The Beginnings of Big Brother

Way back when, President Bush spoke about how our terrorist enemies hate our American way of life and its respect for individual liberty. Presumably, by that he was
including the Constitution, and our protections under the 1st, 4th and 5th Amendments, as well as the separation of power clauses and the basic restrictions on unchecked government power for which our Constitution was created.

Well, if that was the case, then the effect of our psychopathic terrorism enemies has been to start to accomplish what they wanted, because under the current administration, they have been used as an excuse to change our basic free and open democracy to one of a government of clandestinely granted powers, secret spying,
and now the monitoring, if allegedly not yet in content, of every telephone call made by every American.

From USA Today: "'It's the largest database ever assembled in the world,' said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's goal is 'to create a database of every call ever made' within the nation's borders, this person added."

We now have a new type of doublespeak. Simply take something, and, magically, by words, change its entire meaning, as the Administration repeatedly called the program lawful, and stated that no "domestic" calls were being monitored without court order.

There has been ongoing doublespeak both with regard to the legality of the underlying NSA wiretap program, and the word domestic. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act FISA) and the Federal Wiretap Act's express prohibition on electronic surveillance (18 U.S.C. 2511 (1)(a)) that does not comply with the act's requirements (such as procuring a FISA warrant either before or after the covert surveillance) (50 U.S.C.1809), applies specifically to "communications to or from U.S. citizens or permanent resident aliens in the United States" 50 U.S.C. 1801(f), 1801(i).

Despite this clear language, the administration, which has repeatedly denied almost every aspect of this larger ambition at one point or another, is now implying to the American people that the NSA wiretap program is legal because no "domestic" calls are being monitored (despite the gathering of millions of such phone call records?) when FISA specifically defines such communications to be those that either originate or end with U.S. citizens or residents.

Perhaps the reference, despite the larger context, was solely to this new revelation, and also despite its obvious ties to the NSA surveillance program. But without any checks upon any of the programs, particularly from a government that has previously denied each bit of information that is now known, how would Americans know just what the limits of this power were and are? Supporters of the program, nevertheless, seem to miss these points, and confuse the need for sensible security with the Constitutional and democratic imperative of some check upon, and basis for review, of our own government's power. This similarly confuses a record for judicial or other governmental review, with some imagined daily expose on CNN news of mundane FISA and similar warrant applications or simple record keeping.

The legal and constitutional separation of power issues regarding the clandestine wiretap program to monitor certain calls to or from citizens within the U.S., to or from a location outside of the United States, are clear cut, and unambiguous. The program is "blatantly illegal," in the words of Yale Law School Dean Howard Koh, and according to similar language by the ABA and a host of not just democratic, but republican scholars and legal experts. Those that insist that it is not are extreme partisan loyalists, or have not read the Constitution lately (notice the very first line of Article I, Section 1, therein).

Yet in the brave new world of Orwellian type Doublespeak, where in the most severe examples white can be twisted into black, and black into white, blatant violations can be turned into something totally legal and constitutional, merely by stating it to be so.

What is the media saying about all this? From the film "Orwell Rolls in his Grave." "We falsely think of our country as a democracy when it has evolved into a mediacracy, where a media that is supposed to check political abuse is part of the political abuse."

Perhaps this overstates the case. But with respect to this critical, clear, and unambiguous issue, turn on the television news, or read the nations leading newspapers, you will hear "all sides" to what is a fairly simply, basic, unambiguous issue under our Constitution.

There may always be "two sides" to the story. But that does not mean that there are always 'two sides" to the Constitution. As noted in several of the links above, the separation of powers clause does not "magically" disappear simply because the executive branch can make an argument that something somehow relates to a war effort, thereby rendering this most basic purpose and requirement of our Constitution null and void during any time of war or "extended war" (as combating terrorism is likely to be) . It's that simple. But one wouldn't necessarily know it from listening to the media.