Earlier quoted context omitted.
Throwing out a prediction: If the Biden/Harris ticket wins in 2020 and Trump is charged with anything, expect a pardon from the president. People will rage for a bit, get tired, run out of attention span, and move on to the next controversy.
> expect a pardon from the president. Biden is on record saying this is right off the table. He will not pardon Trump.
Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
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Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#252Now, when can we begin prosecuting the instigators? Presumably, after we have prosecuted those who ordered and participated in torture. (There is no statute of limitations on torture, is there?)
Will Clapper's perjury ever be punished?
Don't forget about Keith B. Alexander, the director of the NSA at that time.
He testified to congress that this program helped foil 54 terror plots. Weeks later, he conceded that it was helpful in "only one or two".
We later found out there was basically just one, and it wasn't a terror plot; it was a Somali-born taxi driver living in San Diego who attempted to send $8,500 to a Somali terror group.
But the damage was done. The headlines blared from his initial testimony about the NSA using this program to thwart 50+ terror plots, but there was a fraction of that coverage correcting it.
Clapper's perjury may be more blatant, but Gen. Alexander's is pretty galling too. They both should've been charged.
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#253Earlier quoted context omitted.
He knowingly and clearly broke laws by stealing and disclosing classified information. I think he was ethically correct to do so, and his act qualified as civil disobedience, but that's why the US government is after him.
Media is calling Snowden a "leaker" rather than whistleblower, because Trump has been considering pardoning him. The only thing the media cares about is 'orange man bad'. >Trump says he is considering pardon for leaker Edward Snowden https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-politics-snowden/trum... discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24174265
TIL: one headline constitutes "the media".
Also: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/congressional-report-slams-...
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#254That's the trouble with power.. sooner or later it is wielded by someone you don't control.
It's not the abuse of power that is the problem but the power to abuse.
http://www.harrybrowne.org/articles/PrinciplesOfGovernment.h...
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#255Earlier quoted context omitted.
>> If the Constitution says "Congress shall make no law..." and Congress still makes a law, what are you going to do, throw Congress in jail? That's nonsense. > Actually, it's nonsense to think anything to the contrary. Either our founding document matters as the backbone of our Laws or it doesn't. Your outlandish logic nullifies any power that the government may have over it's people. It nullifies the social contrac…
> honestly any attempt to add jail time to the mix would probably have all kinds of disastrous consequences to the balance of those checks. If this governmental system is to by dynamic enough to survive, its parts need the ability to probe the boundaries as needed. That can't happen if the people who make them up are paralyzed in personal fear of being jailed for a misstep. > The framers themselves recognized that, s…
The solution here is on fixing the parties/elections not imposing penalties on office holders. Higher quality candidates need to be on the ballot and make their way into office.
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
The standard answer, of course: a war, especially after a national civil war, prosecuting everyone who participated in the enemy's side will be a disaster. Also whistleblowing cases.
To the extremely limited and minimal extent that whistleblowers have been pardoned, good on that president/governor, but I think it is atrocious that whistleblower protection relies on pardon power—we need much, much stronger protections for whistleblowers, in my opinion. I think 90% of people are basically good but don't really want to stick their neck out of line—which means rules by themselves will never constrain…
> we need much, much stronger protections for whistleblowers, in my opinion. [...] That includes institutionally empowering whistleblowers.
Agreed. Relying on pardoning is at best a stop-gap solution to a broken system.
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#257Unfortunately, this is:
1) Only a 3 judge panel, so their will be an appeal for the full court to here the case.
2) Not yet over even if the full panel agrees, because then it will be appealed to the Supreme Court.
So it could still be years before the issue is finally
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#258>implying anyone gives a shit >implying they will stop
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#259Pardon Snowden.
Hard to even pretend he did something wrong after this ruling. The government was proven to be acting illegally and likely also unconstitutionally, he had a moral imperative to alert the public.
So does he also have a moral imperative to stand trial for what laws he himself broke?
So basically the US needs to follow their strict laws to the T. But adversaries like Russia and China can play as dirty as they want.
Moralists will do well against communist dictatorships, I'm sure.
Re: Ninth Circuit rules NSA's bulk collection of Americans' call records was illegal
#260Can we put James Clapper in prison now, pls? Or is he still untouchable?
What did he do?