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Democracy

  • Angry and Furious at the Collaborationist Democrats
    10 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
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    I don’t understand. An hour after I saw the Times "scoop" on the Bush illegal wiretapping plan, I wrote that it was clearly illegal and unconstitutional.
    But as it now turns out, dozens of politicians, as well as the New York Times knew about the surveillance plan and did nothing.
    Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House, and Senator Jay Rockefeller, the Democratic senator from West Virginia, a man known for some sensitivity to civil liberties infringements, and a (…)

  • New Alito Opposition Efforts Launched
    9 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
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    By civilrights.org staff
    With Samuel Alito’s confirmation hearings scheduled to begin next week, groups opposed to President Bush’s nominee to replace Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court are stepping up their efforts to inform the public about Alito’s record.
    IndependentCourt.org, a coalition of public interest organizations, launched a new 30-second television spot Wednesday focusing on the fact that as a federal judge, Alito has more than once broken promises he made to the Senate (…)

  • The $4bn industry that is America’s guilty secret
    4 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
    2 comments

    By Rupert Cornwell
    Lobbying is Washington’s grubby secret. Some say lobbying is part of the democratic process. Others claim it is legalised bribery, even corruption. But love it or loathe it, it is the way Washington works.
    Usually you hear little about the quiet meetings, the lavish lunches and junkets that lubricate American politics. But every once in a while something comes along to open the system to what it hates most: daylight. The case of Jack Abramoff, influence-peddler (…)

  • A Gestapo Administration: Bush tactics parallel Hitler’s rise to power
    2 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
    6 comments

    Caught in gratuitous and illegal spying on American citizens, the Bush administration has defended its illegal activity and set the Justice (sic) Department on the trail of the person or persons who informed the New York Times of Bush’s violation of law.
    Note the astounding paradox: The Bush administration is caught red-handed in blatant illegality and responds by trying to arrest the patriot who exposed the administration’s illegal behavior.
    Bush has actually declared it treasonous to (…)

  • NSA Spying on Americans: Official objected; decision on who to monitor left up to a shift supervisor
    2 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 - A top Justice Department official objected in 2004 to aspects of the National Security Agency’s domestic surveillance program and refused to sign on to its continued use amid concerns about its legality and oversight, according to officials with knowledge of the tense internal debate. The concerns appear to have played a part in the temporary suspension of the secret program.
    The concerns prompted two of President Bush’s most senior aides - Andrew H. Card Jr., his (…)

  • A U.S. view: So this is how democracy dies
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)
    1 comment

    This is the land of the free and the home of the brave? This is the “democracy” we’re killing people to spread around the world? by Keith Gottschalk
    Sorry to interrupt what has been a very entertaining election season in Canada this holiday period, but I regret to inform you that your neighbour’s house is on fire.
    As reported by Ron Hutcheson of the Knight Ridder new service on Tuesday: A defiant President Bush said he didn’t need explicit permission from Congress or the courts to (…)

  • It Wasn’t All Bad
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    by Katha Pollitt
    All year long it’s been one piece of bad news after another, but now it’s time to put on the rose-colored glasses and list some of the good things that happened in 2005. I had to e-mail about fifty people to come up with these items, but that’s OK. Keeping you cheerful is part of my job. I mean, the war could be wrong, but the Iraqi elections could still be good. So fill that glass half full with whatever and...and...well, just drink it.
    1. The Bush Administration is on (…)

  • Constitution loses in Haiti election fight: analysts
    1 January 2006 par (Open-Publishing)

    By Jim Loney
    MIAMI (Reuters) - Haiti’s constitution is being violated by both the U.S.-backed interim government and by the candidacy of a Haitian American millionaire running strongly in the polls in a long delayed election, analysts say.
    "The government has not been paying much attention to the constitution," said Brian Concannon, a U.S. lawyer who worked in Haiti and helped prosecute military leaders accused of a peasant massacre.
    The first round of voting in the troubled Caribbean (…)

  • ACLU: Bush Broke the Law and Lied to the American People
    31 December 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
    1 comment

    WASHINGTON, Dec. 30 - The Justice Department said on Friday that it had opened a criminal investigation into the disclosure of classified information about a secret National Security Agency program under which President Bush authorized eavesdropping on people in the United States without court warrants.
    The investigation began in recent days after a formal referral from the security agency regarding the leak, federal officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the (…)

  • GO TO THE LIGHT!
    31 December 2005 par (Open-Publishing)
    1 comment

    By Sheila Samples
    Folks at the White House stay pretty busy these days just trying to untangle the lies George Bush keeps telling every time he opens his mouth. For example, back in April 2004, Bush explained to a cheering audience and an unchallenging press corps in Buffalo about "eavesdropping" on Americans — "When you think ’Patriot Act,’ constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because," he said earnestly while leaning (…)