[wvns] FISA Courts Dismantled Just in Time
FISA courts dismantled just in time
By Marlene Lang,
08/12/07
"Daily Southtown"
What if you or I could secretly commit crimes against our fellow
citizens, bury the evidence of the crime by stamping it "TOP SECRET,"
refuse to answer questions when we are accused of committing the
crime, and then, before we can be prosecuted for the crime, we can
make a law that says the crime we committed is no longer a crime. And
then call ourselves heroes.
Welcome to the New America.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act has required, since 1978,
that government agents obtain a warrant before spying on Americans. A
special system of courts was set up to hear the reasons such spying
was necessary, with judges granting the warrants under rather lenient
conditions. The feds were allowed, when granted a warrant, to listen
in on international phone calls; a later provision included electronic
communications: It was simple accountability, based on the Fourth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
One week ago, the FISA court system was effectively set aside by your
president and his sneaky administration, in the name of keeping you safe.
Bush's National Security Administration was accused in 2005 of
listening in on the international calls of Americans, without getting
warrants first. Two American attorneys for an Islamic charity
organization have since sued the administration, armed with a log of
their calls -- inadvertently released and copied -- despite the TOP
SECRET stamp on every page. Their case is to be heard in federal court
in San Francisco on Aug. 15.
What to do? The Bush administration had asked the court to dismiss the
case altogether, then claimed it could not defend itself in such a
lawsuit, because to do so, it would have to give up information that
would threaten national security. In the New America, there seems to
be no constitutional tromping that cannot be justified in the name of
national security.
But, just a nose ahead of the first serious legal challenge to the
NSA's spying program, Bush signed a law on Aug. 5 that revamps the NSA
program, broadening the spy scope, making it all legal.
The handy new law allows international surveillance by means of fiber
optic cable -- the medium of most international communication today --
and best of all, without a warrant. Who needs the Federal Intelligence
Surveillance Act?
It was a tricky move. The FISA law had not yet caught up with
technology. But suddenly, it was a matter of great urgency, even
though the administration had been stretching the spirit of the law
and abusing advances in technology to get around the letter of the
law, for years. These acrobatics will no longer be necessary.
The FISA courts have been stripped of any real oversight; the attorney
general and the director of national intelligence will now approve
international surveillance. There will be no examining of the
individuals being spied upon, to decide if the surveillance is
reasonable. Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell called it
"modernizing" FISA, and graciously submitted to post-surveillance
"reviews."
McConnell assures us the new law's targets will be foreigners, not
Americans.
So, relax. You can trust the Administration of the Freely Reigning
Executive never to abuse or stretch the limits of its power. Or, you
can stay off the phone with your friends overseas.
Daily Southtown columnist Marlene Lang can be reached at
blackbirdlang @ yahoo.com"
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