Salon.com > Civil Liberties

Obama signs NDAA again, disappoints on Gitmo and civil liberties again

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 20:20:00 +0000

This time last year, President Obama said that he had "serious reservations" about certain provisions of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act. But he signed it anyway. This year, the same provisions over which he was so reserved remain in the 2013 version of the bill, along with a number of brand-new problematic amendments. The president threatened a veto on the new bill's prohibitions on closing Guantánamo Bay detention center. But he didn't veto; he signed the bill again on Thursday.

Once again, Obama expressed his misgivings in a signing statement, but stressed that "the need to renew critical defense authorities and funding was too great" to reject the bill, which approved a $633 billion armed forces budget for the 2013 fiscal year. Also approved in the NDAA are controversial provisions that will likely make closing Guantánamo Bay detention center impossible in Obama's presidency, and provisions elsewhere in the act that allow for the indefinite military detention of U.S. citizens.

Government can keep legal justification for drone strikes secret

Wed, 02 Jan 2013 22:20:00 +0000

The Obama administration does not, under law, have to provide legal justification for its targeting killings to the public, a federal judge ruled today. U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in Manhattan said the government did not violate the law by refusing the New York Times' FOIA requests for such information.

As Reuters noted, however, "McMahon appeared reluctant to rule as she did, noting in her decision that disclosure could help the public understand the 'vast and seemingly ever-growing exercise in which we have been engaged for well over a decade, at great cost in lives, treasure, and (at least in the minds of some) personal liberty.'"

Senate votes down indefinite detention of Americans — or does it?

Fri, 30 Nov 2012 13:45:00 +0000

The Senate on Thursday voted in favor of a narrow amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act in the hope of ensuring an end to the indefinite detention of Americans. The newest draft of the 2013 act now includes provisions that aim to protect citizens inside the U.S. from military imprisonment, thanks to an amendment introduced by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

Within hours of the amendment's approval, civil liberties advocates pointed out significant problems that remain in the NDAA, while lawyers noted that the amendment may even fail to achieve its intended purpose regarding the indefinite detention of U.S. citizens and permanent residents. Under the 2012 act, any person suspected of terrorism or substantial support for terrorism in the U.S.could be held without trial indefinitely. To ensure the writ of habeas corpus, the newest draft includes the following:

Liberals let Obama get away with unconstitutional actions

Sat, 03 Nov 2012 11:00:00 +0000

Let us stipulate, as lawyers like to say, that President Obama has a deplorable record on civil liberties, one that threatens long-term damage to the country’s constitutional culture.

Why, then, has his base of support not been eroded decisively? Why have so many on the left fallen silent, after railing against George W. Bush’s rights violations, as Obama has prolonged and codified most of the same practices? And why have so few on the right, riding a groundswell of resentment toward big government, failed to resent the biggest governmental intrusions into personal privacy since the FBI’s domestic spying during the Cold War?

The facts are not in dispute. While Obama has ordered an end to CIA kidnapping and torture, he has personally approved kill lists containing the names of American citizens to be targeted by drones. While he has tried to move the accused masterminds of 9/11 and others from Guantanamo to civilian courts (only to be blocked by congressional Republicans), he has also embraced military commissions and indefinite detention. He voiced misgivings about a bill subjecting suspected terrorists to military arrest — whether foreigners or Americans, whether in Afghanistan or Alabama — and then signed it into law.

Federal court OKs warrantless use of hidden cameras

Wed, 31 Oct 2012 14:07:00 +0000

A federal court ruling Tuesday served yet another blow to U.S. citizens' dwindling expectations of privacy from government surveillance. A U.S. district judge sided with the Justice Department to rule that it was reasonable for DEA agents to enter a property without permission or a warrant to install multiple "covert digital surveillance cameras." (The case in question involved finding evidence in a rural property of mass marijuana plant growing.)

The Wisconsin-based case saw video evidence from hidden cameras placed around the property of Manuel Mendoza and Marco Magana, where 1,000 marijuana plants were found growing. The two men face possible life imprisonment after Judge William Griesbach ruled that "the DEA's warrantless surveillance did not violate the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and requires that warrants describe the place that's being searched," CNET reported.

Privacy concerns grow over FBI data gathering

Sat, 27 Oct 2012 11:30:00 +0000

In July, Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., opened a Senate hearing on the privacy and civil liberties implications of facial-recognition technology by affirming some incontrovertible facts. “You can change your password. You can get a new credit card. But you can’t change your fingerprint, and you can’t change your face,” Franken said. “Unless, I guess, you go to a great, you know, deal of trouble.”

Franken was expressing concerns about the Next Generation Identification system, a database the FBI has been steadily building over the past several years that harnesses the data-gathering power of an emerging slew of forensic technologies. When fully deployed, NGI will allow the bureau to integrate a vast array of forensic data culled from local and state law enforcement agencies, including fingerprints, palm prints, scar and tattoo records, and facial photos. Multiple reports peg the cost of the facial-recognition software upgrade alone at $1 billion.

Kill lists? Dems don’t want to know

Mon, 22 Oct 2012 16:29:00 +0000

Ignorance is a diverse trait; it comes in many forms and emanates from many different phenomena. There is sheer stupidity: a lack of knowledge of something for which there's no genuine excuse. There's willful ignorance: a head-in-the-sand, nah-nah-nah-can't-hear you aversion to truths, often times in pursuit of plausible deniability. And then there's the most rare form: a bizarre mix of the former two that inadvertently highlights how a deliberately narrow political discourse can make otherwise intelligent people uninformed about what should be the most important political issues.

This kind of bewilderment is arguably the most dangerous when it expresses itself at the highest reaches of the government. Case in point is Democratic National Committee Chairwoman U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla.

In a stunning post-debate interview by the nonprofit We Are Change, and flagged by the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald, Wasserman Schultz is asked a series of direct question about why President Obama now asserts the unprecedented right to execute American citizens without charge, judge, jury or trial. The sequence of responses is revealing.

Why is Rand Paul running Muslim-baiting attack ads?

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 21:30:00 +0000

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul has worked hard to distance himself from his party’s hawkish foreign policy, carefully cultivating an image as libertarian hero that may one day carry on the legacy -- and potentially presidential ambitions -- of his father, Rep. Ron Paul. He goes out of his way to criticize his party’s foreign policy, writing an Op-Ed on CNN.com last week attacking Mitt Romney’s “bellicose[ness]” in the Middle East during the debate. Paul has railed against military interventionism, vowed to cut the defense budget, called for a reduction in military bases overseas and otherwise alienated himself from the party’s powerful neoconservative wing as much as possible.

Joe Walsh: “I could give a darn” about how foreigners are treated

Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:30:00 +0000

Illinois Tea Party Rep. Joe Walsh, once again giving voice to the conservative id, told a crowd in Wood Dale, Ill., this weekend that he doesn't care about the rights of non-American citizens, and doesn't care if they're mistreated in what he sees as a grand struggle between the West and radical Islam. "I'm gonna do whatever I can to beat and kill that ugly, evil, radical strain [of Islam]. I'm not concerned about their rights and their liberties," Walsh said at a campaign event Saturday.

"People, my friend, those who are not American citizens. I'm not, they are trying to kill me and my kids. They are trying to kill you and your fellow Americans. I'm concerned with protecting Americans. I could give a darn about their rights, or their freedoms, or how we treat them if they are not American citizens," Walsh added. Video of the event was captured by a tracker from the CREDO super PAC, a liberal outside group connected to the progressive cellphone provider CREDO mobile.