do it sooner, and then toss Cheney out for lying as well, preferably on the same day.
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:2, Interesting)
Ultimately, the only reason these "Blue Dogs Democrats" finally saw the light was because folks like the people at Firedoglake decided to start raising funds to help their primary opponents in the next election.
It's amazing what a little fear of losing their cushy job can make a recalcitrant politician do.
Still, they are to be commended for finally saying "No" to the spoiled child in the White House.
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:5, Interesting)
When Bush leaves, criminal prosecutions by a Democrat-run Justice Department against telecom employees might get them to inform on the illegal behaviour carried out by Bush administration officials in a plea bargain. With telecom immunity however, the Bush/Telecom omerta can continue.
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:3, Interesting)
These same people would vote for Bush again. With all the evidence out there, it makes you wonder, doesn't it?
Re:ACLU is biased? (Score:2, Interesting)
Agreeing with the Supreme Court makes you... wait for it... Conservative.
Re:ACLU is biased? (Score:0, Interesting)
I won't speak for anyone else, but I personally would like to see the ACLU defend the entire Bill of Rights with wolverine-like intensity. That's not what they do. They defend the First Amendment with wolverine-like intensity, and the Fourth Amendment with at least wolf-like intensity, but if they defend anything else, I can't think of it right now.
And their stance on the Second Amendment is particularly galling. I once saw, on a web page, a poster by the ACLU that showed the Bill of Rights: it had ten things on it, not numbered. The Second Amendment was not on there, and one of the long ones was split so that it looked like two Amendments. That is so far beyond neutrality, it's outright dishonesty. I wish I had saved the URL, or that I could find it now. (If you Google for it, you find a lot of pages that aren't the right page.)
I will hasten to point out that the above is in reference to the national-level ACLU. There are likely some state-level ACLU chapters that have a more reasonable stance on the entire Bill of Rights.
I have heard arguments that feel the definition of a "militia" is not specifically spelled out in the 2nd Amendment and is open to interpretation and that therefore what the founding fathers meant when writing about a "well regulated militia" might mean something more/different than what the ACLU interprets it to mean.
When the Constitution was written, everyone agreed what the "militia" meant, and IIRC the term is defined somewhere in the Constitution. That doesn't matter. Consider this sentence:
"A well educated populace being generally a good thing, the right of the people to own and read books shall not be infringed."
Would you argue that the part before the comment materially affects the meat of that sentence? The important part is: "the right of the people to own and read books shall not be infringed."
The Second Amendment is the same exact deal. There is a superfluous clause at the beginning commenting on why the rest of it is important, but it doesn't significantly change anything. The Second Amendment says "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." And that is what it means.
"Keep and bear arms"-If they did mean specifically "citizens" or "individuals" do you think the founding fathers meant ALL types of arms? It was pretty limited back then...cannons, pistols, rifles, swords, so maybe at that time they did. If they meant all types of arms then, do you think that would be appropriate now? There are quite a few people I can think of that don't really need to be carrying around grenades or rockets.
Consider the First Amendment. Court rulings have established that it does not, in fact, protect you from the legal consequences of yelling "FIRE!" in a crowded theater. (Even in a modern theater, someone might get hurt in a panicky stampede.) The First Amendment does not protect every kind of imaginable speech. But overall, the presumption is that it does cover almost everything.
So, I think we can all agree: if a judge rules that the Second Amendment doesn't cover private ownership of nukes, that's not an undue infringement of our Constitutional rights. (Robert Heinlein once wrote a story where a weapon was invented that would make the sun go nova, killing all life on Earth. If there were such a device, I don't think any of the Founding Fathers would consider that a protected weapon!)
Now, the Miller decision basically said that the clause about a "militia" meant that the Second Amendment protects militia-style weapons. Miller was found guilty of possessing a sawed-off shotgun because no one argued that a sawed-off shotgun was a useful military weapon. (IIRC Miller and his lawyer were not present in the courtroo
people (Score:2, Interesting)
And the founders were very clear as to intent, people back then owned what they wanted to, fullstop, there were no restrictive gun laws based on anything until the "jim crow" racist laws started. ( albeit, to be quite fair, slavery in general though was one of two instances of the founders really screwing up, that and the "general welfare" clause) That's right, antigunners got their start as racists, right along with the poll tax, anti "miscegenation" laws, and so on. As to militia, the inclusion was to specify who of "the people" could be called up to serve the governor, that is the organized militia (everyone else is unorganized militia and can be volunteers, but can't be compelled to serve, the organized and then by default "other" or unorganized in total is "the people"), but it had nothing to do with who could keep or bear, that goes back to "the people". Out of the complete pool of the people, a certain subset could be mustered and can't sday no, but it has to be a damn real emergency to, not some bankers war over yonder so a few big companies can make profits.
And the miller decision was seriously flawed, laughably so, absurdly so and easily proven. It was about a short barrel shotgun, saying it had no "militia" purpose. bullcrap, the founders knew there were different weapons and made zero exceptions, these were highly educated and erudite writers, they would have included exceptions if they wanted them., they didn't. Google for "trench gun" used in ww1, which was prior to the miller decision. You have to remember history then, the government was scared shitless of some physical revolt happening, the bankster fraudsters and their sock puppet politician dweebs had screwed the economy over and ripped off 90% of the population and the "people" were getting righteously pissed off about it. *That* is why you got the miller decision, it was mandated from on high to start gradually disarming the US people to protect fatcats from righteous wrath (that they deserved back then).
I quit the NRA in 68 because it was obvious they were sellouts, the establishment got to them and they got compromised (again, also quite clearly at the time racist, they didn't want black folks getting any more guns because of the failure of the civil rights act of 64 and the resultant riots, we needed "law-n-order!!"). If you were around back then you could remember it, I do because I was involved in both civil rights/freedom in general, conservation issues and gun rights (still am but sort of semi retired now).
I never joined the ACLU because they have a centralized controlled government bent that is at odds with a lot of other freedoms (like where are they on constitutional money? absent) I think it is OK they are fighting for free speech, but as an over all org I give them a c-. They could be much better. That this is all we have though, I agree, pitiful.
The NRA exists today as a jobs program for the fatcats who run it. they have done nothing but compromise and give in on every critical point as long as I can remember, and have been consistently on the "wrong" side of every major issue. Wrong on scamwar viet nam, wrong on compromising on gun rights, wrong about the war on some drugs (prohibition II), wrong about supporting the arbusto gang and his crew of fascist fear mongersand.. and a big huge list going way back, I'm not going to type all night.
They are the "useful idiots" center for know nothings who cannot read nor think and it keeps them from being really effective, clueless knobs join them and think that is enough. Stupid, but so it goes. Other gun rights orgs are much better, run by better people who actually understand the whole idea and the real law and the structure of the USA as a completely different concept than any other nation ever conceived, where the individual
Re:Its about damned time... (Score:3, Interesting)
Beyond the fact of giving individuals the right to own weapons, it further gives those armed individuals to be a part of a well regulated militia. Not only are guns then protected, but so is being part of a practiced, organized, private group that trains in the effective military use of those guns. Not a hunting club or a target sport club, but a militia. What do you think the DHS would do if they found proof of the existence in the US of an actual militia that trained together regularly?
Re:ACLU is biased? (Score:-1, Interesting)
From the U.S. Code; TITLE 10, Subtitle A, PART I, CHAPTER 13, 311Prev [cornell.edu]: That seems pretty definitive to me.
As to "well regulated", I've heard (and it seems reasonable to me) that the meaning has shifted over the years. Originally it meant something like, "the property of something being in proper working order. Something that was well-regulated was calibrated correctly, functioning as expected." Of course today it means something considerably different.
Not that we follow the Constitution anymore anyway.
Re:Evil men doing good things (Score:2, Interesting)
The times have changed, as has technology, but the underlying tenets of the Constitution still apply, and We the People (as defined in the constitution), as well as our elected congresscritters need to learn to recognize that.
I am rather amazed and pleased that the Dems decided to grow a spine, and vote to stop letting these things happen.