Alert: Hell Has Frozen Over
Oh man..because of global warming, hell can’t freeze over! Lord knows it would if it could:
Having reviewed it in camera, we conclude that the Sealed Document is protected by the state secrets privilege, along with the information as to whether the government surveilled Al-Haramain. We take very seriously our obligation to review the documents with a very careful, indeed a skeptical, and not to accept at face value the government’s claim or justification of privilege. Simply saying “military secret,” “national security” or “terrorist threat” or invoking an ethereal fear that disclosure will threaten our nation is insufficient to support the privilege. Sufficient detail must be”and has been”provided for us to make a meaningful examination. The process of in camera review ineluctably places the court in a role that runs contrary to our fundamental principle of a transparent judicial system. It also places on the court a special burden to assure itself that an appropriate balance is struck between protecting national security matters and preserving an open court system. That said, we acknowledge the need to defer to the Executive on matters of foreign policy and national security and surely cannot legitimately find ourselves second guessing the Executive in this arena.
The most liberal appellate court in the federal judiciary handed the Bush administration a big victory regarding its terrorist-surveillance program (TSP) at the NSA. A three-judge panel ruled unanimously that the administration correctly asserted its ability to protect state secrets in pursuing leads on terrorists.
The court first ruled that the existence of the program was no longer a state secret because the Admin. confirmed its existence and some of its details following the exposure of the program in the NYT. Thus, the Admin. could not now seek to stop the civil suit on the basis that it would be forced to confirm a “state secret” by even acknowledging the existence of the program.
But, the Admin. also invoked the privilege against the plaintiff because litigating the suit would require disclosure to the plaintiff of information (a “sealed document”) he needed to pursue his action, but which was classified and a “state secret.”
As the court noted, this line of authority goes back to espionage cases following the Civil War where spies hired by the Union sought to recover damages relating to the agreement. The Supreme Court denied the suit on the basis that the agrement itself was secret, and that secrecy precludes any court action to enforce its terms.
In this case the Court held that the government had properly invoked the State Secrets privilege with respect to document(s) and information which the plaintiffs would need to proceed – such as confirmation that the plaintiffs had been the target of the Terrorist Surveillance Program and the details of how the program operated.
Jay:
Wonders never cease! A sliver of sanity actually coming from the infamously liberal leaning 9th Circuit Court in favor of the Bush administration! Naturally the libtard heads are exploding!
I should note, first of all, that the Sixth Circuit has reached a contrary conclusion, so expect the Supreme Court to weigh in on this sooner rather than later. The net result of this line of reasoning is that the media can combine with the courts to create a no-win situation: the media discloses a secret program and portrays it in an unfavorable light that suggests it’s illegal; the White House can’t stay silent without taking a public beating; and then the courts say that lawsuits can not only be filed because the White House fought back, but they also allow the development of a one-sided and incomplete factual record based on media misreporting.
None of which helps fight the bad guys.
The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, the most liberal in the nation, ruled that the “warrantless wiretapping program” is covered by the “state secrets” privilege. Each of the three judges on the panel were appointed by Democrat Presidents.
The suit was brought by a Muslim “charity”, the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, which was shut down by the Treasury Department’s OFAC division, after it was designated a Foreign Terrorist Entity. The “charity” was really an al Qaeda money-laundering scheme.
November 17, 2007 - 09:28 AM on November 17th, 2007
Larry is mentioning it because Plame worked at NSA(like her Air Force dad) working on domestic political groups like the one that just lost in court.
It looks like the domestic politcial group that sued wasn’t allowed to because CIA(Plame) was investigating and NSA is passed over by the courts when it is a CIA investigator. This is good for CIA, Larry, Plame, and all those people at CIa that accessed files at NSA, like the FBI/CIA just arrested.
Larry is bringing this up because; Plame is probably involved, the CIA is probably involved, Specter(as in spook, booman) is probably involved with Verizon and the telecoms will probably get immunity anyway because NSA was used by outsied agencies, like CIA, to access information that they have been banned from access by laws like IIPA; DoJ banning CIA access to an employee file based on DoJ or DoD IIPA.
November 20, 2007 - 07:53 AM on November 20th, 2007
[...] am getting worried..Last week the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Bush and now this headline from the New York Times: Baghdad Starts to Exhale as Security Improves [...]