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House GOP fumbles on Patriot Act renewal

danarhea

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The Republican-led House failed to pass an extension of expiring sections of the Patriot Act on Tuesday, an unexpected setback for GOP leaders that shows the difficulty they face in controlling their majority and its "tea party"-inspired members.

If this is GOP incompetence, then damn it, give me more. Who knows? If the GOP is incompetent enough, it might just end up reversing ALL the bad decisions by Bush AND Obama both.

New GOP motto - Restoring America to the people through incompetence.

They just got my vote. Death to the Patriot Act. Incompetence rules. :mrgreen:

Article is here.
 
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Granted a victory for us but this isnt over, not by a long shot Dana. This piece of **** legislation should be brought the tallest active volcano, tied to Justin Bieber and thrown in as a sacrifice to the Gods of liberty or (insert your favorite deity here).
 
Oops, the GOP House Whip appears to have miscounted.
 
If this is GOP incompetence, then damn it, give me more. Who knows? If the GOP is incompetent enough, it might just end up reversing ALL the bad decisions by Bush AND Obama both.

New GOP motto - Restoring America to the people through incompetence.

They just got my vote. Death to the Patriot Act. Incompetence rules. :mrgreen:

Article is here.

This will almost certainly pass eventually. However, it's going to be open to amendments, so the Democrats are in position to get an extra rider or two out of this, it seems.
 
If this is GOP incompetence, then damn it, give me more. Who knows? If the GOP is incompetent enough, it might just end up reversing ALL the bad decisions by Bush AND Obama both.

New GOP motto - Restoring America to the people through incompetence. They just got my vote. Death to the Patriot Act. Incompetence rules. :mrgreen:

Article is here.
I'm glad they failed, but they'll try to bring it to the floor again. They really only have a one track mind.

The Patriot Act a great example of how to sodomize the US Constitution.
 
Oops, the GOP House Whip appears to have miscounted.

That's what you get from "conservative" educational policies and/or home schooling!
 
That's what you get from "conservative" educational policies and/or home schooling!

When most congress critters went to grade school and high school, the Democrats had been in power for 50 years.
 
I know I am in a minority here but I don't have the knee jerk reaction to everything associated with the Patriot Act that most seem to have. It is folly and also a little arrogant to think we can go on living like 9/11 never happen and that freedom of movement and privacy can be defined the same way. We stand at the peak of a hill where the slope is slippery down both sides. It is sad that freedom doesn't mean and cannot mean what it did 10, 20 or 30 years ago but we have to get over it. U.S. citizens have been well protected since 9/11 and it isn't because we buried our heads in the sand. The Patriot Act represents reality. Sorry that the government has let us down on so many issues and that we don't trust them. It is the only government we have and they are charged with keeping more planes from crashing into buildings or bombs going off where we work and live. Don't take this time of relative quiet to get all haughty about the constitution on this issue. A lot of you probably **** on the Constitution and call it outdated on other issues.
 
I always got the intent of this treaty but thought it goes too far. Overall, I'd like to see less government so this failure is in the short term a good thing. If the government, who's primary duty is to protect this country, could come up with a law that protects the people without stepping on our necks to do it, that would be great. Not sure how feasible that is, but there it is. Just like Obamacare, kill this. Unlike Obamacare, replace it with something better.... there's gotta be a better way.
 
First, shocker, despite all the braying and complaining over the past years the standard historical path has continued just as it has every other time despite the hyperbolic driven cries of those that opposed PATRIOT. The USA PATRIOT Act was hardly the first law or government action enacted during a time where Security had a higher premium put on it than Freedom and it won't be the last. This tradition is a bipartisan one, be it Lincoln or Roosevelt or Bush. And every time the plethora of mechanisms that are in place...the free speaking public, the free media, the democratic process, the constitutional checks and balances, and the way in which laws themselves are written with regards to sunsets...begin to strip away at these things as the balance shifts back the other way and the need for action is superceded by the need for principles.

Second, its this kind of thing that is exactly why we SHOULDN'T remove PATRIOT alone. Even a staunchly held liberal like Russ Fiengold had admitted that over 90% of the Bill is needed, useless, good legislation. Over the past years we have proof time and time again that between the three branches of government...be it legislators not reupping sections, courts stripping away sections, or excutive not enforcing/using sections...that the questionable and/or flat out unconstitutional parts of PATRIOT will and can be stripped out from the Bill. It is better to let this happen and allow a large amount of our intelligence, defense, and general law actually remain updated to an age where a "Smartphone" isn't the work of science fiction writers and where email isn't so rare that the press wonders what an @ means.

The vast majority of Patriot is extremely sound if not needed legislation that, due to its politicized nature now of being tied to Patriot, would likely be EXTREMELY difficult to actually get passed in the currently political climate. Far simpler and easier, as has been shown time and again, is to use the tools government has to remove the fat that happens to be on the edges of this steak to reveal the primarily lean and tasty meat that's underneath.

We should not, in any way, willingly go back to a time where our Telecom law functions from a mentality that Technology is still stuck in the 1960's, with horrible and glaring loopholes that both could severely handcuff the government OR open it up for far wider reaching ability then it even has at times under PATRIOT.
 
First, shocker, despite all the braying and complaining over the past years the standard historical path has continued just as it has every other time despite the hyperbolic driven cries of those that opposed PATRIOT. The USA PATRIOT Act was hardly the first law or government action enacted during a time where Security had a higher premium put on it than Freedom and it won't be the last. This tradition is a bipartisan one, be it Lincoln or Roosevelt or Bush. And every time the plethora of mechanisms that are in place...the free speaking public, the free media, the democratic process, the constitutional checks and balances, and the way in which laws themselves are written with regards to sunsets...begin to strip away at these things as the balance shifts back the other way and the need for action is superceded by the need for principles.

Second, its this kind of thing that is exactly why we SHOULDN'T remove PATRIOT alone. Even a staunchly held liberal like Russ Fiengold had admitted that over 90% of the Bill is needed, useless, good legislation. Over the past years we have proof time and time again that between the three branches of government...be it legislators not reupping sections, courts stripping away sections, or excutive not enforcing/using sections...that the questionable and/or flat out unconstitutional parts of PATRIOT will and can be stripped out from the Bill. It is better to let this happen and allow a large amount of our intelligence, defense, and general law actually remain updated to an age where a "Smartphone" isn't the work of science fiction writers and where email isn't so rare that the press wonders what an @ means.

The vast majority of Patriot is extremely sound if not needed legislation that, due to its politicized nature now of being tied to Patriot, would likely be EXTREMELY difficult to actually get passed in the currently political climate. Far simpler and easier, as has been shown time and again, is to use the tools government has to remove the fat that happens to be on the edges of this steak to reveal the primarily lean and tasty meat that's underneath.

We should not, in any way, willingly go back to a time where our Telecom law functions from a mentality that Technology is still stuck in the 1960's, with horrible and glaring loopholes that both could severely handcuff the government OR open it up for far wider reaching ability then it even has at times under PATRIOT.

So you'd support removing the parts which trample on personal rights and freedoms, but keep the majority of the bill that actually does protect the citizens of the U.S. and exposes those who wish to hurt us or our country. Right?
 
That's what you get from "conservative" educational policies and/or home schooling!

LOL!

tell it to the products of the dc schools, those from detroit, chicago...
 
So you'd support removing the parts which trample on personal rights and freedoms, but keep the majority of the bill that actually does protect the citizens of the U.S. and exposes those who wish to hurt us or our country. Right?

Yep. And each year that passes I generally am okay in a political sense with more and more of those parts being removed. I think some of those things were necessary and understandable in the wake of 9/11, when the potential damage of another attack within a few years could've been catastrophic to our economy, the psyche of the country, not to mention the lives lost in such an attack and the likely larger escalation then even occured in the wake of 9/11. Much like I understand FDR's actions with people of asian, italian, and german descent or Lincolns action's with reporters. That doesn't mean I necessarily think any of those actions are good actions, actions that should be routinely taken, constitutional actions, or "moral" actions...but I do think they're understandable at the time and done in line with, in part, the will of the people and in part due to the prime responsability of the government which is defense imho.

But the farther we move from 9/11, yes I absolutely have no issue with these things being stripped out and I was stating such would happen since 2005. Now some of it...like the roving wiretaps...in principle I think are pretty good, reasonable, and useful things in this day and age, but at the same time I have no qualms with them at this point being removed by the various safety nets as the balance has now swung back to the opposite end of the scale. So while perhaps at point we may quibble on some of the more "questionable" things, in general I fully agree with the stuff that's over the line or questionable going the way side.

But I think far more long term and substantial damage would be done to the country if the entire bill was revoked rather than letting the process that has been occuring over the past years that is stripping out negative parts of the bill play out.

Its why I've generally never gotten upset with the ACLU when they've gone after specific statutes, even if I may disagree with their reasoning or their conclussion. With a historical look at this, I had a pretty confident belief that they would fail in their early attempts and succeed more as time went on, which has been the case. So while I've disagreed with them at times, I've never been a passionate critic of the ACLU's individually targetted attempts.
 
First, shocker, despite all the braying and complaining over the past years the standard historical path has continued just as it has every other time despite the hyperbolic driven cries of those that opposed PATRIOT. The USA PATRIOT Act was hardly the first law or government action enacted during a time where Security had a higher premium put on it than Freedom and it won't be the last. This tradition is a bipartisan one, be it Lincoln or Roosevelt or Bush. And every time the plethora of mechanisms that are in place...the free speaking public, the free media, the democratic process, the constitutional checks and balances, and the way in which laws themselves are written with regards to sunsets...begin to strip away at these things as the balance shifts back the other way and the need for action is superceded by the need for principles.

Second, its this kind of thing that is exactly why we SHOULDN'T remove PATRIOT alone. Even a staunchly held liberal like Russ Fiengold had admitted that over 90% of the Bill is needed, useless, good legislation. Over the past years we have proof time and time again that between the three branches of government...be it legislators not reupping sections, courts stripping away sections, or excutive not enforcing/using sections...that the questionable and/or flat out unconstitutional parts of PATRIOT will and can be stripped out from the Bill. It is better to let this happen and allow a large amount of our intelligence, defense, and general law actually remain updated to an age where a "Smartphone" isn't the work of science fiction writers and where email isn't so rare that the press wonders what an @ means.

The vast majority of Patriot is extremely sound if not needed legislation that, due to its politicized nature now of being tied to Patriot, would likely be EXTREMELY difficult to actually get passed in the currently political climate. Far simpler and easier, as has been shown time and again, is to use the tools government has to remove the fat that happens to be on the edges of this steak to reveal the primarily lean and tasty meat that's underneath.

We should not, in any way, willingly go back to a time where our Telecom law functions from a mentality that Technology is still stuck in the 1960's, with horrible and glaring loopholes that both could severely handcuff the government OR open it up for far wider reaching ability then it even has at times under PATRIOT.

Actually, the Patriot Act was an extension of Bill Clinton's 1996 Antiterrorism Act. I was against that too. It was a power play by the Clinton Administration. So were both Waco and Ruby Ridge, which document well the government's desire to stomp on people. All Bush did was to step into the shoes that Clinton provided for him. Both presidents were anti-American turds, just as Obama is.
 
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If this is GOP incompetence, then damn it, give me more. Who knows? If the GOP is incompetent enough, it might just end up reversing ALL the bad decisions by Bush AND Obama both.

New GOP motto - Restoring America to the people through incompetence.

They just got my vote. Death to the Patriot Act. Incompetence rules. :mrgreen:

Article is here.

Oh thank god. Can we please just get rid of the whole damned thing? You know, if Obama and the dems manage to get the Patriot Act repealed, I'll give them kudos for it. Though I won't be holding my breath.
 
It is sad that freedom doesn't mean and cannot mean what it did 10, 20 or 30 years ago but we have to get over it.

Yeah, it can be. We just have to stop being stupid, fearful, whinny, douche bags. Toughen up, accept the consequences of freedom, and move on. We can most certainly have that freedom if we restore our resolve to have that freedom.

U.S. citizens have been well protected since 9/11 and it isn't because we buried our heads in the sand. The Patriot Act represents reality.

Yes, and in reality it sucks. It's a terrible piece of Orwellian propaganda and law. I love how "conservatives" support broad and large expansions of government so long as it suits their needs. Way to stay principled.

Sorry that the government has let us down on so many issues and that we don't trust them.

If you trust in the government, your a fool. The founders warned against doing so. Governments are not entities to ever be trusted.

It is the only government we have and they are charged with keeping more planes from crashing into buildings or bombs going off where we work and live.

Good fear mongering. Except that those things are all low probability events. Eventually someone is going to set off another bomb, another plane may hit another building. 9/11 did not kill as many people as cars do in a year. Let me know when terrorism starts getting to THAT rate, then I'll have something to worry about. Otherwise, it's happened and while there are reasonable things to do to try to lower probabilities, it will never be zero. We will see these events again, and when we do let's not go balls to the wall insane again.

Don't take this time of relative quiet to get all haughty about the constitution on this issue. A lot of you probably **** on the Constitution and call it outdated on other issues.

This is ****ing hilarious. "Don't tell me how we're ****ing over the Constitution, because we are, but you probably will **** over the Constitution too if you had your way."

Really? That's your excuse, that's your defense. Jesus tap dancing Christ on a pogo stick at least come up with something better than that. It's ok for you to **** all over the Constitution because others would do the same? Is this what has become of "conservatives" in this country? The ones who used to fight for small government, personal responsibility? This is how far the ideology and platform have sunk? It's sad.
 
Actually, the Patriot Act was an extension of Bill Clinton's 1996 Antiterrorism Act. I was against that too. It was a power play by the Clinton Administration. So were both Waco and Ruby Ridge, which document well the government's desire to stomp on people. All Bush did was to step into the shoes that Clinton provided for him. Both presidents were anti-American turds, just as Obama is.

Don't cherry pick now Dana.

If you're going to say it was an "extension" of Bill Clinton's 1996 antiterrorism act, you need to also point out it was an "extension" of the both the FISA ACT of 1978 and TITLE III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets act of 1968. It updated and extended facets found in them just as much if not significantly more than Bill Clintons. The two of earlier ones being some of the foundations for our modern intelligence gathering rules and procedures, both from the smallest of domestic like a police wire tap to full on international survelliance, and were both sorely out of touch with the technological revolution that took place in the decades after them. Are you suggesting we need to repeat those laws as well, as in both cases they allowed the Fed's to have power in some form over the people.

It is wonderful to know though that you consider Lincol and "anti-american turd"
 
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While I don't doubt that there is a healthy discussion possible about the merits of this latest Patriot Act, but it all seems like the warmed over debate from 2006. And, if the bill had passed as the House majority leadership clearly thought it would, there really would never have been much of a debate in the House or here or anywhere else.

What I view as remarkable about this event is that the House majority leadership allowed a vote to occur at all without the necessary committed support. Maybe leadership viewed the legislation as must-pass, noncontroversial legislation that didn't require whipping. Maybe they misunderstood or were mislead by some of their new members positions on the bill. Maybe some representatives changed their minds immediately before the vote without doing their leadership the courtesy of informing them. Whatever happened, the House majority leadership has been humiliated by this failing vote and tells us that they have much work to do to coalesce this unwieldy coalition of old school conservative G.O.P. and upstart Tea Party freshmen into the legislative machine their numbers should command.
 
They will bang drums, make much hoopla, and eventually something will get passes. Does it REALLY matter? The Patriot Act (not my favorite document) was designed specifically to target non-us citizens. Meanwhile, the Obama administration announced it considers all text, email, and voice traffic sent from cell phones to be fair game and not subject to warrants and there was nary a peep from the left. This whole back and forth bull**** in the name of politics ignores the reality that there ARE bad people out there and unless we want to spend the next 40-50 years chasing them AFTER they have killed people, there are certain proactive steps the government must take. And for what its worth...Ive said it before...I believe Obama has actually done a pretty decent job on combating domestic terrorism. All of the hoopla about the Patriot Act is just petty partisan squabbling. I havent seen where its use has been shown to inappropriately target American citizens. If that is the case, then that part should be addressed.

BTW...how many democrats voted FOR this legislation when it was initially passed?
 
Oh thank god. Can we please just get rid of the whole damned thing? You know, if Obama and the dems manage to get the Patriot Act repealed, I'll give them kudos for it. Though I won't be holding my breath.

Maybe I'm mistaken, but I believe Obama is FOR the continued use of the Patriot Act.
 
Maybe I'm mistaken, but I believe Obama is FOR the continued use of the Patriot Act.

He probably wants to bring back the Alien and Sedition Act of John Adams. Dems want desperately to get rid of conservative talk radio.
 
Maybe I'm mistaken, but I believe Obama is FOR the continued use of the Patriot Act.

That's why I ain't holding my breath. I'd like to see it gone in full though. It would be nice. Also, the Real ID Act should be taken completely off the books and everyone who voted for that should be subjected to public whippings.
 
Dems want desperately to get rid of conservative talk radio.

They don't need another law for that. All you got to do is to call them terrorists, and then the Patriot Act allows you to do whatever the **** you want to them.
 
Patriot Act: House Republicans fail to pass renewal - latimes.com
The House GOP sought an eight-month extension to give leaders time to prepare for an attempt this year to make the law permanent, potentially inserting the national security debate into the presidential campaign season.

The Senate is considering a Democratic-backed bill that would extend the expiring provisions to 2013.

"We should not extend this debate into an election year and risk that some will play politics with our national security," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

The House voted 277 to 148 in favor of the extension, falling short of the required two-thirds majority. Twenty-six Republicans opposed the bill, as did 122 Democrats. Sixty-seven Democrats voted in favor.
 
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