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These news articles include revealing information on U.S. presidential
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Destabilizing Iraq, Broadly
DefinedJuly 23, 2007, Washington
Posthttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/22/AR2007072201141.html
Be
careful what you say and whom you help -- especially when it comes to the
Iraq war and the Iraqi government. President Bush issued an executive
order last week titled "Blocking Property of Certain Persons Who Threaten
Stabilization Efforts in Iraq." It could be interpreted as targeting the
financial assets of any American who directly or indirectly aids someone
who has committed or "poses a significant risk of committing" violent
acts
"threatening the peace or stability of Iraq" or who undermines "efforts
to
promote economic reconstruction and political reform" in the war-torn
country. The text of the order, if interpreted broadly, could cast a far
bigger net to include not just those who commit violent acts or pose the
risk of doing so in Iraq, but also third parties -- such as U.S. citizens
in this country -- who knowingly or unknowingly aid or encourage such
people.
The targeting of not just those who support perpetrators
of violence but also those who support individuals who "pose a
significant
risk" of committing violence goes far beyond normal legal language
related
to intent and could be applied in a highly arbitrary manner,
said
Bruce Fein, a senior Justice Department official in the Reagan
administration. Fein also questioned the executive order's inclusion of
third parties, such as U.S. citizens who assist, sponsor or make "any
contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services" to assist people
on the Treasury list. "What about a lawyer hired to get someone off the
list?" Fein asked. The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets
Control keeps a "Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons" roll
that includes those covered by several such executive orders. It most
recently ran to 276 pages.
Note:To read the full text of the Executive Order, "Blocking
Property of Certain Persons Who Threaten Stabilization Efforts in
Iraq,"
click here.
Is this the real president of the United
States?July 23, 2007, Guardian (One of
the
U.K.'s leading newspapers)http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2132603,00.html
Obscurity
has been Cheney's hallmark since he took office in January 2001, and
that's
the way he likes it. "Am I the evil genius in the corner that nobody ever
sees come out of his hole?" he quipped in 2004. "It's a nice way to
operate, actually." Cheney is ... the most powerful vice-
president in American history. "He has expanded the power of the
vice-president fiftyfold," says Bruce Fein, a lawyer who served in the
Reagan administration. So dominant has he been in a traditionally
submissive role that some commentators are now wondering whether it is
time to drop the "V" from his title. "Cheney is de facto president in all
areas of policy, bar just a few aspects of the domestic agenda," Fein
says. It was obvious the Cheney vice-presidency was never going to stick
to convention from the day in July 2000 George Bush announced his running
mate. After all, the man who recommended Cheney for the job was ...
Cheney. The Bush cabinet was formed in Cheney's image. Figures who were
to
become seminal -- Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, John Bolton, Scooter
Libby -- were all Cheney's people. September 11 2001 ... was the moment
for which Cheney had been preparing for many years. Since his days as
White House chief-of-staff to Gerald Ford, living with the fallout of
Nixon's destruction, Cheney had harboured ambitions to hit back at
Congress and reinstate the untrammelled authority of the president.
Within
hours of the attacks on New York and Washington, while Bush was still
floundering around in Air Force One, Cheney had assembled a legal team
within his own office and was actively planning how to roll back the
restraints on the president's executive power that had been introduced in
the wake of Vietnam and Watergate.
Broader Privilege Claimed In
FiringsJuly 20, 2007, Washington
Posthttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/19/AR2007071902625.html
Bush
administration officials unveiled a bold new assertion of executive
authority yesterday in the dispute over the firing of nine U.S.
attorneys,
saying that the Justice Department will never be allowed to pursue
contempt
charges initiated by Congress against White House officials once the
president has invoked executive privilege. Under federal law, a statutory
contempt citation by the House or Senate must be submitted to the U.S.
attorney for the District of Columbia, "whose duty it shall be to bring
the matter before the grand jury for its action." But administration
officials argued yesterday that Congress has no power to force a U.S.
attorney to pursue contempt charges in cases, such as the prosecutor
firings, in which the president has declared that testimony or documents
are protected from release by executive privilege. Mark J. Rozell, a
professor of public policy at George Mason University who has written a
book on executive-privilege issues, called the administration's stance
"astonishing. That's a breathtakingly broad view of the president's role
in this system of separation of powers," Rozell said. "What this
statement
is saying is the president's claim of executive privilege trumps all."
The administration's stance "is almost Nixonian in its scope and
breadth of interpreting its power. Congress has no recourse at all, in
the
president's view. . . . It's allowing the executive to define the scope
and
limits of its own powers," [Rozell said].
Power Without LimitsJuly 22, 2007, New York
Timeshttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/opinion/22sun2.html
The Bush
administration, which has been pushing presidential power to new
extremes,
is reportedly developing an even more dangerous new theory of executive
privilege. It says that if Congress holds White House officials in
contempt for withholding important evidence in the United States attorney
scandal, the Justice Department simply will not pursue the charges. This
stance tears at the fabric of the Constitution and upends the rule of
law.
Congress has a constitutional right to investigate the purge of nine
United
States attorneys last year. The next question is how Congress will
enforce
its right to obtain information, and it is on that point that the
administration is said to have made its latest disturbing claim. If
Congress holds White House officials in contempt, the next step should be
that the United States attorney for the District of Columbia brings the
matter to a grand jury. But according to a Washington Post report, the
administration is saying that its claim of executive privilege means that
the United States attorney would be ordered not to go forward with the
case.
There is no legal basis for this obstructionism. The
Supreme
Court has made clear that executive privilege is not simply what the
president claims it to be. It must be evaluated case by case by a court,
balancing the need for the information against the president’s interest
in
keeping his decision-making process private. The White House’s
extreme position could lead to a constitutional crisis. If the executive
branch refused to follow the law, Congress could use its own inherent
contempt powers, in which it would level the charges itself and hold a
trial. Congress should use all of the tools at its disposal to pursue its
investigations. It is about preserving the checks and balances that are a
vital part of American democracy.
Bush Approves New CIA MethodsJuly 21, 2007, Washington
Posthttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/20/AR2007072001264.html
President
Bush set broad legal boundaries for the CIA's harsh interrogation of
terrorism suspects yesterday, allowing the intelligence agency to resume
a
program that was suspended last year after criticism that it violated
U.S.
and international law. In an executive order lacking any details about
actual interrogation techniques, Bush said the CIA program will now
comply
with a Geneva Conventions prohibition against "outrages upon personal
dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." Two
administration officials said that suspects now in U.S. custody could be
moved immediately into the "enhanced interrogation" program and subjected
to techniques that go beyond those allowed by the U.S. military.
Rights activists criticized Bush's order for failing to spell out
which techniques are now approved or prohibited. "All the order really
does is to have the president say, 'Everything in that other document
that
I'm not showing you is legal -- trust me,' " said Tom Malinowski
of Human Rights Watch. The CIA interrogation guidelines are contained in
a
classified document. A senior intelligence official, asked whether this
list includes such widely criticized methods as the simulated drowning
known as "waterboarding," declined to discuss specifics but said "it
would
be very wrong to assume that the program of the past would move into the
future unchanged." CIA detainees have also alleged they were left naked
in
cells for prolonged periods, subjected to sensory and sleep deprivation
and
extreme heat and cold, and sexually taunted. A senior administration
official briefing reporters yesterday said that any future use of
"extremes of heat and cold" would be subject to a "reasonable
interpretation . . . we're not talking about forcibly induced
hypothermia."
DeFazio asks, but he's denied
accessJuly 20, 2007, The Oregonian
(Oregon's leading newspaper)http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/118489654058910.xml&coll=7
Oregonians
called Peter DeFazio's office, worried there was a conspiracy buried in
the classified portion of a White House plan for operating the government
after a terrorist attack. As a member of the U.S. House on the Homeland
Security Committee, DeFazio, D-Ore., is permitted to enter a secure
"bubbleroom" in the Capitol and examine classified material. So he asked
the White House to see the secret documents. On Wednesday, DeFazio got
his
answer: DENIED.
"I just can't believe they're going to deny a
member of Congress the right of reviewing how they plan to conduct the
government of the United States after a significant terrorist attack,"
DeFazio says. Homeland Security Committee staffers told his
office that the White House initially approved his request, but it was
later quashed. DeFazio doesn't know who did it or why. "We're talking
about the continuity of the government of the United States of America,"
DeFazio says. "I would think that would be relevant to any member of
Congress, let alone a member of the Homeland Security Committee." Bush
administration spokesman Trey Bohn declined to say why DeFazio was denied
access: "We do not comment through the press on the process that this
access entails. It is important to keep in mind that much of the
information related to the continuity of government is highly sensitive."
Norm Ornstein, a legal scholar who studies government continuity at the
conservative American Enterprise Institute, said he "cannot think of one
good reason" to deny access to a member of Congress who serves on the
Homeland Security Committee. This is the first time DeFazio has been
denied access to documents.
"Maybe the people who think there's a
conspiracy out there are right," DeFazio said.
Producer of 9/11 Conspiracy Film 'Loose Change'
Arrested for Deserting the ArmyJuly 26, 2007, FOX Newshttp://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,290942,00.html
One of
the young filmmakers behind a controversial 9/11 conspiracy documentary
was arrested this week on charges that he deserted the Army, even though
... he received an honorable discharge. Korey Rowe, 24, who served with
the 101st Airborne in Afghanistan and Iraq, told FOXNews.com that he was
honorably discharged from the military 18 months ago — which he said he
explained to sheriffs when they pounded on his door late Monday night.
“When they came to my house, I showed them my paperwork,” Rowe said. “The
cops said, 'You’re still in the system.'”
Rowe is one of the
producers of "Loose Change," a cult hit on the Internet espousing the
theory that the U.S. government and specifically the Bush administration
orchestrated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The movie is set to be
released in about 40 British theaters in late August, according
to Rowe and fellow filmmakers Jason Bermas and Dylan Avery. Police
arrested Rowe at his house in Oneonta, N.Y., about 10:45 p.m. on Monday
and took him to the Otsego County jail, where he spent a day-and-a-half
before he was released, he said. Rowe was turned over to officials at
Fort
Drum — the closest military base — who then booked him on a flight to
Fort
Campbell, Ky., where his unit is based, to try to straighten out why the
military issued a warrant for his arrest. “A warrant for my arrest came
down and showed up on the sheriff’s desk,” Rowe said. “Where it came from
and why it showed up all of a sudden is a mystery to me.” There were at
least five sheriffs on hand for his arrest, Rowe said. “They pulled a
whole operation. They cut my phone lines. They came from the woods. It
was
crazy — it was ridiculous,” he said.
Ven 27 Juil - 11:03 par mihou