Category Archives: Bill of Rights

Strip Searches for Everybody!

03 Tuesday Apr 2012

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Constitution, Police State, Supreme Court

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Same song, different verse:

“Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, joined by the court’s conservative wing, wrote that…”

This time it’s about driving another nail into the coffin of the Fourth Amendment and the protection against unreasonable search and seizure. Strip searches for everybody!

“Every detainee who will be admitted to the general population may be required to undergo a close visual inspection while undressed,” Justice Kennedy wrote, adding that about 13 million people are admitted each year to the nation’s jails.

The procedures endorsed by the majority are forbidden by statute in at least 10 states and are at odds with the policies of federal authorities…The federal appeals courts had been split on the question, though most of them prohibited strip-searches unless they were based on a reasonable suspicion that contraband was present.”

Anybody still think this Court gives a damn about precedent and would hesitate for one minute before overturning the entirety of the Affordable Care Act? Dream on.

“Justice Breyer said that the Fourth Amendment should be understood to bar strip-searches of people arrested for minor offenses not involving drugs or violence, unless officials had a reasonable suspicion that they were carrying contraband.”

But this is what passes for reason on the Roberts Court:

“Justice Kennedy responded that “people detained for minor offenses can turn out to be the most devious and dangerous criminals.” He noted that Timothy McVeigh, later put to death for his role in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, was first arrested for driving without a license plate. “One of the terrorists involved in the Sept. 11 attacks was stopped and ticketed for speeding just two days before hijacking Flight 93,” Justice Kennedy added.”

So let’s take the most extreme examples we can think of and use it as justification to strip search everybody who has an expired license plate or inspection sticker. Who knows, law enforcement might accidentally stumble onto one those “devious and dangerous criminals” who drive around with a burned-out tail light. And if the hijacker had been strip-searched on September 9 are we to assume that he had the plans for 9/11 shoved up his ass?

I’m convinced more and more every day that we’d be better off with the Diana Ross Supremes making decisions rather than this group of 5 Barnum and Bailey rejects in black robes.

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Somebody’s Watching Me

16 Friday Mar 2012

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Civil Liberties, Police State

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The new National Anthem:

Because they are, or soon will be:

“Under construction by contractors with top-secret clearances, the blandly named Utah Data Center is being built for the National Security Agency. A project of immense secrecy, it is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks.

The heavily fortified $2 billion center should be up and running in September 2013. Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.”

It is, in some measure, the realization of the “total information awareness” program created during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its potential for invading Americans’ privacy.

But “this is more than just a data center,” says one senior intelligence official who until recently was involved with the program. The mammoth Bluffdale center will have another important and far more secret role that until now has gone unrevealed. It is also critical, he says, for breaking codes. And code-breaking is crucial, because much of the data that the center will handle—financial information, stock transactions, business deals, foreign military and diplomatic secrets, legal documents, confidential personal communications—will be heavily encrypted.

According to another top official also involved with the program, the NSA made an enormous breakthrough several years ago in its ability to cryptanalyze, or break, unfathomably complex encryption systems employed by not only governments around the world but also many average computer users in the US. The upshot, according to this official: “Everybody’s a target; everybody with communication is a target.”

[…]

[F]or the first time since Watergate and the other scandals of the Nixon administration—the NSA has turned its surveillance apparatus on the US and its citizens. It has established listening posts throughout the nation to collect and sift through billions of email messages and phone calls, whether they originate within the country or overseas. It has created a supercomputer of almost unimaginable speed to look for patterns and unscramble codes. Finally, the agency has begun building a place to store all the trillions of words and thoughts and whispers captured in its electronic net. And, of course, it’s all being done in secret. To those on the inside, the old adage that NSA stands for Never Say Anything applies more than ever.”

Obama Administration Pot Calls Out Pakistani Kettle

31 Friday Dec 2010

Posted by in Afghanistan, Bill of Rights, drone strikes, Justice Department, Obama, Obama administration, Pakistan, torture, war on terror

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From the Department of Blatant Hypocrisy, Do As I Say, Not As I Do Division:

“The Obama administration is expressing alarm over reports that thousands of political separatists and captured Taliban insurgents have disappeared into the hands of Pakistan’s police and security forces, and that some may have been tortured or killed.

The concern is over a steady stream of accounts from human rights groups that Pakistan’s security services have rounded up thousands of people over the past decade, mainly in Baluchistan, a vast and restive province far from the fight with the Taliban, and are holding them incommunicado without charges.”

Welcome to the Hotel Gitmo. You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.

“Separately, the report also described concerns that the Pakistani military had killed unarmed members of the Taliban, rather than put them on trial.

…Two months ago, the United States took the unusual step of refusing to train or equip about a half-dozen Pakistani Army units that are believed to have killed unarmed prisoners and civilians during recent offensives against the Taliban. The most recent State Department report contains some of the administration’s most pointed language about accusations of such so-called extrajudicial killings.”

Kind of like this?

“From the moment he stepped foot inside the White House, Obama set about expanding and escalating a covert CIA program of “targeted killings” inside Pakistan, using Predator and Reaper drones armed with Hellfire missiles..that had been started by the Bush administration in 2004.

On 23 January 2009, just three days after being sworn in, Obama ordered his first set of air strikes inside Pakistan; one is said to have killed four Arab fighters linked to al-Qaida but the other hit the house of a pro-government tribal leader, killing him and four members of his family, including a five-year-old child.

…During his first nine months in office he authorised as many aerial attacks in Pakistan as George W Bush did in his final three years in the job…According to the New America Foundation thinktank in Washington DC, the number of US drone strikes in Pakistan more than doubled in 2010, to 115. That is an astonishing rate of around one bombing every three days inside a country with which the US is not at war.”

And then there’s this from the Obstruction of Justice Department, Look Forward Division:

“The U.S. Department of Justice has rejected a request from prosecutors in Warsaw for assistance in the investigation into the alleged CIA prisons in Poland, where captives claim they were tortured. On 18 March, the Prosecutor’s Office of Appeal in Warsaw filed a motion for legal assistance from the US Department of Justice into the probe…[T]he US informed prosecutors that the motion had been rejected on the basis of the international Agreement on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters and that the U.S. authorities consider the matter “to be closed”.

So far, the U.S. Justice Department has failed to comply with its treaty obligations to supply information requested by prosecutors in Spain, Germany, Italy, and Poland who are probing allegations of kidnapping, false arrest, assault, and torture by persons believed to be CIA agents in connection with extraordinary rendition operations.”

This has, by far, been my biggest disappointment with the current administration. Legislative policies are one thing-legislation can be amended, superseded, or repealed. But by continuing, and in some cases expanding upon, the Bush administration “war on terror” tactics, and pursuing this “look forward, not back” lunacy, it has now become the accepted and established policy of two successive administrations—one Republican and one Democratic–that the United States of America now condones actions (indefinite detention without charges, denial of due process) that were once upon a time (pre-9/11) considered a violation of our Bill of Rights.

It also lets other countries that enter into treaties with us know that we will abide by the conditions of those treaties only so far as it is convenient and politically expedient for us to do so, and denies us any credibility on the world stage when it comes to the condemnation of other country’s human rights violations.

In short, we prove to the world that America is a nation of preachers and not practicers.

A Conversation With Thomas Jefferson

22 Monday Nov 2010

Posted by in Afghanistan, Bill of Rights, Financial Crisis, Foreclosures, lobbyists, Politics, special interests, Uncategorized, Wall Street

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I recently sat down for an interview (sort of) with our third president and author of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson. The questions are mine, the responses all quotes attributed to Jefferson. You could look it up:

Mr. Jefferson, a topic in the headlines lately are the security measures being taken in our airports, the aim of which is, allegedly, our safety. What is your opinion on that?

“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.”

Many Americans are protesting these actions by government officials. Would you support that effort?

“All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent…Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.”

Some see this as the continuation of policies instituted after September 11 which erode our civil liberties and Constitutional protections. Your thoughts?

“Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of the day; but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period, and pursued unalterably through every change of ministers too plainly proves a deliberate, systematic plan of reducing us to slavery.”

Also, on a related subject, what about the controversy over whether or not to try terrorist suspects in civilian court?

“I consider trial by jury as the only anchor yet devised by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.”

Moving on to economic issues, have you been keeping up with what’s been labeled Foreclosuregate?

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”

What about the influence of the financial system on our political process?

“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the Government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.”

And the influence, in general, of special and corporate interests?

“Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains.”

What about the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and elsewhere around the world?

“I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of mankind…I love peace, and am anxious that we should give the world still another useful lesson, by showing to them other modes of punishing injuries than by war, which is as much a punishment to the punisher as to the sufferer.”

“War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.”

Any thoughts about ending the policy of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell?

“Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds…Bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.”

In closing, Mr. President, any final words of guidance for the American people?

“If a Nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be…. If we are to guard against ignorance and remain free, it is the responsibility of every American to be informed.”

“The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first.”

Thank you, sir.

Obama Invokes “State Secrets” in Assassination Plot

26 Sunday Sep 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Constitution, Justice Department, Obama administration, torture, war on terror

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“If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”—James Madison, often referred to as the father of that antiquated, outdated, document known as the Constitution of the United States, which is now little more than an a la carte menu.

When the president of the United States has the power to order the assassination of an American citizen suspected of terrorist activities but charged with no crime, that is tyranny. And that is exactly the power President Obama is seeking, under the ever-increasing justification of preserving “state secrets.”

“The Obama administration on Friday asked a federal judge to throw out a lawsuit seeking to stop the government from killing an American citizen [Anwar al-Awlaki] accused of ties to Al Qaeda…In a legal brief, which was filed shortly before midnight, the administration included the contentious argument that litigating the matter could reveal state secrets.”

Glenn Greenwald at Salon:

“…in other words, not only does the President have the right to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind, but his decisions as to who will be killed and why he wants them dead are “state secrets,” and thus no court may adjudicate its legality.”

From the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights (remember those?):

“The idea that courts should have no role whatsoever in determining the criteria by which the executive branch can kill its own citizens is unacceptable in a democracy.”

Obstruction of Justice Department spokesman Matthew Miller:

“If al-Awlaqi wishes to access our legal system, he should surrender to American authorities and return to the United States, where he will be held accountable for his actions.”

Why would al-Awlaki, who is thought to be in Yemen, surrender to authorities when he has not been charged with, or indicted for, any crime? Sure, give himself up and be on the next plane to Jordan or Morocco or wherever the latest outsourcing torture extraordinary rendition site is, to be tortured and meet an untimely, accidental death. Oops.

But few people will notice and even fewer will care. Republicans don’t care because it’s one of “them” who is being targeted for assassination, never mind that al-Awlaki is a US citizen. He don’t look like a reel ‘Murrican. And they’ll take full advantage of the expanded powers of the Executive Branch the next time a Republican occupies the Oval Office. Democrats don’t care because their guy is in there now and they trust him with this power, for some reason that escapes me. Never mind that they would be screaming about the president shredding the Constitution if George Bush was still in office.

What Hath 9/11 Wrought?

11 Saturday Sep 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Constitution, Justice Department, Obama administration, terrorism, torture, war on terror

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September 11, 2001 has been dubbed ‘The Day That Changed America’ and indeed it did. Indeed it did—and not for the better. It changed America from the land of the free and the home of the brave to the land of the increasingly less free and the home of ‘do whatever it takes to keep us safe.’ It changed us from a country governed by the founding principles of due process, equal justice, and the rule of law to a country where indefinite detention without charges or trials are an accepted practice. Where the Executive Branch, aided and abetted by the Judicial Branch, can be exempted from accountability from what were once considered war crimes simply by invoking the vague and all-encompassing claims of “state secrets” and “national security interests.”

These changes were exemplified in a decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday when it dismissed a suit by five men who allege they were imprisoned and tortured under the Bush administration’s rendition program. The decision was also considered a “major victory” for the Obama administration, who appealed an earlier ruling which said the suit should go forward.

“In a 6-5 ruling issued this afternoon, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals handed the Obama administration a major victory in its efforts to shield Bush crimes from judicial review, when the court upheld the Obama DOJ’s argument that Bush’s rendition program, used to send victims to be tortured, are “state secrets” and its legality thus cannot be adjudicated by courts.  The Obama DOJ had appealed to the full 9th Circuit from last year’s ruling by a 3-judge panel which rejected the “state secrets” argument and held that it cannot be used as a weapon to shield the Executive Branch from allegations in this case that it broke the law.”

Not that this is any shift in direction. It’s just the latest effort by the current administration to continue, and in some cases expand upon, the policies of the former administration—policies candidate Obama denounced but President Obama embraces:

“Among other policies, the Obama national security team has also authorized the C.I.A. to try to kill a United States citizen suspected of terrorism ties, blocked efforts by detainees in Afghanistan to bring habeas corpus lawsuits challenging the basis for their imprisonment without trial, and continued the C.I.A.’s so-called extraordinary rendition program of prisoner transfers — though the administration has forbidden torture and says it seeks assurances from other countries that detainees will not be mistreated.”

The reaction to the decision from the ACLU:

“This is a sad day not only for the torture victims whose attempt to seek justice has been extinguished, but for all Americans who care about the rule of law and our nation’s reputation in the world. To date, not a single victim of the Bush administration’s torture program has had his day in court. If today’s decision is allowed to stand, the United States will have closed its courtroom doors to torture victims while providing complete immunity to their torturers.”

Andrew Sullivan at The Daily Dish:

“The case yesterday is particularly egregious because it forbade a day in court for torture victims even if only non-classified evidence was used. Think of that for a minute. It shreds any argument that national security is in any way at stake here. It’s definitionally not protection of any state secret if all that is relied upon is evidence that is not secret. And so this doctrine has been invoked by Obama not to protect national security but to protect war criminals from the law. There is no other possible interpretation.

The Bush executive is therefore now a part of the American system of government, a system that increasingly bears no resemblance to the constitutional limits allegedly placed upon it, and with a judiciary so co-opted by the executive it came up with this ruling yesterday. Obama, more than anyone, now bears responsibility for that. We had a chance to draw a line. We had a chance to do the right thing. But Obama has vigorously denied us the chance even for minimal accountability for war crimes that smell to heaven.

And this leviathan moves on, its budget never declining, its reach never lessening, its power now emboldened by the knowledge that this republic will never check it, never inspect it, never hold its miscreants responsible for anything, unless they are wretched scapegoats merely following orders from the unassailable above them.”

To those who would “look forward” and give the Obama administration a pass here, ask yourself a few questions. If it were the Bush administration would you be so lenient? Let’s be very honest. If one administration is guilty of authorizing and condoning war crimes, is not the following administration, as evidenced by its actions, guilty of being an accessory to the commission of war crimes? I don’t see how any other conclusion can be reached.

Another thing to consider for those who may trust this far-reaching and unchecked expansion of Executive Branch power in the hands of President Obama—the power doesn’t leave with him when he leaves office. Would you trust it in the hands of President Palin? Think about it.

First they came for the suspected terrorists, and I didn’t care because I wasn’t a suspected terrorist………

Sharron Angle: Jefferson “Misquoted Out of Context” on Separation of Church and State

01 Thursday Jul 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Congress, Conservatives, Constitution, Politics, Republicans

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In an interview with Nevada journalist Jon Ralston, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, Sharron Angle, was asked to defend a 1995 statement in which she said, “the tenet of the separation of church and state is an unconstitutional doctrine.” Angle’s response was that “Thomas Jefferson has been misquoted…out of context.” Watch:

OK, here’s Thomas Jefferson in context, from his often-quoted letter to the Danbury Baptists:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”

Jefferson repeats verbatim the text of the First Amendment, that Congress shall “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” followed his own words, “thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.” Look up any definition of “thus” and you will see synonyms such as therefore, hence, and consequently. Substitute any of those words for “thus” in Jefferson’s letter and the meaning is crystal clear.

That’s Jefferson. What about the widely-acknowledged “Father of the Constitution” and the man who proposed the Bill of Rights to the first Congress—James Madison. What were his thoughts on the subject?

“Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity the less they are mixed together.” (Letter to Edward Livingston, July 10, 1822).

Madison even saw the appointment of chaplains as a violation of the establishment clause:

“Is the appointment of Chaplains to the two Houses of Congress consistent with the Constitution, and with the pure principle of religious freedom? In strictness the answer on both points must be in the negative. The Constitution of the U. S. forbids everything like an establishment of a national religion.”

Ms. Angle, when it comes to matters of the Founders and the Constitution, speak not of what you know not. And don’t believe everything you read on a sign at a Tea Party.

Supremes Refuse to Hear Torture Appeal

15 Tuesday Jun 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Constitution, Justice Department, Obama administration, Supreme Court, terrorism, torture, war on terror

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That old-fashioned notion of equal justice under the law was dealt another blow by the Supreme Court yesterday as they refused to hear the appeal of Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen who was detained, tortured, and imprisoned for over a year, without charges, because he was labeled an “al-Qaeda suspect” by the Bush administration. And in what is become an all too familiar occurrence:

“…the Obama administration chose to come to the defense of Bush administration officials, arguing that even if they conspired to send Maher Arar to torture, they should not be held accountable by the judiciary.”

Have to look forward, dontcha know. Mother Jones has a synopsis of Mr. Arar’s ordeal:

“On Sept. 26, 2002, Arar was detained by American authorities during a layover at New York’s John F. Kennedy airport. He was interrogated. Less than two weeks later, he shackled and hooded and placed on a plane bound for Jordan. Once in Jordan, he was transferred overland to Syria. While in Syria, Arar was tortured at the behest of the American government, according to a 1,200-page report released by a Canadian government inquiry that concluded up in 2006.

Here’s how Arar describes a few of his first days in Syria:

Early in the morning on October 10 Arar is taken downstairs to a basement. The guard opens the door and Arar sees for the first time the cell he will live in for the following ten months and ten days.

It is three feet wide, six feet deep and seven feet high. It has a metal door, with a small opening which does not let in light because of a piece of metal on the outside for sliding things into the cell. There is a one by two foot opening in the ceiling with iron bars. This opening is below another ceiling and lets in just a tiny shaft of light. Cats urinate through the ceiling traps of these cells, often onto the prisoners. Rats wander there too.

Early the next morning Arar is taken upstairs for intense interrogation. He is beaten on his palms, wrists, lower back and hips with a shredded black electrical cable which is about two inches in diameter.

The next day Arar is interrogated and beaten on and off for eighteen hours. Arar begs them to stop. He is asked if he received military training in Afghanistan, and he falsely confesses and says yes [another testimony to the effectiveness of “enhanced interrogation techniques”]. This is the first time Arar is ever questioned about Afghanistan. They ask at which camp, and provide him with a list, and he picks one of the camps listed.

In October 2003—more than a year after he had been sent to Syria—Arar was finally returned to Canada. He was never charged with a crime.”

And for this no one will be held accountable. But hey, at least the DOJ has their priorities straight. A federal prosecutor is investigating allegations of blood doping in the Tour de France.

“Modernizing Miranda” by Gutting the Sixth Amendment

15 Saturday May 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Constitution, George W. Bush, Justice Department, Obama, Obama administration, Politics, terrorism, war on terror

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It’s becoming clearer what Attorney General Eric Holder meant when he spoke of the need to “modernize” Miranda. (Even though he also said that “giving Miranda warnings has not had a negative impact on our ability to obtain information from terrorism suspects” ). According to this latest proposal under consideration by the Obama administration, such a “modernization” includes doing away with the Sixth Amendment rights to a speedy trial and to counsel.

“President Obama’s legal advisers are considering asking Congress to allow the government to detain terrorism suspects longer after their arrests before presenting them to a judge for an initial hearing, according to administration officials familiar with the discussions.

If approved, the idea to delay hearings would be attached to broader legislation to allow interrogators to withhold Miranda warnings from terrorism suspects for lengthy periods, as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. proposed last week.

The goal of both measures would be to open a window of time after an arrest in which interrogators could question a terrorism suspect without an interruption that might cause the prisoner to stop talking. It is not clear how long of a delay the administration is considering seeking.”

President Obama has been criticized by civil libertarians in the past for continuing the policies of the Bush administration. This one goes further, it’s beyond Bush:

“Anthony Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, assailed the Obama administration for considering such ideas. He noted that the administration of President George W. Bush, which was heavily criticized by civil-liberties groups, never proposed such modifications to criminal procedures.”

Marcy Wheeler points out how this denies the accused of their right to counsel:

“The way it works…is you’re arrested and you’re brought before the judge (either to be charged or arraigned) and if you don’t have a lawyer, the judge makes sure you have one.

[…]

“[T]he Administration wants to “modernize” Miranda. They want to postpone bringing alleged terrorists before a Court (though it’s not clear why). Are they, by delaying court appearances, trying to at the same time delay the time when alleged terrorists get assigned lawyers? Are they trying to dissuade alleged terrorists from having lawyers?”

And Jeralyn at Talk Left warns of the slippery slope:

“Taking rights taken from terror suspects today just makes it easier to take them from all of us tomorrow. It’s ironic that this is one right even the Bush Administration didn’t try and tinker with, and its our Democratic president showing so little respect for the rule of law.”

More constitutional rights and protections bite the dust in the course of carrying out the “war on terror.” But hey, whatever it takes to keep us safe, right President Bush Obama?

The End is Near: Glenn Beck is the Voice of Reason

05 Wednesday May 2010

Posted by in Bill of Rights, Congress, Politics, Republicans, terrorism

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OK, it’s official, we are through the looking glass on the treatment of suspected terrorists. Glenn Beck is the voice of reason and sanity. Yes, you read that right, Glenn Beck, reason, and sanity all in the same sentence. On Fox and Friends yesterday, Beck said of Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani-born American citizen arrested in the attempted Times Square bombing:

“He is a citizen of the United States, so I say we uphold the laws and the Constitution on citizens. If you are a citizen, you obey the law and follow the Constitution. He has all the rights under the  Constitution. We don’t shred the Constitution when it’s popular. We do the right thing.”

Vodpod videos no longer available.The award for the most extreme, knee-jerk (emphasis on jerk) reaction comes from Joe Lieberman. He proposes taking away the citizenship of those who are “affiliated” (whatever that means) with foreign terrorist organizations when they are “apprehended and charged.” 

My own Senator finds that “interesting”:

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), the head of of the GOP’s Senate campaign arm, is open to Lieberman’s idea. “I’m interested in Senator Lieberman’s approach. He is one of our leading members when it comes to national security issues and I would be interested in exploring that. I think at some point an act of war is a treasonous act, which could be a basis for relinquishing one’s citizenship,” he said.

I propose that we take away the citizenship of those who advocate that we take away the citizenship of others. I think that might solve the problem.