Al Gore: Impeach Bush

I think not

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Gore: Bush engaged in 'excessive power grab'

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former Vice President Al Gore called on Congress and the public to resist what he called "a gross and excessive power grab" by the Bush administration amid the war on terrorism, declaring that "our Constitution is at risk."

Gore said the use of the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans without a court order shows that President Bush "has been breaking the law repeatedly and persistently."

"A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government," he said.

Gore, Bush's Democratic opponent in the bitter 2000 election, spoke to the Liberty Coalition, which calls itself a "transpartisan" group concerned with civil liberty and privacy issues.

Bush has defended his use of the NSA to intercept international communications of people in the United States suspected of having links to terrorist groups, telling reporters the program is legal and necessary to fight terrorism. The president and other top officials argue that Congress gave him the power to act without the approval of a special panel of judges established by Congress under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978.

Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has disputed that assertion.

Gore said lawmakers specifically refused to give Bush that power when they authorized the use of force after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Gore said the wiretaps -- combined with Bush's assertion of the power to hold American citizens indefinitely as "enemy combatants," the authorization of harsh treatment of prisoners and his use of signing statements to declare how he will interpret a law passed by Congress -- have "brought our republic to the brink of a dangerous breach in the fabric of the Constitution."

"The disrespect embodied in these apparent mass violations of the law is part of a larger pattern of seeming indifference to the Constitution that is deeply troubling to millions of Americans in both political parties," he said.

Gore said the dangers of unchecked executive power can be seen in the war in Iraq, which the administration warned was necessary because Iraq was concealing chemical and biological weapons and trying to produce nuclear arms. No such weapons were found after the March 2003 invasion.

He quoted "1984" author George Orwell, who wrote that people are capable of believing things that aren't true until "a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield."

"Twenty-two hundred American soldiers have lost their lives as this false belief, as this belief bumped into a solid reality," he said. "And indeed, whenever power is unchecked and unaccountable, it almost inevitably leads to gross mistakes and abuses."

To emphasize the bipartisan nature of Monday's event, organizers had planned to have former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia -- one of the House managers during President Clinton's 1999 impeachment trial -- introduce Gore via videolink. But technical problems prevented Barr, a conservative critic of the NSA program and a frequent CNN contributor, from speaking.

"In spite of our differences over ideology and politics, we are in strong agreement that the American values we hold most dear have been placed at serious risk by the unprecedented claims of the administration to a truly breathtaking expansion of executive power," Gore said.

Gore said the Republican leadership of Congress has acted "as if it is entirely subservient to the executive branch," with lawmakers too busy raising money for re-election to challenge Bush.

"Though I sympathize with the awkward position in which these men and women were placed, I cannot disagree with the Liberty Coalition when it says that Democrats as well as Republicans in the Congress must share the blame for not taking action to protest and seek to prevent what they consider a grossly unconstitutional program," he said.

He also called on Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the warrantless wiretapping program -- and he urged voters to make it an issue in November's congressional races, because "our Constitution is at risk."

CNN
 

jimmoyer

jimmoyer
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In my opinion as a voting Republican American I think
Al Gore is right to a certain respect. As a conservative
I've seen the Republican party desert many of its principles since it has become the Party in Power.

I never liked the stridency or shrill tone of Al Gore,
but the substance, not the style, is the issue here.

I thing George Bush could have done this better and
I have see how he often goes forth on his own principle
of belief without working for popular support.

This goes a little deeper, but I don't feel like making
a long post explaining it.
 

Karlin

Council Member
Jun 27, 2004
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No, its okay, no need to explain.
Well its not that Gore is saying Impeach Bush. Not directly at least.

But the call of impeachment is rising each day -
58% of Americans think Bush2 should go if he wiretapped, and another majority sized group wants impeachment over Iraq lies.

Golly, I would be smiling to see the Elite's pick for USA President get the boots.
Karlin

-related links:
---

January 16, 2006
New Zogby Poll Shows Majority of Americans Support Impeaching Bush for Wiretapping :
http://www.democrats.com/bush-impeachment-poll-2

---

" impeachment and removal from office will not happen unless the American people are convinced of its necessity after a full and fair inquiry into the facts and law is conducted. That inquiry must commence now."
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060130/holtzman

----

Carol S. Wolman, MD is a psychiatrist in Northern California, and is actively working to impeach Bush and Cheney, and invites you to print out a letter to Bush from Rep. John Conyers, informing Bush that censure and impeachment are underway.
http://tinyurl.com/bagoe

--------------
PS -
Jim Moyer, if it is not too bold of me, I am curious how you found this forum, and what an American Republican is finding in Canadian politics to stick around and write so much?
Not that I mind, just curious... TY
Karlin
 

FiveParadox

Governor General
Dec 20, 2005
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Post Removed

My apologies, I have removed my post (could you please amend your post to remove my quoted text, please, I think not, if you have a chance?).

I kind of "rushed" through the article, I didn't understand the premise.
 

jimmoyer

jimmoyer
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Jim Moyer, if it is not too bold of me, I am curious how you found this forum, and what an American Republican is finding in Canadian politics to stick around and write so much?
Not that I mind, just curious... TY
------------------------------Karlin ---------------------------

Well it happened pretty much by accident.
The forum in my town has a lot of inside jokes going
on between liberals and conservatives and they
call each other the most outrageous names, and after
you get to know the shtick, it gets to be quite hilarious.

But, I really wanted to see the outside world.

I'm on a Britain forum, Israel, Australia too.

I enjoy views outside the normal internal predictable
crap within my own country.

And believe it or not, this is one of the first forums I
discovered that had a decently high degree of
activity at any hour of the day or night and it has
quite passionate participants !!

In addition, as I've said before, the visual arrangement
of this site beats any other site over having little
clutter, and clarity of presentation in that most functions
are visibly intuitively accessible.
 

I think not

Hall of Fame Member
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Post deleted FiveParadox.

I have to agree with Jimmoyer, Al Gore has much to learn about how he conveys his beliefs, however he is correct. I heard his speech on ABC news this evening. He is accusing the Bush administration of illegal surveilance against America's citizens, such being the case, it is most certainly an impeachable offense.
 

jimmoyer

jimmoyer
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Yeah... good point ITN. I just got a problem over
Gore's style and so I normally emotionally react against
him. I have to hang in there to hear the content
of his speech and often find him to have very
substantial points.

And yet for all his emphasis on
personal integrity I find him to be opportunistic and
poll-driven, and therefore not even his closest advisors
can predict what this man will say or do.

This is the man who came up with "no legal controlling
authority." Think about that. Just for a moment.
Think about that.

Anyway, Bush's hubris and presumption is his Achilles
Heel. Having had the least amount of press conferences
in American Presidential history also says something
of his presumptions.

I often think Bush's own party has better criticisms
and better arguments against Bush than the Democrats
do.

The lesson for all opposition parties is to have cohesion
on the deeper arguments.

The opposition party must at all cost not dilute its
message by being shrill, by being opportunistic to seize
on every mistake.

These are hard lessons.

I see the partisans of the opposition often shake
their heads wondering why they are not getting more
people to their cause.

And I know why.

They miss the real fundamental debates that underly
all the shrill partisanship. These real debates
involve the proper mix of socialism and capitalism.
These real debates involve the proper mix of security
and liberty.

These debates are real, and require a nod towards their
reality.
 

I think not

Hall of Fame Member
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Bush is doing the American public a great service.

He is showing Americans the ugly face of democratic extremism. The neo conservatives have sealed their fate, moderation will be the call in 2006 and 2008.
 

Alberta'sfinest

Electoral Member
Dec 9, 2005
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I wonder how many Canadians here know that our government can legally read our e-mails, tap our phone lines, as well as listen in on cell phone conversations without a warrant?
 

I think not

Hall of Fame Member
Apr 12, 2005
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Re: RE: Al Gore: Impeach Bush

jimmoyer said:
Yeah, I think America wants to correct those
abuses.

Indeed, two things I have always believed about Americans, our belief that tomorrow will be better than today, and a personal responsibility to make it so.
 

I think not

Hall of Fame Member
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Re: RE: Al Gore: Impeach Bush

Alberta'sfinest said:
I wonder how many Canadians here know that our government can legally read our e-mails, tap our phone lines, as well as listen in on cell phone conversations without a warrant?

I've never heard of this before.
 

jimmoyer

jimmoyer
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And yes it would be nice to call the Question and have
a Vote of Confidence. But the rigors of a 4 year term
have their unpredictable benefits too.

Perhaps having a government too worried about
the popular will is just as bad as a government too little
worried about the popular will.
 

FiveParadox

Governor General
Dec 20, 2005
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Opinions of Canadians

jimmoyer, I would think that a Government that would not seriously consider the opinions of Canadians (the "popular will," if you please) would be far more prone to abusing the institution of the House of Commons for its own partisan purposes.

As for the matter of intercepting calls and e-mails without a warrant, I would draw the attention of Alberta's Finest to the fact that the legislation that would have legalized these measures, Bill C-74, An Act regulating telecommunications facilities to facilitate the lawful interception of information transmitted by means of those facilities and respecting the provision of telecommunications subscriber information, was dropped from the Order Paper due to the dissolution of the House.

To be perfectly clear, the legislation that you are referring to was not passed.
 

Curiosity

Senate Member
Jul 30, 2005
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The charges against the current administration for "spying" may well be legitimate, however Al Gore is not the one who should be making them. His own past is littered with conflicting expression and he should learn to zip his lip no matter how tempted he is to make some wild hair statements to get himself in the MSM yet once again. Pot and Kettle and all that.... Someone should tell this poor guy its over.... really over.

"The ugly face of democratic extreme" is an apt expression to apply to Gore himself, even if it was used in commending his activities.


Gore Planned to Bug America
Charles R. Smith - Newsmax.com
Friday, Nov. 16, 2001

Secret documents show Gore rejected 'due process.'

During the 2000 presidential elections, Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet. Gore's dubious claim of techno-savvy came within days of his admission that he managed to delete all of his e-mail concerning meetings with large DNC money donors.

Yet recently declassified secret documents show that Al Gore did help invent new ways to violate the privacy of every U.S. citizen using the Internet. The secret documents, obtained from the U.S. State Department through the Freedom of Information Act, show that Gore rejected "due process" in an effort to force America to give up the Fourth Amendment.

The Gore-led effort included classified memos describing ways to obtain access to all private computer information using "key escrow," or key recovery. The key escrow system was designed to force U.S. citizens to give computer code keys in order to meet required "law enforcement and intelligence" access.

In 1996, Gore proposed the legislation in order to restrict the use of "encryption," a technique of scrambling private information on personal computers with secret code keys.

According to a secret 1996 paper, "in August 1995, Vice President Gore approved a decision memo to introduce 'soft' legislation to regulate key escrowers."

The official reason for the Gore proposal was to stop criminals and terrorists from using advanced scrambling technology and preventing legal wiretaps. However, the secret documents show that Gore knew that it was impossible to stop criminals from scrambling their information.

"Drug distributors, organized crime and terrorists are beginning to acquire and use strong encryption. While U.S. policy can only have limited impact on such use, the urgency of supporting general use of escrowed products is increasing," states a secret 1996 document.

Prime targets for key escrow monitoring would be honest citizens, foreign governments, banks, corporations and dissidents unpopular with the then Clinton administration. The escrow keys were to be held by "key recovery agents" licensed by the Commerce Department under Secretary Ron Brown.

According to the 1996 report to V.P. Gore by CIA Director Deutch, the Justice Department proposed an all-out federal takeover of the computer industry. The Justice Department, proposed "legislation that would ... ban the import and domestic manufacture, sale or distribution of encryption that does not have key recovery."

After 9/11

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, former FBI Director Louis Freeh suggested that domestic encryption software should be banned so that law enforcement could monitor all e-mail. Privacy and information security specialists contend that such a drastic restriction would simply deny legal users the tools to defend critical information from terrorist attacks.

Yet in 1996, the Clinton-Gore administration predicted that a future terrorist attack would lead to calls for a ban on domestic scrambling technology.

"Notorious criminal acts could have the effect of forcing Congress' hand, to pass 'hard' legislation restricting domestic use of encryption," warned the 1996 secret document.

Ironically, the secret papers drawn up for the Clinton-Gore team were a product of FBI Director Freeh, the same ex-director of the FBI calling for a ban on legal domestic encryption today.

Still, one cannot always take the word of former director Freeh as the best advice. The same Director Freeh also ignored Chinese generals roaming in and out of the White House and appointed a top KGB agent to be his counterintelligence director in New York.

Yet, the secret FBI documents approved by Al Gore clearly show the previous administration skipped whole sections of law in an overzealous attempt at absolute power.

"Without an effective 'voluntary' policy, encouraging the use of key escrow encryption, it will only be a matter of time before crime brings the issue up. If we wait for refined international agreements and due process, key escrow will not get off the ground soon, if ever," concluded the secret document.

Oppression, Not Law Enforcement

"Can Key Recovery be used against dissidents and political opponents?" questioned Adm. William McConnell, the former National Security Agency (NSA) director under Presidents Bush Sr. and Clinton.

"In a word, YES," noted McConnell flatly.

Privacy advocates were shocked when they discovered that the former director of the NSA agreed with their analysis of the Gore idea to monitor America.

The director of the NSA may have greeted the Clinton/Gore-led key escrow project with dismay, but it was welcomed inside U.S. corporate boardrooms.

The newly declassified documents note that the CEOs of large U.S. computer firms gave their support to the Clinton-Gore proposals. The Computer Systems Policy Project, or CSPP, a lobby group composed of the largest U.S. computer makers, supported the idea as long as it did not interfere with profits and export sales. CSPP members include the CEOs of IBM, Apple, Silicon Graphics and AT&T.

According to a secret 1996 document, the CSPP agreed with the Gore proposal as long it would "protect the market share of U.S. encryption producers, as much as possible."

In return for their support, the corporate CEOs managed to obtain secret briefings inside the Clinton White House, starting in 1995. The secret meetings included detailed information about supercomputer and encryption exports.

Just by coincidence, the CSPP lobby group was led to these secret Clinton White House briefings by Ken Kay, an employee of Tony Podesta, the brother of then-Clinton adviser John Podesta.

Further documents show that John Podesta was also in charge of encryption export policy at that time for the White House. Immediately after the secret briefings in 1995, Podesta left the Clinton White House and went to work for his brother Tony.

When confronted by questions about possible conflicts of interest, attorney C. Boyden Gray and White House counsel Michael B. Waitzkin both denied that John and Tony Podesta engaged in any sort of dirty dealings.

In fact, the White House counsel noted that John Podesta had obtained a waiver from Clinton lawyers in 1997 for the activities that took place in 1995.

Please note that John Podesta obtained that Clinton waiver two years after the closed meetings were held inside the White House. Usually, a legal waiver is given before any conflict of interest takes place, not after. By definition, a legal waiver given after the fact should be called a pardon. Still, the waiver came from the same president who argued with a federal judge over the definition of 'is'.

Leadership 101

Are you surprised that the U.S. computer CEOs of IBM, Apple, Silicon Graphics and AT&T supported Al Gore and his crazy idea to bug America? The fact is that big business is not interested in civil rights or the Constitution, especially when it gets in the way of profits.

Yet the current Bush administration did not introduce a ban on encryption technology in the recent anti-terrorist legislation.

Why does President Bush want encryption to stay legal for all Americans? Perhaps George W. wishes to avoid the mess that Al Gore stepped in. Maybe, but I think not. I am certain that President Bush could teach some U.S. history to Al Gore along with how to be a leader.

After all, our nation started with a coded message when a lone rider looked anxiously toward a church tower: "One if by land, two if by sea ..."
 

Curiosity

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http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pdupont/?id=110007823
Ben Franklin
'Better Than Well Said'
Ben Franklin understood the need for secrecy in matters of national security.

BY PETE DU PONT
Tuesday, January 17, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

Has President Bush exceeded his constitutional authority or acted illegally in authorizing wiretaps without a warrant on calls between American citizens in the United States and people abroad who are, or are suspected of having ties to, terrorists?

Benjamin Franklin (whose 300th birthday is today) would not have thought so. In 1776 he and his four colleagues on the Continental Congress's foreign affairs committee (called the Committee of Secret Correspondence) unanimously agreed that they could not tell the Congress about the covert assistance France was giving the American Revolution, because it would be harmful to America if the information leaked, and "we find by fatal experience that Congress consists of too many members to keep secrets."

While the Constitution was being ratified in 1787 John Jay (later the first chief justice) in Federalist No. 64 praised the Constitution for giving the president power "to manage the business of intelligence in such manner as prudence may suggest." And of course Article II of the ratified Constitution gave the president the nation's "Executive power" and states that "the President shall be the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States."

When in the early 1800s President Jefferson hired foreign mercenaries to invade Tripoli and free American hostages, he did not inform Congress in advance. In 1818, when a controversy arose over a diplomatic mission abroad, House Speaker Henry Clay told his colleagues that since the president had paid for the mission with his contingent fund it would not be "a proper subject for inquiry."

So it is clear that the Constitution's original intent was that the president had the authority to take undisclosed foreign actions to protect America.

In modern times, the 1947 National Security Act contained no provision for congressional oversight of presidential national-security actions. In 1968 Congress enacted the Safe Streets Act, providing that nothing in the act "shall limit the power of the President to take such actions as he deems necessary to protect the Nation against actual or potential attack or other hostile acts of a foreign power, to obtain foreign intelligence information deemed essential to the security of the United States, or to protect national security information against foreign intelligence activities."
When President Carter signed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in 1978, his attorney general noted that it did not "take away the power of the president under the Constitution," and in 1994, when President Clinton expanded FISA, his administration agreed. As constitutional scholar Robert Turner noted in The Wall Street Journal last month, "Section 1811 of the FISA statute recognizes that in a period of authorized war the president must have some authority to engage in electronic surveillance 'without a court order.'"

America's judicial system has reached the same conclusion. The Supreme Court's 1972 decision in U.S. v. U.S. District Court (known as the "Keith case") held that the Fourth Amendment's "unreasonable searches and seizures" clause applied to domestic wiretapping, but refrained from concluding that it restricts "the president's surveillance power with respect to the activities of foreign powers within or without this country."

In 1980 the Carter administration argued in the Truong case that the government could conduct domestic, warrantless wiretaps of conversations between a U.S. and a Vietnamese citizen who had been passing on U.S. military intelligence to the North Vietnamese. The Supreme Court agreed.

In 1982 a federal court of appeals ruled that "the National Security Agency may lawfully intercept messages between United States citizens and people overseas, even if there is no cause to believe the Americans are foreign agent."

And in 2002 the FISA court said that the president has "inherent constitutional authority to conduct warrantless foreign intelligence surveillance."

America is engaged in a global war against terrorists whose intention is to inflict significant damage upon us. They attacked the World Trade Center in 1993, at U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998, the USS Cole in 2000, and of course in New York and Washington in 2001.
If we had known that one of those terrorist attacks was coming, could our government have electronically eavesdropped on the attackers without a warrant?

If a known Al Qaeda terrorist had made a phone call from outside the country to someone inside America about these or other attacks, could our government have listened in?

If we had found an American phone number on a captured terrorist's computer before one of the attacks, could the military have listened in to the next call without a warrant?

If we know of a conversation set for a week from Wednesday between an Al Qaeda operative in Iraq and a sympathetic American citizen in Illinois, one could argue there is time to seek a FISA warrant. But if the CIA has only a three minute knowledge of the call, may it listen in without one?

The answer to all these questions is yes; the federal courts have consistently ruled that the constitution gives the president the authority--as "Commander in Chief" or using his "executive Power"--to acquire foreign intelligence without warrants or other approvals.

There is of course a different view held by America's liberal left. Democratic chairman Howard Dean somehow believes that warrantless surveillance is "a serious blow to our ability to fight and win the war on terror."
And Ted Kennedy said last week that what the President has done in using his constitutional powers to listen in to terrorist communications is "such an arrogant and expansive view of executive power" that it "would have sent chills down the spines of our Founding Fathers."

But of course he has it backward too--it is what Sen. Kennedy believes that would have sent chills down the spines of Benjamin Franklin and our Founding Fathers.

Mr. du Pont, a former governor of Delaware, is chairman of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis. His column appears once a month.
 

I think not

Hall of Fame Member
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WC, Gore isn't the President, Bush is, if he has broken the law, he should be impeached. I fail to see why if Gore broke any laws that should be a premise for Bush to remain in office. Clinton was impeached for lying under oath, Bush can certainly be impeached for breaking the law.
 

Curiosity

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ITN

Not sure what you mean about Gore - he is not the one to be promoting impeachment for Bush. His slate as VP is not clean.

The question IS exactly that: Did Bush break the law? That is the conundrum. There are many examples being given that this kind of "breaking the law" or spying by the All the President's Men or whatever drama we wish to ascribe to it - do not make it clear - yet.

I think it is another complaint du jour to continue delaying any work being done by the legislature who need all the time they can get before the cameras and the reporters.

As an aside I thank the higher powers that Howard Dean never got into an operating room to rip some poor person up - given the way he wild bulls himself around the Capitol building firing out innuendo with nothing to show for it. Think of the lives saved!!!

I would like to see them (the elected officials) get on with the work they are being paid very well for doing - for the public - not in political partisan debate and pontification with nothing to show for it.

If they want to charge the president with "spying and wiretapping" - do so and have the impeachment hearings - stop pandering to the microphones.