Court rejects challenge to wiretap program: Major victory for Bush administration

Source: Los Angeles Times

By Henry Weinstein, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 16, 2007

A federal appeals court in San Francisco today handed a major victory to the Bush administration, ruling that a lawsuit challenging the government's warrantless wiretapping program could not go forward because of the "state secrets" privilege. In a 3-0 decision, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the government, which had argued that allowing an Islamic charity's claims that it was illegally spied upon to go forward would threaten national security.

In the opinion, Judge M. Margaret McKeown flatly rejected the government's argument that "the very subject matter of the litigation is a state secret." However, after privately reviewing sealed information from the government, McKeown said on behalf of the three-judge panel, "We acknowledge the need to defer to the executive on matters of foreign and national security and surely cannot legitimately find ourselves second-guessing the executive in this arena."

The victory was not absolute. The court sent the case back to a lower court to consider whether the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires the government to seek warrants for anti-terrorist wiretaps from a special court, preempts the state secrets privilege. The proceedings on that issue could take months. But coming from three judges, all appointed by Democratic presidents, in one of the most liberal federal circuits in the country, the ruling demonstrates a reluctance by the courts to intervene in President Bush's handling of the war on terrorism.

The lawsuit, filed by the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation and two of its attorneys, challenged the National Security Agency's spying endeavor, called the Terrorist Surveillance Program, which was launched after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks....

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-me-secrets17nov17,0,7326576.story?coll=la-home-center

:banghead:

just saying...

...should the Specter compromise ever become law! The government will claim "state secrets privilege", and the suits against the government will be dismissed!

Of course. Hmmmm. How many months, would you guess? Say...maybe until next November or January? Just long enough to allow Bush to get away with everything, right?

I'm just astonished that the court says they can't "second guess" the President. It's their job to second guess him!!!!

Please, allow me to join you in that :banghead:

.

Utterly revolting, I say!

(oh wait--that's probably what happened...)

...which listed the names and residences for certain of the judge's family members who would be subject to extraordinary rendition should she rule against the executive in this matter... oh well, never mind that.

The plaintiffs' case has basically been dismissed, but the ability of the federal judge to review the "sealed information" that enabled this ruling could easily be interpreted as precedent for any decision by the lower court to support FISA warrant procedure as trumping a blanket "state secrets" claim -- i.e., the judicial can participate as a peer to the executive branch even in national security matters. In that sense, it's still a potentially costly victory for the bushistas, but the setback to civil rights causes is clear and immediate.

The federal government can eavesdrop at will as long as it claims national security privilege, and cannot be challenged on any claim of said privilege due to "state secrets", hence we have no legally active expectation of privacy in our communications. That's going to have repercussions.

:eyes:

.

by me of Hillary that is. She'll love this and other precedents set by Bush. All those precedents support corporatacracy in it's worst form, and so does she...of course she's not alone among the candidates, just saying.

Reid keeps the Senate in session, and meanwhile, our Fourth Amendment rights get shafted.

This is very troubling. I am sufficiently knowledgeable in Constitutional law to comment on the merits; however, I have no inhibitions about commenting on the effects of that ruling. This is an extension of McCarthy-era J.Edgar Hoover attacks on fundamental Constituional guarantees. Something all of us living today are well aware of. Most troubling is who the judges are and which Circuit made these findings. This does not bode well for any impeachment efforts or post election prosecutions.

I'm not sure where in the Constitution the rights of the Executive are promoted over the rights of the Citizen. The Fourth Amendment, protecting individual citizens from searches and seizures absent probable cause seems to be a pretty absolute, bright line legal authority. For the Executive to make up a "state secret" doctrine pretty much out of thin air that trumps the citizen's enumerated right in the Constitution seems to be an overstepping of the Ninth Circuit's legal authority.

I'd be very interested to see if there is a "balancing" analysis in the opinion that would guide future courts in terms of deciding when it's okay to subvert the Constitution on little more than the Executive's "because I say so" argument.

:grr:

Bush can apparently commit illegal acts and alot of judges are willing to support such acts when the "state secrets" claim is waved around like a flag.

Wiretapping?
Wiretapping methods?

Horseshit!

...allowing the government to violate the law and the Constitution any damn time they please as long as they say the magic words...

where do we expect we're going to be headed ---

WAR gives Bush all the BS that produces "national security -"

We've got an AWOL Draft-Dodger as "Commander in Chief" which means as long as he's got the war,
we have the bills and the suppression of our liberties ---

Like IKE said . . .
and I guess he was our first conspiracy theorist --- !!!

What is going on here? What strange ruling from this court.

Hello, judges? Do you not realize that you are an equal power to balance that of the executive?

I guess not :shrug: :cry: