Senator Ron Wyden Says White House Is Required By Law To Reveal Details Behind Yahoo Scanning
from the where's-my-popcorn? dept
So, one of the things in the USA Freedom Act is a provision requiring that the White House declassify any "novel interpretations" of the law in ordering surveillance. This was to avoid the situations, such as under the Section 215 program, where the intelligence community reads words to mean things differently than anyone else would read them. Now, given what we've learned so far about the Yahoo email scanning case and the fact that it clearly goes beyond what people thought the law enabled, it seems clear that there's some interpretation somewhere that's "novel."And that means that the White House should declassify the reasoning. Now Senator Ron Wyden is asking them to do exactly that:
“Recent reports of a mass-email scanning program have alleged that federal law is being interpreted in ways that many Americans would find surprising and troubling,” Wyden said. “The USA Freedom Act requires the executive branch to declassify Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court opinions that involve novel interpretations of laws or the Constitution and I certainly expect the Executive Branch to follow this law.”This is, obviously, something of a warning shot to the administration. Chances are they'll ignore this, but that could turn into a pretty serious strategic mistake. As we've been saying since it first came out, James Clapper should explain what's happening, because the longer they stay silent, the worse this looks.
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Filed Under: fisa court, mass surveillance, nsa, odni, ron wyden, surveillance, usa freedom act
Companies: yahoo
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Rule of Law is long gone
And we already know that next President Hillary considers herself above the law.
The problem is that the entire federal government feels free to ignore the law at their whim.
Wyden can't even convince his Senate colleagues to act on this specific item. This issue is will go nowhere.
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Re: Rule of Law is long gone
That aside, you've got a point. I greatly appreciate that Wyden's out there fighting the good fight, but sadly his attempts to rein in the executive branch on surveillance, drones, etc. don't tend to get much traction from either party.
I expect he and Feingold will have a lot to talk about come January, though.
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Re: Rule of Law is long gone
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"But, your honor! I've been speeding on that road for many years! So I shouldn't have to pay a fine."
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Re: Rule of Law is long gone
As do many in the 1%. They feel they are above the law that everyone else must adhere to .. because, reasons.
Some feel entitled to certain perks they have become accustomed to and are offended when others attempt to point out it out, and enraged when others attempt to correct the situation
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Everyone at or above GS-12 is hereby granted a blanket pardon.
Happy Holidays!
-- President Hussein Obama, 12/25/2016
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But I did read several where many poor people have been pardoned.
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Oh come on, seriously?
"strategic mistake"? Since when have there been any consequences for intelligence officers dragging their feet and/or completely ignoring Congress and laws? There aren't even consequences for perjury and lies upon lies upon lies that are uncovered month after month with ever-changing stories. No reprimands have ever been given.
So why would it be a "strategic mistake" to ignore Wyden? What is he going to do? Throw a tantrum? So what.
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Re: Oh come on, seriously?
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Re: Re: Oh come on, seriously?
http://law2.wlu.edu/deptimages/Powell%20Archives/PowellMemorandumTypescript.pdf
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Criminals like Snowden? Snowden is one of the "good guys"!
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You pirates?... there you go again!... chasing all those "something for nothing" guys! By the way, Johnny Depp isn't a real pirate!... he's just an actor!
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Please!... no emails!
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Please!... no emails!
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Please!... no emails!
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They passed a bill that decimates protection our people had overseas, didn't read it until after it passed, and have yet to start reaping what they have sown... the reason?
Because the bill mentioned 9/11 Families and no one wanted to vote against them.
Literally the bill could have called for euthanizing the 10 oldest members of Congress to make sure it kept up with society, and as long as it mentioned the 9/11 families they would have passed it.
Congress will refuse to touch this because they have made it so making any challenge to the spread of big brother means you are a terrorist lover who hates America. They've sold out the people they are supposed to represent, while chopping away at the foundation of the nation.
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The power to order people to be killed bystepping law and due process and separation of powers is outside of that a leader of a republic may wield without the powers of dictatorship.
The U.S.A. is not "well on the road to becoming a dictatorship", it _is_ a dictatorship due to the amount of executive powers outside of judicial control granted to its president and the U.S. equivalents of SS and SA. And stuff like unilateral retroactive pardons for people violating human rights and the U.S. constitution also have no place in a republic.
That president and administration choose to follow the law when it's convenient is cute but rather meaningless.
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Mommy, what's a law?
I don't know, Sheepy.
I think there used to be laws and voting and stuff before the Ivies took over and eliminated evil from the world.
Now that everyone has brain chips, we just don't need laws anymore. If anyone thinks bad thoughts, the brain chip floods our brains with drugs to make us feel so good the bad thoughts just go away.
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Wake up, you don't even know who your real enemy is.
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Yes, the PATRIOT Act was written by Congress. And it grants power to the executive branch. The President, AG, FBI, CIA, NSA, et al have tremendous leeway, which was conferred onto them by Congress.
(Not for nothin', the third branch of government, the judicial branch, has not put much of a check on that executive power.)
You're correct that Obama has been unable to close Gitmo in the face of congressional resistance. You're also correct that, in terms of warrantless domestic surveillance, Clinton or Trump is likely to continue the policies of Bush and Obama.
But that's not because the President is powerless to stop these surveillance programs. That's foolish. The President is in charge of the surveillance apparatus.
And in this particular instance, a Senator is trying to exercise oversight of the President on that very issue.
Because, you see, "Congress" isn't some kind of monolithic entity. There's only one President, but there are 535 people in Congress. It is possible to agree with some of them on some issues and others on other issues.
Dummy.
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