You won’t see this anywhere else:

A federal judge on Wednesday said the George W. Bush administration illegally eavesdropped on the telephone conversations of two American lawyers who represented a now-defunct Saudi charity.

The lawyers alleged some of their 2004 telephone conversations to Saudi Arabia were siphoned to the National Security Agency without warrants. The allegations were initially based on a classified document the government accidentally mailed to the former Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation lawyers. The document was later declared a state secret and removed from the long-running lawsuit weighing whether a sitting U.S. president may create a spying program to eavesdrop on Americans’ electronic communications without warrants.




  1. Robart says:

    “You won’t see this anywhere else:”

    I’m seeing it everywhere.

  2. bobbo, I see dead people says:

    Isn’t this touted as one of the achievements of the Bush administration and in fact a plank in the 2012 Repuglican Platform?

  3. MrWindows says:

    Bush Hitler. Last I checked, there were no ovens still smoking from the charred remains of Arab nationals.
    Get over it, Grow up, Move on.
    The Obama faithful can’t keep raising the spectre of G.W. Bush to mask their own failures.

  4. tcc3 says:

    The fact that Justice is still defending this crap is certainly a failure of the Obama administration.

    On the other hand, if they didn’t Im sure the right would crucify him for “failing to do what it takes to keep americans safe.”

    It would still be a nice change of pace to see someone do whats right, even if there are trumped up political consequences.

  5. Dallas says:

    I agree we should move on too. The GOP has long swept this sort of stuff under the rug and so has their sheeple followers.

    The democrats need to move onward and tackle the next pile left by the Cheney Administration.

    I am concerned by the Christian Taliban uprising in Michigan. Where is their leader hiding? Appalachian mountains?

    http://time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1976665,00.html?xid=rss-topstories-cnnpartner

  6. Improbus says:

    I won’t be supporting Obama in the next general election unless the Republicans run a Beck/Palin ticket. I thought Obama would bring some real change … fooled again.

  7. Angus says:

    Bush is gone, get over it…

  8. tcc3 says:

    He’s not as gone as we had hoped, Angus. That’s kind of the point.

  9. bobbo, even when out of office, politicians are not above the law says:

    This prosecution is beneficial for reasona having NOTHING TO DO WITH BUSH. ie–maybe, just maybe, but not likely, but still maybe==Obama operatives will not want to be likewise prosecuted and will shy away from violating the law and constitutional rights.

    With idiot Bush supporters like those posting here, and idiot Obama supporters wanting to “look to the future” the maybe gets more remote.

    but still maybe.

  10. wygit says:

    Saw it on EFF a while ago…
    and yes, they pointed out that while it happened under the Bush administration, the Obama administration has been defending it.

    They BOTH got slapped down, and deservedly so.

  11. Breetai says:

    Dallas,

    That would be your first priority you Fascist Nazi piece of shit.

    History has taught us Republican Administrations love murdering Forgivers it’s also taught us Democrat Administrations love murdering Americans.

  12. Cirdan says:

    15+ states claim Congress passed an illegal bill which contains nothing but government take over.

    No news about that?

  13. chuck says:

    It’s a good thing that Obama repealed the Patriot Act so now we never have to worry about this ever happening again.

  14. bobbo, words have a context says:

    #11–Breetai==well thats a bit harsh, I must say.

    You two having some kind of a spat??

  15. Howard Beal says:

    #7
    Bush is gone, get over it…

    yes but it will take many more years to clean up the mess Bush and Co left. Especially with the GOP blocking or slowing down every thing they can. What a bunch of sore losers

  16. Jim W. says:

    I think some things are missing from Cherman’s pull quote.

    FTA:
    The Obama administration’s Justice Department staunchly defended against the lawsuit, which challenged the so-called Terror Surveillance Program that Bush adopted in the aftermath of the 2001 terror attacks. The classified document was removed from the case at the behest of both the Bush and Obama administrations, which declared it a state secret.

    and,

    Under Bush’s so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program, which The New York Times disclosed in December 2005, the NSA was eavesdropping on Americans’ telephone calls without warrants if the government believed the person on the other line was overseas and associated with terrorism. Congress, with the vote of Obama — who was an Illinois senator at the time — subsequently authorized such warrantless spying in the summer of 2008.

    / italics inserted by me

  17. some guy says:

    I just saw it reported on Fox News.

    No joke.

  18. Greg Allen says:

    I honestly believe the Bush Administration violated my civil rights.

    I wasn’t materially damaged so I have no desire to sue, but I do want to know the truth about it.

    That’s not asking too much in a free country that supposedly values it’s constitution.

  19. church lady says:

    “ORGANIZED RELIGION” pays NO taxes. Never have. Never will.

  20. RBG says:

    BZZZZZT! Godwin’s Law.

    8. tcc3 He’s not as gone as we had hoped, Angus. That’s kind of the point.

    Maybe there’s a little Bush in every administration: Gates… Bernanke…

    RBG

  21. kjackman says:

    Wow, this story isn’t something I’d normally take seriously, but damned if that Hitler picture didn’t change my mind!

    /rolleyes

  22. Hmeyers says:

    I thought international phone calls were automatically able to be wiretapped at will after the Patriot Act.

  23. pilgrim says:

    “Obama administration has argued that warrantless tracking is permitted because Americans enjoy no “reasonable expectation of privacy””
    They are dividing and conquering. Republican or Democrat, two heads of the same beast.
    They don’t work for you.

  24. angry says:

    Well if you have nothing to hide then there’s no need to be afraid. Our gov’t would never do anything untoward to violate an innocent’s rights!

  25. MikeN says:

    What does wiretapping have to do with Hitler? Better off putting up pictures of the current Chinese leadership.

  26. Micromike says:

    All you partisan assholes just perpetuate the problem and make it easy for the corrupt to mislead us. Nobody but the Democrat and Republican Parties is responsible for driving our country and its Constitution into the mud. For 150 years these 2 parties have put their desire to dominate the world before their patriotism to the country they pretend to protect.

    Wake up, and grow up. The Dems and Repubs ARE the problem not the solution. If you believe otherwise you are a fool!!!

    I doubt the Tea Baggers have anything better in mind, they just want to run things. That’s why the Dems didn’t object to Bush’s perversion of our democracy. They just wanted their turn to abuse the Constitution too.

    Government always sucks. So do Revolutions because they are just more government.

    Just say no to Government!

  27. Hmeyers says:

    @Micromike

    Some say that the influence and power of the two political parties has recently led us to a defacto state of dictorship where choice is but a corporate-sponsored illusion.

    And yes, the Tea Baggers are corporate sponsored too from that corporate mouthpiece Ben Gleck and funded by 2 [lamo] Republican Senators.

    So we have pestilence on one side and plague on the other side … two non-choices of canned ham.

    At least the more sophisticated canned ham is the president, but I am sort of confused to the party branding with the offshore drilling and the more troops in Afghanistan thing going on …

  28. sargasso says:

    It was funny up until state security tampered with court evidence. What is in a court, stays in a court until judged upon. This stinks.

  29. ECA says:

    “Thats entertainment”

  30. Dallas says:

    #11 Why you, Capitalist Commie (holding fist in air).


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