This Is How Democracy Is Supposed to Work

Trey Smith

David Cameron indicated on Thursday evening that Britain would not take part in military action against Syria after the British government lost a crucial vote on an already watered-down amendment that was designed to pave the way to intervention in the war-torn country.

In a devastating blow to his authority, the prime minister lost a government motion by 272 votes to 285 – an opposition majority of 13 – after scores of Tory MPs voted with Labour.
~ from Cameron Forced to Rule Out British Attack on Syria After MPs Reject Motion by Nicholas Watt and Nick Hopkins ~

In a democracy, the leader doesn't always win. There will be times when a President or Prime Minister makes a proposal that will be voted down. At other times, if the system allows, the leader might veto something passed by the legislative body. And there are times when the executive and legislative branches agree, but the judiciary steps in.

It would be one thing if, each time a nation's leader made a proposal or introduced legislation, the legislative body frequently shot it down. After a while, the reluctance of the legislature to go along with the leader might add up to a cumulative "devastating blow". But this idea that, if the executive branch loses a few key votes here and there, we should call this a "devastating blow" is farcical. No, it is called democracy in action.

It will now be interesting to see if President Obama will follow Prime Minister Cameron's lead. Cameron put the idea of attacking Syria to the UK's legislative body. He made his pitch and lost. To his credit, Cameron says he will honor the will of the people through their elected representatives.

So, what do you think? Do you believe that Obama will work within the democratic process by allowing Congress to vote on the matter OR do you think he simply will make a nondemocratic unilateral decision?

Worse Than the Patriot Act? II

Trey Smith

In this morning's post, I dealt with one nefarious aspect -- a person can be detained and questioned even if they aren't suspected of anything having to do with terrorism -- of the UK's Terrorism Act of 2000. On its face, that is bad enough, but another aspect is even worse. You do not have the right of silence. You must answer the questions posed or you can be charged with the crime of noncooperation!

Just like in the US, Brits and foreigners supposedly have the right to not incriminate themselves. They supposedly have the right NOT to answer questions, particularly when they aren't charged with anything and there is no suspicion that they have ties to terrorism. But that's not what they told David Miranda. According to Glenn Greenwald's spouse, 'They said I would be put in jail if I didn't cooperate.'

If Miranda was a suspect of a crime, the government would have somewhat of a leg to stand on. If they genuinely thought that he was part of a terrorist plot or was contributing money/support to a known terrorist organization, then most people would understand why he was detained and why authorities would demand cooperation. But Miranda is none of these things. He merely happens to be the life partner of an investigative journalist being targeted by the US and UK political elite.

If the authorities picked you up because of your spouse or partner's job -- a legal and needed job at that -- would you be okay with being threatened with imprisonment because you didn't want to compromise your spouse or partner's work?

Again, this is the kind of behavior one would expect in a police state, not a constitutional democracy.

You should be outraged. If you are not, then you won't have the right to whine and complain when the authorities decide it's your turn to be questioned.

Worse Than the Patriot Act? I

Trey Smith

Since I'm not a Brit and I have never been to the UK, I don't pay that much attention to their laws and regulations. The recent row over the detention of Glenn Greenwald's spouse has brought to light the UK version of the US Patriot Act. While I think our law is overly broad and an invitation to abuse, it turns out that the UK's Terrorism Act of 2000 is even scarier.

One would think that -- at the very least -- an individual could not be detained UNLESS there was a degree of suspicion that said person might have some ties to terrorism -- probable cause. But as it turns out, even this minimal standard is not a requirement of Section 7 of the act. A law enforcement officer can question just about a-n-y-b-o-d-y to determine if there might be a reason to be suspicious. In other words, a law enforcement official is empowered to detain anyone they want to for next too no reason at all.

In a democracy, that's absolutely ludicrous!

Imagine if the crime of rape was epidemic in your community. Public officials declare that they need extra powers in order to protect citizens. So, they pass a law or ordinance that grants the police the right to question anybody at any time for any reason under the auspices of trying to prevent rape. Would you be okay with being stopped and badgered with questions for 9 long hours? Would you have no qualms about being detained even if you didn't match any of the descriptions of alleged perpetrators and nothing you had done gave rise to any suspicion that you might be a potential rapist?

Most people would be up in arms about such a law or ordinance. It is the kind of regulation one might expect in Nazi Germany or the old Soviet Union, but not in the USA or UK. It is the kind of law one would expect to find in a police state, not in a nation that [supposedly] recognizes that citizens have certain constitutional rights.

Sadly, that's NOT the worst aspect of the Terrorism Act of 2000. I will deal with that in this evening's post.

Can There Be Any Doubt Now?

Trey Smith

When it comes to "intelligence gathering" to protect us from "terrorism", we've been told countless times from both sides of the pond of the many safeguards in place to insure that this vast and immense power is not abused. But the growing story of the 9-hour detention of investigative journalist Glenn Greenwald's spouse has blown the lid off of that fairy tale.

In the aftermath of this situation, Alan Rusbridger -- the editor of The Guardian -- revealed some shocking information at how far the British government was willing to go to try to suppress any more revelations. Behind the scenes, not only did they threaten legal action, but they sent two official to The Guardian's London office.

And so one of the more bizarre moments in the Guardian's long history occurred – with two GCHQ security experts overseeing the destruction of hard drives in the Guardian's basement just to make sure there was nothing in the mangled bits of metal which could possibly be of any interest to passing Chinese agents. "We can call off the black helicopters," joked one as we swept up the remains of a MacBook Pro.

Only a complete numbskull would believe that this had ANYTHING to do with fear of Chinese spies. It is more than obvious that this action was undertaken at the behest of America's NSA. While some of the revelations printed in The Guardian have taken aim at GCHQ, the vast majority have stripped veil after veil away from the ubiquitous US spy operation.

It is unclear at this point if the destruction of hard drives was meant to be purely symbolic or the British higher ups are incredibly naive. Their efforts in no way have stopped The Guardian from investigating and reporting on this overall topic. I mean, it's not like they kept ALL of the leaked documents on one or two computers in one location. Glenn Greenwald, for example, lives in Brazil!

The most telling quote from Rusbridger's column is about as ominous sounding as you can get: "You've had your fun. Now we want the stuff back."

~

After I finished writing this post, an anonymous US government official admitted that the detention of David Miranda was purely to intimidate Greenwald and other reporters.  See how brazen they have become?  Here is a statement that the British government -- I'm confident this was done at the behest of the US --  explicitly misappropriated the use of their own laws for strictly political purposes!   They detained Miranda even though they knew beforehand he had no connection to terrorism whatsoever.

Really, can there be any doubt now that unchecked authority will be abused with impunity?

Follow-Up to Glenn Greenwald's Partner Held in Detention

Trey Smith

Upon learning that his partner had been detained at Heathrow Airport for 9 long hours, Glenn Greenwald wrote in The Guardian, in part,

According to a document published by the UK government about Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, "fewer than 3 people in every 10,000 are examined as they pass through UK borders" (David was not entering the UK but only transiting through to Rio). Moreover, "most examinations, over 97%, last under an hour." An appendix to that document states that only .06% of all people detained are kept for more than 6 hours.

The stated purpose of this law, as the name suggests, is to question people about terrorism. The detention power, claims the UK government, is used "to determine whether that person is or has been involved in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism."

But they obviously had zero suspicion that David was associated with a terrorist organization or involved in any terrorist plot. Instead, they spent their time interrogating him about the NSA reporting which Laura Poitras, the Guardian and I are doing, as well the content of the electronic products he was carrying. They completely abused their own terrorism law for reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism: a potent reminder of how often governments lie when they claim that they need powers to stop "the terrorists", and how dangerous it is to vest unchecked power with political officials in its name.

Worse, they kept David detained right up until the last minute: for the full 9 hours, something they very rarely do. Only at the last minute did they finally release him. We spent all day - as every hour passed - worried that he would be arrested and charged under a terrorism statute. This was obviously designed to send a message of intimidation to those of us working journalistically on reporting on the NSA and its British counterpart, the GCHQ.

The fact that this unlawful detention is so brazen basically tells us that the US and UK really don't care what anybody thinks. They have granted themselves this power and they will use it whenever it fits into someone's political agenda.

If nothing else, it only underscores the amount of guts journalists like Greenwald and whistleblowers like Edward Snowden are exhibiting. While Bradley Manning's acts were courageous too, he did them anonymously. Who can blame him? But Snowden, Greenwald, other Guardian reporters and a few from The Washington Post are standing up in the open to shine a spotlight on areas the US and British governments desperately want to keep in the dark.

Talk about speaking truth to power!!

And So It Begins

Trey Smith

If this blog had a far larger footprint -- tens or hundreds of thousands of page views per day, week or month -- I might be a bit nervous. For the last two months, I've been sharing articles and offering commentary on the NSA scandal. Even before that, I have been a steadfast critic of the last two presidential administrations as well as Corporate America. In today's world, the political and economic elite don't take kindly to criticism. Criticize too often or too loudly and you become their target!

Since Glenn Greenwald has written one expose after another, he must know that he definitely is in their crosshairs. I am betting that he is extra cautious these days because he can never be sure if America or the UK might try to take him out, grab him or employ some type of intimidation or harassment.

Well, the UK government -- at the behest of the US, I'm sure -- has made their first move. His partner, David Miranda, was detained at London's airport for 9 hours without charges and had all of his electronic devices confiscated.

Here is what Greenwald had to say on the matter.

"This is a profound attack on press freedoms and the news gathering process," said Greenwald. "To detain my partner for a full nine hours while denying him a lawyer, and then seize large amounts of his possessions, is clearly intended to send a message of intimidation to those of us who have been reporting on the NSA and GCHQ. The actions of the UK pose a serious threat to journalists everywhere.

"But the last thing it will do is intimidate or deter us in any way from doing our job as journalists. Quite the contrary: it will only embolden us more to continue to report aggressively."

Just like the US Patriot Act, the UK has granted itself overly broad police powers. Miranda was held under schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000. According to The Guardian,

Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act has been widely criticised for giving police broad powers under the guise of anti-terror legislation to stop and search individuals without prior authorisation or reasonable suspicion – setting it apart from other police powers. Those stopped have no automatic right to legal advice and it is a criminal offense to refuse to cooperate with questioning under schedule 7, which critics say is a curtailment of the right to silence.

Miranda had gone to Berlin to visit Laura Poitras, a US filmmaker, who has been working with Greenwald and others on the Snowden leaks. It is more than obvious that neither the US nor British governments believe that Miranda has ties to terrorism --he simply happens to be the partner of the man who has been making both governments look bad.

It doesn't say anything positive to think that, in today's world, a democratic government can hassle innocent people simply for doing their jobs. In Greenwald's case, he happens to be an investigative journalist who has courageously been investigating the governments responsible for having Miranda picked up...FOR NO OTHER REASON THAN TO TRY TO SILENCE GREENWALD!!