BlackPerspective.net
Discussing the Diaspora as seen through an internal Black lens
FISA: Democrats Selling Us Out On Civil Liberties Again
February 13th, 2008
Yesterday the march towards the police state became stronger. Not only did the Senate, with much democratic approval, in a vote that only had 29 Senators out of 100 opposing the bill; not only did they approve warrantless eavesdropping on Americans in defiance of the U.S. Constitution, it gives retroactive immunity to corporations who broke the law by handing over our customer information to the government.
First of all, what is FISA?
FISA stands for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It was set up in 1978 to create a secret court to provide warrents so that surrvalance operations would not be made public and tip off the targets; yet maintained the Constitutional dictates that law enforcement go to the judicial branch with probable cause to be able to search people (which is what spying is in the most intimate way).
Today it’s being taken up by the House and must be stopped. Listen to my podcast about the issue:
GO HERE TO CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE . There is a box in the top left corner where you can put in your zip and go straight to your Reps page to get his/her contact info.
I pointed out in this post last week that “Everything that Bush did in the last 8 years was almost completely with the cooperation of democrats – EVERYTHING”:
* The majority of dems voted for the UnPatriot Act
* The majority of dems voted to reauthorize the UnPatriot (including Obama)
* The majority of senate dems voted for the war in Iraq
* The democrat controlled congress voted to approve increased warrant-less spying: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/03/AR2007080302296.html and scholarsandrogues.wordpress.com/2007/10/08/will-the-democrats-sell-out-america-on-fisa-spy-bill-vote-again/
* The majority of senate democrats still voted to continue funding the war even though they were elected to end it
* Department of Homeland Insecurity – the Dems only voted against a particular version because they were quibbling over the hiring and firing of civil servants; but it was democrats who initially proposed the department and they supported the creation of the department; this same department who’s initial directives included having citizens spy on one another and report to the FBI.
So in as much as we have a “police state” or “dictatorship” or however most of us who are against Bush’s usurping of power want to phrase it; the democrats have been complicit in handing power to the scepter of King George the Second.
Senate bows to White House on FISA bill
www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080213/NATION/138085468
Amnesty Day for Bush and lawbreaking telecoms
www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/?last_story=/opinion/greenwald/2007/08/06/fisa/
FISA Debacle
www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2007/08/06/fisa/index.html?source=rss
What is Harry Reid doing on FISA?
www.whereistheoutrage.net/wordpress/2007/10/20/what-is-harry-reid-doing-on-fisa/
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9 Responses to “FISA: Democrats Selling Us Out On Civil Liberties Again”
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About The Blog
Yobachi Boswell is creator and publisher of BlackPerspecitve.net. I’m a writer, activist and political watcher based in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve also been know to do some spoken word and MCing in my day.
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Why am I not surprised? In the information age that we live in everything we do or say is under surveillance. I only ask what can we as individuals in society do about it?
Yobachi,The Democrats are punks, they are becoming out of touch with the citizens, the American public understands we have been duped, and that is why Barack is winning.Our democratic party was afraid to not back these crazy laws and initciatives because the country appeared to be conservative,Bush has lost power and if Barack wins the democrats may grow balls. Nice pod cast, Biden is one of the biggest punks, I saw that during the Carlence Thomas hearings, Who should we vote for?
Urban Thought, there’s got to be some consequences for these people. If we keep voting the same people back in; why should the change their behavior. They’re getting rewarded for what they’re doing.
Fredrick Douglas said, “power never concedes without a demand. It never has and it never will”. That’s why I would hope the electorate would start demanding these assholes do the right thing or get rid of them.
We are not powerless. If we’d actually all stand up instead of everyone saying we can’t ; then something would get done. It takes each individual to do their part.
Hope you’ll call your congressmen.
Thanks JD.
It’s just all a big con game like Malcolm X said. These folks (the democrats and republican) are in cahoots with one another.
If people would just ever wake up and stop blindly supporting someone because they give good platitudes, and stop blindly supporting party’s. Both the dems and the reps are corporate bought.
Thanks. Have you read up on the Infragard where the FBI basically deputizes businesses to shoot to kill during Martial Law? We are slipping into a police state quickly. SMDH.
Mmmm, no I don’t think so aj, I’ll have to look into that.
Thanks for the heads up.
What am I doing wrong for some reason I can;t can’t the podcast to start.
Hmmm Cooper, I don’t know. If you can’t get it to work in the post; you can try the player in the right sidebar, or try listening to it straight from my utterz page: www.utterz.com/~h-Yobachi/v-circle/r-1/list.php
Yobachi - I couldn’t get it to work either - thanks to cooper popping in, we all can listen.
Regarding the Infragard that ‘aj’ spoke to. Here’s an excerpt from their home page:
“InfraGard is an information sharing and analysis effort serving the interests and combining the knowledge base of a wide range of members. At its most basic level, InfraGard is a partnership between the FBI and the private sector. InfraGard is an association of businesses, academic institutions, state and local law enforcement agencies, and other participants dedicated to sharing information and intelligence to prevent hostile acts against the United States. InfraGard Chapters are geographically linked with FBI Field Office territories. Each InfraGard Chapter has an FBI Special Agent Coordinator assigned to it, and the FBI Coordinator works closely with Supervisory Special Agent Program Managers in the Cyber Division at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
While under the direction of NIPC, the focus of InfraGard was cyber infrastructure protection. After September 11, 2001 NIPC expanded its efforts to include physical as well as cyber threats to critical infrastructures. InfraGard’s mission expanded accordingly.
In March 2003, NIPC was transferred to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which now has responsibility for Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) matters. The FBI retained InfraGard as an FBI sponsored program, and will work with DHS in support of its CIP mission, facilitate InfraGard’s continuing role in CIP activities, and further develop InfraGard’s ability to support the FBI’s investigative mission, especially as it pertains to counterterrorism and cyber crimes.”
Kinda gives you the warm fuzzies, doesn’t it. I feel so much better now, knowing that we can all sleep at night and wake up in the morning feeling chipper! I won’t even lock the front door tonight - that’s how safe I feel!
Horseshit.
Regarding FISA - it’s the same ole, same ole, same ole song. We’re looking out for you, we want to make you feel safe, we want to know every god damn thing about you, what you do, what you eat, where you shop, who your friends are, what you read, what you watch, what books you check out of the library, where you work, where you play, where you go, what you think, what is your net worth, what you are your recreational activities, who are you going to vote for, what is your party affiliation, ad infinitum. George Orwell, where are you now?