No Meeting on August 27th....

See you in September!

Topic for 8/13 Drinking Liberally get-together: Dems give Bush the right to keep spying on Americans so they can go on vacation

Meeting Time:  7:00 pm, Monday August 13th
Meeting Place:  Tumwater Valley Bar and Grill

So Let me get this right:  Congress votes to give Bush and Company the privilege of warrantless wiretapping, and gives the Attorney General (you know, the guy they want to impeach) and the Director of National Intelligence the authority to decide who in this country the US government will spy on.

I'm thinking we need to clean house again.  Anyone want to run for Congress?  Maybe the Senate?  By the say, does anyone know why Patty Murray didn't vote on this issue?

But I digress.....at Monday's meeting, among the things that I propose for discussion:  Do you think Congress is looking our for our best interest?  And by Congress, I mean Democratic members of Congress.  Are they in it just to get re-elected or are do they have a "higher vision?"  Is there anything we can do to influence decision making other than writing letters and getting canned replies back in return?

Want to learn more?

A detailed blog post on this issue, complete with congressional voting record on this subject, can be found at Pat's Daily Grind.

From AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: With FISA Law, Democrats Give Bush a Blank Check for Domestic Spying (link to full article below):

Responding to fear-mongering by the Bush administration, the Democrat-led Congress put its stamp of approval on the unconstitutional wiretapping of Americans. George W. Bush has perfected the art of ramming ill-considered legislation through Congress by hyping emergencies that don't exist. He did it with the USA Patriot Act, the authorization for the Iraq war, the Military Commissions Act, and now the "Protect America Act of 2007" which amends the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

FISA was enacted in 1978 in reaction to excesses of Richard Nixon and the FBI, who covertly spied on critics of administration policies. FISA set up a conservative system with judges who meet in secret and issue nearly every wiretapping order the administration requests.

But that wasn't good enough for Bush. In 2001, he secretly established his "Terrorist Surveillance Program," with which the National Security Agency has illegally spied on Americans. Instead of holding hearings and holding the executive accountable for his law-breaking, Congress capitulated once again to the White House's strong-arm tactics. As Congress was about to adjourn for its summer recess, Bush officials threatened to label anyone who opposed their new legislation as soft on terror. True to form, Congress -- including 16 Senate and 41 House Democrats -- caved.

The new law takes the power to authorize electronic surveillance out of the hands of a judge and places it in the hands of the attorney general (AG) and the director of national intelligence (DNI). FISA had required the government to convince a judge there was probable cause to believe the target of the surveillance was a foreign power or the agent of a foreign power. The law didn't apply to wiretaps of foreign nationals abroad. Its restrictions were triggered only when the surveillance targeted a U.S. citizen or permanent resident or when the surveillance was obtained from a wiretap physically located in the United States. The attorney general was required to certify that the communications to be monitored would be exclusively between foreign powers and there was no substantial likelihood a U.S. person would be overheard.

Under the new law, the attorney general and the director of national intelligence can authorize "surveillance directed at a person reasonably believed to be located outside of the United States." The surveillance could take place inside the U.S., and there is no requirement of any connection with al-Qaeda, terrorism or criminal behavior. The requirement that the AG certify there is no substantial likelihood a U.S. person will be overheard has been eliminated.

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: With FISA Law, Democrats Give Bush a Blank Check for Domestic Spying

One million Iraqis killed | Press Esc

Whether this figure is accurate or not, it cannot be disputed that hundreds of thousands of Iraquis have lost their lives due to the US invasion.

And impeachment is off the table...... 

One million Iraqis have been killed in the violence caused by the US-led invasion of March 2003, an independent think tank estimated based on the study published in prestigious medical journal The Lancet and the online civilian casualty database Iraq Body Count.

Just Foreign Policy pointed out that since the last scientific estimate of 601,000 violent Iraqi deaths attributable to the U.S.-led invasion was made over a year ago, it necessarily does not include Iraqis who have been killed since then.

One million Iraqis killed | Press Esc

Ex-DOJ employees spar with administration - Lisa Lerer - Politico.com

I have found that the old adage, what goes around comes around most often comes true. Though our Congress seems unable--or unwilling-- to make the hard choices that must be made, fired DOJ'ers are doing the dirty work.

I especially like the quote about lawyers going postal.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales knows well the ways of sparring with the Senate Judiciary Committee, but increasingly he is facing an uncommon and more effective adversary: former Department of Justice career attorneys who are out to settle the score with Gonzales and the administration.
After months of scandal, firings and some testimony from Gonzales that many on Capitol Hill found wholly unsatisfying, these ex-Justice Department employees are taking a rare step and fighting back.

Former employees of the Civil Rights Division are channeling their workplace rage into lobbying force. The government lawyers say they were ignored, disrespected and kicked out by Bush appointees. The attorneys describe an increasingly partisan workplace, where political appointees intimidated career lawyers and undermined civil rights to push political agendas.

The Justice Department rejects the charges. "Many of the criticisms of the Civil Rights Division and its current and former employees are unfounded,” said Civil Rights Division spokeswoman Cynthia Magnuson. “It is unfortunate that critics repeatedly ignore the division's strong record and resort to political and personal attacks."
But the ex-employees, now safely out of the administration, are undeterred and are increasingly speaking out in a clamor of congressional testimony, letters to committees, scathing op-eds and a whole lot of well-publicized trash talking.
For a government lawyer, it's the equivalent of going postal. "These are people who have spent their entire lives being loyal [to the department]," said Mark Agrast, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress focused on legal issues. "It goes against their grain to speak out."

Ex-DOJ employees spar with administration - Lisa Lerer - Politico.com

Hispanic Voter Shift Gives Hope To GOP, Democrats Still Hold An Edge, But Are Losing Ground Among Young And College-Educated Hispanic Voters - CBS News

Now, if I were Hispanic--which I'm not--why would I vote republican?  The republican party have done nothing but shown amazing prejudice against people from Hispanic heritage. 

(AP) Democrats hold an edge with Hispanics in national elections, but Latinos' growing tendency to register as independents and split their vote between parties is buoying Republican prospects for 2008.

Hispanic Voter Shift Gives Hope To GOP, Democrats Still Hold An Edge, But Are Losing Ground Among Young And College-Educated Hispanic Voters - CBS News

Another example:

A developmentally disabled Hispanic man was deported last may, and only recently found, returned to the US, and released to his family, reports the LA Times.  The story goes on to say that while the US government acknowledged the mistake, the government felt no obligation to help search for the man.

Unions Go Slow in Backing a Democrat - TIME

John Edwards had been expecting major endorsements from USA unions.  It hasn't happened.  And in the AFL-CIO Forum earlier this week, it was Dennis Kucinich that stole Edward's thunder.  This from Time Magazine, written prior to the Forum 

In a campaign season that has started earlier than ever, one powerful group trying not to get swept up in the heat of the moment is organized labor. As members of the largest U.S. umbrella union, the AFL-CIO, gather in Chicago for the launch of their presidential endorsement process, no immediate endorsements are expected. And that is causing particular angst for the Democratic candidate who has worked hardest for the union vote: John Edwards.

Unions Go Slow in Backing a Democrat - TIME

By the way, the Debate was scheduled for 4:00 Pacific Time.  That is the time for virtually all the other debates--I wonder what the debate organizers are thinking....that the Pacific Time zone folks don't vote?

Warrantless Surveillance: Taking Liberties

This weekend the Democratic Congress expanded the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) giving the Bush Administration power to tap international telephone calls and email messages of American citizens. Not concerned? Well maybe you ought to be. Here's what the Center for National Security Studies says about it:

The Center for National Security Studies strongly opposes the administration’s FISA bill, S. 1927, because it would permit the National Security Agency to acquire and analyze all international communications of Americans, without any meaningful judicial oversight. The administration legislation would allow the NSA warrantless access to virtually all international communications of Americans with anyone outside the US, so long as the government declared that the surveillance was directed at people, which includes foreigners and citizens, reasonably believed to be located outside the US, a definition that covers billions of people.

The administration rejected all reasonable efforts to require that such surveillance be focused on foreigners, be directed at terrorist targets or be limited to protecting against international terrorism. They also rejected efforts to include meaningful court review of the rights of individual Americans’ swept in or even an independent audit of the affect on the privacy of Americans.

This legislation would sunset or expire in six months. However, the sunset has an exception that would allow any directives by Attorney General Gonzales and Director of National Intelligence McConnell that commandeer access to US telephone and internet companies to remain in effect until their expiration (which is likely to be until the end of the administration since the directives can be issued for up to one year, so could be issued to last for the next six months and then reissued on the eve of the sunset, in January 2008, to remain in effect until this administration is finally over in January 2009).

For CNSS’ full analysis and information on the status of requested documents about surveillance of Americans please follow this link

Here's how Washington's Congressional delegation voted:

Nay	WA	Cantwell, Maria [D]
No Vote	WA	Murray, Patty [D]

Nay	WA-1	Inslee, Jay [D]
Nay	WA-2	Larsen, Rick [D]
Nay	WA-3	Baird, Brian [D]
Aye	WA-4	Hastings, Doc [R]
Aye	WA-5	McMorris Rodgers, Cathy [R]
Nay	WA-6	Dicks, Norman [D]
Nay	WA-7	McDermott, James [D]
Aye	WA-8	Reichert, Dave [R]
Nay	WA-9	Smith, Adam [D]

Source: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s110-1927

Campaign Finance: Who's Giving, Who's Getting

Search who is getting how much and from where at this website, an extensive database for information on campaign finance.

http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/index.asp