Politics: How Can You Tell An Attorney General is Lying?
I don't believe there is anyone better than Attorney General John Ashcroft at dissembling. In his plea to the media to help explain the Patriot Act, he seeks to defuse concerns about library visits and roving wiretaps, according to the examples cited in this Adam Clymer NY Times piece. He says that library records can only be obtained with a court order, and that roving wiretaps have been used for years in drug and health care fraud investigations. He implies that the Patriot Act doesn't have much to do with either item.
In both cases his deception is startling. The difference is that under the Patriot Act and combined with new investigative guidelines, both of these things can occur with a minimum of oversight, because the threshold for such investigative methods was lowered. Of course, AG Ashcroft doesn't mention what the law stipulates a judge should look for when issuing a warrant for a library search or a roving wiretap, just that the warrant is issued by a judge. For instance, the threshold for issuing wiretap warrants is that one goal (not necessarily the primary one) be to gather foreign intelligence. Being so vague and un-directed, a judge has almost no option but to issue the warrant.
About the roving wiretap, Ashcroft even says, "it's important for the public to understand that this isn't something new, this isn't something different, this isn't some vast incursion into the freedoms of the American people."
Ironically, the Ashcroft Justice Department has spent a good deal of its energy ensuring that journalists and the rest of America can't get access to government records. (The National Security Archives has been one of the leaders in the lonely battle to pry open the workings of our government, but the brick walls are everywhere.) Ashcroft, you'll do well to remember, even issued a memo telling government workers who deny FOIA requests that they "can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions."
That Ashcroft would try now to enlist journalists in his vile crusade to purge America of whomever he thinks is a terrorist without regard for innocence or guilt, is terrible. (It's only a coincidence that the man in the story linked is a heavyset Arab fellow named Tarek.) The American media has done a lousy job in serving to protect the interests of regular Americans in the last two years. It has faithfully portrayed America's war on terrorism and Iraq and righteous and true missions, often failing to question abuses of power, abuses of rights and the loss or destruction of innocent lives.
I think it's helped John Ashcroft plenty.
I don't believe there is anyone better than Attorney General John Ashcroft at dissembling. In his plea to the media to help explain the Patriot Act, he seeks to defuse concerns about library visits and roving wiretaps, according to the examples cited in this Adam Clymer NY Times piece. He says that library records can only be obtained with a court order, and that roving wiretaps have been used for years in drug and health care fraud investigations. He implies that the Patriot Act doesn't have much to do with either item.
In both cases his deception is startling. The difference is that under the Patriot Act and combined with new investigative guidelines, both of these things can occur with a minimum of oversight, because the threshold for such investigative methods was lowered. Of course, AG Ashcroft doesn't mention what the law stipulates a judge should look for when issuing a warrant for a library search or a roving wiretap, just that the warrant is issued by a judge. For instance, the threshold for issuing wiretap warrants is that one goal (not necessarily the primary one) be to gather foreign intelligence. Being so vague and un-directed, a judge has almost no option but to issue the warrant.
About the roving wiretap, Ashcroft even says, "it's important for the public to understand that this isn't something new, this isn't something different, this isn't some vast incursion into the freedoms of the American people."
Ironically, the Ashcroft Justice Department has spent a good deal of its energy ensuring that journalists and the rest of America can't get access to government records. (The National Security Archives has been one of the leaders in the lonely battle to pry open the workings of our government, but the brick walls are everywhere.) Ashcroft, you'll do well to remember, even issued a memo telling government workers who deny FOIA requests that they "can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions."
That Ashcroft would try now to enlist journalists in his vile crusade to purge America of whomever he thinks is a terrorist without regard for innocence or guilt, is terrible. (It's only a coincidence that the man in the story linked is a heavyset Arab fellow named Tarek.) The American media has done a lousy job in serving to protect the interests of regular Americans in the last two years. It has faithfully portrayed America's war on terrorism and Iraq and righteous and true missions, often failing to question abuses of power, abuses of rights and the loss or destruction of innocent lives.
I think it's helped John Ashcroft plenty.
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