The group that caught Saddam (and then gave the creidt to those infantrymen that were in the pictures and stuff) is a unit where everyone dresses in civilian clothing(usually worker jumpsuits...why in the desert though) and were all named Bob. You think I'm kidding but I'm not. They were "undercover" Special Forces. Green berets in other words.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

I dunno. The awesomeness of being super special ops is pretty much negated by having to call yourself Bob.

I miss being able to vote by a matter of days. I was bothered, but looking at the candidates, I'm caring less and less about missing out on Decision 2004.

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Steal my dreams and sell them back to me.....

They aren't super special ops. Just your run of the mill special ops.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 12, 2004).]

Double post, please delete

[This message has been edited by THRAWN (edited July 12, 2004).]

And I'm sick of the people dry humping Bush, but you don't see me crying about it. I simply said get Bush out. It's all there, screw the Michael Moore stuff, but Bush is one of the worst presidents of all time. He ruined everything Clinton did in his 8 years, in just a couple of years. And this was from the day he walked INTO office, not just since the 9/11 crap.

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I can't think of anything to put here right now.

[This message has been edited by THRAWN (edited July 12, 2004).]

Thrawn it's because of Clinton that we have the problems with Iraq, Al-Qaeda, and especially North Korea that we do now. When it came to foreign policy he was weak because he wanted everyone to like him.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 13, 2004).]

It was actually a task force from 4th ID (Infantry Division) that caught Saddam. The special ops guys that we worked with over there would wear uniforms and carried US equipment although they had much more flexability in what equipment they used. They wore some fancier helmets, generally kept their hair abit longer and often wore beards or goatees. They never wore rank nor refered to it or their last names. They always went by first names. Generally they operated in support of our missions or conventional forces (us) supported their mission.

Although they never wore patches or referred to their unit, it was generally assumed that these guys were Delta Force.

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Have you forgotten ...

From what I was told the 4th was given credit but they didn't actually do it. And it makes sense to me because if I know where Saddam is, I'm going to send Special Forces in. Not infantry.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 13, 2004).]

Agreed, but enough people with guns pointed at one mans head will make anyone surrender

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I made a thread, that turned into the debate, so I made a second thread, that turned into a debate, then I made a third thread, that caught on fire, burned down, got flamed, crapped on, bashed, then turned into a debate...but the fourth one, the fourth one stayed on topic!

Me can't find any reason to disagree with Mr THRAWN.

I have an "anybody but bush attitude" despite being English, mainly because I dislike his stance on gay marriages etc - he comes across as an ignorant homophobe sometimes and that really pisses me off. I also respect a lot of the things Billy C did, and the fact that Bush takes things further away from his work makes me want to vote t'other way. If I could vote. I'm not slagging off any other aspect of him, he may be a decent politician, I don't pretend to know. That's just the way I see him from this side of the pond.

To be fair, I've got no clue about this Kerry blokey either, apart from he's a leftie. To be honest, if I was American, that'd be good enough for me.

/off topic

Thankfully, this side of the atlantic, you vote locally, and then those votes are collated to see which party, therefore which leader gets into power. Which means I can vote for a minority national party if it will help me on a local level when they get in, even if I disagree with their foriegn policy or whatever, because they've got no chance of beating Labour or the Tories into power overall.

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If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.

Kerry

The two most important things:
1)This is so ****ed up it's not even funny.
2)Patriot Act ("They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.")

What the Patriot Act does is standardize the rules for search, seizure, warrants, and arrests so all local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies are following exactly the same rules. Creates less confusion.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 13, 2004).]

Yeah. It just happens that the standard is a drastically lower level of public accountability and privacy. I think the EFF and ACLU lay it out pretty well. I like the part where the bar for government surveillance is low or nonexistant.

Kerry.

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If you can read this you're
TOO DAMN CLOSE!!

1) Messed up that we would even need to consider a constitutional ammendment to protect marriage.

2) What's wrong with the Patriot Act? Besides, you are aware that Kerry voted FOR the Patriot Act, aren't you?


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Have you forgotten ...

Protect marriage? Is it under threat?

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If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.

1) I shall remain quiet on that issue

2) Everything. The Patriot Act gives WAY to much authority to the Executive Branch. If anything, there should be LESS power in the bureaucracy. Idealy, the Executive Branch (along with the remaining two) should follow what is written in the U.S. Constitution to the letter.


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Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat.

P.Diddy for President!!!!!

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SpriteMod (JO 2003)

The Government has had way too much power for a long time. I just don't understand why it's an issue with some people when it deals with security. That, and the fact that nobody in the media can ever cite any civil rights violations as a result of the act.

However, if you're opposed to the act that is one thing. The thing to remember is that it almost unanimously passed the senate. Therefore the chances are that whatever Senator you see bashing it, voted for it. That's hillarious.

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Have you forgotten ...

[This message has been edited by Wookie06 (edited July 14, 2004).]

Granted the government has had too much power, why is that an excuse to increase the power? Unless we stop thinking that government power is inevitible, it always will be.

Next, maybe the reason we worry about government power even when it is for "security purposes" is that we value liberty over security.

Finally, the lack of empirical civil rights abuses by the patriot act is irrelevant. What Gandalf was referring to in his last post was that government having too much power is a bad thing. The Patriot Act is bad because it gives the government more power to take away your rights. But also the fact that the government has an unchecked potential to harm your liberties with this act is enough reason to reject it.



It's not funny. It's more proof that instead of making wise policy decisions, Senators only act in ways that best preserve their precious political capital.

You can't even begin to call yourself a conservitive if you are for the patriot act, it goes against the CORE VALUES of the conservitive party, being that the government is less intrusive and smaller than it is. Same thing with a "Consitutional ammendment to "Protect Marriage"". According to core conservitive values, the government should have no place in determinating who and when you can marry.

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"Just remember -- No matter how bad things get, Northern Minnesota will always be there"
-- Garrison Keeler

Someone please tell me SPECIFICALLY what is wrong with the Patriot Act. It says nothing new. A lot of it is enumerating things that have already been in practice(for less confusion) and grammical corrections on other laws. And there are been many laws passed besides this that put more oversight on the Patriot Act so if there was any way to exploit it before, there isn't now. Some people seem to think the Patriot Act gives cops the right to break down the door of your house any time they want. They still need a warrant for that. The most intrusive thing it allows is to let law enforcement agencies to tap more than one phone of a suspect. Oh my god, what a breach of liberty!

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 14, 2004).]

With regards to marriage, that is exactly why I said it's a shame that we even have to consider an ammendment. It doesn't seem that the courts will protect marriage from perversion. I guess I prefer states rights in this matter. That way at least I'll know what states to never move to.

I'm not going to proclaim that the Patriot Act is unflawed. No government law or program ever is. However no documented abuses have occured and even at worst we're talking about a terrorist's rights being violated. That seems like a non-issue. There are far more significant risks to our liberties that we could probably tackle first.

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Have you forgotten ...

Wookie, when it comes to marriage, gays are the least of my worries. A greater perversion is when people like Britney Spears, just for the publicity, get married and then divorced within the week, it creates a mockery of marriage. Marriage has been a joke for a long time now.

My plan: Let the churches decide if they want to marry someone. Make both hetero and homosexual unions legal under state law. They would all be under the title "civil unions". Marriages would just be civil unions condoned by the couple's church. That way marriage is kept "sacred"(if that's what you call it) and gays get their civil unions.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

Kieran, how can you be so right about gay marriage and so woefully wrong about the Patriot Act? My mind boggles. Boggles, I say.

Here's a quote from the ACLU with bullet points: The FBI can legimately spy on any American citizen with near zero provocation and without any oversight, in violation of our Constitution. Our rights to due process, speech, privacy, and protection against unreasonable searches and seizures have all been compromised.

Wookie, how could you reasonably expect documented abuses when there is no documentation, no judicial oversight, and no public accountability? Just who do you think is going to blow the whistle?

[This message has been edited by Ictus (edited July 14, 2004).]

Ictus, all those bullets are possibilities. Possibilities, not realities(except that part about judges not even having to approve warrants if they fall under the Patriot Act. No where does it even allude to that in the Patriot Act). Yes, the FBI could monitor what books you read. But they have no reason to. That isn't practical application. If they have a suspected terrorists, what books he reads is the most minute of evidence. They are going to go after bigger things like phone conversations.

And that last one really caught my attention: First, if the FBI has reason to believe someone is a sleeper cell they don't want the person to know they he is being followed and checked out. Thats the whole point of surveillance. And thats besides federal law enforcement having legal access to ALL your records pre-Patriot Act. This just adds the gag order which could be obtained anyway. Also, individual have NEVER had the ability to challenge illegitimate searches....until they are brought to court. And if the search was carried out in an unreasonable way (like looking for a person in hat boxes as what happened in one case that defined the rules of evidence) any lawyer worth his degree would motion for suppression of evidence and any judge with any sense of self-preservation would sustain it. It doesn't matter under what act, law, what have you evidence is obtained. It all has to follow the basic rules of evidence, otherwise it can be dismissed. The Patriot Act could go completely against the Constitution and it wouldn't matter. Constitution is above the Patriot Act and overrides it. Also, the Patriot Act is a new law. It still has to go through a lot of litigation until it reaches its final enforcable form.

Now, you didn't do what I asked you to. Instead, you went to someone else. Stop being a mouth piece and do your own work. Also, drop the pompous attitude("and so woefully wrong about the Patriot Act? My mind boggles. Boggles, I say." and other statements in the past). It can only harm your point.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

I'm more for a "civil union" answer to the whole thing. Just because marriage has already become a troubled institution is no reason to further weaken it.

With regards to the Patriot Act, Ictus, I would like to hear from people that have been damaged by it. As high profile as the issue already is I would think actual victimization stories would be widely trumpetted. There don't seem to be any victims, though.

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Have you forgotten ...

Kieran: It's referring to phone records and email headers.

I'm sorry, but I don't have the time or expertise to wade through over 300 pages of legalese. More to the point, you neither do you. Just because you won't acknowledge your sources doesn't make your statements less canned.

Let try a single example: This article, beginning with the third paragraph and ending five paragraphs later. The FBI can secretly search and wiretap a suspect's home without probable cause if foreign intelligence gathering is a "significant purpose" of the activity. It's an unconstitutional and unneccessary violation of privacy rights. You disagree?

Wookie: Um, that's because the victims either don't know they've been victimized, were deported, or ended up in Gitmo.

Thats why you don't read the stuff on money laundering and everything else that doesn't pertain to what we are talking about. And yes, I do have the time. I had yesterday and today off from work so I had the time. Oh, and canned? Besides studying law, It's called looking at an issue from multiple perspectives and drawing a conclusion. Something most partisan people can't seem to bring themselves to do because everything that isn't originated my someone with their ideology MUST be cruel and evil.

Scenario 1: FBI wiretaps someone house and finds out they are plotting to blow up some building. Because of this they are stopped, arrested, and the tapes are used to convict them.
Scenario 2: FBI wiretaps someone because they think he is going to blow something up. Well, it turns out he is completely innocent of being a terrorist but he there is talk of him thinking of murdering a co-worker. He is stopped and goes to trial. The FBI tapes are thrown out because they can only be used if it has to do with foreign intelligence and this isn't, this is homicide.

I wouldn't call preventing someone from blowing a building up an unneccessary violation. Unconstitutionality is something I would have to look at on a case by case basis(as with scenario 2).

This is also besides the fact that if such a thing were possible, the Patriot Act in and of itself does not enable it to happen as seen by Sec 220. Go to my link and do a word search. This is the only section concerning electronics with the exception of the voice mail message and computer section. You might also want to read Sec 1001. This is about how the judicial(note: not executive) branch designates someone to review all information and complaints and submit a report to Congress on a semi-annual basis. So cops are being watched on how they are using the Patriot Act.

And you really shouldn't be using ACLU as a spring board for your argument. Of course they are going to color anything that gives government more power or restricts personal freedom in a bad light. That is what they are there for.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

[This message has been edited by Kieran Horn (edited July 14, 2004).]

Oh, sorry Knowing only that France opposed the war (didn't know specifically who else), it sounded like people were still sore over WWII.
But why single out Germany? If I remember correctly, most of the UN disapproved the US's going into Iraq... (but then my memory is rather poor, so... )

Well right now, I, as an uninformed citizen, have nothing to comment on. Maybe later tho.

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nytfyre m0d || f33l t3h p0w3r || t3h l0st c0gz || OMF > *

Okay, so if they don't know they were victimized, they weren't. I guess an example would be that someone was suspected of terrorist activity, further investigation revealed they were innocent, yet that person or any people around him who may also have been guilty were unaware. No harm, no foul.

The latter two examples of yours apply to people who aren't US citizens and must have had something to do with terrorism. Otherwise they wouldn't be in Gitmo or deported. Again, I fail to see any problems with those examples.



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Have you forgotten ...

Here's a link if anyone is interested...has a nice fat section on electronic surveillance (which includes wiretapping, of course) and its relation to the 4th.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/

edit - grammar


[This message has been edited by Morfildor (edited July 14, 2004).]

Err...what the ****...Sure, ONE of the core values of conservatives is less government intrusion, but equally important are the moral values, one of which being that homosexuality is wrong. What you said is on the same level of ridiculousness as saying liberals should be against same sex marriage just because they favor more governemtn involvement...it just doesn't work that way.



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"If there's one thing I've learned it's this - you just can't shake hands with a fist" - David Allen Coe

You know the Patriot Act is a bad idea when even the guys who would normally vote conservative (JL, Gandalf) are against it...

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"Look at me! I'm Tracer! BLAHBLAHBLAH!"

-MBeggar

That's how you judge the quality of bill? Then that means almost every law ever created by Congress is bad because there are always conservatives in favor of a bill and conservatives opposed to it. Same with liberals.

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Kieran: The reason I put a link to it is because she is in underwear and I know the admins are touchy on that.
Yecti: Jaiph will touch himself for hours if he so much as smells a woman's underwear

Nooo, I'm saying that when the Bush administration is turning away guys who used to ardantly support it, they're doing something very wrong.

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"Look at me! I'm Tracer! BLAHBLAHBLAH!"

-MBeggar

there have not been any victims yet, but the potential is there. That is the cause for concern, IMO. A few more powerful laws like these could gradually turn America into a police state in the most extreme instance in the name of national security. Just b/c it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean it won't.



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I have found that you can transform your character solely by the power of belief: as you believe yourself to be, so you shall become over time.

Kieran/Wookiee, just because there are no civil rights violations that have come to play YET, does NOT mean that the Act is still good. I have not liked this Act from day one. It gives the Executive Branch way to much power. I honestly hope this is struck down as unconstitutional.

He couldn't have summed it up better. Yes there are fanatical people out there hell bent on destroying our way of life and this Act only helps them further.

I will be seriously considering for whom to vote come the second of November. I'm all ready pissed at D.C. for the way they've treated California...this Act isn't winning me back.

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Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat.

Boo hiss...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3895439.stm

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If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.