WASHINGTON (AP) - The Justice Department on Monday released a long-secret legal document from 2001 in which the Bush administration claimed the military could search and seize terror suspects in the United States without warrants. The legal memo was written about a month after the Sept. 11 terror attacks. It says constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure would not apply to terror suspects in the U.S., as long as the president or another high official authorized the action.
Even after the Bush administration rescinded that legal analysis, the Justice Department refused to release its contents, prompting a standoff with congressional Democrats.
The memo was one of nine released Monday by the Obama administration. Another memo showed that, within two weeks of Sept. 11, the administration was contemplating ways to use wiretaps without getting warrants.
The author of the search and seizure memo, John Yoo, did not immediately return a call seeking comment. In that memo, Yoo wrote that the president could treat terrorist suspects in the United States like an invading foreign army. For instance, he said, the military would not have to get a warrant to storm a building to prevent terrorists from detonating a bomb.
Yoo also suggested that the government could put new restrictions on the press and speech, without spelling out what those might be. "First Amendment speech and press rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war successfully," Yoo wrote, adding later: "The current campaign against terrorism may require even broader exercises of federal power domestically."
While they were once important legal pillars of the U.S. fight against al-Qaida, all of the memos were withdrawn in the final days of the Bush administration. In one of his first official acts as president, Barack Obama also signed an order negating the memos' claims until his administration could conduct a thorough review.
In a speech Monday, Obama's attorney general, Eric Holder said that too often in the past decade the fight against terrorism has been put in opposition to "our tradition of civil liberties."
That "has done us more harm than good," he declared. "I've often said that the test of a great nation is whether it will adhere to its core values not only when it is easy but when it is hard."
CARACAS (Reuters) - It's something few people can tell Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez: stop talking.
Chavez, whose speeches often stretch five hours or more, said on Sunday his doctor told him to stay quiet for three days to help a sore throat. "I am a little affected by the intensive, continuous and permanent use of this cannon I've got here and the doctor has told me not to talk," Chavez said to audience laughter.
Chavez immediately responded that silence was not the best medicine for him. "I said 'listen friend, do what you can but how am I going to follow this treatment?' Three days without talking? I lasted one, not even one," Chavez said at the start of a television show he presents every week.
Spain's King Juan Carlos famously tried to silence Chavez, sparking a diplomatic incident when he told the Venezuelan leader to "shut up" during a summit in 2007.
Chavez makes frequent joking references to his loquacious style and occasionally tries, with little success, to shorten his speeches.
Two consecutive election races in recent months have taken their toll on Chavez, whose throat is inflamed after dozens of hours-long stump speeches in which he often sings and shouts. On the show, Chavez often speaks for five hours or more. In January, Chavez spoke for about seven hours without a break during an appearance in Congress.
He campaigned intensively before state and city elections in November, then launched straight into a new campaign to amend the constitution via a referendum. Chavez won the referendum, which removed term limits and allows him to run for re-election as many times as he pleases.
Posted by: zip the lip ||
03/02/2009 16:48 ||
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#1
As I recall, the King of Spain told him the same thing.
Does Barry know anybody who knows how to pay taxes?
WASHINGTON Ron Kirk, nominated as U.S. Trade Representative in the Obama administration, owes an estimated $10,000 in back taxes from earlier in the decade and has agreed to make his payments, the Senate Finance Committee said Monday.
The committee said the taxes arise from Kirk's handling of speaking fees that he donated to his alma mater, and for his deduction of the full cost of season tickets to the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team.
The disclosure made the former Dallas mayor the latest in a string of top-level Obama administration appointees found to have underpaid their taxes, following Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Tom Daschle, who withdrew as candidate for Health and Human Services secretary. Nancy Killefer, Obama's pick for chief performance officer, also bowed out amid tax problems.
White House spokesman Ben LaBolt said Kirk was working to clear up "a few minor issues" uncovered by the committee and expressed confidence he would be confirmed.
Despite the error, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, issued a statement calling Kirk "the right person for this job," and said he would attempt to have the nomination moved through the panel quickly.
Kirk routinely gave any speaking fees he earned to Austin College, the committee said, and did not list them on his tax returns. Instead, the committee said he should have listed the fees as income, then claimed them as charitable donations. The estimated effect was to reduce Kirk's tax bill by an estimated $5,800, according to the report.
Kirk also deducted more than $17,000 as entertainment expenses for the cost of Mavericks' tickets. The committee said he substantiated about $9,900 of that amount, and will owe about $2,600 in taxes on the balance.
The committee said that last fall, Kirk amended his income tax return for 2006, paying an additional $2,188 in tax and $139 in interest after a notification from the Internal Revenue Service. The return was filed by a paid tax preparer, the panel added.
GORDON BROWN hopes to forge a partnership with President Barack Obama in Washington this week, to call for a "global new deal" to lift the world out of recession.
As he prepares for his first White House visit since the president's inauguration, the prime minister has hinted that he is ready to make further tax cuts to boost the UK economy.
Brown will meet Obama on Tuesday and address a joint session of Congress on Wednesday. Aides say he has both to demonstrate to a sceptical British public that he commands the respect of the president, and to persuade the American political establishment that global action is needed to rescue the US economy.
Brown is under pressure to persuade American political leaders to sign up to bold aims for the G20 summit of industrial and leading developing nations, which is to be held in London next month.
Many US politicians believe economic policy should put America first, and have shown little interest in concerted global action. Brown will argue for a renewal of the transatlantic relationship, with the two powers working together to solve global economic problems.
The prime minister will borrow from the rhetoric of Franklin Roosevelt, who introduced the government-financed New Deal to tackle the US Depression of the 1930s. He will argue that his 21st century "global new deal" will also require public spending on a huge world-wide scale.
Writing in The Sunday Times today, Brown calls for "universal action to prevent the crisis spreading, to stimulate the global economy and to help reduce the severity and length of the global recession".
His stress on continued economic "stimulation" will increase speculation about next month's budget. No 10 sources said that, while no final decision had been taken about further tax cuts, the prime minister would do "whatever it took" to pull the UK out of recession.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/02/2009 00:00 ||
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Oh, you mean the US taxpayer now gets to "stimulate" and bail out foreign economies and firms too? Yay!
#3
The prime minister will borrow from the rhetoric of Franklin Roosevelt, who introduced the government-financed New Deal to tackle the US Depression of the 1930s. He will argue that his 21st century "global new deal" will also require public spending on a huge world-wide scale.
What finally brought the world out of the depression was WWII. Who does Brown think we should declare war on? He won't even defend his own country against the Muslims.
Posted by: Formerly Dan ||
03/02/2009 8:11 Comments ||
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Brown will try anything to get his sorry a$$ out of a sling.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/02/2009 8:58 Comments ||
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A bit of Rantrivia:
Did you know that President Obama signed his stimulus package at the same desk where President Clinton got his package stimulated? anon
#10
In Great Britain Brown is increasingly unpopular and Obama is currently popular. There is nothing of substance being accomplished. Brown is just trying to get a little sprinkling of Obama pixie dust for his domestic audience.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
